Essay On Oppression Of Women In Margaret Atwood

The book written by Masha Gessen is one that seems to fit into the continuing timeline of revolt against the government due to undesirable circumstances. It is quite evident as the book goes on that the members of Pussy Riot were not fond of Putin or the patriarchal system. There is an incredible amount of detail following these women and their lives before and after the arrest, even individually analyzing the three women that were arrested. The background stories of the women’s parents were intriguing because they had been raised by grandparents and it seemed that this was how they were also raising their own children. The incident in the Cathedral of Christ, however, was the performance that garnered national attention and widespread support.

Mildred in the novel is Montag’s wife. She is the perfect example of a conformed person in this society because she is brainwashed by the tv that the government has set in place. Proof of such is when she said, " 'Books aren't people. You read and I look all around, but there isn't anybody!' ".

For centuries, women have been exploited by the society. Events of women being prohibited from doing things like voting or working and being forced to behave the way it is considered to be socially acceptable have been jotted down in history. Until today women are still viewed as the weaker sex. In some countries, women are regarded less than human and are treated like slaves. Khaled Hosseini goes into the oppression of women in his novel A Thousand Splendid Suns.

All in the Puritan community thought of females much like children in the way that they should be seen and not heard. These absurd rules were even in their bibles. Verses insinuated that women couldn't have their own minds and that they decision making process for everything should be left up to their husbands (Glubok 30). Furthermore rights were so limited that they were almost completely dependent on men: “A wife’s dependence became not only a matter of cultural, social, and legal restrictions, but necessarily of concrete economics as women moved from the households of fathers to husbands.” (Westerkamp 14).

In this written text, the emphasis will be on Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale and as well as the way Atwood portrays women and how it can be argued to show the oppression of women. The main purpose is to analyze the way women are treated throughout this book and depict why they are represented this way in the society in Gilead. Then, comparatively, observe the men’s domination over women and how they govern this society. In The Handmaid’s Tale, women are stripped of their rights, suffer many inequalities and are objectified, controlled by men and only valued for their reproductive qualities. The Gilead society is divided in multiple social group.

This play, A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen, focuses on women, especially in marriage and motherhood. Torvald is a character, who describes inequality between men and women and the women’s role in the society in that era. He believes that it is an important and the only duty of a woman to be a good wife and mother. As an individual, a woman, could not conduct or run a business of her own, she needs to ask her father or husband and they were only considered to be father’s or husband’s property. Women were not allowed to vote and divorce if they were allowed they would carry a heavy social shame and it was only available when both partners agreed.

In the book I Am Malala, Malala Yousafzai explains the struggles of her hometown, Sway Valley, and the problems that occur in Islam. One of the enormous problems in Islam was the fact that Women were not allowed to have an education and furthermore, were not allowed to be even seen outside. In Islam, it is extremely hard for women to do anything besides staying home and if they were caught outside without a burqa or a niqab, they could be killed. Malala Yousafzai was torn with these new laws that were implanted by the Taliban which made her take action against them with her prominent words and leading her to becoming an international symbol of peaceful protest. Although, Malala could not convince the Taliban for educational equality in Islam, she was able to convince millions of people around the world to take actions against them through her struggle for educational equality powerfully due to her use of ethos, tone, and imagery.

During the Puritan times gender roles in the society were very anti-feminist. Women were required to act as housewives and do womanly duties such as cook, clean, and take care of their children. Women had very little freedom as far as their rights were concerned also. Puritan writers, Anne Bradstreet and Mary Rowlandson both experienced the struggle of the anti-feminist movement. From their writings we see that they both were against anti-feminism and they tried their best to abandon the whole idea.

What would become of the world, if our current societal flaws, such as sexism, racism, and classism were ingrained and executed at a systematic level? This is exactly what The Handmaid’s Tale set out to explore. The novel, which claims to be speculative fiction, is set in the theocratic Republic of Gilead (formerly the USA), where birth rates are rapidly declining and women have been marginalized by the patriarchal regime, forbidden to read, write or love and valued only if they are able to procreate. They are separated into classes, including Wives, Marthas, Aunts, Unwomen, and Handmaids, distinguishable only by the color of their clothing. The Handmaids are renamed by combining ‘of’ and the name of the Commander that they have been assigned to, stripping them of any individuality.

Throughout the history of the human race, women have been chastised, degraded and completely controlled by their male counterparts. Women have been oppressed and controlled without any room for retaliation. Whether it is an over-bearing father or an abusive husband, women had barely any say in what happened to them. They were housewives and child-bearers first and human beings second. In the play “The Heroine of 1812”, by Sarah Anne Curzon is a play that marvellously relates the story of Laura Secord.

No one every explained to her how her body would grow and change, so in fear of her body changing she rushed into her first consensual sexual experience and ended up a teenage mother. Her options for work were limited and the expectations society had for her life were significantly more limited than her male counter parts. Like with Civil Rights, Maya Angelou was able to use her own experiences to add to the chant of women all across the United States of America fighting for women’s freedom and liberation. With this novel Maya Angelou showed just how capable, respectable, and intelligent a woman could be, even if a man was too blind to see it right in front of

Men, however, have more power being able to read, write and are able to own themselves. Handmaids in Gilead are women who were convicted of a crime and are able to bear children. Although the handmaids are convicted of crimes they are treated like slaves. In an excerpt from the book Offred says “ we aren’t allowed out, except for our walks… which was enclosed now by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire” (Atwood 4).

The woman was trapped in a barred, dirty room, imagining that she is locked up. Along with the thought that she must stay in that room, as her husband demanded, the wallpaper dominated her thoughts and made her pull “off most of the paper, so you can’t put me [her] back!”(9) After days of interpreting and thorough investigation of the women behind the bars creeping around, Gilman finally creates a direct association between her and the wallpaper for the first time in the book. The wallpaper is symbolic of how the woman would always have to creep around their husbands and if they wanted to be free they must be stripped of their privileges. Gilman writes, “you can’t put me back” to give personality to the character she has created. The woman is crazy yet so powerful.

The Handmaid’s Tale is a dystopian novel by Canadian author Margaret Atwood. The protagonist, narrator, and handmaid Offred lives in a dystopian world where a theocracy, Gilead has taken the place of the United States government, and women have lost all of their rights. Offred has been forced to become a handmaid, but dreams of escape. In the essay we will be looking at how certain themes in the novel can be applied to the wider society, more specifically how women are oppressed.