Gender Roles In Westernized Culture

Furthermore, Puritan women were expected to be “one with their husband”, meaning that the husband could control their wife by dictating her decisions (Deering). In today’s society, women are free to do as they choose. Women are allowed to work and decide how many children they want to have. These decisions were previously made by the woman’s husband. In the Puritan times, women were required to stay at home and tend to the children.

Humans have always had a unique perspective on gender roles. Throughout history, women have somehow became less superior to men. There are multiple variables to how and why this came to be. Whether it was the agriculture revolution, influential literature, or even climate events from the Mesopotamian civilization, males have managed to be more dominant. There has also been harmful sexism perspectives passed down each generation that could have triggered what women can and cannot do.

Words such as “fag” or sissy would hinder his ability to live authentically and partake in activities that are outside the gender binary. Dorianne Laux includes male typical professions such as “chief, chef, serf, or sheriff” to establish empathy between the reader and the men that are being referenced. By including “son, brother, husband, and lover” the author normalizes these men and highlights that like any other gender, their emotions are valid. The overall theme of the poem is to highlight the notion that though men are thought to be stoic creatures they are emotional beings that should be allowed to express themselves

During the 1840’s, the roles of men and women to their communities became defined by the social and economic changes around the world. The role of women averted from assisting their husband in their jobs to attending primarily to their domestic duties at home. The crucial fact of what Victorians thought of as the “separate spheres” define the natural characteristics of men and women in society. Women were considered to be physically weaker than men however they were morally superior to them due to connections to the domestic sphere in society. Needless to say it has always been the duty of women to balance the duties of obliging to commands made by men and being a mother.

The gender role for a woman has been challenged, debated, and adjusted throughout many years. In the late 19th century, the ideal woman was considered to be one who “obeys male authority” and “focuses on the home and children” (Edgenuity Lesson: Rights for Women). This meant that the role of married women was mainly limited to the chores at home. Some of these chores included cooking and cleaning the home.

I have applied this metaphor to show an effect of how rapidly the world is changing because of consumerism as America is forming a basis to control its neighbouring countries with a flow of American goods imposed upon the other countries. As soon as the countries adapt to it, they stuck with it forever. This has explained consumerism fairly well as it represents the regulation of goods for a ‘better’ economy. Well that’s it from

All this so the man can be certain that he is the father of a certain child of a certain woman. The idealised image of a women in the 19th and 20th century was as stay at home mother, who cooked, cleaned, care for the children and fawned over her husband, who went out to work daily. Things have gradually been changing since the late 20th century, women have been gaining more rights as the century carries on. They have fought for the right to vote, to be able to own land, and are continuing to fight for equal pay in the workplace.

Frist, there were numerous tasks and roles for women in the 17th century. Women were to obey and serve their husbands which included tending to their children, maintaining the household, and other chores around the house. Governor John Winthrop stated, “A ‘true wife’ would find contentment only in subjection to her husband’s authority.” (George Brown Tindall, 110) The modal woman at this time was one who would silently do as she was told by her husband.

They had fewer children. Nevertheless, gender inequality persists, and its evolution can be traced throughout literature and film. By portraying the extraordinary in the everyday life, for example, Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway and Boyhood depicted the impact of traditional Western gender roles upon their characters while also showcasing how such gender roles evolved during the time

For most of history, we have lived in a patriarchal society, where men have been the rulers and the leaders. Women in general have always been second in society, especially women of color. During the colonization area, women were going to the new homeland to start a new life for them and their families. The gender norms of the time were to be the husband was the bread winner and went out and the women stayed home and took care of the children. Throughout this colonization time, certain women were challenging their status quo and paving the way for more women to have more rights in society.

Over the years there have been many movies that have come out were characters either fall in their gender roles or they step out of their gender roles. When movies first came out, filmmakers usually made movies where characters within the movie had typical or traditional gender roles. The reason that they did that was because they wanted to present viewers with characters they can easily recognisable and relatable to, by portraying a conventional image of a person or group of people with identifiable characteristics. There are many examples of this.

Looking in from the outside, the journey of Women’s rights was a lengthy one, and it has come a significant way from what it began as. It was a long road to freedom that started with just a few women protesting together for change in the mid 1800’s to the large movement it is today. What started only as an effort to put women on equal footing with men in the voting realm blossomed into a full on fight against gender norms and independence through protesting, speeches, and gatherings. Gender norms or ‘roles’ are (as defined by Webster’s dictionary) “a set of societal norms dictating what types of behaviors are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on their actual or perceived sex” and they are one thing that modern feminist have set their sights on to change for the better. Traditional gender roles have continued to exist for hundreds of years through perpetrators such as religion, government and society, and its effects have been felt by every woman, whether they realize it or not.