Gender Quotations In George Manwell's 'Beneatha'

The play “Trifles” by Susan Glaspell is largely based on stereotypes. The most prevalent one explores the difference between gender roles. Glaspell exerts the repression of women in the 1900s. During that time, women were highly looked down upon by men, and were only seen as the housekeepers and child bearers. This example is displayed throughout the play with the men, however, the women in this play prove that the stereotypes of gender roles held against them are completely wrong, which is shown through the characters, set design, and symbolism.

In this scene Polonius, was reading Hamlet’s letter. The men contributed to gender roles as men lie to get what they want. Superiority, betrayal and deception, William Shakespeare introduces the theme of gender in his tragedy. The thoughts can be provoking, due to the fact gender roles are completely different, yet similar. As the population is growing and advancing we are slowly evolving.

In the Victorian era, gender inequality was daily life. Men were most often the dominant power in a relationship whereas women were expected to be pure and innocent. In an era of arranged marriages, women belonged to their husbands and were attached to their households. However, Wilde has questioned these gender roles and created rather independent and powerful female characters in the play. Though Lady Bracknell and Jack have to give their consent as an approval of marriage to their wards, Gwendolen and Cecily, women show dominance over men in each relationship.

He thoroughly shows through these characters that Female physical traits equal weakness, while male traits equal power. He promotes his sexist views by showing the gender roles reversed to further enhance mans power. The women, Nurse Ratched for example, is looked at as destructive forces she is seen as a machine “a mistake was made somehow in manufacturing putting those big, womanly breasts on what would of otherwise been a perfect work”(6). “She’s swelling up, swells till her backs splitting out the white uniform”(5). At the end of the novel her breasts are exposed and her feminine (less powerful) side is seen.

Much of the preservations in the play are for men who have even denied the women their privacy. Susan Glaspell shows women as weak and only able to do weak responsibilities such as housekeeping and staying at their

This play consists of a lot many themes. To cite a few: Rewriting the tale of Cinderella and Sleeping beauty, Class, language and phonetics and Independence. But in this paper, I would like to work on the feminist aspect of this play for this aspect, is the one which impressed me more. As this paper is based on Gender analysis I am restricting my analysis to the theme of Feminism in this play.

An overarching theme in the play is identity, especially the character of Beneatha; she is progressive and decided to fight back against assimilation to reclaim her identity throughout the tough challenges she faces. When talking to her Nigerian suitor, Asagai, the man who led her to these beliefs says, “You came up to me and said.. Mr. Asagai- I want very much to talk with you. About Africa. You see, Mr. Asagai, I am looking for my indentity!”

In comparison to the movie, the play undermines male dominance by focusing on women’s efforts to solve their own problems. First of all, there aren’t even men in the cast of the play,

As an African American, low class, woman, a high class position of that type, wasn't widely known. In that time period, it was unheard of for the most part. Beneatha is remarkably outspoken. She lives in a family with all similar beliefs and morals, yet she doesn't fear to disagree with them. Her need for independence leads to many arguments and shakiness within her family.

In Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, gender divides are not readily apparent however they do exist, resembling many real societies. In Bradbury’s society the government has the most power followed by the firemen. There is no evidence of any women being firefighters in their society, resulting in women having less power than men. Also in Montag’s case, he works while his wife is at home. Montag’s wife, Mildred, is not expected to work, nor are there any jobs mentioned that she, a women, could perform.

It may seem like Shakespeare treats his female characters worse than his male characters, but it is his female characters that drive the plot

In this play one women didn't have much say and all male personages clearly display

Not only that, but we also saw fragments of indifferent actions towards the women. The men in the play were evidently more superior and dominant compared to the women. They were also more powerful, and did not treat women as equals. One overt aspect that supports this declaration is the fact that men were the only ones who were allowed to be in command. Being a queen was basically like being a trophy to your husband, standing by them just to make them look even more superior.

Although being written centuries apart, the limited expectations of women presented in ‘Othello’ and ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ differ little from each other. The female characters are confined by society’s expectations of male dominance, female purity and virginity, and the many passive roles of women. Despite the differing legalities surrounding the position of women between the centuries in which the plays were written, both plays explore the impact of how societal conventions confine women and the ways they must comply to be safe in a patriarchal society. The behaviours and treatments of Desdemona, Blanche and Stella illustrate the attitudes enforced on and the behaviours of women throughout both periods in time and it is these attitudes and behaviours that impact the plays to the greatest extent. When characters in either plays defy their norms, or demonstrate a lack of compliance they induce negative consequences, such as the murder of Desdemona and the institutionalisation of Blanche.

This proved when the narrator’s mother always tried to get the narrator to do work that appropriate for a lady instead of outside work, however it was not something that she enjoyed. The narrator also was not considered of real helper to her father because she was a female. This proved when her father introduced the narrator as ‘his new hired hand’ to a salesman, he replied, “I thought it was only a girl” (line 76, paragraph 10).This shows how the society view girl as ‘just a girl’ at that time and it means that their roles are not really significant in the society. As being said by Alexander Pope (1688-1744), “Most women have no character at all.” (Bressler, C.E., 2011).