Gender Stereotypes In Kate Chopin's Short Story 'The Storm'

This was so typical of marriages of that time, women were just not treated equally. Paula Anca Farca agrees wholeheartedly that there are touches of feminism and how often in Kate Chopin’s work you can find these themes, “I argue that due to reversals of power, Chopin’s oppressed female protagonists challenge patriarchal structures.(Paula Farca)” Chopin is clearly addressing her feministic outlook in the story “Desiree’s Baby” making sure that the text embellishes the fact the protagonist is scared of her

It proves its genuine precocity to allow the reader to know about the heroine’s ordeals, feelings of frustration as well as about her victimization within the oppressive patriarchal society. It displays women’s struggles to conceal the politics of gender roles of their epoch and to protest against the Law of the Father. In her discussion of Gothic tropes, Anne Williams reveals that Female Gothic falls under the rubric of a marginalised genre while identifying the critical reception of the gothic in the pre-romantic era with the categorization of women as peripherized subjects, admitting that this literary form has been “congenial” to them and pleasantly suited to their lower social position (Fleenor The Female Gothic 8).

‘The Colour Purple’, published in 1982, was written by Alice Walker and demonstrates the brutal treatment of black women within the early 20th century. During this time, there was much oppression, particularly for black women. They were mistreated purely because of their colour and gender. The form and content of the novel can be viewed as a slave narrative that reflects the struggle for one woman’s independence. Female independence and freedom from the patriarchal society are topics that many feminist literary theorists tend to explore, particularly those that belonged to the third wave of feminist writing.

GENDERED ROLES IN MARRIAGE IN EMILY DICKINSON’S POEM Emily Dickinson was in a time where women were primarily raised to be the accommodating housewife, bound to the household duties of everyday life and social conventions created by a patriarchal society, which continued the diversion of both genders into different spheres of society. In “Emily Dickinson and Popular Culture”, David S. Reynolds, a new historicism critic, wrote that it's no surprise that the majority of Dickinson's poetry was produced between 1858-1866, “It was a period of extreme consciousness about proliferation of varied women's role in American culture.” It was a time where women were actively searching for more “literary” ways of self expression (Reynolds :25).

In these conversations between the couple, the audience can detect Nora’s charming manner which reinforces Torvald’s image as a protector. This realistic representation of a traditional couple, which strongly relies on stereotypes, is an important factor that contributes to the shocking effect of the ending as it suggests naïve, middle-class housewives were in fact capable of reaching autonomy. Within a society in which women were virtually powerless, this was an outrageous idea for both men and women.

Andrew Messing states that Euripides carefully made Medea into the stereotypical woman: "emotional," "self _ deprecating" and " prone to ask favours or forgiveness. " But we can see it from different angle, typical stereotypes are about both gender not only sticks for women. Women always responsible of the demotic life. They also stay as homes caring of their babies. They are weak and fragile.

ABSTRACT This paper is an analysis of the feministic aspectof Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Feminism is a crusade, which has some aim and dogmas, where a feminist seeks equal political, economic, cultural, personal and social rights for women. The storyhere provides feminists a rich ground in which one can explore the codes of sexual morality that the townspeople of Columbia reluctantly uphold. The portrayal of female characters in the novel shows their submissive nature and how often they have been exploited and forced to go against their free will just for the sake of false family honour and society.

In order to be able to fully understand Chopin’s message, readers must envision the tradition of the Victorian society in which Kate lived. This was a society that clearly defined the gender role. Looking at Louse Mallard, one of the characters in the book, the author uses a woman who suddenly discovered a new life after the death of her husband. Ironically, Kate depicts Louise’s independence as a doomed fantasy because such freedom was actually unrealistic for the 19th Century woman.

In the play it is also very stereotypical to see men mocking women since they have the last word and women's opinions are just "unimportant": "[After the women find the quilt and start discussing what happened] Sheriff: They wonder if she was going to quilt or just knot it! [The men laughed; the women look abashed]”. (1863)

Dee approaches culture by decontextualising it, while Maggie and Mama relate to it with a kind of ‘organic criticality’. The former stance is mere rhetoric and the later one is womanist. In one of her interviews, Alice Walker identifies three cycles of Black Woman she would explore in her woman’s writing: 1.

Hale and Mrs. Peters, but Lewis Hale, the sheriff George Peters, and the County Attorney George Henderson play an important role in serving as the male attitude during the time period. When paying attention to particular .mannerisms and attitudes of the County Attorney the reader can truly gauge how sexist the environment was in the 1920s. One of the first signs of sexism appears from the County Attorney’s remarks towards the two ladies about the housekeeping. He notes that Mrs. Wright was not much of a housekeeper and turns to the ladies for their opinion because in the setting this was one of their common roles. Hale even states that, “women are used to worrying over trifles” (965).

The author thinks women can hardly wear anything without a fear of being judged. She provides few pieces of evidence on how women usually are targeted and not men in this society in respect to interpretation. She argues on how different forms have Mr. as a suffix which shows nothing, but in the case of women there is Mrs. and also Miss which reflects the marital status of women. She raises her point also about how a woman changes her surname with the men after marriage. I personally believe that she had some evidence and her argument really made me think twice o and made me think why women are judged so much and she was also definitely true in her argument.

In the late 19th and early 20th century, there were limitations for women. Women have little to no political or legal power, because of this, women still could not vote. They also could not own property, could barely gain employment and education. Without employment and education women has no financial stability. The social limitations that Kate Chopin, Edith Wharton, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman faced were reflected in their writings.

Chopin wants the reader to realize that in her time, women were stereotyped in a male dominated society. After hearing about her husband’s passing, Mrs. Mallard began to have a sense of peacefulness coming from the outside world. This doesn’t mean that she was happy about the death of her husband, but she felt a newfound independence. Stereotypically, married women were considered to be housewives during the early 1900s. Women were told by their husbands what to do because in those times it was believed that men had higher authority than women.

The framing structure and imagery Kate Chopin utilizes in “The Storm,” focuses the reader on how a storm is a catalyst for a woman’s liberation, overpowering the moral dimensions of having an affair as a married woman in the 19th century. Kate Chopin is known for her truthful depictions of women’s lives during the 19th century, a time period when women were not equal to men. “The Storm” is no different, channeling the character of Calixta as a traditional housewife. In the opening frame of “The Storm,” the framing is immediately shifted towards Calixta from the description of her family dynamic.