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Role Of Nurse Ratched In One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

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Through Chief Bromden’s journey rediscovering himself in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey, he witnesses recurring power struggle between male and female characters, such as between Nurse Ratched and McMurphy, or between his parents. Although widely regarded as kind and benign characters in society at the time, in these conflicts, female characters are often tagged with detrimental characteristics, and therefore are depicted as demeaning antagonists. Through Chief’s biased narration, Nurse Ratched is often seen to be emasculating patients, through influencing their way of thinking, and thus their decisions to remain with the institution. She plays an essential role in confining the dynamic of the hospital through her recurring manipulation of patients. She influences, or in some cases, uses her power to force others into doing things her way. She takes advantage of the patients’ insecurity in order to demean them, both mentally and physically. She encourages patients to list emotional problems their fellow patients have shared through daily conversations in a logbook, consequently eliminating opacity pertaining to personal information of each patients. During their daily Group Discussions, …show more content…

A large portion of the institution, referred to as When describing Big Nurse, Harding refers to her as a ‘good strong wolf’ (64), mentioning that he alongside other patients needed her to teach them their place in society. In popular culture, wolves are seen as malevolent figures, for example, depicted as villains in children’s folk stories. Nevertheless, Harding uses pos adjectives such as ‘good’ and ‘strong’ in description of Nurse Ratched, therefore, portrays her as a powerful and benign figure. By doing so, he places her above him, both in strength and social

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