Being A Girl Child Essay

ABSTRACT

The hardest profession to take in life is being a girl child. Discrimination and discrepancy are two most important factors that hamper the journey of every female from the earliest stage of life. Starting from her presence into her mother’s womb to infancy, childhood and finally to adulthood, she is outnumbered by the male dominating society of the country. Gender is a social and cultural construct. Socialization plays an important role in the construction of gender. Socialization is a very influential method. It has enormous power in moulding a girl’s psyche. Its influence begins early in childhood. The novelists like Shashi Deshpande, Kamala Markandaya, Anita Desai and Kashmira Sheth are the few Indian English women writers who

This partial behavior against girl child is enrooted in Indian society. I India boys are always preferred than girls. The girl child is brought up with the typical societal values imposed on her by patriarchal society. When she grows and comes in contact with the outer world, through education and marriage, she realizes herself as the victim of discrimination and becomes aware of her lack of isdentity. Gradually gender becomes a cultural construct, instead of biological distinction of men and women. And thus the characteristic features of behaviour are established in this belief of discrimination which is not acquired one, but

These novelists have redeemed the gloomy situation by creating some memorable girl characters. Notable among them being Saroja and Lalitha in Kamala Markandaya’s Two Virgins, Raka in Anita Desai’s Fire on The Mountain, Leela in Kasmira Sheth’s Keeping Corner, Saru in Shashi Deshpande’s The Dark Holds no Terrors, Kalpana in Shashi Deshpande’s The Binding Vine, Mira in Kamala Markanaya’s Some Inner Fury, and Monisha in Voices in the City. There is a detailed examination of the girlhood of the protagonists.

In The Binding Vine Shashi Deshpande shows the violent and repulsive picture of tyranny of society towards girls. Kalpana and Mira both are rape victims. Rape is a tool used by man to ruin the self confidence of a lively and energetic girl. Society compels a girl to be frightful and submissive. Rape of body makes a girl remember of her state in a male dominated society where a man wants to dominate a girl if not mentally than physically. As Andrinee Rich