The Disposable Rocket By Margaret Atwood

Because the American West was dominated by men, the frontier seldomly addressed the role of women, while also minimal developing overall femininity. However, the embodiment and existence of femininity itself was a precursor to the cowboy’s success within Westerns. After All, the cowboy needed the female in order to be married and keep his masculine figure in tact. Although the industrialized East created an allure of the liberation for the cowboy, the intensity of the Old West grew as the East came to alter its form. Thus, manhood was becoming re-established within both sexes.

For example, in the movie Mean Girls, teenage girls are portrayed as dramatic and unintelligent individuals who strongly care about their physical appearance and enjoy to gossip and backstab other girls. The film points out the importance of physical appearance by showing the concern of Regina George, one of the members of “The Plastics,” about her body weight as she strictly monitors

In a society that is heavily influenced by mass media, women are repeatedly compartmentalized into unrealistic, and often degrading standards of appearance and sexuality. Doris Bazzini’s research on magazines and Caroline Heldman’s blog explores themes related to a woman’s appearance, while Jessica Valenti elaborates on the concept of virginity in her essay titled, “The Purity Myth”. Despite the diversity in scope when it comes to womanhood, there is a numerous set of expectations that a female must fit in order to be “ideal”. However, this checklist is so specific and debasing that it renders the criteria useless. The three main pre-requisites in being the ideal woman include physical attractiveness, sexual accessibility, and purity. The pressure

Scott Russell Sanders’ essay, “Looking at Women”, contains his views about women that originate from his experience living among a given group of people. In fact, it is apparent that his opinion results from his childhood memories. The quotes he chooses as well as language depict his opinion about how men view women and illustrate that his thoughts were acquired during his early years of life. As stated, his thoughts originate from the personal views of other people about women. Thus, this paper seeks to examine his perspectives about women. In particular, it shows that women attract the attention of men by wearing fancy clothes and attending beauty pageants to get noticed.

Firstly, Atwood satirizes the way women are presented stereotypically in literature work. She implies that women do not have a voice of their own, and that they always act in the shadows of men because of lust or pity for men. This description is full of exaggerations and Atwood also indicates how

Is this what media finally comes to? To profit and acquire fame, while throwing into the back the importance of wellness and confidence of women young and old alike? In this age many women around the world are heavily influenced by the prevarication of the modern culture's "perfect female body". Evidence of this ubiquitous illusion is prevalent in the texts "My Body Is My Own Business" an essay by Sultana Yusufali and the short comic "My Body" by Vicky Rabinowitz. The example of the crushing influence of beauty by the media are explicated by both texts. In the essay by Yusufali, she boldly writes: "[By] reading popular teenage magazines, you can find out what kind of body image is "in" or "out"' (page 52). By this, Yusufali explains how women

As a little girl you are encouraged to be who you want to be. You fill your world with fairy tales or Barbie dolls that inspire you to believe that the sky is the limit. But little do you know, that as you grow older, the dreams you are forging for yourself is no longer achievable. Where you once saw the sky as the limit is now transformed to be seen as a man’s word as the limit. No little girl, you are not liberated nor are you empowered…you are simply propagated by a man’s world to believe that you are. But where did it all start and how did you get to this position?

existent. It is widely believed that we live in a man’s world. Even something as common

“The Body and the Reproduction of Femininity” from Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture and the Body by Susan Bordo (1993) introduces the discourses around the female body, and the different perspectives that influence this body. She goes on to explain that the body is a medium for culture, from which contemporary societies can replicate itself. In addition, Bordo (1993) provides continuous insight on how women have changed throughout the years to be more within societies norms, and how they have transformed so much to manage their bodies to becoming desirable within the culture. Throughout this essay, I will be explaining how women have for centuries, used there bodies as a means to rebel against these norms that have been placed upon them, such as being a typical housewife. For years, women have been discriminated against and unable to speak their opinion. Within this essay, I will describe how women have used their bodies as a way of speaking out against political discourses and stereotypes that have been developed since the beginning of humanity.

In the two pieces “A&P” by John Updike and “The Harlem Dancer” by Claude McKay both the narrator and speaker see women as nothing more than beautiful objects, symbols of elegance and status. However, it is these thoughts that ultimately lead them to become morally better and draw new conclusions about not only themselves but women as well.

Individuals go through a process, called socialization, by which they internalize the values, beliefs, and norms of a given society and learn to function as members of that society (Conley 118). In the essay, “Out-of-body Image” by Caroline Heldman the reader is exposed to a contemporary problem that women face in the modern world of consumerism. Heldman is effective in making her call to action in regards to the problem of self-objectification that has emerged through mass media by targeting women through an amalgamation of logical, ethical, and emotional appeals.

Mary Wollstonecraft’s, Maria or The Wrongs of Woman, is an analyzation and critique about a woman’s place in society. Specifically, that socially, politically, and economically woman are at a disadvantage. Furthermore, society perpetuates this imbalance through certain expectations about motherhood, marriage, and double standards. This power imbalance has always been present in society and through the analyzation of Maria and themes such as: motherhood, domination, and traditionalist thought it is possible to contextualize the era that Mary Wollstonecraft lived in to gain a better understanding of what women went through in her time so that we have a reference to compare to how women are treated today.

So when people look and see that they don’t look like they’re favorite super-model it can put a downer on their self-confidence. This causes many girls feeling that they aren’t good enough in society, society won’t accept them because they aren’t perfect and they start to not like their body. When for many females they can’t lose as much weight as their friend can just because of their genes and how they were born. “The lack of connection between the real and ideal perception of their own body and firm willingness to modify their own body and shape so as to standardize them to social concept of thinness…” (Dixit 1), being focused on unrealistic expectations can cause women to lose themselves and change their attitude on how they view their body, and not for the better. “Body dissatisfaction, negative body image, concern with body size, and shape represent attitudes of body image.”(Dixit 1), women are so obsessed with looking good that they are missing out on enjoying

Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, argues that women are instruments of the patriarchy, that women know this, and that women allow the system of oppression to live on. Her fictions ask, “What stories do women tell about themselves? What happens when their stories run counter to literary conventions or society’s expectations?” (Lecker 1). The Handmaid’s Tale is told through the protagonist, Offred, and allows readers to follow through her life as a handmaid while looking back on how life used to be prior to the societal changes. The novel is set in a dystopian future that illustrates the collapse of the US government, a new theocracy taking over, and how the theocracy has supposedly solved the problem of fertility with the creation

The Handmaid’s Tale Essay-How does Atwood’s portrayal of women compare to modern conceptions of women?