The Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

While women are held to a much more fair standard than in the recent past, women have always suffered from a perceived inferiority as shown in the texts, The Yellow Wallpaper and If I were a Man, written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Patriarchal institutions and social relations are responsible for the inferior or secondary status of women therefore, patriarchal society gives absolute priority to men and to some extent limits women's human rights.

Feminists use the term patriarchy to describe the power relationship between men and women as well as to find out the root cause of womens subordination. The Yellow Wallpaper is a short story published in 1892 and is regarded as an important work of American feminist literature. Gilman also wrote

If I were a Man depicts the same theme of repression of women. A woman, Mollie Mathewson, imagines what it would be like if she were a man for a day and subsequently ends up in her husband’s body. Mollie states “women are pretty much people”, which implies she thinks most men don’t consider women as people, because they don’t hold jobs or make their own living. Orly Bareket states in his research paper, “In line with the famous feminist saying that ‘The personal is political’, patriarchal arrangements (i.e., a social structure in which men are the dominant group) manifest both in the broad social level (e.g., men’s overrepresentation in power centers such as governments) and in the interpersonal level (e.g., men’s aggressive behavior is penalized less than identical behavior among women” This demonstrates the common stigma that women are less than men and explain male supremacy over women and the absurdity of gender roles in society. In addition, If I Were a Man also highlights the struggle of women in a patriarchal society by stating “As for Mother Eve-I wasn’t there and can’t deny the story, but I will say this. If she brought evil into the world, we men have had the lion’s share of keeping it going ever since-how about that?” (Gilman 3). Gilman shows men blame women for the way the world is, but it is both men and women who should equally be blamed for what goes