Women In Othello Essay

750 Words2 Pages

The patriarchal Venetian society presented in William Shakespeare's play Othello, expressed deeply on the idealistic values of the Elizabethan England standards of how a woman should be represented in society, seemingly to put women in their place by the men that surrounded them catering to their every want and need without any say in the regards of the situation. Throughout this time men considered women to be possessions, in which they were to remain submissive and obedient to their every command. Also, it is suggested that the only power that women do seem to gain control over men is being viewed as a temptress based solely on their sexual power and how it is considered to be evil which must be resisted by the men in this Elizabethan society.

For example, The women in the play Othello formally known as Desdemona, Emilia, and Bianca were represented in society expected to be silent, chaste, and obedient to the men that surrounded them. Justifying a women's subordination because women were thought to be inferior to men which in many ways made these women differ from one another but remained fairly similar in other aspects as well. Therefore, the women in the play were viewed as being possessions to the men such as, Desdemona being married to Othello claims herself to be an obedient wife throughout the entire play even as his jealous antics and accusations of her infidelity play a huge part throughout the storyline, she continues to remain obedient to Othello’s orders from the early phases of their relationship being seemingly in love with one another to the later stages of the relationship which is practically bursting at the seams with the empty accusations of adultery and jealous ravings on Othello’s part. Throughout the enti...

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...lly guilty. When things go wrong male society thinks it’s socially acceptable to make slanderous accusations against females labeling them and putting the blame on them like the storyline in the play. The women in Othello are judged harshly by the male characters as being unfaithful and engaging in adulterous behavior just based merely on the fact that they are women and the men think it’s acceptable to automatically find them guilty of wrongdoing without any clear cut evidence. Ultimately, The play's treatment of feminist tension and gender difference only adds up how women are treated just as harshly as Othello was by Iago throughout the play. All of the Women in the play are pre judged as guilty because the social order in which men set labeling a women as a whore just because she has a different opinion or being smarter, causing them to fear her as an individual.

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