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Gender roles in the middle ages
Gender roles in the middle ages
Gender roles in childrens literature
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Children readers often make decisions on their choice/interest in a book based on the gender of the main character. Girls typically are uninterested in "boy books," and boys often reject the idea of reading "girl books." Consider gender based reactions that readers may have to the book you read. Does the author or the publisher do anything to make the book more appealing to both genders? Do you think girls and boys have different schema for the Middle Ages? Communist Russia? What do you think a girls' schema vs. a boy's schema would be?
I chose to read “A Single Shard” its a really interesting story. The main person would be a young orphan named Tree-ear. He lives with a man named Crane-man under a bridge. They barely survive with the food they have, and find. Tree-ear loves pottery, especially from a person named Min who knows how to do pottery. This young boy went to Min’s house to look around and accidentally drop a box. Min called Tree-ear a “thief”. Tree-ear suggested to do work for Min to repay him for what he had done. At first Min. didn’t want to but at the end he accepted the request. Emissary kin was looking for people with great
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work with pottery. Min was waiting to see the results, he was accepted. Kim considered Min to take his work to Songdo. Min rejected to take his work to Songdo because he was an old man. Tree-ear told Min’s wife he is willing to take his work to Songdo. Min’s wife said, yes but under two conditions: they are to return to the village safe and quickly and the second was that Tree-ear called her Ajima. This means “Auntie”. Tree-ear felt very special that he was able to call someone auntie. Tree-ear had told Min that he has been working for Min more than a year, he wanted for Min to teach him pottery. Min didn’t want to teach him because potter trades go from father to son. Min did have a child, but he doesn’t have his child with because he passed away. Before Tree-ear was taking off to his journey, he gave Crane-man a monkey he had made out of clay. Crane-man was honored to wear it. Crane-man told Tree-ear to climb the Rock of the Falling Flowers at Puyo. When he arrived there he was robbed by two men, and the pottery broke. Tree-ear was still managed to go to Songdo and show at least the single shard. Emissary Kim loved the shard, and gave Min the commission for his work. Tree-ear called Min to give him the great new, but Min had to give him bad news in return to Tree-ear that Crane-man had passed away. Tree-ear was sad, and wonders why bad things happen to wonderful people. Min’s wife asked Tree-ear if he would live with her and her husband, and called him Hyung-pil. He did accept the request, and live his life happy with a family. This book can be for both genders in my opinion, because it’s about a young boy who is an orphan.
This book brings happy endings. There are many people out that can relate to this story. It doesn’t matter the gender. Sometimes it takes a lot of work to become someone better in life. It is also hard to find a family out there. In today’s life they are many way to adopt. This book goes out more to the males, because it’s based on a father and son thing. In today’s world we will not see young boys making pottery. Like I was saying this is for both genders. It’s a great example of a life lesson. I do believe boys and girls do have a different schema in the middle ages, because they see things differently. Man schema would be competitive, controlling, central, and self-confident. A woman would be loving, sensitive, and
supportive.
Munro, Alice ““Boys and Girls” Viewpoints 11. Ed, Amanda Joseph and Wendy Mathieu. Alexandria, VA: Prentice Hall, 2001. Print.
Children’s literature of the Nineteenth Century is notoriously known for its projection of expected Victorian gender roles upon its young readers. Male and female characters were often given specific duties, reactions, and characteristics that reflected society’s particular attitudes and moral beliefs onto the upcoming citizens of the empire. These embedded concepts helped to encourage nationality and guide children towards their specific gender roles which would ensure the kingdom’s future success. Even in class situations where the demanding gender roles were unreasonable to fulfill, the pressure to conform to the Victorian beliefs was still prevalent.
Gender plays a role in literature, often reflecting the culture at the time of their creation. In such cases, it is also easy to tell the expectations of men and women in society. Gender roles in the works The Odyssey and The Epic of Gilgamesh are similar to which there is an obscure line between the two genders. Although most women are presented as maternal figures in both works, they are mainly seen as tools at the disposal of men.
Women pageant queens think they are supposed to represent the ideal of female beauty. The tomboy is especially associated with childhood and is defined by the girlhood performance of masculinity. As Michele Abate noted, “The traits most Americans are likely to name as constitutive of this code of tomboy conduct include proclivity for outdoor play (especially athletics), a feisty independent spirit, and a tendency to don masculine clothing and adopt a boyish nickname” (Abate). What does it mean to be a boy in children’s literature and the kind of varieties of boys that are represented? J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series typically features a social, educational, and physical dangers of school life that provide opportunities for adventure, mischief, and exploration. This collection of experiences allows boys to enact traditional forms of boyhood while practicing many of adult men’s culture and the ability to plan out schemes. Not all boys in children’s literature fit these conventional models of the physically robust athlete, hearty survivalist, or mischievous bad boy. Children’s literature also includes boys such as Laure in Little Women, who are described as sensitive, saintly, sickly, or effeminate. The literary and popular texts help understand expectations of boyhood and the insight into contemporary constructions of
Antonia Shimerda broke down the wall of female gender roles versus male gender roles whenever they were presented to her. She was not only strong in house chores, but strong in all of the “manly” labor as well. My Antonia, by Willa Cather, takes place during the Westward Expansion. During this time period, it was custom for women to cook, clean, and raise the children while the men worked on the farm. The author, Willa Cather, was one of few woman writers in the 1900’s. Popular literature was more often than not by male authors. This led me to pick gender roles as my topic for this project because I am inspired by how brave and strong Willa Cather was during a time when women were perceived to be inferior. She strongly relates to Antonia, and derived her character in the novel from her own
conceptualizations of gender in literature are situated in a culture and historical context ; the
According to “Boys and Girls”, there are certain things women should not be doing as defined by their genders. The narrator, a young girl, feels more inclined to spend her time outside alongside her father, “I worked willingly under his eyes, and with a feeling of pride.” She finds her place in a man’s world, outdoors in her father’s domain. While she is a female, she does not relate herself to the things of feminine nature. When her mother goes to speak with her father in the barn the narrator “felt my mother had no business down here,” admitting that it was a man’s world, and also her place, but not her mother’s. Her mother could not stand the idea of her daughter doing a man’s work, reminding her husband, “Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you’ll have real help and then I can use her more in the house. It’s not like I had a girl in the family at all.” According to her mother’s definition of girls, a daughter, who spends all her time outside doing a son’s work, is not a daughter at all.
“A women’s place is in the kitchen” is believed by a majority of male Creekview students and most of the world’s male population. Within A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen, Nora, the main character, saves her husband’s life by securing a loan to get the money to take a trip to Italy without his consent. In this time period, the1800s or later, it was unheard of to do something without the husband’s consent. This is similar to the views of the relationship between men and women in Antigone by Sophocles. Antigone is about the house Laius and its curse, with Antigone, the protagonist, burying her brother, Polynices, when it was forbidden by Creon; this crime is punishable by death. She defies man law; going against everything she ever learned, being a rare person to stand up against the man dominated society. Both of these authors, Sophocles and Ibsen, show glimpses into a world that still exists into today’s society but a world that is much different with women’s capabilities, relationship towards men, and individual rights.
Flynn, Elizabeth. Gender and Reading: Essays on Readers, Texts, and Contexts. Johns Hopkins, 1986. 280-281.
“Boys and Girls” describes a major turning point in a girl’s life, turning down a path towards womanhood. Her childhood fears of the dark and fears of being less than a perfect worker to her father and her control of her brother slowly dissolve. Her decision to free the terrified horse highlights her pivotal journey into adulthood. And her ability to cry with sensitivity over her decision of freedom, demonstrates the acute sensitivity of a woman.
Munro, Alice. "Boys and Girls." The Norton Introduction to Literature. Eds. Carl E. Bain, Jerome Beaty and J. Paul Hunter. 6th ed. New York: Norton, 1995.
The feminist perspective of looking at a work of literature includes examining how both sexes are portrayed
Throughout literature, authors employ a variety of strategies to highlight the central message being conveyed to the audience. Analyzing pieces of literature through the gender critics lens accentuates what the author believes to be masculine or feminine and that society and culture determines the gender responsibility of an individual. In the classic fairytale Little Red Riding Hood, the gender strategies appear through the typical fragile women of the mother and the grandmother, the heartless and clever male wolf, and the naïve and vulnerable girl as little red riding hood.
Many people think that boys in our culture today are brought up to define their identities through heroic individualism and competition, particularly through separation from home, friends, and family in an outdoors world of work and doing. Girls, on the other hand, are brought up to define their identities through connection, cooperation, self-sacrifice, domesticity, and community in an indoor world of love and caring. This view of different male and female roles can be seen throughout children’s literature. Treasure Island and The Secret Garden are two novels that are an excellent portrayal of the narrative pattern of “boy and girl” books.
In the earlier years of literature and life women's roles within society were at a minimum and woman were shunned upon by men. They are also suppressed, unequal, and seen as the minority in the population. Within these three poems; "Goblin Market", "MacBeth", and "Sir Gawain and The Green Knight" the position of women and lack of power is displayed in broad context and is projected out to the audience, they also show the way woman are used for one’s self pleasures. Gender behavior is remarkably swayed by social factors than by natural differences, like how humans naturally are supposed or how they want to respond to certain thing. Gender roles of men and woman heavily depend on culture, race, location, religion, location, a stance on politics and so many more circumstances. The way society is determined is by your outside forces, the trend. It is basically what everyone expects you to do, to be, to look like, to marry and so forth. Believe it or not, when you learn to read, you are also learning your culture. As a child the first few books you read are set up to give you a vision of the ideal boy and the ideal girl and what to expect from them. This doing can shape the way you look at life as a child and you will grow off of that very platform and extend the branches. What is old English literature book without a woman either being stupid, sexual or trying to mock a masculine quality figure of a hero? Exploring these three works of literature, you can also gain a sense of where you came from and how you think subconsciously. Most people don’t realize that who they are today, and how they think today is based upon their past. Men and women both play important roles no matter what they “rank” in society in English Literature. To c...