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Gender issues romeo and juliet
Status of women in renaissance
Gender issues romeo and juliet
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“And therefore women, being weaker vessels, are ever thrust to the wall; therefore I will push Montague’s men from the wall and thrust his maids to the wall” are the words spoken by a Capulet servant at the beginning of the play (I.i.14-17). He illustrated right off the bat that the women characters had a completely different place in society than men did and were thought to be weaker compared to them. Although there are only three main female characters in William Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet, it’s easy to interpret what the roles of women were in Verona during the Renaissance time period. Based on the female characters in Romeo and Juliet, it seems they matured more quickly than women do today, portrayed a subservient role in society, and were seen as an object to possess.
Considering people during the Renaissance didn’t live as long as they do now, the women in Verona during that time matured much more quickly than women do today. Marrying and having children were jobs that were often completed before the age of eighteen. Juliet’s marriage to Paris was supposed to happen when she was only thirteen years old, and Juliet’s mother tells her that she became a mother “much upon these years” (I.iii.70-72). Women during that time were passed down from their parents to their husbands without much chance of independent thought or action. Juliet had never even considered marriage until her mother brought it up, and seemed somewhat astounded when she did. Because there were arranged marriages at that time, there were likely many instances when the women didn’t love their chosen man. Juliet’s arranged marriage to Paris is an example of this, And because of it, an ample amount of trouble arose.
Women had little freedom during that...
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...ord to hire people to do work for them, but it wasn’t like that for other poor families of the Renaissance.
Women in Verona during the time of the Renaissance had a completely different place in society than the men did. Juliet, Lady Capulet, and the Nurse were the only female characters in the play, but were able to illustrate the roles that all women had during that time period. All women during the Renaissance time, based on the characters of Romeo and Juliet matured more quickly then women do today, played a subservient role in society, and played the role of an object to possess. Their roles show that they were powerless compared to men, but still had an important role in society. Women have gained significant control and influence since Romeo and Juliet was written, but unfortunately there are still many cases around the world where women are secondary to men.
Women in society were always put as not being equal to men. During the Renaissance, women were inferior to men; women in different classes had different roles. Low class women were expected to be housewives and take care of everything to do with the house. Working class women were expected to work for their husbands and help them run their business. They would work along side with their husbands and then go home and take care of the household. Upper class women may have had servants and workers working for them but the women were still expected to take care of the house hold.
One clear representation of the reverse gender roles displayed throughout the novel is when Juliet proposes the idea of marriage to Romeo. On the balcony, following Romeo’s profession of love, she states, “Thy purpose marriage, send me word tomorrow” (Rom.2.2.146). During the time of Romeo and
In the middle ages, men and women had completely different roles in society. Romeo and Juliet is set in the city of Verona, in a time when what gender you were dictated your entire existence. If you were a women then you were nothing more than someone’s property, first your father’s then your husband’s. Women had no say in their lives and were seen as weak. Men ,by contrast, were seen as always strong, mentally and physically, and dominant. In Romeo and Juliet, gender expectations play a huge part in the action of the play. Shakespeare uses imagery, hyperbole, and metaphors to highlight the theme of gender roles and the meaning of gender in Romeo and Juliet.
Gender Roles are norms set by society that dictate what types of behavior would be deemed appropriate and desirable for a person based solely upon their actual or perceived gender. Gender roles have been placed on society since the beginning of humanity and we can find examples of gender roles even in holy texts, such as the Holy Bible. Examples of gender roles found in the Bible are, I Corinthians, 11:14 and 15 which states “Does not the very nature of things teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a disgrace to him, but that if a woman has long hair, it is her glory?”, this quote states the obvious long hair is feminine, you are a man,short hair is masculine, it is wrong to do anything feminine because
Romeo & Juliet is a play written by Shakespeare about two young lovers, who cannot have each because of their family’s never-ending fighting. They both come from rich upper class families and, in which they have a big impact on the society of Verona. In the fifteenth century social statuses were based on how much money a person had, and if the person were born in to the right family or not. In Romeo & Juliet there are a lot of gender rolls, which there still is in today’s society. A woman gets paid $0.77 for doing the same job that a man does for $1 dollar an hour. This is even less for women of color. So another question woul...
Romeo and Juliet has different roles for different genders. During the Shakespearean period, when Shakespeare writes, most women had to marry when they were teen, when they were in adolescence or even before. However, the men who they were marrying were in their early to late twenties. In the household that the women lived in, the men basically owned them. The women always followed men’s word, which says that the male was the dominant gender of the society. Romeo and Juliet reflects this in a number of ways. Juliet was forced to marry Paris, by the word of her father, who said that if she did not marry Paris, she would go to the streets(Shakespeare, 3.5.154-62). Women were thought to be weaker and less important than men in Romeo and Juliet because men are trying to be the strongest out of everyone, women have a lower social status, and men think they owned women in Romeo and Juliet.
The Elizabethan era gender roles were much different than they are today. Women were regarded as the weaker sex, and men were always dominant. These “rules” are shown prominently throughout Romeo and Juliet, and paved way for obstacles they went through in their relationship. The gender conventions for women and men were prodigiously stereotypical and unreasonable, as they made men out to be the superior gender. Women should not have been perceived as inferior to men, and these unwritten rules for masculinity and femininity were shown throughout the play. Romeo acted very feminine which contradicted his gender conventions while Juliet did not abide by rules and disobeyed her parents. Romeo and Juliet had many ways in which they followed and
Romeo and Juliet is a play written by William Shakespeare, where a boy and a girl fall in love with each other during a party hosted by Juliet’s father, Lord Capulet. The two teenager decide to get marry, despite their family's hate for each other and only meeting each other a few hours ago. However, the Montagues (Romeo’s Parents) and the Capulets end their feud after they discover that their children killed themselves. Romeo and Juliet’s death was caused by Juliet’s parents, Juliet, and Friar Lawrence.
During the Elizabethan era women had a status of subordination towards men. They had a role to marry and oblige to their husband’s wishes. Shakespearean literature, especially illustrates how a woman is psychologically and physically lesser to their male counterpart. The play, Othello, uses that aspect in many different ways. From a Feminist lens others are able to vividly examine how women were subjected to blatant inferiority. Being displayed as tools for men to abuse, women were characterized as possessions and submissive; only during the last portion of the play did the power of women take heed.
The play Othello is presented as a male-dominated society where women are only recognized as property; objects to own and to bear children. Women in the Elizabethan society and in Shakespeare society were not seen as equal to men and were expected to be loyal to their husbands, be respectful, and to not go against their husbands judgements or actions. Shakespeare presents Desdemona, Emilia , and Bianca as women in the Elizabethan time where they were judged based on their class, mortality, and intelligence. Shakespeare makes his female characters act the way they would be expected to act in an Elizabethan society. The role of these women in Othello is crucial because they show how women were treated and how unhealthy their relationships between men really were in both Elizabethan and Shakespeare's society.
During the times in which Shakespeare lived, women had certain roles which ensured they were a permanent underclass to men. In Women in Shakespeare’s world by Theresa D. Kemp, Kemp states that “The roles of early modern women included daughters and wives, sisters and mothers; they learned and worked and played but for the most part they were not expected to be school girls (whining or otherwise) As women they were expected to be the slightly beautiful beloved and not the balladeer. Women were not seen as fit to play soldier or the judge. And as keepers of the homes and the households, as in our own time, women withdrawn from a “world too wide” ( 29). This quote from Kemp shows how victorian women were seen a just a pretty face to do as told. They were to be obedient and non opinionated. A woman of that time period was very objectified and used, basically women weren't real people.
.Another thing that woman you don't have any power over in Romeo and Juliet is who they marry For example Juliet was being forced to marry Paris when she loved Romeo. because back then women were considered property when the girl was young and hadn't been married off yet the woman was her father's property but once the girl got married she was considered her husband's property.
This is to be expected in a society that did not even permit women to perform in theaters, so men played the women’s roles. Women were not allowed to perform on stage until 1660 when Charles II took the throne and the Restoration occurred (Nestvold). Hence, women are often restricted by husbands or fathers, like Juliet who was controlled by her father in Romeo and Juliet, or women are victimized by men and not in control of their own fate, like Desdemona who dies at the hands of Othello in Othello.
Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet in the 16th century, at a time where the role of the woman was to be subservient to men and act as a wife to their husband and a mother to their children. Women were expected to conform to the expectations of society, and were seen as possessions by their fathers and husbands. Fathers arranged their daughters’ marriages, usually for financial or social gain for the family. In Romeo and Juliet, the unfair treatment of women is conveyed through characters such as Juliet, a young girl who is growing into the expectations of society, and Lady Capulet, who represents a traditional side of love and values social position rather than men themselves.
Women in the Elizabethan era were subservient to men. They were expected to conform to the societies expectations while obeying the significant male figures in their lives. High-born women were often portrayed “possessions” to be shared between fathers and husbands. In several cases, they were socially restricted and unable to explore the world around them without chaperones. The women were mainly expected to act as loving caretakers to those in their families. In William Shakespeare’s play Macbeth, however, the female figures in the play both promote the idea of unbridled feminine sexuality but also promote the female ideals of being loving caretakers. The dramatic technique Shakespeare uses to characterize his female figure in the play are the setting, the character’s dialogue and what the other characters say about them, especially behind their backs. The three main female characters that endorse but also contradict the archetypes of women are the tyrannical Lady Macbeth, the loving Lady Macduff and lastly the mysterious weird sisters.