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Gender and roles of women in literature
Gender and roles of women in literature
Gender and roles of women in literature
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Maxine Hong Kingston’s, The Woman Warrior, displays many cultural stereotypes and incidents of women Kingston knows. Kingston is first introduced to estranged aunt that she has never met. She gains the perception that her aunt was married and forced to have sex with an unknown villager. She ends up being pregnant, which potentially led the village to be under attack. She committed suicide and murdered her baby. Kingston’s family disowned her, because of this went against their Chinese roots. Kingston was born in America as a Chinese, with the expectation of being a wife or a slave. Not wanting to be the stereotype of a Chinese woman, she left her family (temporarily) with the hopes of becoming a warrior. After beating and defeating …show more content…
As stated above in the summary Kingston believed that when going to Chinese school everyone must be quiet and not talk about their past. This is shown first when Kingston refers to her estranged Aunt who murdered herself and her child. Her family disowned her because she was pregnant by another villager who was not her husband. Kingston’s family disowned her aunt because of what she did. Therefore Kingston’s family kept quiet about this because this was a disgrace to their heritage along with their culture. In reading The Woman Warrior, we see that Kingston is naturally quiet and socially awkward. When she begins to write the real Kingston begins to unfold. Kingston then develops her own voice and has a say in what she feels and in what she believes in. In the article Cutting the Tongue: Language and the Body in Kingston’s The Woman Warrior, it shows and sparks the question should Kingston’s views of the Chinese culture and the Chinese-American culture. Although the book does seem very biased Kinston develops a voice. The article then defends Kingston’s biased racial views. In actuality her views help contribute and validate the stereotype of Chinese culture and the American-Chinese cultural tradition. This also fits in with cultural theory because it reflects how the cultures are
This is evident in the persistence of elderly characters, such as Grandmother Poh-Poh, who instigate the old Chinese culture to avoid the younger children from following different traditions. As well, the Chinese Canadians look to the Vancouver heritage community known as Chinatown to maintain their identity using on their historical past, beliefs, and traditions. The novel uniquely “encodes stories about their origins, its inhabitants, and the broader society in which they are set,” (S. Source 1) to teach for future generations. In conclusion, this influential novel discusses the ability for many characters to sustain one sole
Kingston shows the social view towards girls by stating “You know how girls are. There’s no profit in raising girls. Better to raise geese than girls” (Kingston 46). Reminding the reader the constant sexist comments Kingston experienced throughout her childhood. More importantly, Kingston’s imagination of Fa Mu Lan adapts a gender role of a man. Kingston states, “I put on men’s clothes and armor and tied my hair in a man’s fashion” (Kingston 36). As a warrior in battle, Kingston takes the role of a traditional man. In fact, this ideology was used to show Kingston’s frustration towards the place of a women in the Chinese American society. A society where one’s abilities were identified only if they were boys. Moreover, after recalling an encounter with a villager, Kingston states, “I’m not a bad girl, I would scream. I’m not a bad girl….I might as well have said I’m not a girl” (Kingston 46). Showcasing her infuriation towards gender inequalities which made her feel that things would be easier if she was a boy. More importantly, throughout the text, Kingston was not only resisting beliefs of her society towards women but also of her own
The diary form implies that life on Mango Street will be memories to the protagonist after her assimilation to the American culture. However, Kingston wants Asian Americans to prove that they are a group who also has voice, rather than try to meet the whites’ standard of being
“Whenever she had to warn us about life, my mother told stories that ran like this one, a story to grow up on. She tested our strengths to establish realities”(5). In the book “The Woman Warrior,” Maxine Kingston is most interested in finding out about Chinese culture and history and relating them to her emerging American sense of self. One of the main ways she does so is listening to her mother’s talk-stories about the family’s Chinese past and applying them to her life.
Justina Chen Headley explores in her book Nothing but the Truth (and a few white lies) the search for her protagonist’s identity, Patty Ho, which is a part Taiwanese, part American girl. Headley displays the mother as a one-dimensional parent who is holding onto conservative and traditional Taiwanese values, and is imposing her cultural values onto her daughter as a justification for her strict parenting style.
The end of the civil war should’ve marked a major turning point for the position of African Americans. The north’s victory marked the end of slavery and in addition, the fourteenth and fifteenth amendment guaranteed African Americans full civil and political equality. However, the end of the civil war and the beginning of the reconstruction era was seen a ‘false dawn for the slaves in the former confederacy and border states.
As an American Chinese Maxine Hong Kingston tries to find out what defines her The Search for Human Identity All humans encounter the search for personal identity at some point in life. As an "American Chinese" Maxine Hong Kingston tries to find out what defines her. Let them be her mother’s traditional world, her new American home, or herself as an individual. Undoubtedly, Maxine is strongly interested in the margins between certainty and falsehood, remembrance and tradition, honesty and deceit. As she grows up, she realizes that indeed, part of becoming a young mature woman is figuring out what makes up her own individual.
...in her essay “No Name Woman”. The Chinese tradition of story telling is kept by Kingston in her books. Becoming Americanized allowed these women the freedom to show their rebellious side and make their own choices. Rebelling against the ideals of their culture but at the same time preserving some of the heritage they grew up with. Both woman overcame many obstacles and broke free of old cultural ways which allowed them an identity in a new culture. But most importantly they were able to find identity while preserving cultural heritage.
Maxine Hong Kingston's China Men contains many fables and parables from the Chinese Culture. In "On Mortality" Kingston reveals the story of human mortality and the reason for this mortality. The story focuses largely on human emotions and reactions towards the situations that people find themselves in. It also raises questions about the role of women in the Chinese culture and the attitudes of the culture towards them.
Gish Jen’s “Who’s Irish?” explores a Chinese grandmother’s thoughts and beliefs about her ethnically integrated family. The grandmother tells the story as though she is looking back on past events and thinking about how they have affected her present life. As her tale begins, she identifies her granddaughter, Sophie, as a wild three-year-old (161). Perhaps the grandmother associates with Sophie’s strong will, because she reveals her own intense nature when she says, “I am hard work my whole life, and fierce besides.” (161). Jen provides an immediate glimpse into the grandmother’s true character that remains constant. As the grandmother recounts her time living with her daughter, Natalie, while babysitting Sophie six hours every day, she gives numerous examples of her fervent beliefs about the roles that members of a family should play. Ultimately, it is the ethnic differences that occur between their generations that divide the Chinese grandmother and Natalie, even though they share the same race.
The women in the novel, The Joy Luck Club, deal with all of the good and the bad that their history and culture have to offer. At times they experience difficulties because the mothers and daughters, although they are as one, share different cultures, while their history is the same. Ying-Ying St.Claire is the mother of Lena, who is a Chinese-American women. Lena and her mother don’t see eye to eye at all times because of the fact that they were raised in different cultures. Ying-Ying grew up in China in a very well-to-do family. At first she had very few worries, other than being obedient. Her Amah once told her, “You don’t need to understand. Just behave, follow your mothers example (Tan,66)”. As she grew older, she had to prepare for her future; a life of following future husbands orders and taking care of her husbands family. Chinese women would do this because it was expected of them. They would care for their husbands parents so that when they were old they would be taken care of as well.
Kingston uses the story of her aunt to show the gender roles in China. Women had to take and respect gender roles that they were given. Women roles they had to follow were getting married, obey men, be a mother, and provide food. Women had to get married. Kingston states, “When the family found a young man in the next village to be her husband…she would be the first wife, an advantage secure now” (623). This quote shows how women had to get married, which is a role women in China had to follow. Moreover, marriage is a very important step in women lives. The marriage of a couple in the village where Kingston’s aunt lived was very important because any thing an individual would do would affect the village and create social disorder. Men dominated women physically and mentally. In paragraph eighteen, “they both gav...
Changes in society have brought issues regarding gender stereotype. Gender roles are shifting in the US. Influences of women’s movement (Firestone, Firestone, & Catlett, 2006) and gender equality movement (e.g., Obergefell v. Hodges (2015)) have contributed to expanding social roles for both genders. Nevertheless, gender stereotypes, thus gender stereotype roles continue to exist in the society (Skelly & Johnson, 2011; Wood & Eagly, 2010). With changes in gender roles, pervasiveness of gender stereotype results in a sense of guilt, resentment, and anger when people are not living up to traditional social expectations (Firestone, Firestone, & Catlett, 2006). Furthermore, people can hold gender stereotype in pre-reflective level that they may
You are at an interview, the interviewer says that you are not qualified for the job because of your gender. What would you say? Sexism has caused stereotypes, and harassment in the workforce, and professional sports, therefore people should know more about sexism. Media is a powerful tool of communication, it produces both negative and positive impacts on society.
Kingston is the largest and one of the most diverse cities in the English-speaking Caribbean. More than half a million people populate Kingston of different decent ranging from African, Asian, European, and Middle Eastern roots. The city's tremendous growth during the 20th century has produced severe overcrowding, persistent unemployment, and violent crime. Poverty has devastated Jamaica's black majority and nowhere is this more apparent than in the ghettos of Kingston. European colonialism set up a society of racial stratification and current residents of Kingston have to deal with historic tensions between the city's black and brown residents.