There Is No Unmarked Woman Summary

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Both men and women bring so much to offer in creating and maintaining society. “The question of gender differences and roles has baffled and angered us, delighted and confused us, in life as well as in literature” (Shea 347). Society tends to look at men and women a certain way by determining how each gender should act, what kind of job they should have, and their lifestyle. For example, the way some people think that women should take on the profession of a hairdresser and only a man should become a plumber. In all reality, the world we live in needs both men and women and the qualities that they bring with them. Firstly, the article “About Men” written by Gretel Ehrlich, a native Californian that writes and reflects on the interaction of humans and their natural environment, compares to the article “The Myth of the Latin Women: I just met a girl named Maria.” “The Myth of the Latin Women: I just met a girl named Maria” got written by Judith Ortiz Cofer, a poet, novelist, and essayist born in Puerto Rico in …show more content…

These two articles compare because they both show stereotypes about both the female and male gender. In the article by Tannen, she talks about the styles and looks of the women and men around the room. She described the masculine style as unmarked and the women's styles as marked. Tannen stated that the boy’s clothes, shoes, and looks remain unmarked and the girl's clothes, looks, and hairstyles remain marked. Cofer stereotypes Hispanic women as dressing like a “Hot Tamale” or sexual firebrand. When working in factories their “boss men” talked to them wrongly because of what color their skin stereotyped them as. Cofer states “It is custom, however, not chromosomes, that leads us to choose scarlet over pale

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