A Feminist Perspective: What’s That Smell in the Kitchen Essay

She essentially discusses how she does all of these things, but doesn’t get much in return. Another example of pathos in this essay is when she talks specifically about the sexual relationship that a wife and husband have. “I want a wife who is sensitive to my sexual needs, a wife who makes love passionately and eagerly when I feel like it, a wife who will not demand sexual attention when I am not in the mood for it.” In this quote, Brady compares the sex that a wife has with her husband to another chore that she does. She shows that there is no mutual emotion or desire between them and that it is more of a duty of a wife rather than a pleasure. Essentially, she compares herself and any other wife to a sex puppet who is just there to service the husband with little to no joy. These two examples make the reader sympathize with Brady and the common housewife because of all of the responsibilities that they have as well as how they get little to no pleasure out of what they have to do. Lastly, Brady’s hasty tone shows her resentment towards divorced men as well as men in general. This allows the audience to understand her feelings on the topic of gender dynamics and it forces the audience to feel that way too.

When most people get married, they go into the marriage with the expectations and hopes that everything will go as planned, that they will always get along, and that the responsibilities will be evenly divided between both spouses. And for two working spouses who have children, they share the expectation that no one parent will be more of a caretaker than the other. Eric Bartels, a feature writer for the Portland Tribune in Portland, Oregon, feels as if he has personal experience as to what it is like to be on the receiving end of his wife’s irrational—or at least in his eyes—anger. Bartels informs his readers of the anger his wife projects

Kate Chopin's “The Story of an Hour” and Gail Godwin’s “A Sorrowful Woman” are similar pieces of literary work. Both stories offer a revealing glimpse of extremely unhappy marriages due to being forced into stereotypical roles. Both stories portray women, who are trapped in their marriages and trapped in their socially expected matriarchal characters. They are identified by their role as a wife and mother.

In the 1970’s the average family had a wife that would take care of all of the cooking, the cleaning, everything concerning their kids, and even caring for her husband too. They did all of this without complaining, while their husband was at work. In those times nothing less was expected from them. In the article “Why I Want a Wife” Brady uses ethos, logos, and pathos to illustrate her opinion of what a wife do in a marriage, in which she infers that wives do too much for their families.

Women are taught from a young age that marriage is the end all be all in happiness, in the short story “The Story of An Hour” by Kate Chopin and the drama “Poof!” by Lynn Nottage, we learn that it is not always the case. Mrs. Mallard from “The Story of an Hour” and Loureen from “Poof!” are different characteristically, story-wise, and time-wise, but share a similar plight. Two women tied down to men whom they no longer love and a life they no longer feel is theirs. Unlike widows in happy marriages Loureen and Mrs., Mallard discover newfound freedom in their respective husband’s deaths. Both stories explore stereotypical housewives who serve their husbands with un-stereotypical reactions to their husband’s deaths.

In paragraphs three through seven, Brady provides the reader with what she desires in a wife. Through repetition and tone, she shows the reader the unrealistic roles of a wife.

Women in history stood best known for a less ascendant sex in the mid-nineteen centuries. Since times have gone by women had fought for their equal rights and freedom. There had been many stereotypes, where the women were considered as a slave to the men’s because the women’s position was to be the homemakers and a mother to their children, while the men’s are out socializing with others. If they were not happy with the marriage, they cannot just walk out or complain because a women role is to endure all these pains without a word coming out of their mouths. Two out of the ordinary short stories, “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “The Story of An Hour,” mostly focused on a women’s dilemma that they faced near the 19th century. The two main characters in the short stories show some resemblances in some ways, but both characters portrayed them in different ways of how they dealt their sorrows in their marriages.

Bartels explains that wives often let out their stress induced, pent up anger on their husbands. He uses his own life and instances he has experienced with his wife to support himself. He describes his wife as tired, angry, and wanting to take that out on him (Bartels 58). Bartels has experienced this spousal anger firsthand, giving him credibility to write about it. He understands how the cycle of spousal anger works. However, his lack of other means of support makes his article fall short in some areas. Whereas telling a personal story may appeal to one reader, it may not appeal to the next. Bartels lacks a balance of logical and emotional appeal. The emotional appeal that Bartels uses is successful, though. He says that at times his wife is so negative that is “threatens to grind [his] spirit to dust” (Bartels 59). This use of emotional language is well executed because any reader will either be able to relate to him or feel sorry for the situation he is in. However, some women may sympathize with him less as they take the side of the wife in his story. His stance is flawed because he comes at this argument at an obviously subjective position. Bartels overlooks the idea that many women will not feel sorry for him if they disagree with what he has to say.

As hardworking women living of the prairie, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters can relate to Mrs. Wright’s situation. They know personally that long days of doing laundry, cooking, and cleaning can become very tiresome (Hedges 91). They realize that living on the prairie can force a woman to be confined to her own house for weeks at a time, and because Mrs. Wright never had children, the grueling loneliness that she suffered must have been excruciating. Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters both experience the constant patronization and sexual discrimination that most women in the early twentieth century lived with. They empathize with the difficulties of Mrs. Wright’s life and almost immediately a bond is formed with a woman they do not even know.

Most women in America nowadays are lucky enough to consider themselves to be an independent individual, but females were not always guaranteed their freedoms. Throughout the early 1900’s, authors would characterize husbands to be controlling figures. In “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Charlotte Perkins demonstrates just how possessive the husband is to his wife in their marriage. This short story shows just how miserable the woman is to be in a marriage with John because John, thinks it would be best that his wife is isolated to get over her postpartum depression.“The Yellow Wallpaper” demonstrates how a male dominated society leads to the woman not being their own individual by using characterization, narrator perspective, and conflict between women and society.

In Judy (Syfers) Brady’s article, “I Want a Wife”, she expresses her opinions in a satirical commentary that offers hypothetical criteria for an ideal wife, with an underlying message that deals with how people should be grateful for all of the deeds and chores that women do. Brady utilizes the strategy of

Before, women were considered housewives who were in charge of taking care of children and cleaning the house while their husbands worked jobs to sustain their families. As years passed, many things have changed throughout society, including the responsibilities of both men and women. Today, women work and provide for their own family as much as men do. Throughout the years, many roles have changed, but one issue remains which is that most men do not consider house cleaning as a mandatory task. Gross believes that men lack the emotional and physical drive to do a “woman’s job”. Although today more men are contributing to their home chores, there are still many men who leave this to their wives or any woman in general. Men cook and watch for their children, but they do not bother with house cleaning. Most men feel like a clean house is not needed to have a healthy, safe environment for the family, which Gross does not agree with.

The lack of control women have in a society mainly controlled by men is presented through the author’s effective use of anecdote. In the beginning, when the speaker introduces the audience to her relationship, in which her partner takes lead in day-to-day activities, the audience immediately get an insight into the lack of power women receive with the author’s use of anecdote. The speaker is quick to tell the readers about her“[h]olding the log / while he sawed it. Holding / the strings while he measured” (Atwood lines 1-3). Atwood employs anecdote as the speaker’s explanation of helping her partner out in everyday activities is presented to the reader in forms of an account of an event in the speaker’s life. This forms a greater insight for the reader, as the anecdote creates an understanding of the way the actions in day-to-day activities men and women take when together, women are appointed smaller tasks within a society, which is dominated by men, whereas men are the driving force and do the important parts of the activities. Furthermore, when the speaker describes herself sitting in

Thesis: In the short story, “A Couple of Hamburger’s”, their ongoing disagreements seem that of a couple who has been married for a long time when everything your significant other does bother you, whereas, in “The Girls in Their Summer Dresses” the problem seems much bigger because the husband admits to ogling at other women.

Suppression of women has occurred in all societies. Damage created by societal repression ranges from psychological damage to physical damage.  The suppression of women is not only perpetrated by men, often other women support the cultural traditions which are damaging, as they themselves grew up within the confines of those social norms.  Marge Piercy, a feminist activist, writer and poet makes a statement against social norms damaging to women with her poem, "A Work of Artifice". After reading the poem, one can certainly appreciate the fact that many norms embraced as acceptable for a woman causes physical and psychological damage to their total health. Through "A Work of