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Analysis Of Simone De Beauvoir 's The Girl

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Throughout history, women have constantly been objectified and forced into submission by the male dominated society. Simone de Beauvoir’s philosophical work, The Second Sex, echoes the intense oppression of women and reflects the first wave feminist movement. Her existentialist decoding of genders resulted in the idea of the Other, which explores the phenomenon of women forced into the role of an object, while men are the subject. In the second chapter, “The Girl”, Beauvoir further studies the idea of this oppression during one’s transition from a girl into a woman. Beauvoir states that no matter how much freedom and sense of self a girl holds, she is always forced into the role of the Other in society. Beauvoir 's idea of the Other held …show more content…

(Beauvoir 348)
Beauvoir claims that a girl going through adolescence must suppress their freedoms, sexual desires, and basic human tendencies to adhere to social pressures. It is unnatural for a female to be the subject and must “assume herself as a passive object”. A girl during the first would be forced into a role of a passive object, but Korra has completely withstood Beauvoir 's idea of girls being forced into a passive object during adolescence. She is the subject and the most dominate force within the series. She achieves the ideal of femininity with confining herself within the role of the Other. Unlike the Beauvoir’s idea of girls, Korra does not limit her freedoms and erotic tendencies to conform to social pressures. In season 4, episode 12, Korra and Asami reveal their budding relationship. This freedom to be open about her affections from another girl and the idea of bisexuality, in general, reinforces the difference between the first and the fourth wave of feminism. Korra doesn’t conform to social norms and pressures, but rather shatters the glass ceiling society places on women.
Jinora undermines Beauvoir’s idea of the father’s role in fostering the idea of Other in girls. She does so by possessing the ability to connect to the spirit world, which all male

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