Gender In Peter Pan's Portrayal Of Womanhood

Patriarchy is described as a general structure where men hold the position of power of women. This could include being head of the household, ‘upper level’ in the workplace, or leader in society. Cinema falls under this patriarchal institution by constantly constructing ideological images of women. Since the beginning, women in film are “made to conform to the ideal image that the man has of them” (Smelik, 496) by power or sexual desires. Essentially, Hollywood cinema is structured for the male audience, therefore majority of films are classified as patriarchal. A lot has to do with how female characters are portrayed and if there is a male gaze in the film. Although the film has a female lead and focuses on women, Pan’s Labyrinth is constructed

Anne Sexton was a junior-college dropout who, inspired by emotional distress, became a poet. She won the Pulitzer Prize as well as three honorary doctorates. Her poems usually dealt with intensely personal, often feminist, subject matter due to her tortured relationships with gender roles and the place of women in society. The movies, women’s magazines and even some women’s schools supported the notion that decent women took naturally to homemaking and mothering (Schulman). Like others of her generation, Sexton was frustrated by this fixed feminine role society was encouraging. Her poem “Cinderella” is an example of her views, and it also introduces a new topic of how out of touch with reality fairy tales often are. In “Cinderella”, Anne Sexton uses tone and symbolism to portray her attitude towards traditional gender roles and the unrealistic life of fairy tales.

Three plays, five movies, and two television shows. The story of Peter Pan has lived on for over one hundred years, dating back to the original play in 1906. Filled with mythical fairies, mermaids, and pirates, J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan is a beloved story centering around the adventures of Peter Pan, and the Darling Children. Wendy Darling, along with her two brothers fly to the island of Neverland, a place that had lived in their imagination for years, but the true story is unbenounced to most everyone who has read the text or seen the movie. How could such an innocent story have such a dark background?

Snow White is a fairy-tale known by many generations; it is a beloved Disney movie, and a princess favoured by many kids. But did you know the fairy-tale was made to teach young children, especially little girls, their duties in life? It also values beauty over knowledge, portrays women to be naive and incompetent, and assumes that women cannot understand anything other than common household chores. Throughout this criticism, I will be using the feminist lens to analyze the fairy-tale, Snow White, through the perspective of a feminist.

Anne Sexton was a junior-college dropout who, inspired by emotional distress, became a poet. She won the Pulitzer Prize as well as three honorary doctorates. Her poems usually dealt with intensely personal, often feminist, subject matter due to her tortured relationships with gender roles and the place of women in society. The movies, women’s magazines and even some women’s schools supported the notion that decent women took naturally to homemaking and mothering (Schulman). Like others of her generation, Sexton was frustrated by this fixed feminine role society was encouraging. Her poem “Cinderella” is an example of her views, and it also introduces a new topic of how out of touch with reality fairy tales often are. In “Cinderella”, Anne Sexton uses tone and symbolism to portray her attitude towards traditional gender roles and the unrealistic life of fairy tales.

In the play, gender is portrayed through what society believes to be the masculine and feminine gender role. It is natural for us to see men as protectors and women as the nurturers. This gender role is portrayed in the play in many ways. Peter Pan was not only the leader of the group but he was the protector. In the play Tootles states “I am always afraid of the pirates the petter is not here to protect us”(pg 1323) . Most boys at a young age are expected to be ruff and boyish and play with swords as the lost boys portrayed all these things. Ms. Darling is warm and caring for her children, making sure they are safe and reading them bedtime stories. This is the first example where women are portrayed as the nurturer. The Lost boys do not have

Throughout this essay I will be comparing and contrasting I’m glad I’m a Boy! I’m glad I’m a Girl! And William’s Doll. Both of these stories touch upon gender stereotypes and the characters not conforming to it. In the 20th century picture books began minimizing the discrimination against female characters, but these books say otherwise.

At first glance, J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan appears to be an innocent literary depiction of a young boy who wishes to never grow up—thus, remaining a child. Peter Pan, the story’s main protagonist, poses as the mischievous and youthful boy who spends his eternal life seeking adventures and leading the Lost Boys through the make-believe island, Neverland. Peter acquires the company of a young British girl by the name of Wendy Darling and her two little brothers, John and Michael Darling. In the company of the British children, Pan travels back to Neverland to primarily utilise Wendy for her motherly-expertise. Further inquiry and literary analysis of the 1904 novel leads readers to believe there is more to the story than what can be seen at first glance. Peter Pan is one of many novels subject to feminist literary criticism; the novel displays an array of male characters with very few female characters to contrast. Furthermore, female characters can be seen as passive, and frequently submit to paternal authority. In Peter Pan, women are assigned specific roles that mirror the responsibilities of those in the Victorian Era. The demeaning and gender-stereotypical interpretation of women coupled with the encouragement of male dominance places the story under criticism for its subjugation of women. In essence, the female characters are subject to the gender stereotypes and societal norms of the Victorian era in which they are

At the time of this novel, women’s rights were non-existent. According to Lexa W. Lee “women had been confined to the home in traditional roles of wife and mother”. It was very difficult for women during this time to get a job besides their house work. Women were very reliant on their husbands not just for money; if they wanted a divorce, they were shunned. Moreover, women were responsible for the children because of their gender. J.M. Barrie breaks this stereotype with his unique and outcast of a character, Tinker Bell. Barrie carries it for the most part of the book with Wendy Darling. In other words Barrie disagrees with gender equality by, portraying Tinker Bell as the outcast for not letting Peter Pan treat her like he does Wendy. Since

    This study defines the feminism aspect of our princess, Cinderella. Cinderella stands up for what she believes in, allowing herself to be her own hero. As she grows older in that demeaning family, she realizes her worth and what she is beyond capable of. Although she is passive towards her family who mistreats her, she still believes that she is doing it all for the right reasons. Cinderella was brainwashed by her family but it didn’t stop her from going out on a whim to be who she desires to be.

The biggest challenge while researching and writing this paper was strictly presenting scholastic and objective arguments in order to avoid bias and reduce critics’ opportunity to discredit or delegitimize my work, especially those who oppose feminism. Presenting a rebuttal statement and then counteracting it with more critical arguments of how that specific repudiation is problematic, acknowledges critical audiences’ concerns while remaining adamantly strong in my stance. I was conscious to pay the respected attention to detail when selecting rhetoric language as it conveys the appropriated tone and mood of the paper to the reader as it represents the film. Just as typical research papers require, my primary source, The Little Mermaid, is immediately and easily identifiable within the paper, and unlike most scholarly works, the analyzed topic is the primary source itself. However, the problematic dynamics the film presents based on the sexist theme it poses, may be too broad and largely based without adequately supportive and specified examples from the film. This was another one of the concerns I had when I first began to construct my paper because there were so many different examples of female

When someone mentions the name “Cinderella”, the first thing that usually comes to our minds is the fairytale in which the fair maiden who works so hard yet it treated so poorly gains her “fairytale ending” with a wave of a magic wand. However, the fairytale of Cinderella written by the Grimm Brothers has multiple differences in plot from the fairytale we all usually think of. The plot of the Cinderella written by the Grimm Brothers, written in 1812, is that a young female’s mother passes away early in the story, departing with the message to Cinderella to remain “pious and good”. Cinderella remained true to this message given to her by her mother, and she showed this in her work ethic. Because Cinderella had remained pious and good, her mother, in return, watched over her in the form of the birds above her grave that gave Cinderella help and material things that she needed. In the end, Cinderella has her “happily ever after”, for when the prince held a festival to find a new bride, she was chosen due to her insurmountable beauty. The feminist lens critiques how females are commonly represented in texts, and how insufficient these representations are as a categorizing device. These representations of women often include them being passive and emotional—staying back while the men do the work. Cinderella relates to the feminist lens because she fits into the typical representations of women created by men. Feminist criticism is important to recognize because women are often falsely represented as helpless, thus needing a man to come to their rescue. It is common in literature to see helpless women, crying and begging for help instead of being able to work out their own problems and hardships. Others, however, may believe that it is still important to uphold the fundamentals of the feminist lens because it keeps the man in power, which they say is important in keeping the man the head of the household. Cinderella thoroughly represents the feminist lens because it shows how women in literature uphold the representations of passive and emotional, created by the man.

Once upon a time in a land not so far away, the society of man created the idea that it was a woman’s job to conform to the ideologies generated in fairy tales. From women depending on their prince charmings all the way to romanticized sexual abuse and lack of consent, stories like Cinderella and Snow White radiate sexism within an array of scenes of the stories and films. Not only does this affect the way that men view women, but it has had a relatively negative effect on the ways that many women view themselves. Many fairy tales have made their way into mainstream culture, and today many young girls and boys grow up hearing and seeing the subliminal messages in fairy tales. As more and more fairy tales make their way onto the big screen, it can be seen that all princesses seem to share a common feature other than their crowns and lack of self worth without a man by their side; their tiny waists. In recent years during the 21st century more and more people in the media have been calling out fairy tales for their anti-feminist attitudes with sexism, body standards as well as societal comments about women being dependent on men.

Children fairy tales are some of the first books we’re introduced to growing up. Typically, the princess is saved by the heroic prince and they lived “happily ever after”. Some may think our life should be like a fairy tales while others don’t. These tales created gender roles in which appeared to be very important. In the Grimm Brothers fairy tale, “Hansel and Gretel”, the parents leave the children in the forest to starve due to not having enough money to buy food in order to sustain life. The children later find a house deep in the woods where an old, evil witch lures them in and tried to eat Hansel and Gretel. They eventually kill the witch and find their way home to their father with no stepmother to be found as she has died while the children were away. In the fairy tale, “Hansel and Gretel” gender and feminist criticism are highlighted throughout the tale by defining characteristics, consequences from their actions, and societal roles and expectations that were both prominent in German history and modern society.

For years, in the on stage productions of Peter Pan, the boy who never grows up was being portrayed by, a girl. The ambiguity surrounding Peter’s gender is portrayed from the start with this choice. And while it is possible that the original director of the Peter Pan story simply chose Nina Boucicault because of her skill or size, the decision to continue the tradition cannot be considered accidental. Through this deliberate choice to cast females into the male lead, we get to see Peter’s gender confusion from the first moment we see him or her on stage. And this idea of gender confusion is not only found in this character alone. We are also able to see this gender conflict elsewhere in Never Land and London. Specifically, through the characters of George Darling and Captain Hook. Captain Hook, is a male character that exhibits characteristics that would be considered specifically “masculine” and characteristics that would be considered “feminine”. Hook does not limit himself to one gender. Through his outfits, actions, and speech, Hook exudes femininity and through this, compromises his pure masculinity. And George Darling is an adult male, who in that society, would have been at the top of the social hierarchy. However, we are able to see through his actions that he wishes to possess some characteristics that would be considered “feminine”. Conflicting his gender role as the “alpha male” within his household. Peter Pan, plays with the normal gender ideas through the