Gender Roles In The Anglo-Saxon Era Till The Present Time

Most stories in their way are timeless in the moral they represent, but what about Anglo-Saxon literature makes it relevant to this day? Considering these types of stories are still being written, the core values apply to all times. Beowulf fights for glory and saves his people, thus embodying our code of good surpassing evil; Sir Gawain representing chastity and keeping oneself honorable, or “their word”. To illustrate, stories such as the Lord of The Rings; letting oneself fall to greed then overcome it, still echo the Anglo-Saxon tropes. In addition, The Hunger Games series pulls inspiration from these texts by keeping the core concept of fighting for the cause of your people. In conclusion, Beowulf and Sir Gawain haven’t “grown

Beowulf represents all of those values. The story starts with King Hrothgar of the Danes celebrating his region by building a bar called Heorot. He holds a feast there; the loud music and laughter makes Grendel attack the hall at night. The bloodshed and loss of warriors lasts twelve years. Word spreads of Grendel’s attack to the Geats. Beowulf decides to help them. Beowulf and his men arrive to help the Danes. They wait for Grendel to attack Heorot, when he does, Beowulf tears Grendel’s arm from the socket. Grendel runs to his lair where he dies. Grendel’s arm is nailed to the wall in Heorot. Grendel’s mother comes to the hall for revenge of her son. Beowulf goes to defeat her at her lair at the bottom of the lake where Grendel’s mother is waiting to attack. They battle but Beowulf’s sword cannot hurt her; he finds another sword near by which slices her head off. He then goes to find the dead Grendel to cut off his head as a trophy. Everyone is waiting at the surface of the lake and because it is taking such a long time that they have gave up hope. Beowulf comes up victorious and with treasures; they all celebrate. Beowulf returns to his home, fifteen years later a fire-breathing dragon is terrorizing the Geats. Beowulf being the hero that he is goes to fight the dragon. The arm that he brings runs in fear except Wiglaf. They battle the dragon; the dragon was beheaded. During the battle, Beowulf had been bitten and later dies from the poisonous venom

In Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, he introduces a character known as the Wife of Bath. It is her turn to tell the stories, and her tale begins discussing her past marriages in the prologue. Married five times, the Wife of Bath tells us about her own marital issues, and the way she was able to manipulate the gender roles to her own advantage. As interesting of a character as she is, I find Chaucer created the Wife of Bath to deliberately introduce the issues gender roles play in our society. I believe that the role the of the Wife of Bath in the tale was purposely written by Chaucer to twist the traditional gender roles of the time, satirizing how gender plays in society.

Humbleness was also key for an Anglo-Saxon hero as it proved respectability and honor towards the hero. Anglo-Saxons wanted their hero to prove their strength and courage, however, they did not want the hero to become a dictator of any kind. Strong friendships were known as the most trustable alliances an Anglo-Saxon hero could form for battles (Trekker2392). It was key for an Anglo-Saxon hero to have the ability to create strong friendships around him. Beowulf perfectly identifies to all five of these main characteristics throughout the epic poem.

Women have had many different roles in the history of European literature but have generally been restricted to the roles assigned to them in a largely patriarchal society. As a result of this society, these roles have often been powerless ones. This calls into question the constitution of a powerful woman in literature: in Beowulf, being a powerful woman means becoming the bond between families and alliances; in Lanval, power comes from assertion and control-- a powerful woman is a woman in charge. The primary difference between the representation of women in Beowulf and Lanval is that the latter transcends overarching patriarchal boundaries, and the former does not; the reason for their respective representations lies in the literary time periods in which the stories were written. From this, one can see that the introduction of romance as a central theme gave way to new representations and roles of women in predominantly heteropatriarchal English literature and gives new meaning to the analysis of stories like these.

Each individual culture has many cultural truths that a group of people follow and believe in. Cultural truths are principles, values, or standards important to a group of people, which display moral behaviors that are respected and immoral actions that are scorned at. Also, cultural truths are norms in a society that you are born into and are expected to do daily because they shape the lifestyle of a group. For example, during the Anglo-Saxon period, there were a number of cultural truths that were applied to everyday actions and attitudes. An epic poem, composed based on the Anglo-Saxon period called Beowulf, written by an unknown author translated by Seamus Heaney, depicts many of the cultural values of the time period. In the poem, is it revealed that all the cultural values in the Anglo-Saxon culture are developed from the idea of a warrior culture. The epic poem is about a hero named Beowulf from the Geats tribe who goes off and helps Hrothgar and the Danes defeat a monster, Grendel, who attacks their mead hall. Before Beowulf meets his fate he fights three monsters, which includes Grendel, to protect the lives of people in two different tribes. Within the epic poem Beowulf, there are several of cultural values presented and focused on such as, courage in battle, fidelity to one’s word, and loyalty to kinsmen, which are all demonstrated by Beowulf.

In John Osborne 's 1956 piece, Look Back in Anger, housewife Alison Porter is faced with the difficult decision of remaining in a toxic marriage or returning to live with her parents. Indeed, Alison is the archetype of the 1950s British woman, as depicted in both academic and popular discourse—meek, miserable and resigned to her fate as mother and housewife. While such a paradigm of the 1950s woman has long remained unchallenged, historians have begun to suggest that this stereotype is inaccurate and misleading, and overlooks the complexity of female gender roles during Britain of this era. When reviewing the literature on this topic, what emerges as a clear point of tension between academics is whether the 1950s was a static or a dynamic

Every culture has its own set of beliefs values and customs. Cultural beliefs, values, and assumptions are directly and indirectly acquired throughout a lifetime. A culture is the sum of a group’s way of life and this is no different with the ancient Anglo Saxon culture. Cultures usually have distinct figures that reflect their culture as a whole. The importance of religion, values, and heroes are reflected a great deal in the epic poem of Beowulf accurately showing the Anglo Saxon culture as a whole.

There are many known periods that we know lead to the development of the modern era and the Anglo-Saxon period is the oldest known period of time that had a complex culture with stable government, art and literature. This period is a time filled with great advancements and discoveries in government, religion, literature, and art. Cultures of Anglo-Saxon society and modern society have many similarities as well as differences. There are many differences between this period and the modern era we live in today in terms of politics, social climate, values, social hierarchy, the role of women, military, government and language. In this essay, I am going to focus on the differences of the two periods in terms of values, role of women and language in the society.

During the medieval times, women were not seen as they are today. Although in the world today there are still those who are full of misogyny, it was much more common and intense during this time period. Women during the middle ages had specific roles assigned to them in society. These roles depended on the type of women they were, whether it be a peasant, noble woman, or an evil temptress. These roles that women have served have shown up in numerous stories from the middle ages including: Beowulf, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and The Wife’s Lament.

What are values? Values are things which are important to one, and will determine one’s priorities. During the Anglo-Saxon era, there were values which remain the same till this day. Loyalty and courage play a big -roll in today’s values, as much as it did during the Anglo – Saxon time.

The roles Anglo-Saxon women played in their society depended on the status they had in their community. As in most cultures, the roles of women in Anglo-Saxon society included mother, wife, caregiver, and teacher. Because Anglo-Saxon women had many different roles, I will only focus here on marriage, divorce, and their daily life in their society.

Beowulf is known for displaying the importance of male heroism via Beowulf, but what about the significance of the women in the poem? The significance of women in Beowulf is overshadowed by the great heroism of the character Beowulf, but the women each have a reason for participating in the epic. The ideal woman was someone who was a noble, a mistress and loyal. An ideal woman is described in Maxim I: “at mead drinking she must at all times and places approach the protector of princes first, in front of the companions, quickly pass the first cup to her lord’s hand”. The significance of women in Beuwolf is a minor detail in the epic, but proves to be vital to Beuwolf. The epic of "Beowulf" illustrates three major roles for the women in the society: the hostess, the peacemaker, and the monster. Five women in Beowulf play the major roles throughout the epic: Wealhtheow, Freawaru, Thyrth, Grendel's Mother, and Hildeburh. These women entertain, bring peace, and contradict societal expectations of the female gender, either directly or indirectly.

Beowulf, the hero of Anglo-Saxon epic, had many adventures, and many companions and fellow-warriors are mentioned throughout his story. Some of them seem noble and courageous, truly living up to the standards of their culture; some seem cowardly. But all have gained immortality in the words, many times transcribed and translated, of the famous epic. However, the women of the time are rarely mentioned in Beowulf. Still, even from those few women who are mentioned and from other documents of the era, it is possible to see the position of women in of Anglo-Saxon society. In many cases, they enjoyed more rights than women in later Medieval cultures.

During the Anglo-Saxon period, women were seen as inferior to the man, even though they had certain responsibilities to carry out that had a positive influence on the society. Aside from their specific responsibilities, they did whatever they were told by their husbands the women were not allowed to disagree or question him; any sign of insubordination would be considered in adequate. They were to attain dignity and give the upmost respect to their husband by taking on the role as a wife. In addition, many of the women, if mentioned in a story or conversation, would be referred to as “wife”, “daughter”, opposed to their actual name. An example of this is present where the narrator stated “He was four times a father, this father prince: one by they entered the world, Heorogar, Hrothgar, the good Halga and a daughter, I have heard…” (7).