Joan Murray 's Play By Play

In a patriarchal society, women are expected to conform to social restrictions by demonstrating reverence and obedience to the males in their lives. Shakespeare's tragic play, Romeo and Juliet, explores the effects of patriarchal authority exerted over women and how the patriarchal structure left no escape from it, save death. Through Juliet, Lady Capulet, and the Nurse, Shakespeare establishes a common understanding of this type of society, but illuminates three different reactions to the social oppression by portraying the responses of a passionate lover, an idyllic housewife, and an attendant.

Feminist critical lens examines certain texts with a primary focus on both gender’s relationship with each other and how such relationships demonstrate effects towards beliefs, behaviors, and values. This critical lens also examines a patriarchal-centered society and how such society define and interact with women with an emphasis on stereotypes of both genders that are present and evident in the text being analyzed. William Shakespeare’s Othello can be scrutinized through the feminist critical lens. A deep analysis focused on feminism of the play Othello paves way for the judgement of different societal status of women in the period when the play took place, the Elizabethan society. Othello is a best fit that demonstrates how men were

The feminist school has various goals when being used to scrutinize a piece of literature. As Gillespie points out, historically texts were written by males with primarily male protagonists, and thus, the male sentiment is most dominantly expressed in many works of literature. The lessened representation of women in literature is usually confined to typical stereotypes of the historical period. This can be seen in Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, and this will be further explored and discussed. Through the feminist lens, women’s presence and portrayal in the play, as well as the common stereotypes about women in Shakespearean society, can be studied carefully, despite the centuries that have passed between the play’s conception and the present. Additionally, as stated in Literary Theories: A Sampling of Critical Lenses,

The most prominent woman figure in this play is Linda, but the male characters in this play also give us insight into women’s roles and help feed the feminist analyses

When analysing these two plays under a gender or feminist lense it becomes obvious that feminism was not only present,

The works of William Shakespeare have long been used as a sources for areas of gender studies. Gender and sexuality are two notable themes in Shakespeare’s plays that are generally either used as tools of manipulation, forms of propaganda, and sometimes a mixture of both, depending on the genre of the play. These plays tend to reflect the social situation of the women who live through the Elizabethan Age. During the Renaissance, social construct of gender and sexuality norms are a part of society just as they are today. The assignment of gender roles in society reflects a gender hierarchy. While his works explore and often support the social constructs of femininity, “he is also a writer who questions, challenges, and modifies those representations” (Gerlach, et al).

Shakespeare’s play, “Twelfth Night” provides a great deal of insight into gender roles, gender identities, and desire in Elizabethan, as well as modern, society. Gender roles have also changed drastically over time. Many of the expectations and standards that woman, as well as men, were held to in Shakespearean times, no longer apply today. For example, women, and to a lesser extent, men, have become generally more free to pursue any career they wish. Partly because of the removal of such arbitrary restrictions, people tend to think that society as a whole has become more progressive over time, and in many cases, this is true.

These different expectations are set by the patriarchal society we live in. Women are treated as objects and property of men and they lose their agency as full human beings, especially in Shakespeare’s plays. They are no longer full human beings because they are being treated as objects. Society forces gender norms on both men and women, expecting men to have public power and influence. When

The play, A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare, demonstrates many aspects of a feminist approach to play writing. By examining the Athenian patriarchal order, male dominance, and the overall portrayal of women in the play, it becomes clear that Shakespeare is in favor of patriarchal order and a strongly male dominated society, much like the society in which the play was written in. During the time A Midsummer Night’s Dream, England was under a patriarchal order. “Even though there was an unmarried woman on the throne in Elizabethan England, women were still considered to be the weaker sex.

“Masculine and feminine roles are not biologically fixed but socially constructed” (Judith Butler). This essay will conclude that classic literature challenges the traditional roles of men and women whom strive to fulfill their full potential, hence needing to obtain traits from the opposite texts. A Streetcar Named Desire tells of a typical married couple living in Elysian Fields who becomes disturbed by their pesky in law whom interferes with their greatest priority, sex. Blanche interferes where she does not belong and hides a past of sexual and financial discrepancy making her a target for Stanley and the loss of her sanity. Hamlet describes a royal son’s tragedy of losing his father, but learns he was killed for power and greed.

Although all women were effected by men determining women’s behavior, largely middle class women suffered.  Men perpetrated an ideological prison that subjected and silenced women.” This was the pressing issue for the female role in both Chopin and Gilman. Mrs. Mallard and the woman mentally troubled were both feeling trapped in a marriage due to masculine oppression. Many women felt trapped in their marriage, as if they were equivalent to prisoners being mentally confined. Women should not submit to a male’s authority, this would be betraying her own identity and individuality. A woman cannot truly be an individual if she is always submitting to her partner. There must be compromises met that determine the outcome rather than one voice subjugating the other.

The play is comically pleasing, yet at the same time, there is emotional turmoil and discomfort in expected social behavior. According to the socially accepted rules during that time, men were with women. In recent years, society’s rules have become more forgiving, yet there are still zones of unacceptance. The social roles that Oscar Wilde pokes

I think this play is very different to me and my fellow colleague’s because sexism is rare to see day to day in our environment. Even if this isn’t rare to see on a day to day basis, we rarely experience sexist remarks to women. Nor does our generation work in such a class based society, which diversifies jobs based their gender. Our society encourages jobs to be the goal and to have a fulfilling career, which can provide for the rest of someone’s life.

For hundreds of years people have been trying to achieve equal society. The 20th century has become the breakthrough era in advocating the rights of people from different social categories. Although a great variety of civil rights movements emerged during the second half of the 20th century, feminism became one of the most important ideologies of that time, which have drastically changed the lives of modern people. Developed as political and social movement that had an aim to unite women and achieve gender equality, feminism appeared to be an ideology that divides women rather than helps all women benefit from the expected unity. Facing numerous challenges of the feminist movement, modern women are less likely to call themselves the advocators of feminism than their mothers or grandmothers. The evolution of feminism resulted in a wide range of problems, which even worsened the problems of females from lower classes. Several plays of the 20th century describe the lives of women and the challenges they must overcome to achieve happiness and satisfaction. The plays Top Girls (1982) by Caryl Churchill and A Taste of Honey by Shelagh Delaney have an aim to reveal the core problems of this ideology. For this reason, it can be useful to understand the essence of feminism on the example Caryl Churchill’s Top Girls and Shelagh Delaney’s A Taste of Honey (1958), identify the appropriateness of this plays for current realities, and discuss the theme A Past Concealed, A Present

The play, placed at eminent place to the libertine, whose pursuit of sexual conquests seemed to reinforce the views of women as little more than sexual diversions for men. Despite Behn’s political investment in this upper-class concept of manhood, critics and scholars have ‘argued that her plays simply just offer celebrations of libertine masculinity.’ (Staves, 2004: 81)