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Uncle Tom's Cabin Gender Roles

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For this essay I will be analyzing the role of women in Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. In the 19th century it was common for the man to be the head of the house while the women sat back and did all the cleaning, cooking, and taking care of the children. However, when looking at the main and minor characters in the novel, the audience just sees one perspective of these women until digging deeper and realize they all have a specific purpose that is just not as obvious. It also exercises the sense of good and evil in female roles and encourages the use of wisdom and power as a force for social change. Stowe is able to create a vast assortment of female individuals to cover all the different viewpoints women could have in this time period. This novel exemplifies how important children are to women, how gender roles are established, how stereotypical women’s personalities are, and finally how they influence their morals on their family. …show more content…

They believe in morals and separating the right from their wrong. It was their duty to keep their husbands on the right religious track and try and use their own influence with their husbands to try and help abolish of slavery. Throughout the novel, Stowe argues that women had the ability to shape other people’s morals around them. A quote in the book illustrates how Mrs. Bird manipulated her opinions on her husband when he had to follow certain rules regarding slavery. “O, nonsense, John! You can talk all night, but you wouldn’t do it. I put it to you, John, -- would you now turn away a poor, shivering, hungry creature from your door, because he was a runaway? Would you, now (73)? Mrs. Bird is able to use her beliefs and morals and imply them onto her husband to make sure he does the humane thing. She may not be able to make a rash decisions, but she is able to make her husband second guess what is morally

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