What Gender Roles Mean to People of This Time:
Gender roles are really big and important to this time period because they have an impact on everything like music, writing, and important people. Women are just starting to stand up for themselves and demand that they be treated equally, and they are trying to change their gender roles, while the men feel like theirs is in jeopardy because of this. Alice Walker does a great job of showing what gender roles really are in her book, “The Color Purple”.
In “The Color Purple” every character has a gender role whether it is a man or a woman. The characters feel very strongly for their gender roles, where some want to change theirs, and some want to keep them the same. Like Sofia, who is fighting the normal woman gender role by doing whatever she wants and what needs to be done, and not worrying about being a woman. The character Harpo feels as if he is not filling his gender role because he does not act like every man around him. Harpo thinks that he needs to beat his wife (who is Sofia) to be an actual man.
Obviously gender roles play a big part in this time, as it is popular in books written. Maybe Alice Walker felt as if her life was affected by gender roles, and that’s why it was such an importance in “The Color Purple”. If I had to guess I’d say that Alice felt as if she was more like Sofia, in the way that she stood up against gender roles, because she made it very clear on where Sofia stood on the subject.
Another example where set gender roles occur is in "From Dust Tracks on a Road," by Zora Hurston. It seems as if the women take care of the children most and watch out for them. Zora's Grandmother worried about Zora's "forward ways," and would tell Zora to get down off the gatepost. Once Zora read excellently in front of her class, the visitors wanted her to come see them at a hotel the next day. Who did Zora tell of this great event? Of course she told her mother, and her mother was there trying to clean Zora up and get her looking spiffy. Gender roles were set in place because you sure didn't see grandpa or dad trying to clean Zora up. Zora's mother was always there to keep Zora in line, like that one time Zora repeated what she overheard her neighbor say. Her mom "licked" Zora a few times and then locked her in her room with only "The Bible."
Alice Walker also displays this theme in her short story "Everyday Use." The mother in this short story is described with the characteristics of a man according to Alice Walker. The mother is a big boned woman, and she does all the "man" work around the house, like cleaning hogs, and working outside all day. Men and women appear to have different set gender roles, but in this story, Alice Walker shows this mother fulfills both roles. The motherly role tends to be caring for children and doing housework, while the fatherly role seems to be doing outdoor, and hard, laborious, and dirty work. The mother also takes care of Maggie by not letting her other daughter Dee walk over her when Dee wants the quilt that should belong to Maggie. It's clear through the way Alice Walker put things in this text, that she thinks men and women have different roles in life. This is a very worthwhile text definitely worth checking out. http://xroads.virginia.edu/~ug97/quilt/walker.html
In “The Color Purple” every character has a gender role whether it is a man or a woman. The characters feel very strongly for their gender roles, where some want to change theirs, and some want to keep them the same. Like Sofia, who is fighting the normal woman gender role by doing whatever she wants and what needs to be done, and not worrying about being a woman. The character Harpo feels as if he is not filling his gender role because he does not act like every man around him. Harpo thinks that he needs to beat his wife (who is Sofia) to be an actual man.
Obviously gender roles play a big part in this time, as it is popular in books written. Maybe Alice Walker felt as if her life was affected by gender roles, and that’s why it was such an importance in “The Color Purple”. If I had to guess I’d say that Alice felt as if she was more like Sofia, in the way that she stood up against gender roles, because she made it very clear on where Sofia stood on the subject.
Another example where set gender roles occur is in "From Dust Tracks on a Road," by Zora Hurston. It seems as if the women take care of the children most and watch out for them. Zora's Grandmother worried about Zora's "forward ways," and would tell Zora to get down off the gatepost. Once Zora read excellently in front of her class, the visitors wanted her to come see them at a hotel the next day. Who did Zora tell of this great event? Of course she told her mother, and her mother was there trying to clean Zora up and get her looking spiffy. Gender roles were set in place because you sure didn't see grandpa or dad trying to clean Zora up. Zora's mother was always there to keep Zora in line, like that one time Zora repeated what she overheard her neighbor say. Her mom "licked" Zora a few times and then locked her in her room with only "The Bible."
Alice Walker also displays this theme in her short story "Everyday Use." The mother in this short story is described with the characteristics of a man according to Alice Walker. The mother is a big boned woman, and she does all the "man" work around the house, like cleaning hogs, and working outside all day. Men and women appear to have different set gender roles, but in this story, Alice Walker shows this mother fulfills both roles. The motherly role tends to be caring for children and doing housework, while the fatherly role seems to be doing outdoor, and hard, laborious, and dirty work. The mother also takes care of Maggie by not letting her other daughter Dee walk over her when Dee wants the quilt that should belong to Maggie. It's clear through the way Alice Walker put things in this text, that she thinks men and women have different roles in life. This is a very worthwhile text definitely worth checking out. http://xroads.virginia.edu/~ug97/quilt/walker.html