In Alice Munro’s “Boys and Girls” the narrator rejects the idea that she is just a girl and try as she might to avoid it she gradually grows to accept her status of just a girl. The narrator in the story is a young girl who desperately wants the acceptance of her father and tries to achieve it by being anything but a girl, much to the chagrin of her mother and grandmother. After experiencing the brutality of the work her father performs as a fox farmer she realizes that maybe being just a girl isn’t such a bad thing. Over the course of the story, the narrator gradually begins to accept her status as a girl and the acceptance of her role in society sneaks up on her and before she knows it she has accepted her fate. “Boys and Girls” is set in a rural town in the Northern United States, on a fox farm, where a family of four lives. The narrator is the daughter of the farmer and she works tirelessly for her father trying to prove that she is worthy of his acceptance and love. The narrator views her father as the person she would gain her identity from she, “was shy of him” but “nevertheless, worked diligently under his eyes, and with a feeling of pride” (Munro 155). The narrator finds her father’s approval when he introduces her to a salesman as his “new hired hand” (Munro …show more content…
The narrator is ashamed that “tears flooded her eyes” (Munro 162) but her father in good humor says that “she’s only a girl” (Munro 162) for the first time she doesn’t protest or rebel against the notion. Instead, she admits that even in her heart she couldn’t protest that maybe she was just a girl. She has finally come to accept that she can’t change what is, but that her father doesn’t need her to be something that she isn’t to accept her. The change was gradual and then all at once, she realized that it wasn’t so bad being just a
Munro uses a fox farm for the setting of Boys and Girls to bring out many of the social issues between genders. While her father worked outside doing all the labor work, her mother stayed inside cooking and cleaning, “it was an odd thing to see my mother down at the barn” (Munro 12). The girl was very resentful towards her mother, mostly because she did not agree with the stereotypical life that her mother led. Causing the girl to spend more time helping her father around the farm. The girl would help feed the foxes, “cut the long grass, and the lamb’s quarter and flowering money-musk” (Munro 10). Although when she turned eleven, things started to change causing the girl to not only observe gender differences between her mother and father but to experience it between her and her brother Laird when working around the farm. While Laird became more predominant with helping on the farm, the girl became less valuable to her father and was forced to help her mother around the house.
The poem starts with the line, “This girlchild was born as usual,” which suggests that as soon as a girl is born, society already expects her to learn the role she will soon play in when she hits puberty (1). Thus, showing why we are given dolls as little girls to illustrate how we should act and appear according to society. After we learn all the roles we will soon take part in, “the magic of puberty,” hits and girls immediately begin applying the ideals to their own lives (5). As if this attempt to conform is not enough we have other people telling us we are not to perfect. “You have a great big nose and fat legs,” says a classmate to the girl (6). This type of pressure can slowly but surely destroy even the little confidence women do have in themselves.
The mother cautions her daughter endlessly, emphasising on how much she wants her to realize her role in the society by acting like a woman in order to be respected by the community and the world at large. Thus, Jamaica Kincaid’s work argues that traditional gender roles are learned because at a young age children are taught how to act masculine and feminine. According to Carol Baileys article on Performance and the Gendered Body in Jamaica Kincaid’s ‘Girl’ “The poem is a fictional representation of the double-edged tendencies which involve child-rearing practices in many Caribbean societies: as the mother provides guidelines for living, the moments of care are constantly weakened by the severity evident in what the mother is actually saying and the fact that her daughter is lectured with little room for discussion” (Carol Bailey 106). The instructions in the poem “Girl” reveal an effective performance of gender roles assigned to women in the Caribbean societies, which shows significant acts in domestic, social, and other spheres.
She tells the girl to “walk like a lady” (320), “hem a dress when you see the hem coming down”, and “behave in front of boys you don’t know very well” (321), so as not to “become the slut you are so bent on becoming” (320). The repetition of the word “slut” and the multitude of rules that must be obeyed so as not to be perceived as such, indicates that the suppression of sexual desire is a particularly important aspect of being a proper woman in a patriarchal society. The young girl in this poem must deny her sexual desires, a quality intrinsic to human nature, or she will be reprimanded for being a loose woman. These restrictions do not allow her to experience the freedom that her male counterparts
Munro, Alice ““Boys and Girls” Viewpoints 11. Ed, Amanda Joseph and Wendy Mathieu. Alexandria, VA: Prentice Hall, 2001. Print.
During the Victorian Era, society had idealized expectations that all members of their culture were supposedly striving to accomplish. These conditions were partially a result of the development of middle class practices during the “industrial revolution… [which moved] men outside the home… [into] the harsh business and industrial world, [while] women were left in the relatively unvarying and sheltered environments of their homes” (Brannon 161). This division of genders created the ‘Doctrine of Two Spheres’ where men were active in the public Sphere of Influence, and women were limited to the domestic private Sphere of Influence. Both genders endured considerable pressure to conform to the idealized status of becoming either a masculine ‘English Gentleman’ or a feminine ‘True Woman’. The characteristics required women to be “passive, dependent, pure, refined, and delicate; [while] men were active, independent, coarse …strong [and intelligent]” (Brannon 162). Many children's novels utilized these gendere...
In Alice Munro’s “Boys and Girls,” there is a time line in a young girl’s life when she leaves childhood and its freedoms behind to become a woman. The story depicts hardships in which the protagonist and her younger brother, Laird, experience in order to find their own rite of passage. The main character, who is nameless, faces difficulties and implications on her way to womanhood because of gender stereotyping. Initially, she tries to prevent her initiation into womanhood by resisting her parent’s efforts to make her more “lady-like”. The story ends with the girl socially positioned and accepted as a girl, which she accepts with some unease.
“I've told her and I've told her: daughter, you have to teach that child the facts of life before it's too late” (Hopkinson 1). These are the first three lines of Nalo Hopkinson's short story “Riding the Red”, a modern adaptation of Charles Perrault's “Little Red Riding Hood”. In his fairy tale Perrault prevents girls from men's nature. In Hopkinson's adaptation, the goal remains the same: through the grandmother biographic narration, the author elaborates a slightly revisited plot without altering the moral: young girls should beware of men; especially when they seem innocent.
She wrote this novel to inform readers that there are differences and similarities between the genders of male and female and how each of their minds work. She says, In other words, when we are not thinking of ourselves as “male” or “female” our judgements are the same. This quote directly shows us that she is trying to tell us what life is like with each gender.
Alice Munro’s “Boys and Girls” is a story about a girl that struggles against society’s ideas of how a girl should be, only to find her trapped in the ways of the world.
“Girls wear jeans and cut their hair short and wear shirts and boots because it is okay to be a boy; for a girl it is like promotion. But for a boy to look like a girl is degrading, according to you, because secretly you believe that being a girl is degrading” (McEwan 55-56). Throughout the history of literature women have been viewed as inferior to men, but as time has progressed the idealistic views of how women perceive themselves has changed. In earlier literature women took the role of being the “housewife” or the household caretaker for the family while the men provided for the family. Women were hardly mentioned in the workforce and always held a spot under their husband’s wing. Women were viewed as a calm and caring character in many stories, poems, and novels in the early time period of literature. During the early time period of literature, women who opposed the common role were often times put to shame or viewed as rebels. As literature progresses through the decades and centuries, very little, but noticeable change begins to appear in perspective to the common role of women. Women were more often seen as a main character in a story setting as the literary period advanced. Around the nineteenth century women were beginning to break away from the social norms of society. Society had created a subservient role for women, which did not allow women to stand up for what they believe in. As the role of women in literature evolves, so does their views on the workforce environment and their own independence. Throughout the history of the world, British, and American literature, women have evolved to become more independent, self-reliant, and have learned to emphasize their self-worth.
The folk tale of “Little Red Riding Hood” has numerous variations and interpretations depending on what recorded version is being read or analyzed. “Little Red Cap,” by the Grimm Brothers, and “The Grandmother,” as collected by Achille Millien, are different in numerous ways: the depth of the narrative structure, characters involved, length – yet, the moral lesson is largely unchanged between the two versions. One of the more glaring differences between the two versions is the way that the narrator and the actions of the characters are used to describe the young girl, female, and the wolf, male. Being either female or male are matters of biological makeup. The characteristics of femininity and masculinity that are associated with being female or male, however, are socially and culturally defined. How do these different descriptions inform gender construction, and more specifically, how do gender constructions help to naturalize stereotypes within the collective conscience of society?
Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning and also the basis of education. Curiosity had killed the cat indeed, however the cat died nobly. Lives of Girls and Women is a novel written by Nobel Prize Literature winner, Alice Munro. This novel is about a young girl, Del Jordan, who lives on Flats Road, Ontario. The novel is divided into eight chapters; and each chapter refers to a new, unique event in Del's life. As an overall analysis of the book reveals that Del Jordan's intriguing curiosity has helped her throughout her life, and enabled her to gain further knowledge The character is often seen in scenarios where her attention is captivated, and through the process of learning she acquires information in order to her answers her questions about particular subjects. There are many examples in the book that discuss Del’s life, and how she managed to gain information, as well as learn different methods of learning along the way.
Many people think that boys in our culture today are brought up to define their identities through heroic individualism and competition, particularly through separation from home, friends, and family in an outdoors world of work and doing. Girls, on the other hand, are brought up to define their identities through connection, cooperation, self-sacrifice, domesticity, and community in an indoor world of love and caring. This view of different male and female roles can be seen throughout children’s literature. Treasure Island and The Secret Garden are two novels that are an excellent portrayal of the narrative pattern of “boy and girl” books.
While growing up, many girls could not see their selves beyond the age of twenty one, they had no image of their own future, of themselves as women. Young girls were afraid of growing up and being like their mothers. They were afraid of being a teenage mother and having to stay home all day taking care of the house and their children, as shown in the literary work by Alice Walker. The Color Purple introduces us to the life of a young woman that was given away by her stepfather in order to work in the fields and take care of her new husband’s children. “She ain’t no stranger to hard work. And she clean. And God done fixed her. You can do everything just like you want and she ain’t gonna make you feed it or clothe it” mentioned her stepfather as he gives her away without considering she is a human being and refers to her as a meaningless object. After years of being dominated by men, women felt there was a need for a new identity. A battle for women’s freedom began, to participate in the major work and decisions of society as the equals of men and began to deny their nature as women. An act of rebellion and a violent denial of women identity led the passionate feminist to forge new trails for women. Women had to prove they were humans just like men, they were not a passive, empty mirror, not a useless decoration, nor a mindless animal