Little Nonconformists When a book published in 1868 with the name “Little Women” is given to you, one would think that the story inside is about the lives of prim and proper young women, and it almost is. But Louisa May Alcott’s character Josephine “Jo” March chips away at society’s carefully constructed gender conforming mold. Her actions and speech appall most of the other characters in the novel, but there is one boy who is unbothered by it all. Theodore “Laurie” Laurence, another gender nonconforming teenager created by Alcott, never bats an eye at Jo’s different behavior. His own way of living, while not as drastically different from the norm as Jo’s, also shows that he is not your average young person. The two become great friends; …show more content…
“Because some tomboys refuse to perform femininity over a lifetime, preferring a variously male-identified expression both physical and psychic, they expose the assumption that such tomboyism is temporary and safely confined to childhood” (Quimby 1). If Jo hadn’t responded to forces of society telling her to be a young lady, then her life would have been very different in the long run. She wanted to be able to act as manly as she wanted, and she wanted to be able to fight in the war and. Jo just wanted to be herself. Her family wasn’t that understanding of her feelings. Even her sister Beth, the most thoughtful and sympathetic of the family, in response to Jo’s dread of becoming a “poky old woman”, tells Jo that “It’s too bad, but it can’t be helped. So you must try to be contented with making your name boyish, and playing brother to us girls” …show more content…
The world wouldn’t tolerate her tomboyishness for too much longer. Jo even begins to fall in love with the older Professor Bhaer. She allows herself to have feminine feelings, but is still very stubborn and “would have died rather than openly wipe her eyes” (443). But Jo’s acceptance of becoming a lady doesn’t erase her previous masculinity. Alcott created this character to defy gender roles, and she did that and more. “This beloved character was created by an author who was a tomboyish girl when young” (Abate 26). She inspired a whole generation of girls without even trying. It was never her plan to write a book that targets female audiences. “Alcott wrote Little Women because an enterprising publisher wanted to capitalize on the untapped market for young, female readers” (Grasso). It may have not been something that Alcott enjoyed writing, but it was something that the readers fell in love with. They fell in love with the slightly feminine touch that Theodore Laurence that brought to the March family. The feminine touch that balanced out Josephine March’s masculine way of living. They fell in love with these two rebellious teenagers, and those teenagers changed everything. Works Cited
Alcott, Louisa May. Little Women. New York: Bantam Books, 1983. Print.
Quimby, Karen. “The Story of Jo: Literary Tomboys, Little Women, and the Sexual-Textual Politics of Narrative Desire.” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay
Throughout the book, readers are able to see Scout as being a tomboyish, little girl. For example, Aunt Alexandra does not approve of the way that Scout has been dressing. “Aunt Alexandra was fanatical on the subjects of my attire… She said I wasn’t suppose to be doing things that required pants” (108). Aunt Alexandra seems to feel that a girl Scout’s age should not be wearing pants and overalls, but she should be wearing a dress. Aunt Alexandra also thinks that Scout should be staying inside doing woman like activities instead of playing outside with her brother and Dill. Someone else who thinks that Scout is tomboyish is Mrs. Dubose. “And you… what are you doing in those overalls? You should be in a dress and camisole young lady” (135). Even though Mrs. Dubose grew up in a different time period, she still thinks that Scou...
The lives of men and women are portrayed definitively in this novel. The setting of the story is in southern Georgia in the 1960’s, a time when women were expected to fit a certain role in society. When she was younger she would rather be playing ...
Jean Louise, or Scout, had no intention of becoming ladylike. She was, essentially, a tomboy because she grew up playing with Jem and Dill, and she had no mother. In the games they would play, Jem would assign Scout “girl” roles, in which she would not play a major part because men had the more important roles. Jem had a lot to do with Scout’s defiance to ladylike behavior. In more instances than one, he would insult Scout by calling her a girl, or saying that unless she stopped acting like a girl, she couldn’t play with him and Dill. Along with that aspect, Jem was considered a “gentleman” which is a respectable quality for boy or man. However...
Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott, was published in 1868 and follows the lives, loves, and troubles of the four March sisters growing up during the American Civil War.1 The novel is loosely based on childhood experiences Alcott shared with her own sisters, Anna, May, and Elizabeth, who provided the hearts of the novel’s main characters.2 The March sisters illustrate the difficulties of girls growing up in a world that holds certain expectations of the female sex; the story details the journeys the girls make as they grow to be women in that world. Figures 1 and 2 in the Appendix are of Orchard House, the basis for the March family home, where the Alcotts lived.
In Alice Munro’s short story “Boys and Girls,” our narrator is a young farm girl on the verge of puberty who is learning what it means to be a “girl.” The story shows the differing gender roles of boys and girls – specifically that women are the weaker, more emotional sex – by showing how the adults of the story expect the children to grow into their respective roles as a girl and a boy, and how the children grow up and ultimately begin to fulfill these roles, making the transition from being “children” to being “young adults.”
Gender roles have been the one of the longest conflicts since the creation of man. Females have been struggling to gain way in the country since the foundation of the United States. For most of our country’s life up until the 1940’s women predominantly were supposed to stay at the house and do all the house work. For a fictional unnamed female child in the short story “Boys and Girls” by Alice Munro, the life of the average woman is not the life she wants to live. She wants to work the hard labor with her father who sells fox pelts but, she is constantly getting “harassed” by her mother to do lady like work. The women’s struggle for rights can be divided up into centuries starting with the 19th and continuing to present day. At the end of the story the girl finally accepts her role as a female because she messes up and her father says, “She’s only a girl.” Men on the other hand, have had always had any opportunity they wanted but, generally their role is the
...she describes the pompous women. The author uses the women's conversations to emphasize the reasons Scout remains a tomboy and refuses the traits of Maycomb females.
Wadsworth, S. (2009) ‘Louisa May Alcott and the Rise of the Gender-Specific Series Books’ in Montgomery H and Watson N (eds), Children’s Literature Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan in association with Open University, pp.39-48
Emily displays female masculine characteristics from an early age but her appearance, attitude and actions are seen as a phase. In the text Halberstam states that “‘Tomboys’ are described as an extended childhood period of female masculinity. If we are to believe general account of childhood behavior, tomboyism is quite common for girls and does not ge...
The roles of women and how they were treated during the 1800’s are portrayed throughout Little Women, while also demonstrating how the main characters deal with these conformity norms. Through the 4 sisters, Alcott depicts different ways they dealt with being a woman during nineteenth-century expectations. While two conform, the other two attempt to rebel against the standards. Alcott doesn’t imply that one way is necessarily better than the other, but she shows that one is more realistic than the other.
Children’s literature of the Nineteenth Century is notoriously known for its projection of expected Victorian gender roles upon its young readers. Male and female characters were often given specific duties, reactions, and characteristics that reflected society’s particular attitudes and moral beliefs onto the upcoming citizens of the empire. These embedded concepts helped to encourage nationality and guide children towards their specific gender roles which would ensure the kingdom’s future success. Even in class situations where the demanding gender roles were unreasonable to fulfill, the pressure to conform to the Victorian beliefs was still prevalent.
James’ character did what most rebellious young American women would do. She broke free from cultural restrictions and lived her life as she pleased. A woman of passion, she chose to ignore the repressive attitudes of those around her. Women of today are still fighting for equality, but have authors of the past and women like the characters in their stories to thank for the improvements they made.
Millhone’s personality is “free spirit” and a tomboy type of character in this novel. She tends to avoid the typical female gender orientation by wearing mostly jeans, shorts, and, most importantly, turtleneck sweaters as a normal part of clothing attire when she begins her day with a morning jog: “A pair of shorts and an old cotton turtleneck. I’m really not a physical fitness advocate” (Grafton 67). In this manner, Millhone is not a woman that is overly concerned with her appearance, which gives her a carefree quality in her behaviors. This aspect of Millhone’s character defines a tomboy personality that cares very little for the traditional “feminine” gender role.
In every society, there is conformity and nonconformity, although we may not notice it. Conformity is when someone is doing the same thing as others because they do not want to be the only one doing differently. Example, if there was a whole class raising their hands would you want to be the only one with your hand down, no so you would raise it with the rest of the class to not look like you don't know anything. This is called social pressures it when a large group is doing something and you're the only one not then you want to be doing whatever that large group is doing.
All three main characters in each of these stories fail to fulfill society’s idea of beauty and femininity. The lead character of To Kill a Mockingbird, Scout, is a nine year old tomboy, during a time when girls aren’t supposed to be tomboys. She receives much criticism by her aunt and many others for not being the ideal young little girl. Harper Lee, the author, expresses through the view point of Scout, “Aunt Alexandra was fanatical on the subject of my attire. I could not possibly hope to be a lady if I wore breeches, then I said I could do nothing in a dress, she said I wasn’t supposed to be doing things that requi...