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Handmaids tale literary devices
Imagery and identity in a handmaid's tale
Imagery and identity in a handmaid's tale
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Our current society is not capable of turning into one similar to Gilead. Gilead is an unstable time period, for what was known to be the United States of America. There are several reasons why our society today cannot be one like Gilead. The people of Gilead do many acts that violate the Bill of Rights, which our society respects highly. The United States Constitution is also violated in the novel, The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. In the novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, The main character of the story are classified by the title of “Handmaids”. A “Handmaid” is a fertile female who bares the right to reproduce for a wife. They are separated away from the rest and dressed differently so they can be identified. A “Handmaid” must wear all red, dress and gloves, with the exception of their white wigs. The Handmaid breaks the rule of freedom and women rights. In this text the women have no say so to what they want or need they have to go by life according to their title. During President Obama’s run for presidency, he has given many speeches. One in particular stood out, March 18, 2008 to the understanding of society today and society then. His speech targeted race, within this speech,he gives examples to why our society today could never be as the Gilead. Obama has high hopes, faith and wants better for our future society. Whereas Gilead is the bad outcome of after The United States of America. President Obama said, “And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States.” (page 1) Our president is willing to do whatever it takes to see the men and women treated equally. Each individual share t... ... middle of paper ... ...ple have assassinated the president for temporary control of Gilead. Known of the acts taking place in The Handmiads Tale, our society can never be one like theirs. We have been following the Constitution for over a hundred years and have a president today who is obeying but all laws and not will to change. He will change but not change for the worse like Gilead. Our people are too strong to stoop to the level of those in Gilead. Their people are treated wrong. They get executed and hung for creating homosexual acts. How is that fair to life. Why can’t all be accepted for who they are. Why should you me exiled for who you love. The society of The United States of America can never have a society like one such as Gilead. We obey by understanding rule, all are equal and all get treated the same. We have a President that wants only the better for us, not the worse.
The basis of Gilead’s government system is Theocracy. By ruling in God’s name, every action The Commander takes is justified through Christianity. This concept reverts back to the idea of divine right; compliant Christians would not dare go against these actions because that would be as if crossing God himself.
Finally, President Obama calls for action. He reminds us, through anaphora, that “our journey is not complete” until we are all equal and more opportunistic, per-se. Obama tells us that that is our task, alluding to the Declaration of Independence, to “make these words, rights, these values of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness real for every American” is a task that we will all go through together as one to achieve for all. Concluding his speech, the president reminds us that we are the hope; we ARE the change.
...hat it was the women participation that allowed the government to regulate every aspect of their public and private lives. Women such as the Aunts especially Aunt Lydia where willing participants in the republic by indoctrinating women to the new way of life. The women became the eyes and ears to the government, condemning other women who don't follow the laws. If the women had the strength to rebel they might not have been able to change much but, at least they were taking a stand on what they believed in. The government had such control on every aspect through rules, conduct and rituals that were followed by the people with little to no questions by the people. That is why I feel that Societal Complacency played such a role in the success of the Republic of Gilead.
The Republic of Gilead’s power comes from a violent control of its citizen’s actions. Gilead, replacing the Constitution with “the overweening patriarchal principles of Genesis,” uses force and intimidation to inspire people’s natural tendency of self-preservation and uses it to control them (Stimpson 764). They enforce compliance through fear and create a society of suspicion and anxiety. The government’s unadulterated control is evident in the atmosphere of Gilead. The people of Gilead are censored, their actions, emotions, and knowledge is not under their management. Nothing belongs to them anymore; they hold government-approved conversations, go on government sanctioned shopping trips, and are even told what they are supposed to believe. Gilead uses a sort of manipulative brainwashing to generate conformity. They use intimidation as their weapon of choice and defend their actions with the Bible. An ingenious strategy for verbal defense because anyone who dares to stand against them stands against the Bible and can branded a heretic. Gilead does not do these things to be unreasonable and unjust; they believe through a society built with a rigid, religious structure they can control sin and create a better world. However, they have rewritten the Bible and taken it so out of context to create this society they have doomed it from the start. They trapped their citizens in a world of pre-determined choices, which confines them within themselves. Gilead makes no direct threats to its people but it implies its threats through prominent displays of its power such as the “imposing display of security forces, the omnipresence of ‘the eye,’ public executions, the threat of banishment to the colonies,” and the bodies hung on hooks on t...
Margaret Atwood’s depiction of the future in The Handmaid's Tale is extremely bleak and forlorn; this oppressive atmosphere has been created by the development of an independent nation - Gilead - inside the U.S, which is governed by a totalitarian fundamentalist Christian sect. This dystopian text is the brainchild of a series of experimental social ideas which have given birth to a science-fiction novel, which satirises mainly the folly of human characteristics rather than the misuse of technology.
The Handmaid's Tale is a dystopian novel in which Atwood creates a world which seems absurd and near impossible. Women being kept in slavery only to create babies, cult like religious control over the population, and the deportation of an entire race, these things all seem like fiction. However Atwood's novel is closer to fact than fiction; all the events which take place in the story have a base in the real world as well as a historical precedent. Atwood establishes the world of Gilead on historical events as well as the social and political trends which were taking place during her life time in the 1980's. Atwood shows her audience through political and historical reference that Gilead was and is closer than most people realize.
In Gilead, the rules and laws enforced on the people is no longer related the democratic
The President was shot and Congress was overthrown. The Constitution was also suspended and the military then took over. People did not riot or fight for their rights because they were too scared to do anything (Atwood 174). Women were not protected in the past and were told not to open their door to anyone. There were no uniforms or dress codes. Women used to be employed and earned their own money (Atwood 24). During the pre-Gilead period birthrates were decreasing because of syphilis, AIDS, stillbirths, miscarriages and genetic deformities. This decrease in birthrates was linked to nuclear power plants (Atwood 304). In response to this, the Gilead banned birth control and required pregnancy tests for all females (Atwood
A theocratic society is a society where the laws and government are ruled in the name of God. In today’s society the laws are theocratic as they are based on the ten commandments, which are the laws and rules God sent to the people to follow and go to heaven. We see the similarities in a number of laws murder, Thou shalt not kill and thievery, Thou shalt not steal. Gilead is a theocratic society as its name is a city referenced in the bible “behold my handmaid Bilhah, go in unto her; and she shall bear upon my knees, that 1 may also have children by her Genesis 30 1:3” we see how much the novel is based on religion in the Epigraph where it references multiple biblical stories. Just like our society the novel is always based on religion making the laws and normalities not drastically
Margaret Atwood created The Republic of Gilead, a society based on fertility and being able to have children, in her book The Handmaid’s Tale. Gilead is in the former United States of America. This area has become highly polluted and has caused the birth rates to significantly decline. Gilead was able to take over the United States’ government by killing off every single Congress member. While in a state of shock and panic, The Republic of Gilead took control by helping to “save” the population. The men are now either a part of the military or are a Commander. Commanders run a household and are responsible to “make” the babies. Women are either shipped off, domesticated servants or walking wombs. The Commanders each receive a Handmaid. Handmaids are the one who becomes impregnated. The Handmaids are heavily protected, since they are the only woman left with viable
The United States of America has been taken over by people running a new order called the Republic of Gilead. They killed the President and the members of Congress. The Gilead took over at a time when women were being disrespected. They could not have jobs or own land.
Welcome to Gilead, here “women are tortured and killed for disobeying the law - a society where religious beliefs, the political structure, and the sexual identity are so intertwined as to justify and require the control of women’s freedom, the sexual victimization of women, and the torture and murder of women who do not comply” (Cameron 298). The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood plots the dystopian society of Gilead in which “all men are not created equal: some men are second-class citizens and all women are third class citizens” (Callaway 48). Because of this “women are seen as potentially threatening and subversive, and, therefore, require strict control” (Callaway 48). In order to maintain the control, Gilead families are torn apart,
its endless freedoms, but now known only for its never ending restrictions. You aren’t allowed to wear makeup, go out in public except for the purpose of shopping for the household, read, write, or even speak out of turn. Offred, a woman from the novel “The Handmaid’s Tale,” is going through a scenario exactly like this one. She once was a citizen of the United States, but the once free country fell into rubble and out of it grew the oppressive, Republic of Gilead.
The society established by the Republic of Gilead in “The Handmaid’s Tale” is founded on and sustained by false doctrine. They intentionally twist and skew the Bible in order to justify their actions and brainwash the women who are involuntarily participating in their indoctrinated society. The Gilead does not treat the Bible as the divine word of God. Instead, they exploit its authority and use it as a tool for their own benefit. The very framework of the Gilead’s social hierarchy is in sharp contradiction to everything the Bible teaches, but because they are so corrupt and only use the Bible for their own advantage, they seem not to care. Instead of abiding by the teachings in the Bible and letting them shape how things are done, they hand-select and contort certain parts of it to match the framework of their own aspirations and beliefs, which are by no means Christian. Every piece of scripture that the Republic customizes is specifically suited to help them achieve their ultimate goal: indoctrinating an entire society for the purposes of personal power and authority. The end product is the unethical, dysfunctional society that is depicted in “The Handmaid’s Tale.” The Republic of Gilead is by no means a true religious group, but they do use religion and skewed religious text as a reference for the foundation, justification, manipulation, and enforcement of their new society.
"The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood is a dystopia about a world where unrealistic things take place. The events in the novel could never actually take place in our reality." This is what most people think and assume, but they're wrong. Look at the world today and in the recent past, and there are not only many situations that have ALMOST become a Gilead, but places that have been and ARE Gileadean societies. We're not in Kansas any more, Dorothy!