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1.5 Characteristics and themes tackled by Feminist literature
female portrayal in poems
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Who decides what a woman should look like? Wislawa Szymborska’s poems “Rubens Women,” “Portrait of a Woman,” and “Over Wine” begin to answer this question. The ideal female body of today’s world is tall and skinny, but not everyone fits that description. Why can’t a woman decide for herself what she should look like?
Szymborska was a Polish poet who was one of few females to win a Nobel Prize for her works. She is not known for feminist writing and she does not preach feminism in her works. Many of her poems in this novel do not specify a gender, but since she is a female we assume it is of the female role. Polish professor Grażyna Borkowska says it does not matter for literature, whether the author is male or female, what matters
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Szymborska praises these “Rubenesque” women in the poem. In “Rubens Women” it says that skinny girls do not make it into his paintings, they “went single file along the canvas’s unpainted side. Exiled by style. Only their ribs stood out.” The poem goes on to say that, “The thirteenth century would have given them golden halos. The twentieth, silver screens. The seventeenth, alas, holds nothing for the unvoluptuous (Szymborska, 2000, pg 47). Szymborska uses some imagery in “Rubens Women” to help you visualize these big women and perhaps she over exaggerates to make her point. Perhaps this poem, along with her other poems based on works of art, are about her thoughts as she looked at them. She says, “O pumpkin plump! O pumped up corpulence inflated double by disrobing and tripled by your tumultuous poses! O fatty dishes of love!” In today’s world no women would want to be described as a “fatty dish of love” and are told to love their bodies no matter what shape and size, but she is trying to give the poem a humorous …show more content…
It is comprised of contradictory phrases such as, “change so that nothing with change (Szymborska, 2000, pg. 161).” The woman’s role in this poem seems to be the typical female persona of having kids, being submissive to the male, and reading Ladies Home Journal for fun in her down time. The woman is “Naïve, but gives the best advice. Weak, but takes on anything. A screw loose and tough as nails.” Naïve, weak, and a screw loose could be how a male describes her, but she would say that she gives the best advice, has the willpower to take on anything, and is as tough as nails. The last two lines of the poem read, “She must love him, or she’s just plain stubborn. For better, for worse, for Heaven’s sake.” For better, for worse is taken out of a traditional marriage ceremony and since they are married, she is bound to him forever and it his her duty to love and please him. Although this described role of the wife is not as common of a tradition today, because gender roles are not as defined in the post modern era, there are still multiple male figures around the world who believe that this is still the utmost duty of the
When we look into the mirror, we are constantly picking at our insecurities; our stomach, thighs, face, and our body figure. Society has hammered into our brains that there is only one right way of looking. Society disregards that there are many different shapes, sizes, and colors. Then society makes us believe that corporations can shove detrimental products to fix our imperfection. As a consequence, we blame media for putting all the negative ideas into women’s brain. It is not wrong to say that they are in part responsible, but we can’t make this issue go away until we talk about patriarchy. In the article Am I Thin Enough Yet? Hesse-Biber argues that women are constantly concerned about their looks and if they are categorized as “beautiful” by society. These ideas are encouraged by corporations that sell things for us to achieve “beautiful” but the idea is a result of patriarchy. Hesse-Biber suggests that if we want to get rid of these ideas we need to tackle patriarchy before placing all the blame on capitalism.
It seems if a woman does not follow what the television or magazines do, they will be considered a ‘disgrace’ to society. “By the 1930’s, mass advertisements on radio and in magazines persuaded women to purchase cosmetic products by appealing to her fear of growing old or being rejected by social acquaintances,” (Gourley 56). The beauty industry specifically targeted women, using the ideas of an often highly feminine related idea of vanity. This also talked about women’s apparel in clothing and how they weren’t able to dress casually since they would be titled, slob. As looks represent a lot in a woman, the body type of a woman has always struggled with maintaining since the ‘perfect’ body types are not what everyone has. “In the 1890’s women had full bosoms, round hips. In actual measurements they were probably no rounder than Miss Cox but they seemed so because they were shorter, tightened their waists into an hour-glass effect … Now, though, the ideal figure must have a round, high bosom, a slim but not wasp-like waist, and gently rounded hips” (“This is What…”). Ideals women that society has pushed onto women to be for them to have any chance in romance. Though many women can drift away from this the women, though they won’t admit to it, had struggled to meet the ‘set standard’ for women. This shows how after women have gained the rights of voting, gender roles
The idea that women are subjected to an unfair amount of pressure as a result of the fashion world and other media outlets is hardly new, but Naomi Wolf takes this claim to a new and absurd level. Her essay is as unorganized as it is impractical. Her ideas are presented in a smorgasbord of flawed logic. Particularly disturbing is what she calls the “beauty myth.” What I disagree with is the word myth. According to Wolf, women in magazines and advertisements have approximately 20% less body mass than that of the average woman, creating an unattainable standard. This fact in no way supports her claim of a “beauty myth.” The existence of a myth suggests something to be untrue in nature. Magazine companies and advertisement agencies are not in the business of showing an average woman. They are in the business of selling a product. Of course they are going to use beautiful people. These companies completely regard the fact that most women do not in fact look like this, but they know that their product would be less appealing if they displayed average or unattractive women. Therefore, they do not deserve scrutiny over the fact that they do not present a typical woman. They in fact do the same for men. Wolf says, “The beauty myth is not about women at all. It is about men’s institutions and institutional power” (page 485, first new paragraph). How does one begin to say how warped this impression is?
Throughout history women have been portrayed as inferior to men in all ages. However women have transcended from being too inferior to men to actually being portrayed as naive in the sense that women only care about their beauty since that is the only thing that society cares about now. This has now spread to age in society where now women are portrayed by the media as sex symbols so that could be enticing to society. In the “Fat Girl” by andre dubus the main charcter Louise is pressured by her family members espically her mother to lose weight so that she can fit into societies portrayal of women.In the poem “the barbie doll” by margie piercy the female charcter is forced to correct her body images in order to fit with that of which society
This painting was created in 1863, just over 350 years after the painting above. This shows that in over 350 years the ideal body did not change as this painting still depicts women whom people today may classify as being ‘larger’. Also, it is clear that that this is the ideal body at that time as the two men who are with the women are vying for the women’s attention. From the 1500s onwards, up until the mid 1800s the ideal woman's body was larger. Peter Stearn, a historian, explained this in his book ‘Fat History: Bodies and Beauty in the Modern West’ by writing that “in those days, slenderness may indicate malnutrition or disease, whereas plumpness was seen as a sign of affluence, health, good temperament and maternal function”. During this era, famine was a regular occurrence and it was common for women to consider reproducing as her duty. This meant that a well-fed wife who had wide hips from child bearing looked favourably on her husband.
Kasey Serdar (2005) argues that only a small number of women can actually fulfill the characteristics of what media defines beautiful. Yet, women are constantly being exposed to the ideal women image. Serdar (2005) illustrates that “models shown on television, advertisement, and in other forms of popular media are approximately 20% below ideal body weight, thus meeting the dia...
In the context of a tumultuous time for the United States that was undergoing drastic changes socially, politically and ideologically, Kate Chopin published her first novel At Fault in 1890. Probably not aware of her role as one of the forerunners of the feminist movement in the late nineteenth century, Chopin embarked on expressing what women do feel, experience and suffer in their everyday lives. The first seeds of feminism, effectively, started essentially with the emergence of a group of women writers in England as well as in the United States who dared to speak about women from the standpoint of women and targeting a female audience. In spite of the fact that women had been taught to keep quiet, repress their voices and “internalize the codes of genteel womanhood” (Showalter 177), women writers during the nineteenth century attempted to reconstruct themselves as free individuals and refashion the image of the ideal woman. This was possible through writing that enabled them to “break new ground[s] and create new possibilities” (Showalter 19). G.H Lewes defines “female literature” as the articulation of women’s experience which “guides itself by its own impulses to autonomous self-expression” (qtd. in Showalter 13). Following women’s awareness of the unequal treatment they receive from men, their
To start with, Bartky describes how women personalize men’s expectations in regards to their physical appearance, style, attitude and behavior, by using “internalization”. The author is trying to explain that women incarnate “patriarchal standards of bodily acceptability” meaning that have embodied the social standards; which make them feel guilty if they fail acting in accordance with the appropriate principles. Furthermore, women struggle to meet men’s expectations with the fear that if they don’t, they will face male refusal. ‘Male gaze’ constructs how women’s appearance should be according to what is more attractive and more appealing to men. It is also recognized from Bartky that women willingly accept what men want and the disciplines are forced to, but she also understands that the...
Beauty is a cruel mistress. Every day, Americans are bombarded by images of flawless women with perfect hair and smooth skin, tiny waists and generous busts. They are presented to us draped in designer clothing, looking sultry or perky or anywhere in between. And although the picture itself is alluring, the reality behind the visage is much more sinister. They are representations of beauty ideals, sirens that silently screech “this is what a woman is supposed to look like!” Through means of media distribution and physical alteration, technology has created unrealistic beauty ideals, resulting in distorted female body images.
Models of Rubens, Rembrandt, Gaugin and Matisse were all rounded, plump women.A plump and healthy women was admired as it reflected wealth and success.(14). Where as images of women have become slimmer since the 1950’s according to Jennifer A. (Australian journal of nutrition and dietetics).
Throughout history when we think about women in society we think of small and thin. Today's current portrayal of women stereotypes the feminine sex as being everything that most women are not. Because of this depiction, the mentality of women today is to be thin and to look a certain way. There are many challenges with women wanting to be a certain size. They go through physical and mental problems to try and overcome what they are not happy with. In the world, there are people who tell us what size we should be and if we are not that size we are not even worth anything. Because of the way women have been stereotyped in the media, there has been some controversial issues raised regarding the way the world views women. These issues are important because they affect the way we see ourselvescontributing in a negative way to how positive or negative our self image is.
In her novel “Beauty Myth”, Naomi Wolf argues that the beauty and fashion industry are to blame for using false images to portray what beautiful woman is. She believes the magazines are to blame for women hating their bodies. Wolf states, “When they discuss [their bodies], women lean forward, their voices lower. They tell their terrible secret. It’s my breast, they say. My hips. It’s my thighs. I hate my stomach.” (Wolf, 451) She is focusing on how w...
Everywhere one looks today, one will notice that our culture places a very high value on women being thin. Many will argue that today’s fashion models have “filled out” compared to the times past; however the evidence of this is really hard to see. Our society admires men for what they accomplish and what they achieve. Women are usually evaluated by and accepted for how they look, regardless of what they do. A woman can be incredibly successful and still find that her beauty or lack of it will have more to do with her acceptance than what she is able to accomplish. “From the time they are tiny children, most females are taught that beauty is the supreme objective in life” (Claude-Pierre, p18). The peer pressure for girls in school to be skinny is often far greater than for boys to make a team. When it is spring, young girls begin thinking “How am I going to look in my bathing suit? I better take off a few more pounds.”
...y standards, further resulting in negative impacts on their self-esteem and confidence. Furthermore, this limited perspective of beauty causes women to be blinded and not realize that there is not one specific look of beautiful, but many. In a sense, women are taught to think that beautiful is being thin, having silky hair, toned legs, big breast, blemish and acne-free skin, and so on. However, in order to reach these beauty standards set by society, a woman can overwork her body in order to lose weight by dieting, or not eating to be “thin”, which also puts her health at risk and acts as an additional issue. Women who fail to reach these beauty standards set by society, may feel as though it is their fault and end up feeling even more insecure and bad about their body image, when in fact, the beauty standards were unrealistic and unattainable from the beginning.
Body image for women has always been stressed for them to look a certain way and to try obtain “physical perfec...