An essay written as extra work, graded A+, on the theme of Gender Roles in The Handmaid's Tale.
Note: the essay was a practice essay submitted to a teacher prior to studying quotes and hence, it focuses predominantly on the theme and not the quotes.
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood looks at gender roles in a dystopian society where
women are treated like property and stripped of their rights. The novel takes place in a unborn
totalitarian theocracy known as Gilead, where gender places are manipulated by the ruling
governance to control the population. The novel's protagonists, the biddies, are particularly
affected by this power dynamic because the governance rigorously defines and regulates their
places.
The Gilead governance has established a rigid gender scale in which men hold the most
important positions and women are relegated to subservient roles. Women are reduced to the
status of property, whereas men are the decision- makers and hold all power. Because the
ruling nobility is unfit to conceive on their own, the biddies are impelled to bear children for
them, and their sole function is to act as reduplication vessels.
The novel also looks at how people's internal and emotional countries can be affected by how
gender roles are changed. The biddies are stripped of their independence and individuality and
forced to conform to the governance's prospects. Any deviance from this is met with severe
discipline, and they're subordinated to constant surveillance and indoctrination in the testament
of the governance. insulation, despair, and a diminished sense of tone- worth result from this
pressure to conform.
The power of individualities to repel the government's control of gender roles is also explored in
the novel. Offred, the main character, struggles with the oppression she goes through and how
it affects her internal and emotional state. Offred is suitable to maintain her sense of tone and
humanity in the face of the government's attempts to control her. Through her inner studies and
recollections, as well as her connections with other characters who give her a sense of stopgap
and community, she's suitable to repel the government's control.
Eventually, The Handmaid's Tale is a potent disquisition of gender places. The book shows how
a totalitarian government can control its people by changing gender roles and taking down
people's rights and freedoms. It also looks into how people can repel this control and keep their
humanity and sense of tone. The story serves as a warning about the troubles of rigid gender
roles and the significance of securing individual freedom and rights.
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