Category: Academic Essay
Status: Unpublished
Gender And Language
Many feminist historians and critical analysts have indulged into the study of women and gender,
deconstructing concepts and ideologies already existing before by men, and concluding after
extensive research that gender is a socially constructed ideology, sketched predominantly by men
themselves, who claimed to be the superior of the sexes. Patriarchy is a system built on the
superiority of the male gender, and the oppression of the so-called “weaker” gender, which is
deprived of a voice of itself. Gender has been artificially constructed by society concerning the
biological factors, sexuality, anthropology, nature and Literature as well.
Many acclaimed writers like Freud and Lacan have greatly emphasized the woman as being “not
man” a being born without a phallus and thus lacking power. The power thus, belongs to those
that possess the phallus that symbolises power strength and domination of the weaker sex. Ann
Rosalind Jones refers this theory as phallocentrism. Lacan supported Freud in his theory that
sexual desire is only masculine, and that women can only enter into the symbolic life of the
unconscious if she internalizes male sexual desire, imagines that she has a phallus and begins to
view herself the same way as men view the female sex. This goes on to prove that men consider
women as sexual objects of desire which partake in cultural subordination to their will, when it
comes to sex and marriage. The Blank Page is a short story that highlights the very issue of
female sexuality where, their virginity is considered sacred and a symbol of honour in society,
showcased to the world as a prestige or good reputation of the men. The image of the sheets
framed on the wall, in the story, symbolises an ideology built on male control through marriage,
female sexuality and reproductive power. The fact that the nuns continued to pass on the story
and the tradition of the cloth framing of one’s honour continued in society shows that women
were unable to voice out the unfairness being done to women in society. Annie Leclerc, in her
courageous outspoken essay “Women’s Word” proudly speaks about female sexual pleasures
and desires, because women’s body is always considered not their own but the possession of
males, presented to them “Mouth sewn up, face made up.”
In a society, women are treated with no signification or heed to their desires or thoughts, only
exchanged as gifts between each other via marriage, to appease an alliance between families.
They have no power in society or influence within the patriarchal society that they belong in,
which is entirely controlled by men. The public and the private were invented to distinguish
between what belongs to women and what doesn’t. The private life was meant to be a safe haven
for the men, after they participated in the public domain, while the domestic private realm was
assigned to the females. Child-bearing and domestic work was supposed to be an assigned task
of women that was innate, and what they were meant to do. Many old traditions have supported
this sexist ideology, including Bible teaching which emphasizes women’s role in the domestic
household as the obedient wife and daughter.
Status: Unpublished
Gender And Language
Many feminist historians and critical analysts have indulged into the study of women and gender,
deconstructing concepts and ideologies already existing before by men, and concluding after
extensive research that gender is a socially constructed ideology, sketched predominantly by men
themselves, who claimed to be the superior of the sexes. Patriarchy is a system built on the
superiority of the male gender, and the oppression of the so-called “weaker” gender, which is
deprived of a voice of itself. Gender has been artificially constructed by society concerning the
biological factors, sexuality, anthropology, nature and Literature as well.
Many acclaimed writers like Freud and Lacan have greatly emphasized the woman as being “not
man” a being born without a phallus and thus lacking power. The power thus, belongs to those
that possess the phallus that symbolises power strength and domination of the weaker sex. Ann
Rosalind Jones refers this theory as phallocentrism. Lacan supported Freud in his theory that
sexual desire is only masculine, and that women can only enter into the symbolic life of the
unconscious if she internalizes male sexual desire, imagines that she has a phallus and begins to
view herself the same way as men view the female sex. This goes on to prove that men consider
women as sexual objects of desire which partake in cultural subordination to their will, when it
comes to sex and marriage. The Blank Page is a short story that highlights the very issue of
female sexuality where, their virginity is considered sacred and a symbol of honour in society,
showcased to the world as a prestige or good reputation of the men. The image of the sheets
framed on the wall, in the story, symbolises an ideology built on male control through marriage,
female sexuality and reproductive power. The fact that the nuns continued to pass on the story
and the tradition of the cloth framing of one’s honour continued in society shows that women
were unable to voice out the unfairness being done to women in society. Annie Leclerc, in her
courageous outspoken essay “Women’s Word” proudly speaks about female sexual pleasures
and desires, because women’s body is always considered not their own but the possession of
males, presented to them “Mouth sewn up, face made up.”
In a society, women are treated with no signification or heed to their desires or thoughts, only
exchanged as gifts between each other via marriage, to appease an alliance between families.
They have no power in society or influence within the patriarchal society that they belong in,
which is entirely controlled by men. The public and the private were invented to distinguish
between what belongs to women and what doesn’t. The private life was meant to be a safe haven
for the men, after they participated in the public domain, while the domestic private realm was
assigned to the females. Child-bearing and domestic work was supposed to be an assigned task
of women that was innate, and what they were meant to do. Many old traditions have supported
this sexist ideology, including Bible teaching which emphasizes women’s role in the domestic
household as the obedient wife and daughter.
