GENDER ROLES IN ELIZABETHAN SOCIETY

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GENDER ROLES IN ELIZABETHANSOCIETY
Bharathi Ram Kiely Pham Scott Sok Samir
Hamsafar Pauli Wilhemsen
ELIT 17 PESANO
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Gender Roles in Shakespeare

• Gender roles in Shakespeares work is a critical
  point in understanding the characters involved.
• Overall, Shakespeare sees women as extremely
  powerful beings, even if they are not viewed as
  such by society. However, Shakespeare still
  acknowledges in this work that women are often,
  unfairly or not, the scapegoats or the tools of
  men.
• Possibly a tribute to Queen Elizabeth.

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Power factor in Gender Roles

• Shakespeare often plays with gender roles in
  his writing, sometimes making women more or less
  powerful in actuality than they originally
  appear.
• In Macbeth for example, Shakespeare explores the
  relationship between gender and power, portraying
  male characters as strong willed and courageous,
  but at the same time giving a female
  characterLady Macbeth a ruthless, power-hungry
  personality which is typically more associated
  with masculinity.
• The main source of Macbeths power stems from his
  wife, Lady Macbeth who is the brains behind the
  plot to murder King Duncan and seize the throne
  of Scotland. The type of power that Lady Macbeth
  wields over her husband is unusual in literature
  of this time, and certainly would have been
  atypical for a husband and wife during the time
  in which Macbeth is set.

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Contrasting Views

• Shakespeare often contrasts mens view of women
  with womens view of men.
• For example, in Othello, Iago warns Othello
  "Look to your wife observe her well with Cassio
  Wear your eyes thus, not jealous nor secure...
  They women dare not show their husbands their
  best conscience/ Is not to leave't undone, but
  keep it unknown.
• Iago describes women as deceptive and secretive
  people, who have the somewhat surprising ability
  (surprising in the sense that men during this
  time period controlled their women, or at least
  believed they could control them in whatever way
  they wished) to manipulate and deceive their
  husbands.

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Contrasting Views (cont.)

• Another  example is given by Iago's wife, Emilia, 
  when she complains about how women seem 
  to serve as men's scapegoat for everything. 
  She says "A man... They are all 
  but stomachs, and we are all but 
  food They eat us hungerly, and when 
  they are full, They belch us.
• Emilia touches on exactly what Iago is doing to
  Desdemona using her as a scapegoat for his own
  villainous actions. Emilia complains that men
  only use women, using the metaphor of a hungry
  person eating until they are full and then moving
  on. Although Iago uses Desdemona for furthering
  his evil plan, he doesn't actually belittle her.
  In a weird and twisted way, Iago has praised
  women for having the keen ability to outsmart
  their husbands, although he warns Othello against
  this.

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• The protestant leader John Knox wrote
• "Women in her greatest perfection was made to
  serve and obey man. 
• Even though there was an unmarried woman on the
  throne in Elizabethan England, the roles of women
  in society were very limited.
• Most women were given education only if they were
  members of the nobility. Otherwise, they had to
  stay home and learn to run the household and
  become the housewife.
• Many women in this period were highly educated,
  like the Queen herself, who was tutored by the
  famous Elizabethan scholar Roger Ascham.
• Education included knowledge of several
  languages, including Latin, Greek, Italian, and
  French. However, even noblewomen were not allowed
  to go to university and were only taught by
  tutors who visited them in their home.

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• Women were not allowed to enter the professions
  i.e law, medicine, politics, but they could work
  in domestic service as cooks, maids etc, and a
  female painter.
• Women were also allowed to write works of
  literature, providing the subject was suitable
  for women mainly translations or religious
  works. Women were not allowed to act on the
  public stage or write for the public stage.
• They were strictly forbidden from the Army and
  Navy.
• From birth, Elizabethan era women were taught how
  to
• govern a household and perform domestic duties so
  that when they married, their husbands would be
  proud.
• Childbearing was considered a great honor to
  women, as children were seen as blessings from
  God, and they took great pride in being mothers.

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• Women were regarded as "the weaker sex", not just
  in terms of physical strength, but emotionally
  too. All throughout their life, the women of the
  Elizabethan times were made to become dependent
  on a male relative - father, brother, uncle,
  husband, or other.
• Disobedience was seen as a crime against their
  religion and the Church continuously quoted the
  Bible in order to ensure adherence to this
  principle.
• Women, regardless of social position, were not
  allowed to vote. Neither could women inherit
  their father's titles. All titles would pass from
  father to son or brother to brother. They were
  strictly forbidden from the Army and Navy.
• The only exception was, of course, the crown. The
  crown could pass to a daughter, and that daughter
  would be invested with all the power and Majesty
  of any king.
• In a way, despite the limitations, women had more
  freedom in the Elizabethan period than they had
  had previously. The Renaissance brought with it a
  new way of thinking. It was thought men and women
  could do anything and be anything they wanted to
  be, that their capacity for knowledge was
  limitless. Thus, noble women were given an
  impressive education in the classics,
  mathematics, and all other academic subjects of
  the day.

WOMEN
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HOMOSEXUALITY

• The term homosexual was not used in during the
  Renaissance instead the term sodomy was used
  to label same sex relations.
•  Elizabethans acknowledged the existence of
  same-sex desire through all levels of society,
  but religious teaching and the law strictly
  prohibited sodomy.
•  Such acts could be presented as evidence of
  witchcraft or wizardry, and those caught in the
  act (or in some cases accused) could be put to
  death.
• Shakespeare and Homosexuality
• Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece
  dedicated to the Earl of Southampton.
•  
• Shakespeares Sonnets are clearly addressed to a
  young man.
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• Was Shakespeare gay?
• What is Queer Theory?

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CROSSDRESSING

• Sumptuary Laws called the 'Statutes of Apparel'
  attempted to limit the expenditure of people on
  clothes and to maintain the social structure of
  the class system.
• So crossdressing threatened the carefully
  constructed hierarchal social order, and
  regulation of dress was necessary to mark and
  secure social difference.
• These statues were impossible to enforce and were
  essentially a lost cause.
•  Shakespeare, Crossdressing, and the Theatre
• Actors were exempted from the Sumptuary Laws on
  stage, but outside of the theatre they could not
  legally wear their costumes. 
• Women were forbidden to act on the public stage,
  so female roles were played by prepubescent
  boys. 
• In certain comedies, women crossdressed as a
  strategy to achieve their goals.

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MEN IN ELIZABETHAN ERA

• Woman in this eras, lives are more analyzed and
  documented because of their limitations.
• Men lived life as the superior gender, thus life
  was just considered normal.
• Both gender and the patriarchal dominance were
  assumed to have been set in place by God and
  nature

• Men virtually ran all aspects of society.
• They were the only ones allowed to go to war.
• To be lords and accepted artisans
• Any position of power besides the queen.

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MEN IN THE FAMILY

• The Elizabethan family life for men was one of
  power. The men made the decisions and the women
  were expected to obey them.
• The men were expected to support the family from
  a whole variety of occupations.
• Expected to improve the positions of all members
  of the family through influence and patronage
  from wealthier people and families than their
  own.

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QUIZ TIME!

• How was it possible for a woman at the time to
  receive an education?
• Name two characters from our past comedies that
  showed abnormal (for the time) strength as a
  woman?

• What is the other term used for homosexuality
• Who are Shakespeares sonnets directed to?
• Who played women on stage?