Cleft Research Paper

Good morning, we would like to talk about the cleft, by doris lessing. I am iris. They are Christy, Kimberly and Donna. And i would like to discuss the changes and problems of social class in genders. This is the timeline of the society development.

In the history of the cleft, it revealed there were 2 classes in the community, the higher one,called the old shes, and the lower one was younger generation. For example, “Yes, we always fed them and give them the nicest bit to eat.” in maire’s speech. The younger one showed respect to the elder one and the old shes had rights to command others. This structure ran well for a long time as they dislike changes and nobody challenged it.

And then, an incident happened. The 1st baby boy was born and the births of these monsters kept
occurring. After they accepted to keep some of the monsters, the social structure evolved from 2 levels into 3.The highest was the old shes, the lower was younger clefts, and the monsters were the lowest. It was in a female dominated society since they gave birth to new form of human, the male. Being the lowest defective products in the clefts’ eyes, the squirts were treated in a bad way. Some of them even killed by the clefts, their mothers, at some points.
In the historian narrator’s version of the history “-boys kept as ‘pets’ and playthings by the Clefts escaped” and “Their mothers had fed them, on the order of the Old Shes, but reluctantly, and never enough.” The clefts did not even want to take care of them, but the Old Shes got the absolute power to make decisions in the society. Males or squirts did not have any rights living as humans. They had no rights of decisions and they were the passive gender. this social structure was not benefit to the race. The population of the clefts is dropping although they could still give birth on their own as they need to bear a certain opportunity of carrying a monster. Their superiority of their race and their hatred of changes led them seldom thought of long-term method to deal with the problem. They decided to objected the change.

Then, the clefts and the squirts separated and formed 2 single gender societies whensomesquirts wereescaped. This was the transitional period of developing the gender differences in the life attitude and behaviours. The squirts were becoming independent from the clefts and created a new lifestyle, like building huts. On the other hand, the majority of the clefts’s lifestyle was immutable. Both genders were exploring the new social structure which was benefit to the future development of the genders in their own way. However, the birth problem was not solved in this case.
They have no direct interaction between each other at this period.
They were in hostility towards the opposite gender because of The unhealthy social class pyramid in the past. According to the squirts’ story, their fright of the clefts is more than the hatred. The clefts was able to control the number of squirts directly as all offspring were born by them.

After the incident of a cleft be raped, the history left a blank for a long time. In maire’s talking to a squirts, the clefts found the importance of the squirts to maintain the race in future. 2 societies were combined, the female still had a leading status. The birth ability of the clefts had changed and they need males/the squirts to make babies. The squirts gives new ideas to the society, such as the individuality, the building of huts and land exploring. So, the squirts were considered as a kind of human, the companion of the clefts. The society started being in gender equality.

Later, the history was covered and the bible appeared. It wrote that the male are first human and female are made later. This becomes the base of the male dominated society for centuries. This structure deeply rooted in the culture til the modern
world.

And then, i would like to pass to Kimberly for the next part, thank you.