Patriarchal Oppression In Story Of An Hour And The Awakening

Effect of Patriarchal Oppression
Women, for hundreds of years, have suffered from a great oppression caused by men who never let their wives do anything or think for themselves. Women’s roles in society were specifically to care for the children and do the housework while their husbands were at work and providing economically for the family. As the lack of rights continued for women, they started to rebel and believe in equality between men and women, which evolved to be called feminism. Feminist analysis is exploring and understanding the social roles of men and women. Women have denied the roles given to them due to lack of everything they wanted, from education to expressing their feelings once they realized what their lives have become.
In “Story of an Hour,” Chopin writes about a woman who thinks lost her husband in an accident, yet she is taking it very well. Mrs. Mallard, main person of this story, recognizes her indiscriminate thoughts and thinks about how she felt when her husband was still alive. She lets in her feelings of how her husband, Mr. Mallard, had made her feel as if he was pulling her back from everything she wanted to do. This is an example of how women felt throughout their marriage with limited actions and ways to express themselves. With little detail, Chopin illustrates the oppression that Mrs. Mallard once felt and how she now feels relieved and free that those feelings won’t continue anymore. Chopin demonstrates the protagonist’s feeling of freedom with, “She knew she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that had never looked saved with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead. But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome.” (2). Chopin’s other very famous story The Awakening has highly portrayed the feeling of oppression that
His first key principle talks about the impact of patriarch actions made on women through history and how it affected their daily lives. The second key principle states how women reacted to their patriarchal oppression and what they did to try to resist and distract themselves from it. Then, the third key principle says how the history of why and when feminism started caused many writers to turn the topic into a short story or novel. These principles are important for readers because they start to understand feminist analysis in depth. In his second key principle, Hall writes, “Some forms of feminism are interested primarily in emphasizing the fundamental similarities between women and men as well as in opening access to the prevailing economic and political system so as to ensure equal opportunity and a level playing field for all.” (203). By this, Hall says that women have tried to resist their oppression that they are going through by trying to distract themselves and making their own decisions. For example, in Chopin’s The Awakening, the female protagonist Mrs. Pontellier decided to move into a new home without the consent of her husband. This was the start of the awakening to her true self and being independent. Hall also discusses the dehumanization of women, caused by the ignorance of men.