Patriarchy in Society

Patriarchal society and its effect on language and literature.

Patriarchy as an ideology:

Pam Morris, in her book Literature and feminism has defined ideology in two ways. The first is that ‘ideology’ is a consciously held system of beliefs which people knowingly choose or reject, like a religion.

The second definition says that an ideology is used to refer to the way we perceive reality. The second term rests on the assumption that as we enter society, we absorb and assume its perceptions. We are drawn into a network of values, assumptions and expectations which have always ‘been there’ and seem natural to us.

A great deal of Morris’ feminist study is concerned with the term ideology in the second sense, that is, with ways in which women’s subordination is naturalised.

Morris explains how women have suffered from a long tradition of what is called biological essentialism. The belief implies that women are biologically weaker, which justifies their suppression.

Female figures of power.
I’ll start with a simple question. How many female protagonists do you know about? In books or movies? Centuries of literature, and we still don’t have many novels about strong women, who aren’t looking for ‘Prince Charming’.

Let’s take an example. What were some of the first stories you read? Cinderella, Snow white, and Sleeping Beauty. And how do these stories present their ideal princess? As a fair, helpless, delicate girl, whose sole aim seems to be to marry a handsome, strong, courageous prince she met about 10 minutes ago. And, of course, they live happily ever after.

They say love is blind, but you never read about a gay or lesbian happy ever after or a rich heiress falling in love with a waiter. Every story I have read reinforces social notions of a heterosexual romance- boy meets girl, they fall in love, overcome whatever obstacle stands in their way, and hen fade away into happy oblivion.

A blissful prince and his fair maiden riding off into the sunset, however raises quite a few questions if you think about it. Why does the fair maiden always sit passively in a palace, or the highest room of the tallest tower? Why can’t she be the one to ride off to rescue a prince? Why are all our heroes male?
The answer clearly lies in our social structure. Society tells us that young men can't think of women as role models unless they're a family member, whereas young women can admire and seek to emulate anyone, regardless of gender.
If you're a young man, and if you have a poster on your wall with a woman, she had better be in a bikini.
Young men are taught not to think of women as role models. They are taught to think of them as either family members or sexual objects. There is no other category presented. This ideology is clearly reflected in our literature, which shows a dismal dearth of independent, self sufficient women, who may or may not conform to hetero-normativity.

Language of a patriarchal society.
Even our language shows our patriarchal leanings. ‘His’ is the pronoun used to represent ‘mankind’. The tale of humanity is a ‘history’.

It is difficult to spot signs of patriarchy when one is comfortably within the constructs of what goes as normal.

However, normal is a relative term. What is normal in Vietnam may be unacceptable in India. What is normal for a spider is chaos for a fly. Studying literature, then, comes down to this- analysing society’s restrictions and unlearning our own prejudices. After all, as Vincent Van Gogh said ‘Normality is a paved road- it is comfortable to walk on, but no flowers grow on it.’