Womens Traditional Roles - Essay Example

6 October Women’s Traditional Roles Women have played a major role in shaping and developing the society. They have demonstrated that without their influence a society cannot reach anywhere. They are vital to the development of the family and have important roles and responsibilities to fulfil. In the essay “I want a Wife”, Judy Brady tries to analyse the role of the women of the 1970’s and the responsibilities towards their husbands. This essay shall give out a brief of that writing as well as the author’s own opinions on the role and the duties of women towards their husbands as well as their families.

In the essay the writer talks about how important it is for the woman to satisfy the sexual needs of the husband. It is of extreme concern that woman should be able to satisfy the sensual as well as the sexual wants and needs of the husband. The man expects his wife to be ready for making love at any time of the day, as he expects his wife to make him happy through these things. While the husband is busy earning for the family being the bread earner, the role of the woman is more confined to the house and towards her husband and her children.

The importance of wife as a cook who feeds her husband has been played out in the essay. Wife is indeed the source through which the husband gets his daily meals, and therefore her inputs are considered to be very important. She is the one who makes tasty meals so that her husband can have a good time eating meals and enjoy his food. She tries to satisfy the hunger of her husband by cooking delicious meals in order to win his heart as well. It is an old saying that the door to the man’s heart goes from his stomach, so indeed it is pertinent that a good wife knows how to cook good meals for her husband.

The essay is highly feministic in its approach which talks about the social roles played by woman. It also talks about the role of the wife as a mother who should take good care of her children. It is important that the children get a good upbringing and the wife has to play a very important role in maintaining the children. Wife should also be prepared to let her husband go to some other woman if he wants to. This has been depicted in a very humorous way by the writer, saying that for almost everything and anything the wife is ready to put her happiness before the happiness of her husband.

In the story “Girl” by Jamaica I this poem the mother is telling her daughter how to do things in the household when she marries her husband. She is teaching and training her daughter the right way of doing things, which involve sweeping and cleaning the house, cooking food, washing the clothes and so on. It is a satirical take on the duties and responsibilities of the wife and how the society interprets such things without realizing the hardships faced by the women in doing such things for their families.

The poem has a very satirical look to it and is talking straight out of the box. The mother is trying to give all the instructions to her daughter with respect to the way she should do her work. This includes how to make tea, food, cleaning clothes, washing dishes, preparing medicines for her husband, teaching her children. “this is how to bully a man; this is how a man bullies you” The above is an extremely verse from the poem, where the mother is giving the reality information to her daughter with respect to her marriag,e She is teaching her how to dominate and bully her husband, while at the same time she is trying to tell her that men would react and that her husband would also try to do the same to her and therefore with that respect she needs to be aware and mature.

She teaches her everything under the Sun there possibly could be, and the poet takes the note from the fact that even in real life women are expected to work like robots mechanincally. Work Cited http://www.my-island-jamaica.com/girl_by_jamaica_kincaid.html http://womenshistory.about.com/od/feministtexts/a/i_want_a_wife.htm