Shaping of Gender Roles - Essay Example

Shaping of Gender Roles Gender roles in North America had been largely borrowed from European colonists who settled in this part of the world. They had fixed gender roles that divided men and women according to the chores that each was meant to perform. However even though they came to North America with fixed notion of gender roles, they met some resistance from Native American women in Canada and some activists in other parts of North America.The early colonists were predominantly male and in order to find a place in Native American societies, they married women in these tribes.

This is where they found serious conflict in prescribed European gender roles.The changes that European encountered helped shape gender roles that were different from original roles that Europeans that brought in. Native American women had greatly sense of individual self-respect and self-worth. They were seen as a major force in a clan because "family and clan membership passed through the mother" and women "held considerable influence over village politics." Missionaries tried to shape gender roles according to their Christian beliefs but met with substantial resistance and hence negligible success.

The marriages between European and Indian women also helped alter gender roles because while these women did the household chores, they were also involved in other important duties. They would serve as "interpreters and negotiators between Indians and Europeans." This arrangement was though often frowned upon still it continued to exist and gave women considerable influence "in the marketplace and diplomatic councils which their European counterparts could not rival."The accounts by female travelers of the time also reflected upon the traditions of the time and gave us an insight into gender divisions that existed in the times of early colonization.

A French Nun for example spoke of the way women were treated at the seminaries. The women at the seminaries were trained to be docile. "They dare not even raise their eyes or look at us." Interestingly the Nun's accounts consistently calls Indians, "Savages", which is highly racist in tone. She even demeans people of other religious beliefs and feels that Christian beliefs are better. The women at the seminary are instructed in European mode of life. They are trained to be obedient and docile.

"She said she loved obedience because she had been forbidden to speak to the pagan." The woman who had been forbidden to speak to the pagan is harshly punished for disobedience even though she said she was innocent. These accounts highlight the treatment of women in early colonial days and tell a good deal about gender roles and beliefs of European colonists. However the real changes in gender roles were introduced by the Natives whose women were assigned greater power and were not confined to specific chores only.

These women along with activists like Ann Hutchison and Mary Dyer played a significant role in challenging European gender roles. They brought in changes which later triggered emancipation movements and gave women greater liberation than they had been accorded to by the European settlers.