Kate Chopin
27 February 2014
The Roles of Women
“It is the wife’s responsibility to provide for her husband, and to maintain a happy home; the single spot of rest which a man has upon this earth for the cultivation of his noblest sensibilities” (Doc. 26, “Woman’s Rights and Men’s Wrongs”). Women are meant to uphold a certain expectation that has been held over them for centuries. But in the nineteenth century things for women began to change. While many women fulfilled their "responsibilities", a large number of women responded to this attempt to define and limit their roles with literature and work in the feminist movement. There were many feminist writers during this time as well, such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Kate Chopin (who began writing at the beginning of the fight for women’s rights, but did not exactly declare herself a feminist). Most of this change came about because of the actions women took upon themselves and their desire to break out of the limits imposed on their sex, because of the specific roles women are expected to pursue. They have been unjustly held back from achieving full equality for much of the human history. Chopin was neither an activist nor an advocate for the roles of women. She was nonetheless a woman who took women extremely seriously. She never doubted women 's ability to be strong because she came from a long line of strong women whom she loved and respected; her great-grandmother, grandmother, and mother affiliation. She had a lack of interest in feminism, she had a different understanding of freedom for women. “She saw freedom as much more a matter of spirit, soul, character of living your life within the constraints that the world makes [or] your God offers you, because all of us do live within constraints. There 's no indication that for example she regretted her marriage, or regretted being a mother" (PBS). Whereas Gilman is a straightforward activist. Even though during this period of life people felt that, “the ideal woman
The Roles of Women
“It is the wife’s responsibility to provide for her husband, and to maintain a happy home; the single spot of rest which a man has upon this earth for the cultivation of his noblest sensibilities” (Doc. 26, “Woman’s Rights and Men’s Wrongs”). Women are meant to uphold a certain expectation that has been held over them for centuries. But in the nineteenth century things for women began to change. While many women fulfilled their "responsibilities", a large number of women responded to this attempt to define and limit their roles with literature and work in the feminist movement. There were many feminist writers during this time as well, such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Kate Chopin (who began writing at the beginning of the fight for women’s rights, but did not exactly declare herself a feminist). Most of this change came about because of the actions women took upon themselves and their desire to break out of the limits imposed on their sex, because of the specific roles women are expected to pursue. They have been unjustly held back from achieving full equality for much of the human history. Chopin was neither an activist nor an advocate for the roles of women. She was nonetheless a woman who took women extremely seriously. She never doubted women 's ability to be strong because she came from a long line of strong women whom she loved and respected; her great-grandmother, grandmother, and mother affiliation. She had a lack of interest in feminism, she had a different understanding of freedom for women. “She saw freedom as much more a matter of spirit, soul, character of living your life within the constraints that the world makes [or] your God offers you, because all of us do live within constraints. There 's no indication that for example she regretted her marriage, or regretted being a mother" (PBS). Whereas Gilman is a straightforward activist. Even though during this period of life people felt that, “the ideal woman
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