Role of Women in Society: Perspectives from Kate Chopin and Ernest Hemingway

For the longest time, women had accepted the role of being the housewife that performs house duties while men went to work to provide for the family. However, different historical events have led to extensive changes in the perceptions of gender and gender roles. This might be attributed to various authors including Kate Chopin that decided to exclude themselves from societal perceptions. In Kate Chopin's The Awakening, there is a high disapproval of the way gender operates in contemporary society. In various parts of the text, aspects such as motherly obligations, women's sexual activity, and marriage customs are challenged. Similarly, there seems to be a questioning of the society's default gender setting in Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises that demonstrates that the gender labeling of male and female by society was not a very good concept and has been changed by historical events.

In Kate Chopin's The Awakening, there is an inclination towards the concept of natural affection of a mother to a child instead of the constraints that are enabled by maternal commitment. This is apparent in the text:

If one of the little Pontellier boys took a tumble whilst at play, he was not apt to rush crying to his mother's arms for comfort; he would more likely pick himself up, wipe the water out of his eyes and the sand out of his mouth, and go on playing. Tots as they were, they pulled together and stood their ground in childish battles with doubled fists and uplifted voices, which usually prevailed against the other mother-tots (Chopin 8).