Zarrinjooee, Bahman, and Shirin Kalantarian. “Women’s Oppressed and Disfigured Life in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.” Advances in Language and Literary Studies 8.1 (2017): 66-71.
Summary: The article written by Zarrinjooee provides a deep literary analysis of Margaret Atwood’s novel “The Handmaid’s Tale” based on the feminist theories of Simone de Beauvoir which show how Atwood portrays the women of Gilead are transformed into the traditional passive roles in the traditional and patriarchal society “through the discriminations they encounter because of their sex and infertility in their lives” (Zarrinjooee and Kalantarian). The article explores how Atwood portrays the exploitation and marginalization of women in the dystopian society of Gilead by comparing Atwood’s work with Simone de Beauvoir’s work “The Second Sex” which examines the historical and cultural factors that have shaped the identity of women as “Other” in a patriarchal society of men. The authors of the article show Atwood’s portrayal of Gilead where women were treated as “objects” and reduced to their biological functions and sexual roles in the patriarchal system. Moreover, the article argues that both Beauvoir and Atwood challenge the biological and sexual roles as well as discourses that define women based on their reproductive capacities. They both argue and advocate for women’s empowerment and liberation from the patriarchal system as Beauvoir criticizes the biological determinism that denies women their individuality. In addition, the sexuality section of the article explores how violence through objectification forced women of Gilead society “to have sex with their assigned commanders in the presence of their wives” (Zarrinjooee and Kalantarian). Beauvoir in his work rejects this patriarchal norm of objectification of women’s bodies that subject them to male domination and violence.
Intention: By utilizing this research article, I will be able to analyse the novel “The Handmaid’s Tale” from a feminist point of view. This article will correlate to the argument that women were subjected to exploitation, oppression, violence, and alienation in a dystopian society where “objectification” of their bodies reduced their roles to only reproductive and sexual beings. This source will also help me dive into the details of the novel and how Atwood challenges the religious and patriarchal discourses that justify the “subordination” and “objectification” of women in society and the denial of their agency and identity.
Haghi, Samira, Mahmoud Reza Ghorban Sabbagh, and Zohre Taebi. “Representation of Female Body in the Social Context of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.” 4th International Conference on Applied Research in Language Studies. 2016.
Summary: This article is a scholarly paper that analyses “The Handmaid’s Tale” from the perspective of how Atwood depicts the discrimination of women’s gender, exploitation of their sex, and violence on their bodies in a dystopian society. The paper argues that the novel reflects religious, social, and historical views on the “bodies” of women as “objects” that are subordinated to control women’s agency, identities, and functions (Haghi et al.). The paper also argues the way female bodies are appropriated and manipulated in the society of Gilead where women’s reproductive and sexual functions were “objectified” to alienate and marginalize this specific gender. The patriarchal ideology of Gilead depicted in Atwood’s novel is explored in this article showing the core essence of how violence leads to the dehumanization of women in a patriarchal society.
Intention: What sparked my interest in this article is that this article reflects how Atwood’s novel challenges the negative and instrumental view towards “objectification” of female bodies the way women’s gender and bodies are exploited, objectified, and alienated by the patriarchal ideology in the patriarchal system using social reform and religion as a justification. This article will be helpful to make readers realize that resistance to the domination, oppression, violence, and dehumanization of female bodies is necessary in the contemporary world.
Howell, Amanda. “Breaking silence, bearing witness, and voicing defiance: the resistant female voice in the transmedia storyworld of The Handmaid’s Tale.” Continuum 33.2 (2019): 216-229.
Summary: This scholarly paper explores how the fictional world of The Handmaid’s Tale is “unified by a thematic concern with the resistant women’s voice” which challenges the oppressive regime of Gilead and its silencing of “objectification” of female bodies (Howell). The article argues that the resistant female voice is not only a narrative device but also a platform that offers different challenges and opportunities for the reception and expression of resistant females in political and ethical scenarios. The paper also analyses how the challenges posed to women due to their “reproductive systems” require a voice for social change and feminist activism (Howell). The research study explores the role of the protagonist, Offred, a fertile female who is used as a “handmaid” to bear children for her assigned commander Fred. The sexual violence of the women in that Gilead republic is used as the justification to show that Gilead rulers treat their women with respect and protect them from violent behavior when they use women for bearing children than in the pre-Gilead society filled with rape and pornography. Howell in this article also explores how challenges and different opportunities of “violence” against women contribute further to the expansion and engagement of the contemporary storyworld where women are still forced to live in a patriarchal system.
Intention: The way the article aims to read through Atwood’s novel will help me build the argument that Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” is a critique of violence and gender inequality that results in women facing violence and oppression even in contemporary society and the modern world. This article will also help me research and write about the pre-Gilead and Gilead society that was subjected to violence in the guise of fertile women bearing children although it is difficult to judge which variant is suitable for the females of the society, to have sex with any unknown maniac or to be forced to have sex with a commander as a handmaid.
Sahu, Aarti. “Portrayal of Marginalized Women in Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.” Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow Volume 16: 5 May 2016 ISSN 1930-2940 (2016): 1.
Summary: This research work by Aarti Sahu provides a critical analysis of the dystopian novel “The Handmaid’s Tale” which depicts the society of Gilead, a totalitarian regime, where women are exposed to violence, oppression, and exploitation by the patriarchal authorities. The article examines different types of women and their characters in the novel such as the rebels, the handmaids, the aunts, and the wives in a male-dominated society. The author explores how Atwood exposes the terrible conditions that the agency of women feel in a male-dominated or patriarchal system and how they cope with or resist the marginalization and coercion imposed on them by the society of Gilead (Sahu). The article explores how Atwood has written this novel as a provocative and powerful feminist work to expose the violence on women of the Gilead society that led to the dehumanization of gender.
Intention: The intention of choosing this article is that this piece of research challenges the readers to question the status quo of society and fight for women’s rights and dignity. The article will be helpful to explore how Atwood depicts the violence and marginalization leading to the “dehumanization” of women in a dystopian society that is ruled by a theocratic, patriarchal, and male-dominated society. This article is relevant and significant because it raises important questions about feminism, violence against women, dehumanization of gender, and resistance in the face of oppression and tyranny.
Works Cited
Haghi, Samira, et al. “Representation of Female Body in the Social Context of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.” 4th International Conference on Applied Research in Language Studies. 2016.
Howell, Amanda. “Breaking Silence, Bearing Witness, and Voicing Defiance: The Resistant Female Voice in the Transmedia Storyworld of The Handmaid’s Tale.” Continuum, vol. 33, no. 2, 2019, pp. 216–29.
Sahu, Aarti. “Portrayal of Marginalized Women in Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.” Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow Volume 16: 5 May 2016 ISSN 1930-2940, 2016, p. 1.
Zarrinjooee, Bahman, and Shirin Kalantarian. “Women’s Oppressed and Disfigured Life in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.” Advances in Language and Literary Studies, vol. 8, no. 1, 2017, pp. 66–71.
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