Essay On Gender Roles In The Colonial Era

Gender binary is a classification system that people use to identify as maleness and femaleness. In the Colonial and Industrial era, the gender binary that one identified themselves with, played an important role in how society shaped their lives. For generations, society has separated the duties of males and females. Men are usually higher on the power spectrum, whereas women are inferior . However, over the course of the colonial and industrial eras, there were many changes in the role of genders. At the start of the colonial era, Puritans were the first of many Europeans to settle on American ground. They came to America with a mission of having “ a city on a hill.” As a result, the Puritans wanted to become a model society for everyone to mimic after. Puritans migrated to America in hopes to live in a purified society. This was due to the corruption of Christianity and Catholicism in Europe. Colonial society consisted of 90 percent of people

Childbirth was a very important aspect in colonial life. The amount of children a family economy had was the resulting factor of the family’s success. Therefore, childbirth was a sacred event that happened very often. This was performed by the midwives and women servants only. Men were not allowed to take part in this event. This is similar to the child birth event of Ona in The Jungle because Jurgis was not allowed into the room when Ona was conceiving the baby. Marija and a widow says to Jurgis “ you go away. Do as I tell you — you have done all you can, and you’re only in the way. Go away and stay away” (170) while Ona was having the baby and dying at the same time. The reason the widow says this to him is because in times like this, the men are usually known for being in the way. This was shown through colonial time to industrial time. They just believed that the event of birth conception should solely rely on