ipl-logo

Power In The Handmaid's Tale

1407 Words6 Pages

Margret Atwood’s, The Handmaids Tale is a dystopian novel set in a totalitarian theocracy. Many unpleasant circumstances lead towards making this regime extremely controlling and manipulative. The government uses its power to take away every citizen’s freedom and force them to conform to the dystopian political ideology. In an oppressive society like Gilead, there are people who rebel and fight against the government to attain their rights and freedoms back. The main goal for dystopian societies like Gilead is to maintain power over its citizens through different means of control and suppress anyone who speaks against the government. The regime is successful in maintaining power by practicing several different methods of control by limiting …show more content…

All relationships are monitored and there are certain boundaries set out which you can’t cross at any cost. Women are oppressed through the means of sex in Gilead. Handmaids are required to have sex with their Commanders at fixed times, called the ceremony. Sex is strictly meant for procreation purposes only. Women are basically considered to be vessels of the child. “Atwood’s Handmaids, then, are an extreme example of almost complete loss of personal leisure space. They have no choice regarding the treatment of their bodies; no permission to select the individuals with whom they pass time; no control of their lives.” (Nordström). The control over women's sexual life is all in the hands of the government. This power of freedom is not given to the women which makes them inferior to men. The concept of controlling sex doesn’t only control the Handmaids but also the other women in the regime, such as the Marthas and the Wives. Any woman who is not a Handmaid, especially the Wives, create this sense of jealousy towards the Handmaids which serve the purpose of destroying unity in the society. Other women wanting to be each other, stops them from having a real connection with other women. That results in getting rid of any incentive from them that would create an alliance to overthrow the …show more content…

They twist many of the biblical references to fit their ideology. This shows one of the ideologies that Gilead has to offer, selectivity. “Gileadean government uses the Bible in order to reinforce their beliefs. They want the handmaids to believe that childbearing is their sacred purpose” (Osijek). This leaves Handmaids no chance of questioning their role in the society. They simply follow what the government has set out for them. This idea of religion as a means of control has come up a lot more times. When the Handmaids listen to the tape from the Bible, Offred notices how so many things about the bible have been

Show More
Related

Symbolism In How To Read Literature Like A Professor

643 Words | 3 Pages

The Handmaids must submit to their Commanders as they hold the dominant role. The Handmaids are also sacrificing their bodies and fertility to their Commander and his wife in order to give them a child. They have all been renamed with names that signify the Commanders they serve: Offred, Ofglen, Ofcharles, Ofwarren, etc. These names show the Commanders’ possession of the Handmaids. In The Handmaid’s Tale, sex symbolizes the Handmaid’s sacrifice and submission and the Commanders domination and control over the Handmaids in

Read More

The Handmaid's Tale Misconceptions Towards Women

1310 Words | 6 Pages

She is known as a vessel for reproduction having no control over her own body. This reflects her acknowledgement of the degrading and oppressive nature of her circumstances. In conclusion, the oppressive nature of Gilead results in women not being able to own properties, empower themselves, and control their

Read More

What Is The Abuse Of Power In The Handmaid's Tale

921 Words | 4 Pages

Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale is a dystopian novel which bases itself on the idea of recovering a society suffering from an alarmingly low birth rate. The women within the story have said to been rendered infertile. As a result, the fertile women are forced into becoming ‘Handmaids’ to bear children for the upper class. Within the newly established society, classes are segregated through distinct ranks and exploited through limiting circumstances and consequences. The theocratic nation also makes use of religion to manipulate the public and to justify their actions.

Read More

Examples Of Power In The Handmaid's Tale

2815 Words | 12 Pages

Power is not corrupt, people are. It’s evidently shown that in The Handmaid’s Tale those who thrive on greed and control will do whatever it takes to achieve their greatest desires, even if it means stripping away freedom and humanity from others. In The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, the Gileadean society dehumanises women as a tactic to gain control over them. Language, power, sex, and religion are means used to strip away individualism, all to create a twisted version of a perfect utopia.

Read More

Hunger For Power In The Handmaid's Tale

718 Words | 3 Pages

Atwood’s novel reveals that hunger for control can lead to the oppression of women, this is demonstrated through the Commander’s characterization, the Aunts attitudes, and some of the Gileadean rules/laws. Having the world at the tip of your fingers, and still feeling as if that is not enough, is the reason for the oppression of women in this novel, this is shown through the Commander’s characterization. In this scene, the Commander is explaining to the protagonist why society is how it is. “You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs, is what he says. We thought we could do better. …

Read More

Dehumanization In The Handmaid's Tale

783 Words | 4 Pages

The Handmaid’s are not only not allowed to touch the Commander during the process; they are not even allowed eye contact. This portrays the idea that the Handmaid’s are only there to provide sexual stimulation for the man, and is not allowed to take any sort of pleasure in the act. The Handmaid’s must remember, “For him …I am only a whim.” (Atwood 159). Another example of sexual dehumanization during the Ceremony is when Offred is “serviced” beforehand.

Read More

Government In The Handmaid's Tale

1523 Words | 7 Pages

In Gilead, the government made it a priority to take away individuality from women. Women cannot work, go to school, or read and write, and are each assigned very basic, specific tasks, such as having children. In that aspect, the society seems to be outdated instead of in the future, as women used to have menial tasks before they became equal. For Offred, her only job is to have children, as reproduction is a necessity in Gilead. However, even though Offred has a different job than other people, she is still restricted from having individuality.

Read More

Political Issues In The Handmaid's Tale

988 Words | 4 Pages

The subjugation of women is evident in the Gilead system as each Commander is given a handmaid whose name is “Of” the Commander’s name. Handmaids have no identity of their own and are similar to sex slaves at the mercy of

Read More

Environmental Changes In The Handmaid's Tale

510 Words | 3 Pages

The Republic of Gilead created Handmaids and they are placed in households of high ranked officials whose wives cannot bear children. The birth rates in the Republic of Gilead has sharply declined due to the chemical pollution in the air and water. The land is highly damaged because of the wars, especially the use of nuclear weapons. The humans are also damaged due to the land and the chemical pollution.

Read More

The Handmaid's Tale Power

1126 Words | 5 Pages

Margaret Atwood's didactic novel The Handmaid's Tale (1985) serves as a cautionary "tale" to warn readers about the destructive nature of power and oppression. Atwood portrays a dystopian totalitarian regime, Gilead, with a firm hierarchy motif where gender separation is established to reveal how an abuse of political power results in the oppression of individuals. Atwood uses her novel as an artistic tool to encourage the need for heightened political and social awareness by examining the way individuals are controlled through oppressive means, giving rise to a frightening loss of individualism and freedom. Hence, Atwood's novel communicates the dangers of a passive acceptance of power and oppression within societal and political movements

Read More

Women In The Handmaid's Tale

762 Words | 4 Pages

For a society that was built on a goal of controlling reproduction after pollution and chemical spills led to radiation sickness which caused a decline in fertility rates, fertility was one of biggest influencers of Gilead’s caste system. For sterile women living in the Republic of Gilead, perhaps the most fortunate they could get was to be married to an man of power and status. Otherwise, the next best alternative for a sterile woman was to serve as a servant. In Gilead, two servant positions are granted to infertile women. Servants known as “Aunts,” worked to educate and train the fertile women in their road to becoming a handmaid, and “Marthas,” worked at an elite family’s home, serving as either housekeepers or cooks.

Read More

How The Handmaid's Tale By Margaret Atwood Dehumanize Women

981 Words | 4 Pages

In The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, the Republic of Gilead actively represses women by forcing them into very narrowly defined, ultra-conservative gender roles. This totalitarian government strips women of all rights and protections, and imposes severe punishments for defiance. Pollution and disease had caused severe infertility in this society, drastically reducing birth rates. In an effort to reverse a drastic population decline, this thoroughly misogynistic and power-hungry regime, takes full control over the human reproductive process. Furthermore, the leadership uses various dehumanizing methods to achieve complete subservience of women to men.

Read More

Totalitarianism In The Handmaid's Tale

1251 Words | 6 Pages

The Handmaid 's Tale is one of Margaret Atwood most famous novels written during the spring of 1984, when the Berlin wall was still standing. Atwood creates a dystopia, which mostly consists of gender gap and oppression. The Handmaid 's Tale effectively portrays the United States as the modern-day totalitarian society of Gilead, which was illustrated as perfect by using the book of Genesis. Although the authors ideas are inherently and completely fictional, several concepts throughout his book have common links to the past and present society which the author herself calls a speculative fiction. The author uses a totalitarian system which includes aspects of Soviet system, to describe, deprivation, repression and terror with the use of

Read More

Oppression Of Women In The Handmaid's Tale By Margaret Atwood

996 Words | 4 Pages

Handmaid’s whom are the fertile women in the Gilead society, are stripped from all freedom and rights, banned from knowing any form of literature and have to be submissive to men, allowing their bodies to be sexually used to produce children. In contrast, women who are not fertile such as Wives have their freedom taken away too as they are confined to doing assigned jobs around the house. In contrast, the Aunts and the Commanders are shown to have the highest rankings in the Gileadean society. They are powerful figures, with privileges such as the Aunts being allowed to read and write and the Commanders being permitted to get married and have a handmaid's assigned to

Read More

Comparison Of Feminism In The Handmaid's Tale By Virginia Woolf

1141 Words | 5 Pages

In this frightening society, women are not allowed to speak freely, therefore, the handmaids learn how to lip-read, and to whisper at one another while they are at the Red Center (where handmaids are trained for their mission), as their only way to communicate with another person, and to maintain even a minimum of human contact in a society that has amputated their ability to feel as a normal human being. Even though this is pure fiction, sadly some common threads between Gilead and our society can be found. For instance, in some South Asian countries, women’s rights are non-existent, they are treated

Read More

More about Power In The Handmaid's Tale

Related Topics

Open Document