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Women In Maggie Piercy's Expectations Of Women

838 Words4 Pages

Throughout the years, women have withstood sexist dilemmas enforced by men. They have been stereotyped and expected to be something fraudulent. Women as a group, have come a long way from the struggles and discrimination they have faced for many years. Men have adequately impacted the reputations of women. Women are demonstratively stereotyped as powerless, passive, and sacrificial humans due to the expectations they received in the past imposed by paternal society. The term “peacemakers without power” was given to women by a mostly male dominated society. Since women were labeled as powerless, men felt superior to women. This superiority demoted the maternal society; therefor, the paternal society took advantage of women because they were …show more content…

For example, sports calendars rarely feature overweight women. Models are expected to be young, thin, and attractive. Women constantly try to attain perfection through makeup, hair coloring, and trendy diets. Studies show, the average woman spends approximately $15,000 on beauty products in a lifetime. This $15,000 is spent to increase the self-confidence of women that men knock down with their expectations of physical perfection. Maggie Piercy discusses how the expectations women face can be harmful. These expectations are ones that women and girls face every day. Maggie Piercy exaggerates the consequences of the expectations women face in her poem “Barbie Doll”. In this poem, the main focus is that the girl cut off her flaws. The society she lived in, ruled by men, drove her to kill herself because they were making fun of her and her lack of perfection. Women are labeled with many expectations; however, these expectations have …show more content…

Women and Social Protest. Oxford University Press, 1990, EBSCOhost.com
Piercy, Maggie. “Barbie Doll”. The Norton Mix. Judy Seig. pp 82-83.
Wolf, Virginia. “Professions for Women”. The Norton Mix. Judy Seig. pp 145-151.
Brady, Judy. “I Want a Wife”. The Norton Mix. Judy Seig. pp 45-47.
Davtyan-Gevorgyan, Anna. “Women and Mass Media.” Heinruch Boll Stiftung, 8 Apr. 2016,
Schmitt, David P. “Are Women More Emotional Than Men?” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 10 Apr. 2015.
Peterson, M. Jeanne. "No Angels in the House: The Victorian Myth and the Paget Woman." The American Historical Review 89.3 (1984): 677-708.
Kratofil, Colleen. “Can You Guess How Much a Woman Spends on Makeup in Her Liftetime? (We Were Way Off!).” PEOPLE.com, 30 Mar.

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