Summary Of Bastard Out Of Carolina

Boys will be boys; An excuse for men when they are acting like children. Women seem to constantly make excuses for men and their behavior. In the book Bastard out of Carolina Dorothy Allison tells the story of a young girl named Bone and her struggles with power in South Carolina. We follow her life as she grows up in an abusive family and watch how the ongoing abuse effects her. Bastard out of Carolina gives us a lens into the power plays as it pertains to gender roles. Men are described as boys. They always come first and need to be taken care of. They also get away with anything and everything. Even from the very beginning of the book when bone is quite young she noticed this. “My aunts treated my uncles like over-grown boys—rambunctious

‘It's the other way around and you know it. It's the woman belongs to the ones she feeds’" (10.72-73). The way men and women in the book see their lives is quite different. Women describe themselves as slaves but yet they stay because they need someone to help support their family. While men, as uncle Earle puts it, belong to the women that feed them. I agree with Alma because men could get out of the relationship while women seem to feel caged in. For example, when Alma kicks her husband out for cheating, she goes back to him within two weeks. “This body, like my aunts' bodies, was born to be worked to death, used up, and thrown away.” (14.7) Bone tells us how women are not appreciated. They work so hard holding as many jobs as they can and then come home to clean and take care of the children while men go through them like tissues. Women seem to need men in this book. Anney already is struggling with money so she has to stay with her abusive husband even when she knows he is hurting Bone. When it came down to it, she needed a husband who would make money more than she needed another mouth to feed and she left Bone in order to keep her