Toni Cade Bambara's 'The Chrysanthemums'

Jared Keim

Mr. Bowne

AP English III

November 19, 2016

Teaching the Lesson of Inequality

The television is on. The bottom line reads, “ Black unarmed teenager killed walking down a street at night-- top anonymous executive says the gender wage gap is because one week at of every month, women are irrational due to their period.” Gender and racial inequality is a problem faced by society throughout time. In Toni Cade Bambara’s, “The Lesson,” the divide between the black American children, and the privileged, upper class white children is used to demonstrate social inequality. In contrast, John Steinbeck’s, “The Chrysanthemums” challenges the gender inequality between a dominant, male figure and a female protagonist that is unwilling to be content

The beginning of the short story introduces Elisa Allen in an exposition that defines her as independent, as she dresses in men’s attire to not display her female physique, thus denying her gender. With her farming materials , Elisa dominantly cuts the chrysanthemums, a phallic symbol meant to represent her power over men. Elisa is talented, smart, and ambitious, but all these attributes go to waste because she is a women. Although the two men in the story are not on the same intellectual level as she is, their lives are far more attractive and busy. All Elisa can do is watch her husband, Henry, from afar as he makes the business deals and money for the household. The tinker who ,according to Elisa, does not even match her skill as a tinker, gets to ride about the country, living an adventurous life that is believed to be unfit for a woman. Steinbeck uses Henry and the tinker as a symbol for the patriarchal societies: They ignore a woman’s potential just like how society treats women as

One of the top advisors to the President of the United States, Steve Bannon, wrote an article titled, “Would you rather your child have feminism or cancer?” Gender inequality is an issue that should have been solved long ago. However, the same actions by men that occurred in 1937, when “The Chrysanthemums” was written are happening almost 80 years later. At the end of the short story, Steinbeck wrote, “ She turned up her coat collar so he could not see that she was crying weakly--- like an old woman.” Elisa has to hide the fact she is upset because it fits one characterization people have of the archetype of a woman, a person who is emotional and weak. Society has progressed, showing woman in literature and television as powerful, strong human beings, but it seems with every step forward, society is taking two steps