Betty Warren's Depiction Of 'Women In The Film'

The film starts with a setting of a socially conservative society of the 1950’s at Wellesley College which was a prestigious, elite private women’s college. It gives us a view of how women back then were treated and suppressed by the society and the norms. The thinking and beliefs of men and women were socially structured from the day they were born and hard to challenge by anyone. Most of the students in the college was intelligent but they lacked personal opinion and believed only in facts and beliefs. Their idea of an ideal woman was to earn the hand of a Yale or Harvard man and be lucky enough to cherish the chance in her life and be a dutiful wife. And education for them was only a way of maintaining and living up to the husband’s idea …show more content…
She has her entire life planned of getting married after her college and having children. Her life revolved around patriarchal values ever since she was born. She was a strong believer of the college, society and her mother, who thought that a woman’s role in life was to be a good wife, take care of her husband and children. This believe that Betty used to carry was not something she ever pondered upon nor did she ever tried to reflect upon what the society or her mother used to say about marriage. She was determined to prepare herself to be a proper companion for her future husband. She was the most influential among the other girls and wrote in the editorial of the college newspaper. To sum up one can say, she lacked her own opinion and rather tried to follow the path of her mother, which she was reinforced of frequently. She even described Watson’s teachings to be subversive and political which encourages the girls of Wellesley College to reject the ‘roles they were born to fill’. Proving herself and others that she was a defender of Wellesley pattern, she finally got married while pursuing her studies and seem to not attend her classes for a long