Males have always been seen as dominant over women and these gender roles particularly cause difficulty in marriage. In the play A Doll’s House, Henrik Ibsen perfectly demonstrates what gender roles do not only to a marriage, but to a whole family. Nora, the wife and mother, is dreadfully oppressed by her husband, Torvald Helmer. Torvald constantly oppresses and diminishes her as a woman and expects her to be a certain way as a wife because she is a woman. Nora allows this to happen as a result of the way society taught her it’s supposed to be. Near the conclusion of the play, in Act III Nora says: “What I mean is: I passed out of Daddy’s hands into yours…I lived by doing tricks for you, Torvald. But that’s the way you wanted it. You and Daddy did me a great wrong. It’s your fault that I’ve never made anything of my life” (Ibsen 80). Nora finally realizes her role in their marriage due to her gender and it causes her to stand up for herself but it ultimately tears apart her whole family. Masculine dominance in a marriage has always been evident and it is dangerous considering if one is dominating, that obviously means the other partner is being dominated and …show more content…
Women and men are both negatively affected by masculine hegemony in reference to employment. Correlating with gender roles, masculine dominance results in difficult employment expectations for women. Because men are seen as dominant, they are often expected to have higher income jobs and more power in the business world which is a cause for employment expectations based on gender. Due to this expectation, it leaves it to the assumption that women have lower paying jobs and less power in the workplace. Although employment equality has improved for women over the years, recent statistics show that in the state of Oregon in 2014, on average men made $47,194 yearly and women made $38,801. (The Gender Pay Gap). These statistics clearly show that masculine dominance is controlling women’s success in the business