Masculinity In Things Fall Apart

Tradition, values, and different perspectives of the things around us are affected by the environment in which you grow up in as well as impacting how the person feels, sees, and thinks about different aspects of our world. Humans take what they see and hear, then eventually become immune to it and develop some kind of a stereotype. Achebe, Reyes, and Bloomekatz . All show how the peers around you influence your life and beliefs. In “ Things Fall Apart” written by chinua achebe, the reader is able to see how masculinity and male superiority are taught to children at a young age. In the article “men are stuck in gender roles” written by Emily Alpert Reyes, she explains how men and women are still stereotyped based on the type of job they …show more content…
Bloomekatz demonstrates how growing up in a much more accepting generation has changed the views on people 's sexuality, even though some people are still in opposition to the gay community. Although these three writings address three different topics, they are quite parallel.
In the novel “Things Fall Apart” being weak is considered a disgrace to your culture and you are automatically disdained by your community. In the story, male children are taught and trained to understand the importance of being dominant at a young age. The main character known as Okonkwo revolves his life around masculinity, and strength. He deeply despises the concept of weakness and failure. In the story Okonkwo 's father Unoka was considered weak and not a true man to the community which then lead to Okonkwo separating from his father considering him an “embarrassment”. When Unoka died he was said to have “taken no title at all and he was heavily in debt”(Achebe 5). Due to the fact that he was not eligible to take care for his family. Women in the community were considered to work hard, at least as hard as women were expected to work. Okonkwo thought …show more content…
As children grow and grow they will keep away from the objects their parents told them were not the made for them. On the more adult side of the article, Reyes explains that the reason men have been keeping away from female jobs is because of economic barriers. To this day women are still getting paid less than men in certain career fields, this dating back to the fact that (as Reyes explain) “women were not breadwinners” meaning women did not work for the income of the family. As seen in many historic time periods dating all the way back to ancient time women in some cases are still seen as a household worker. Meaning she is mainly used/made for cleaning cooking, and other domestic responsibilities. This illustrating how women are still seen the same way as in many generations back in history, because of the way culture is passed down from generation to generation. Reyes also explains how men are lacking in fields such as nursing due to the slight sexism still taking place. Also coming from the fact that women were responsible for the less fragile work. Women were typically seen as working in fields such as nursing therefore causing men to feel embarrassed to take part in that type of field, in which they may be judged, forever leaving the stereotypical views on women since the beginning of history. Reyes