Taming Of The Shrew Gender Roles Essay

Evolution has caused society to become more sophisticated which in advance has changed social construction such as gender. William Shakespeare’s was a phenomenal playwright who in the 1600’s wrote historically significant texts such as, ‘Taming of the shrew’, Within Shakespeare’s great plays such as ‘Taming of the shrew’ social constructions were seen through the representations of gender. Gender representations were not only found within historically significant texts such as Shakespeare’s plays but, also in contemporary texts such as the film ‘Ten things I hate about you’, which was directed by director Gil Junger. Despite the enormous difference in the time frame of these two texts Shakespeare plays, are still consider valuable and educational …show more content…
As an example of this, the plot reinforces the gender role of men being gold diggers and dominant as shown in the play. In the play, Petruchio is a bachelor who is on the hunt for a rich wife. Petruchio is a man only in it for the money, this can be seen in Act 1, Scene 2 where he states “…if thou know one rich enough to be Petruchio wife”. Also, Petruchio shows that he dominant and reigns over women when he treats his wife recklessly with no mercy in Act 4, scene 1, where he states “… last night she slept not, nor tonight she shall not”. Correspondingly, in the film this gender representation is reinforced as Patrick in the film, is a man who only dates Katerina for the money in return. Also, the gender representations of men being dominant is also reinforced within the film, this can be seen in the film when Patrick denies Kat a deservingly kiss. Therefore, Junger has successfully reinforced the gender representations of men within Shakespeare play “Taming of the shrew” in a precise and accurate interpretation of gender that fits into modern