Women In The Crucible

Improved Essays
Our story begins with dancing, not the footloose kind, although the two towns have similar policies on the matter, but a much more ominous dancing in the woods. The setting is early 1800’s Massachusetts in a puritan colony. We are first introduced to the main character in the play when reverend Parris, a rich reverend from Barbados, stumbles upon girls dancing. It is never stated why Parris was in the woods to begin with, and it is never questioned either. Parris discoveres the girls dancing and is horrified to see one of the girls naked, and again straying from Footloose, where daisy dukes and crop tops reign, seeing a woman’s ankles was considered risque at the time. Parris is quick to break up this atrocity and brings all the girls home, …show more content…
They were considered to be, “the weaker vessel in both body and mind”, and expected to be quiet, so they often had to manipulated their born roles in order to fulfill their own aspirations and goals. Since puritan leaders were all male, there were few that would stand up for the rights of women and they were often upset when women defied these gender roles. A good example of this in The Crucible, is when Martha Corey is accused of witchcraft because she was reading. This is the perfect example of men being afraid of a woman expanding her knowledge. Knowledge is power, and power was something women were scarcely …show more content…
Dancing was a forbidden pleaser, possibly because it was considered wild and unruley, but what if it had been young men dancing in the forest? Since men could do no wrong, I assume the term, “boys will be boys” would be tossed around. As if the fact they are male exuses their actions for anything. Abigials behavior is seen as crazy and extreme, but Reverend Parris exhibits many of the same traits and he is not hated. For example, Abigial is quick to accuse other women in order to avert attention from herself, Revered Parris does the same thing when Hale questions his motives in the church. This, along with many others, are prime examples of how The Crucible had a lot of gender inequality and the main conflict in the play could have been avoided if women were awarded the same rights as their make

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