How do Shakespeare’s portrayal of certain characters demonstrate his views on gender roles?

final word will consist of two paragraphs in response to the overarching prompt, “How do Shakespeare’s portrayal of certain characters demonstrate his views on gender roles?”. Basically, the way that you should go about this is to first determine what you believe those views are. Does he conform to traditional gender roles, specifically the role of women in society as well as how they should behave?

Once you have determined your answer to that question, your job is to use two characters to support that answer. So, your first paragraph might address how S’s portrayal of Kate supports your answer, and your second might address how Lucentio supports it. There are a number of factors in this portrayal that you may choose to explain- the things they say, the things they do, the way they are viewed by other characters, how (and if) they change over the course of the play, etc. You can pick whichever two characters you want; however, I would probably pick at least one of the 4 main characters (Kate, Bianca, Lucentio, and Petruchio). There is plenty of evidence in the portrayal of Hortensio/Gremio and Baptista as well, but I would probably avoid Tranio and Grumio.

Here is the link for the summary

https://www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/shrew/summary/

Shakespeare’s work portrays gender in a mesmerizing manner, whereby he enhances and diminishes conformity to traditional gender roles. Shakespeare uses characters that do not conform to gender role personalities and in some instances, portrays them to possess traditional roles.  Moreover, characters dress up as the opposite gender, which becomes confusing to determine the actual feelings Shakespeare tries to portray on gender roles. The Taming of Shrew play provides a battle of sexes, presenting sexist and feminist concerns as seen through the characters Katherina and Petruchio. Primarily, Katherina is dehumanized and portrayed as a sharp-tongued woman, quick-tempered, and prone to violence. She is shown to depict hostility towards her suitors, and her jealousy brings out her insecurity problems. For instance, Gremio calls her a wild cat (p.196), showing how untamable and vicious she can become. Petruchio also describes and aligns her with household stuff, animals, and inanimate households (p.230-232). This shows she is likened to objects that lack a voice, are useful, and are always obedient, as a means to try to tame her. This description shows that Shakespeare conforms to the traditional roles of women to become subjective and obedient without a voice to their husbands. In the play, she seems to avoid marriage traps only to be disappointed, as she must conform to societal demands and expectations among women. The play provides humiliation scenes that Shakespeare uses to show gender roles and perceptions of Katherina. In the wedding scene, Petruchio strongly humiliates her through his lateness and misappropriated dressing. She gets angry and expresses her anger, outrage, and embarrassment. This scene portrays her as a strong woman whom many people would describe as having an attitude defying the traditional nature of a woman who would remain unmarried her entire life and become an outcast as society disapproves of such a woman. This shows defiance from traditional gender roles.

Petruchio is portrayed as an eccentric, witted, and boisterous character. He uses a language rich in imagery possessing high social status and high levels of knowledge that portray and underpin his patriarchal dominance. He uses this knowledge to try to tame Katherina, which he succeeds, as he uses his loud and shrewd nature to tame and silence Katherina’s nature. He uses his power to humiliate Katherina socially and uses that patriarchal hierarchy to oppress her in the marriage (p.8-10). When Petruchio describes and aligns Katherina to household stuff, animals, and inanimate households, shows the power he has, and as a male in the dominant sex, he counts her as his possession (p.230-232). Shakespeare’s characters and confusion of characters as well as conformity to traditional gender roles shows his desire to escape from social conventions while showing patriarchy dominance and male oppression as a source of criticism. In the final speech from Katherina, she describes him as a lord or king who demands respect and subjectivity from his wife (p.155-156). This scene and words conform to traditional gender roles of a man as the household king, by whom the wife should be subjective. According to society, a woman should be humble, useful, and subjective to her husband with expectations to tend to domestic duties, which seems that Petruchio achieved. However, as stated above, his power and patriarchal status is used to oppress Katherina by violating her human rights yet persuading the people that he is the ‘good guy.’