Indian Societies: Gender roles in the Ramayana Essay

In the early patriarchal date of reference of the Ra mayana, custody reign over the Indian societies. All areas of social prominence were entirely fail by men in the form of warriors, priests and tribal chiefs. Women had very particular or no power at all in the semipolitical and public arena. They were raised to look after their families as rise as being dutiful wives. Women had the task of being loyal, faithful, loving and compassionate towards their husbands. various(prenominal) families were normally set up on a Male self-assurance basis, with the husband and arrest determining fundamental conditions and making the key decisions for their well being. Womens main role in confederation was that of influencing their family by providing know and affection to their husbands and children charm the man was in charge of satisfying his familys inevitably.Male oriented societal values allowed little or no space for women to express their interests and be influential in their everyday lives. Women were traditionally expected to serve their husbands and to wealthy person no autonomous interests. Only men could be rulers and draws in the patriarchal cabaret where the write up of the Ramayana developed. Rama at a time said on his designation as prince regent Mother, my father has plant me to the task of protecting the people (Mack 584). This passage clearly illustrates how power was transferred from father to son in order to provide for the peoples needs and for the alliance as a whole. Rama then as a leader of society must enforce values among others and express his desire to pull in remarkable attri furtheres to the people that surround him. Sovereignty falls to your share, too, for you are my guerrilla self (585). The need for a sovereign ruler is thus explicit among the community and desired for all individuals in the society.Women were projected as passive victims of the male-ruled system in which they were trapped. Females were responsible for the well being of the family as a whole. Women were raised with a limited perception of their role and nonplusment in the community. To be a respectful and a good house married woman meant for these women to shed themselves of any ambitions and desires they might dream of. They had to conform to what was expected from them, which was to have no identity besides being a wife or a mother (Qazi). If they did non conform that way, they were subject to indignity while toughened as mereobjects whose main role was to tempt men into sin. record has proven that women were alienated if they did non conform according to what was expected of them. These kinds of women were stereotype as villains or sensed as being tainted. manpower were perceived as being in a role of power, no case how large their families were. They were brought up with the belief that they were the sole providers for the family. Their failure to perform as it was expected from them led the family into constant pe rish. Males were in charge of many aspects of society including making decisions for the community, serving as spiritual guiders, choosing leaders and maintaining an equitable place to live in. Men often made decisions and enforced those decisions upon the family. As Raghunathan state in his work, Men lead and women follow. Women had no chance but to agree to the males decisions they imposed to women. The fact that they were born males gave them an value over women in the way that they could achieve anything they wanted and become anything they desired.Men were highly valued and respected if they possessed certain values and ideals at heart the society. They were educated and trained to be ambitious and to have idealistic values, which were estimable in this specific society. On the other hand, women were taught to shed any ambitions and ideas they may have for themselves. The characteristics valued in men were not valued in women on the contrary, these characteristics in women were disapproved because of the male-ruled system of the time. Patriarchy leads to gender inequality in society (Seeger). Eventually this could lead these women to become isolated from society since they were not allowed to perform the same tasks and duties as men. Women then, had to rely on the love and cultism they would bring to the family while having other interests and aspirations.In conclusion, the male and female roles in the Ramayana were pre-established by the rigorous society in which the story developed. Males had certain expectations they had to gratify such as being rulers and leaders in order to be good men. Females, on the other hand, were limited to being faithfulto their husbands while expressing their love for the family. Each had a role in society that they could not differ from due to extreme moral valuation. Men were to become the trounce warriors and to desire power through leadership women were to become good mothers and decorous wives with no intent or d esire to achieve higher goals or expectations.Patriarchy led men into high power positions in the community leaving women with no chance of participation in this field. This type of society facilitated men into possessing key roles in the religious and political arena which served them as a platform to pursue and achieve higher goals. In the story of the Ramayana, men were empowered and women were often subdued due to the patriarchal era that they were living in at the time of the story, which facilitated these typical gender roles. plant life citedMack, Maynard. The Ramayana of Valkimi. The Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces. New York W.W. Norton, 1997. 576-612Qazi, Uzma. Ramayana Lecture Notes. Grant MacEwan, Edmonton, 2008.Seeger, Elizabeth. The Ramayana. New York William R. Scott, 1969.Raghunathan, N. Srimad Valkimi Ramayana. Madras Vighneswara Publishing House, 1981.