Gender

Gender

1. Context: Men were the superior gender. Women were only seen as relievers of men's sexual desires. If a woman was unmarried, she was the 'property' of her father

2. IAGO'S USE OF GENDER

   • 'Zounds, sir, you're robbed. For shame, put on your gown! Your heart is burst. You have lost half your soul. Even now, now, very now, an old black ram is tupping your white ewe. Arise, arise! Awake the snorting citizens with the bell, or else the devil will make a grandsire of you. Arise, I say!'
     • Act 1, Scene 1
     • Suggests that Desdemona's elopement is a form of 'theft' on Othello's part. This is because she is female, and therefore 'belongs' to her father, and Othello has stolen her
     • Plays on the fears of miscegenation (interracial couples 'mixing' via sex or marriage). 'an old black ram is tupping your white ewe'
       • Iago's vivid and crude description of the lovemaking between a black man and a white woman is meant to scare Brabantio into thinking that Desdemona's lamb-like purity and whiteness are being contaminated and compromised by her sexual relationship with a black man
   • 'In Venice they do let God see the pranks they dare not show their husbands'
     • Act 3, Scene 3
     • Iago claims that Venetian women cannot be trusted because they hide their secret 'pranks' from their husbands. This acts as a dominant attitude within the play - that women are promiscuous and disloyal. This could be argued to be why it is so easy for Iago to manipulate Othello into believing that Desdemona had had an affair

3. OTHELLO'S USE OF GENDER

   • 'She wished she had not heard it, yet she wished that heaven had made her such a man'
     • Act 1, Scene 3
     • Could be interpreted as: she wished that God had made her such a man as Othello for her to marry...OR
       • She wished that God had literally made her a man. It is known that Desdemona is an adventurer and would rather live an action-filled life rather than stay at home (evident when she wants to go to Cyprus with Othello in the war). This also reinforces the fact that women were extremely inferior and lived very sheltered lives, and so would rather have been born a man to have better rights and lifestyle

4. BRABANTIO'S USE OF GENDER

   • 'Look to her, Moor, if thou hast eyes to see. She has deceived her father, and may thee'
     • Act 1, Scene 3
     • An unfair stereotype of young women that seeing as she deceived her own father, she will deceive her husband too. This suggests that Brabantio now has a lack of trust in his daughter

5. THE ROLE OF BIANCA

   • Madly in love with Cassio who only uses her to relieve his own sexual desires. Lower class. Has to sell herself to prostitution to be able to survive (buying food etc)
   • Shakespeare made Bianca a prostitute as she acts as a foil to the chaste and faithful Desdemona. However, Othello does not recognise the differences between Bianca and Desdemona and claims that Desdemona has slept with another man, despite her innocence

6. DESDEMONA'S SUBMISSIVENESS

   • At the play's beginning, Desdemona is strong, confident, and defiant but she winds up becoming the victim of Othello's physical and emotional abuse. From this point on, she is passive and obedient and by the play's end, she blames herself for Othello's violent behaviour. This shows how women were submissive to their husbands in fear that they would be abused for (in their mind) no real reason. This also reflects on women being the inferior gender and their lack of rights

7. EMILIA'S FEMINIST SPEECH

   • Act 4, Scene 3
   • She claims that if a husband can sleep around with other women all the time, then why can't his wife. This is where we finally see that Emilia is sick of being undermined by Iago and her views of female rights come to be