Understanding Gender and Society after reading the texts and after watching historic videos?

  



Atwood(1976).Reincarnation of Captain Cook’ was included in Selected Poems. 

Before you read the poem a few details ought to be kept in mind that will facilitate your understanding of the poem. As a general rule the term ‘gender’ is used in the social sciences to describe ‘socially constructed categories based on sex.’ Gender refers to a set of qualities and behaviors expected from a female or male by society. Gender roles are learned and can be affected by factors such as class, race, education or economics. In patriarchal societies women have been victimized, oppressed and put in a state of subjectivity on the basis of sex. Their experience of powerlessness however is shared by all who are similarly discriminated against on the basis of class, race, education, economics etc. irrespective of biological anatomy. Since gender is a social construct rather than a biological one, by corollary such discriminated sections of society also become gendered subjects raising similar expectations and facing similar representations. ‘There was a call for experiences of gender, colonial domination, class and race to be treated as interpenetrative.’ (Articulating Gender, page 21). The question of identity is thus politicized.Consulted the 08/11/2016:http://sol.du.ac.in/mod/book/view.php?id=1387&chapterid=1155

Biography:Margaret Atwood