Additional Response to Bell Hook’s Article
This week’s topic in my English composition class are
gender roles and what we are so used to doing/expecting from the opposite sex
in today’s society. One of the readings that we were given is I Want A Wife, by Judy Brady. The essay
is in list form of 10 reasons of why she wants a wife. Some of it included the stereotypical
“I want a wife who will keep my house
clean. A wife who will pick up after my children, a wife who will pick up after
me.” (Brady) As you read closer
to the end it becomes a little more intense with requests that are deemed ‘too sensitive/personal
to talk about with others.’ Things like “If,
by chance, I find another person more suitable as a wife than the wife I
already have, I want the liberty to replace my present wife with another one.
Naturally, I will expect a fresh, new life; my wife will take the children and
be solely responsible for them so that I am left free.”(Brady)
Throughout the essay I became infuriated with what I was
reading because I was unaware that the author was a woman. Immediately into the
2nd point I was thinking “This
guy has to be kidding me right now.” Instantly my mind went to thinking a
man was writing this. . . but why? Now thinking about it, I too fell into the
patriarchy we saw Bell talking about. Most people think or have thought in a
way that men are superior to women, and whatever they want the women must do. Of course, times have changed, however, in the
70’s when Brady wrote her essay, it was an accurate representation of what men
want and a great example of patriarchy.
Bell mentioned in her text “At church they had learned that God created man to rule the world and
everything in it and that it was the work of women to help men perform these
task, to obey, and to always assume a subordinate role in relation to a
powerful man.” (Hooks 18) Which I think it is a good explanation to why I
instantly thought of a man writing it. Even though Brady wrote the essay in a sarcastic
manner from a man’s point of view, at the end of the day, it was a women
calling out the patriarchy enforced in the 70’s.
**I know this isn't exactly a typical form of art/artist. However, Brady was a feminist and acitivist, and I feel her essay really ties into Hooks.**
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