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Gender Stereotypes In Grimm's Snow White

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The Grimm Brothers tale, Snow White, is a Phallocentric story about a young princess who is on the run from her mentally unstable step mother who is trying to kill her. Relationships between the characters are often gender specific as the roles between males and females are strongly defined. The Evil Queen, the Huntsman and the Dwarfs are all key characters which help with the demonstration of stereotypes, paternalism as well as gender roles.
Stereotypes are very prominent throughout the tale. Snow White and the Evil Queen are quite different as far as stereotypes go. Right from the beginning, Snow White portrays typical female stereotypes such as being gentle, kind, sensitive, and dependent. It is also assumed by these qualities that she is not able to protect herself from …show more content…
The most obvious gender role is the one at the beginning of the tale when the dwarfs assign Snow White basic female gender roles: “If you will keep house for us, and cook, make beds, wash, sew, and knit, and keep everything clean and orderly, then you can stay with us” (3). This quote shows that in order for the dwarfs to keep Snow White safe, she must do the basic “female” jobs such as cooking and cleaning because they are out working and doing “male” jobs. This is a common theme in old fairy tales that the women must be the house keepers and the males go out to the field and work. Another act of gender roles is at the end of the story. Near the end, the prince accidentally dislodges the piece of poison apple from Snow White’s throat and saves her by bringing her back to life. This example shows a typical gender role because it shows a heroic male saving a hopeless females life. Although the prince saved Snow White by accident he is still seen as heroic because of the gender roles that come with being a male that saves a life. Therefore, because of the apparent gender roles given to Snow White this makes the fairy tale

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