Entry #3 Responding and Reflecting

I believe that gender roles are shown and confused clearly in Toni Morrison’s Beloved. Through the feminist lens, this is something seen in Beloved because the main character is a woman slave. Slaves are depicted as property, and during the time period of Beloved, women did not have the same rights as men. Men controlled every action of women, and they did not have independence from the household. Women were in charge of the household and the kids. Beloved was in the Civil War time period of American history was a time when women did not have the same rights as men. The author writes about how the main character, Sethe, has a kid and a dead kid, but she does not have a husband, so she is a single mom. Because Sethe is a single mom, she has to take care of both kids by herself, and there is no male person to provide for the mom. When the old slave friend of Sethe, Paul D, comes back into her life, he does not provide for her but instead wants Sethe to help him, like a man would provide for a woman. This is because Paul D needs Sethe, and Sethe does not need Paul D.