![]() ![]() ![]() In ancient Greece where Antigone was written in or before 441 BC, gender norms systematically oppressed women and enforced an essentialist gender binary. In this paper, I suggest that while characters in Antigone – Creon, the Chorus, and Ismene – appear to reinforce gender essentialism by playing out stereotypes entrenched in an essentialist gender binary, the moments where they most aggressively regulate essentialist gender norms actually reveal the contingency, fragility and encultured nature of these norms, thus challenging contemporary gender ideologies in ancient Greece. It implies a limit on the variations and possibilities of change – it is not possible for a subject to act in a manner contrary to her nature" (84). As feminist theorist Elizabeth Grosz explains, essentialism "entails the belief that those characteristics defined as women's essence are shared in common by all women at all times. In feminist theory and gender studies, gender essentialism refers to the attribution of a fixed essence to women. ![]() The starkly separate realms into which Antigone relegates men and women prompt a reading of the play through the lens of gender essentialism. Even the Chorus of Theban elders, assumed to hold a neutral perspective so as to advise Creon on matters of society, consists entirely of old Theban men, excluding female perspectives from the political arena. Creon’s insistence that “I won’t be called weaker than womankind” (680) reveals a male superiority complex that aligns masculinity with strength and dominance and femininity with weakness and subordination. Ismene’s advice to Antigone, “we two are women, / so not to fight with men” (61-62) points to the inferior power position that women hold in Theban society and the gendered assumptions that inform civil obedience. In his play Antigone, Sophocles presents a skewed power dynamic between men and women in Thebes as the conflict between Antigone and Creon unfolds. The following essay by Luka Cai Minglu received an honorable mention in 2017. McLeod Freshman Writing Prize recognizes original research papers that explore some aspect of race, gender and/or identity. ![]()
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