Gender Discrimination: The Domestic-Public Dichotomy in Anne Tyler’s Earthly Possessions

The ideologies of domestic-public dichotomy refer to two separate boundaries for men and women. Explicitly, the public arena is related to men and the domestic arena is connected with women. In other words, the domestic-public dichotomy denotes that women should exercise their roles as caretakers and homemakers of the domestic realm whereas in the public arena, men exercise their roles by socializing with other fellow beings. In the world of domesticity, women and domesticity are two inseparable entities. Emphatically, the concept of domesticity has left an indelible mark that only women can occupy the domestic space for cleaning and cooking. In this context, gender discrimination gains prominence while the men rule the domestic environment with patriarchal ideologies. Besides, the political thinker, Alexis de Tocqueville documents that women’s longingness to establish their independence is diminished in the marital bondage. Contrarily, Barabara Welter, the historian in the nineteenth century identifies that more than men, women can only be the possessions of domestic or private sphere to be labelled as epitome of home making. Adversely, it is assessed that women’s responsibilities as homemakers and caretakers are devalued in contrast to men’s socializing behavior in the public sphere. Significantly, it is explored that domesticity is found to be a stockade to curtail the women’s freedom of thought and expression in terms of gender discrimination. The paper follows a close reading methodology in order to observe the true womanhood in terms of piety, purity, domesticity and submissiveness. Further, the paper theoretically lays its emphasis on the conceptual knowledge of gender discrimination to delineate the predicament of Charlotte Emory in the mundane existence in Anne Tyler’ s Earthly Possessions.

Keywords: Domestic -Public Dichotomy, Gender Discrimination, Piety, Purity, Domesticity, Submissiveness.