Theme: understanding the impact of societal norms - Cabarrus ...

©Ms. E Creationsÿ 1

*belief that men & women should have equal rights & opportunities*

Theme: understanding the impact of societal norms Essential Question: how do societal views affect the treatment of marginalized groups? Novel: The Handmaid’s Tale Anti-Bias Lens$: Feminism + Social Status/Power

Articles: *refer to “The Yellow Wallpaper* Haunted by the handmaid’s tale by Margaret Atwood, Men are Stuck in Gender Roles by Emily Alpert Reyes, Orwell and me by Margaret Atwood, what women want now by Nancy Gibbs, A male perspective by FJ Rocca, and Digging by Semaus Heaney Main Activities: Dystopia in real life, Societal Analogy, and choices Supplemental text (Poems & Short Stories): Girl by Jamaica Kincaid, this is a photograph of me by Margaret Atwood, and A modest proposal by Jonathan Swift Musical connect: U.N.I.T.Y.- Queen Latifah & Just a Girl-No Doubt Films: Orphan Black (season 1 & 2) + Sliding Doors (alternate end) The Handmaid’s Tale has been made into a film [although, we will not watch this in class] Themes: gender roles, reproduction, identity, rebellion, government, loss of individuality, control, freedom, exploitation, and religion

“Sometimes it's the journey that teaches you a lot about your destination”. ~Drake Grammar Tips: Using that vs. which [If you are using ‘which’, it should come after a comma. You

do not need a comma if you are using ‘that’]

You can use ‘which’ when you are including extra information and when the clause is

descriptive; basically, a sentence that can be left without changing the meaning.

example: “the drake mixtape, which was twelve dollars, was stolen”.

You can use ‘that’ when your information is vital to the sentence. “The drake mixtape

that was on my desk was stolen”.


Table of contents: The Handmaid’s Tale

Haunted by the handmaid’s tale............................................................3

Girl............................................................................................................6

Men are stuck in gender roles..............................................................7

Orwell and me........................................................................................10

what women want now...........................................................................13

A modest proposal................................................................................16

A male perspective................................................................................21

Digging....................................................................................................22

This is a photograph of me...................................................................23

Character chart ...................................................................................24

get in the know ....................................................................................25

Dystopia in real life ............................................................................26

Analyzation ...........................................................................................27

Literary analysis ................................................................................28

making connections ..............................................................................29

Compare and contrast .........................................................................30

The women of Gilead ............................................................................31

Power of language ...............................................................................32

Gender roles ........................................................................................33

Lyrical synthesis ................................................................................34

Analytical paragraph .........................................................................35

Power of the pen ................................................................................36

Symbolization .......................................................................................37

Salvaging ..............................................................................................38

Socratic ................................................................................................39

E.C Choices............................................................................................40

Societal analogy ..................................................................................41

symbolic interpretation .......................................................................42

Essay .....................................................................................................43

Character chart Ms. E drawings .......................................................46

Handmaid terminology .........................................................................47

Cool Vocabulary ..................................................................................48

important Quotes..................................................................................49

Extra credit .........................................................................................51

(Bonus) Women wore handmaid’s tale robes to Texas senate..........53


Haunted by The Handmaid's Tale *It has been banned in schools, made into a film and an opera, and the title has become a shorthand for repressive regimes against women

by Margaret Atwood guardian.co.uk, Friday 20 January 2012 22.55 GMT Some books haunt the reader. Others haunt the writer. The Handmaid's Tale has done both. The Handmaid's Tale has not been out of print since it was first published, back in 1985. It has sold millions of copies worldwide and has appeared in a bewildering number of translations and editions. It has become a sort of tag for those writing about shifts towards policies aimed at controlling women, and especially women's bodies and reproductive functions: "Like something out of The Handmaid's Tale" and "Here comes The Handmaid's Tale" have become familiar phrases. It has been expelled from high schools, and has inspired odd website blogs discussing its descriptions of the repression of women as if they were recipes. People – not only women – have sent me photographs of their bodies with phrases from The Handmaid's Tale tattooed on them, "Nolite te bastardes carborundorum" and "Are there any questions?" being the most frequent. The book has had several dramatic incarnations, a film (with screenplay by Harold Pinter and direction by Volker Schlöndorff) and an opera (by Poul Ruders) among them. Revellers dress up as Handmaids on Halloween and also for protest marches – these two uses of its costumes mirroring its doubleness. Is it entertainment or dire political prophecy? Can it be both? I did not anticipate any of this when I was writing the book.

I began this book almost 30 years ago, in the spring of 1984, while living in West Berlin – still encircled, at that time, by the Berlin Wall. The book was not called The Handmaid's Tale at first – it was called Offred – but I note in my journal that its name changed on 3 January 1985, when almost 150 pages had been written.

That's about all I can note, however. In my journal there are the usual writerly whines, such as: "I am working my way back into writing after too long away – I lose my nerve, or think instead of the horrors of publication and what I will be accused of in reviews." There are entries concerning the weather; rain and thunder come in for special mentions. I chronicle the finding of puffballs, always a source of glee; dinner parties, with lists of those who attended and what was cooked; illnesses, my own and those of others; and the deaths of friends. There are books read, speeches given, trips made. There are page counts; I had a habit of writing down the pages completed as a way of urging myself on. But there are no reflections at all about the actual composition or subject matter of the book itself.


Perhaps that was because I thought I knew where it was going, and felt no need to interrogate myself.

I recall that I was writing by hand, then transcribing with the aid of a typewriter, then scribbling on the typed pages, then giving these to a professional typist: personal computers were in their infancy in 1985. I see that I left Berlin in June 1984, returned to Canada, wrote through the fall, then spent four months in early 1985 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, where I held an MFA chair. I finished the book there; the first person to read it was a fellow writer, Valerie Martin, who was also there at that time. I recall her saying: "I think you've got something here." She herself remembers more enthusiasm.

From 12 September 1984 to June 1985 all is blank in my journal – there is nothing at all set down, not even a puffball – though by my page-count entries it seems I was writing at white-hot speed. On 10 June there is a cryptic entry: "Finished editing Handmaid's Tale last week." The page proofs had been read by 19 August. The book appeared in Canada in the fall of 1985 to baffled and sometimes anxious reviews – could it happen here? – but there is no journal commentary on these by me. On 16 November I find another writerly whine: "I feel sucked hollow." To which I added: "But functional."

The book came out in the UK in February 1986, and in the United States at the same time. In the UK, which had had its Oliver Cromwell moment some centuries ago and was in no mood to repeat it, the reaction was along the lines of, "Jolly good yarn". In the US, however – and despite a dismissive review in the New York Times by Mary McCarthy – it was more likely to be: "How long have we got?"

Stories about the future always have a "what-if" premise, and The Handmaid's Tale has several. For instance: if you wanted to seize power in the US, abolish liberal democracy and set up a dictatorship, how would you go about it? What would be your cover story? It would not resemble any form of communism or socialism: those would be too unpopular. It might use the name of democracy as an excuse for abolishing liberal democracy: that's not out of the question, though I didn't consider it possible in 1985.

Nations never build apparently radical forms of government on foundations that aren't there already. Thus China replaced a state bureaucracy with a similar state bureaucracy under a different name, the USSR replaced the dreaded imperial secret police with an even more dreaded secret police, and so forth. The deep foundation of the US – so went my thinking – was not the comparatively recent 18th-century Enlightenment structures of the republic, with their talk of equality and their separation of church and state, but the heavy-handed theocracy of 17th-century Puritan New England, with its marked bias against women, which would need only the opportunity of a period of social chaos to reassert itself.

Like any theocracy, this one would select a few passages from the Bible to justify its actions, and it would lean heavily towards the Old Testament, not towards the New. Since ruling classes always make sure they get the best and rarest of desirable goods and services, and as it is one of the axioms of the novel that fertility in the industrialized west has come under threat, the rare and desirable would include fertile women – always on the human wish list, one way or another – and reproductive control. Who shall have babies, who shall claim and raise those babies, who shall be blamed if anything goes wrong with those babies? These are questions with which human beings have busied themselves for a long time.

There would be resistance to such a regime, and an underground, and even an underground railroad. In retrospect, and in view of 21st-century technologies available for spy work and social control, these seem a little too easy. Surely the Gilead command would have moved to eliminate the Quakers, as their 17th-century Puritan forebears had done.

I made a rule for myself: I would not include anything that human beings had not already done in some other place or time, or for which the technology did not already exist. I did not wish to


Edited extract from Margaret Atwood's contribution to BBC Radio 3's Twenty Minutes: The Orwell Essays series, broadcast tonight at 8.05pm. Margaret Atwood's latest novel, ‘Oryx and Crake’, is published by Bloomsbury.

be accused of dark, twisted inventions, or of misrepresenting the human potential for deplorable behavior. The group-activated hangings, the tearing apart of human beings, the clothing specific to castes and classes, the forced childbearing and the appropriation of the results, the children stolen by regimes and placed for upbringing with high-ranking officials, the forbidding of literacy, the denial of property rights: all had precedents, and many were to be found not in other cultures and religions, but within western society, and within the "Christian" tradition, itself. (I enclose "Christian" in quotation marks, since I believe that much of the church's behavior and doctrine during its two-millennia-long existence as a social and political organization would have been abhorrent to the person after whom it is named.)

The Handmaid's Tale has often been called a "feminist dystopia", but that term is not strictly accurate. In a feminist dystopia pure and simple, all of the men would have greater rights than all of the women. It would be two-layered in structure: top layer men, bottom layer women. But Gilead is the usual kind of dictatorship: shaped like a pyramid, with the powerful of both sexes at the apex, the men generally outranking the women at the same level; then descending levels of power and status with men and women in each, all the way down to the bottom, where the unmarried men must serve in the ranks before being awarded an Econowife.

The Handmaids themselves are a pariah caste within the pyramid: treasured for what they may be able to provide – their fertility – but untouchables otherwise. To possess one is, however, a mark of high status, just as many slaves or a large retinue of servants always has been. Since the regime operates under the guise of a strict Puritanism, these women are not considered a harem, intended to provide delight as well as children. They are functional rather than decorative.

Three things that had long been of interest to me came together during the writing of the book. The first was my interest in dystopian literature, an interest that began with my adolescent reading of Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, Huxley's Brave New World and Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, and continued through my period of graduate work at Harvard in the early 1960s. (Once you've been intrigued by a literary form, you always have a secret yen to write an example of it yourself.) The second was my study of 17th and 18th-century America, again at Harvard, which was of particular interest to me since many of my own ancestors had lived in those times and in that place. The third was my fascination with dictatorships and how they function, not unusual in a person who was born in 1939, three months after the outbreak of the second world war.

Like the American revolution and the French revolution, like the three major dictatorships of the 20th century – I say "major" because there have been more, Cambodia and Romania among them – and like the New England Puritan regime before it, Gilead has utopian idealism flowing through its veins, coupled with a high-minded principle, its ever-present shadow, sublegal opportunism, and the propensity of the powerful to indulge in behind-the-scenes sensual delights forbidden to everyone else. But such locked-door escapades must remain hidden, for the regime floats as its raison d'être the notion that it is improving the conditions of life, both physical and moral; and like all such regimes, it depends on its true believers.

*Edited for spoilers* ...When asked whether The Handmaid's Tale is about to "come true", I remind myself that there are two futures in the book, and that if the first one comes true, the second one may do so also.

v With a partner, discuss Atwood’s motivation for writing The Handmaid’s Tale.

v What message do you believe she will try to send through her novel?


Girl by Jamaica Kincaid Wash the white clothes on Monday and put them on the stone heap; wash the color clothes on Tuesday and put them on the clothesline to dry; don't walk barehead in the hot sun; cook pumpkin fritters in very hot sweet oil; soak your little clothes right after you take them off; when buying cotton to make yourself a nice blouse, be sure that it doesn't have gum on it, because that way it won't hold up well after a wash; soak salt fish overnight before you cook it; is it true that you sing benna in Sunday school?; always eat your food in such a way that it won't turn someone else's stomach; on Sundays try to walk like a lady and not like the slut you are so bent on becoming; don't sing benna in Sunday school; you mustn't speak to wharf–rat boys, not even to give directions; don't eat fruits on the street—flies will follow you; but I don't sing benna on Sundays at all and never in Sunday school; this is how to sew on a button; this is how to make a button–hole for the button you have just sewed on; this is how to hem a dress when you see the hem coming down and so to prevent yourself from looking like the slut I know you are so bent on becoming; this is how you iron your father's khaki shirt so that it doesn't have a crease; this is how you iron your father's khaki pants so that they don't have a crease; this is how you grow okra—far from the house, because okra tree harbors red ants; when you are growing dasheen, make sure it gets plenty of water or else it makes your throat itch when you are eating it; this is how you sweep a corner; this is how you sweep a whole house; this is how you sweep a yard; this is how you smile to someone you don't like too much; this is how you smile to someone you don't like at all; this is how you smile to someone you like completely; this is how you set a table for tea; this is how you set a table for dinner; this is how you set a table for dinner with an important guest; this is how you set a table for lunch; this is how you set a table for breakfast; this is how to behave in the presence of men who don't know you very well, and this way they won't recognize immediately the slut I have warned you against becoming; be sure to wash every day, even if it is with your own spit; don't squat down to play marbles—you are not a boy, you know; don't pick people's flowers—you might catch something; don't throw stones at blackbirds, because it might not be a blackbird at all; this is how to make a bread pudding; this is how to make doukona; this is how to make pepper pot; this is how to make a good medicine for a cold; this is how to make a good medicine to throw away a child before it even becomes a child; this is how to catch a fish; this is how to throw back a fish you don't like, and that way something bad won't fall on you; this is how to bully a man; this is how a man bullies you; this is how to love a man; and if this doesn't work there are other ways, and if they don't work don't feel too bad about giving up; this is how to spit up in the air if you feel like it, and this is how to move quick so that it doesn't fall on you; this is how to make ends meet; always squeeze bread to make sure it's fresh; but what if the baker won't let me feel the bread?; you mean to say that after all you are really going to be the kind of woman who the baker won't let near the bread?

Discuss the following statements with a partner. You can agree or disagree but please explain your reasoning.

o Gender roles are pretty similar no matter what place you come from

o It is easier to be a girl than a boy in this world

o Gender roles are pretty similar from generation to generation

o You can tell a lot about a person by the way they verbally express themselves

o In your own life, what expectations are you grateful for that others

place on you? Why? o In your own life, what expectations do you wish others did not place

on you? Why?


'Men are stuck' in gender roles, data suggest Even as society encourages women into typically male roles, research shows it holds rigid gender stereotypes for men — probably to everyone's detriment. December 26, 2013|By Emily Alpert Reyes Brent Kroeger pores over nasty online comments about stay-at-home dads, wondering if his friends think those things about him. The Rowland Heights father remembers high school classmates laughing when he said he wanted to be a "house husband." He avoids mentioning it on Facebook.

"I don't want other men to look at me like less of a man," Kroeger said.

His fears are tied to a bigger phenomenon: The gender revolution has been lopsided. Even as American society has seen sweeping transformations — expanding roles for women, surging tolerance for homosexuality — popular ideas about masculinity seem to have stagnated.

While women have broken into fields once dominated by men, such as business, medicine and law, men have been slower to pursue nursing, teach preschool, or take jobs as administrative assistants. Census data and surveys show that men remain rare in stereotypically feminine positions.

When it comes to gender progress, said Ronald F. Levant, editor of the journal Psychology of Men and Masculinity, "men are stuck." The imbalance appears at work and at home: Working mothers have become ordinary, but stay-at-home fathers exist in only 1% of married couples with kids under age 15, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.

In a recent survey, 51% of Americans told the Pew Research Center that children were better off if their mother was at home. Only 8% said the same about fathers. Even seeking time off can be troublesome for men: One University of South Florida study found that college students rated hypothetical employees wanting flexible schedules as less masculine.

Other research points to an enduring stigma for boys whose behavior is seen as feminine. "If girls call themselves tomboys, it's with a sense of pride," said University of Illinois at Chicago sociology professor Barbara Risman. "But boys make fun of other boys if they step just a little outside the rigid masculine stereotype."

Two years ago, for instance, a Global Toy Experts survey found that more than half of mothers wouldn't give a doll to someone else's son, while only 32% said the same about giving cars or trucks to a girl. Several studies have found that bending gender stereotypes in childhood is tied to worse anxiety for men than women in adulthood.

In the southern end of Orange County, former friends have stopped talking to Lori Duron and her husband. Slurs and threats arrive by email. Their son calls himself a boy, but has gravitated toward Barbies, Disney princesses and pink since he was a toddler. In a blog and a book she wrote, Duron chronicles worries that would seem trivial if her child were a girl:


Whether he would be teased for his rainbowy backpack. Whether a Santa would look askance at him for wanting a doll.

"If a little girl is running around on the baseball team with her mitt, people think, 'That's a strong girl,'" said her husband, Matt Duron, who, like his wife, uses a pen name to shield the boy's identity. "When my 6-year-old is running around in a dress, people think there's something wrong with him."

Beyond childhood, the gender imbalance remains stark when students choose college majors: Between 1971 and 2011, a growing share of degrees in biology, business and other historically male majors went to women, an analysis by University of Maryland, College Park sociologist Philip N. Cohen shows. Yet fields like education and the arts remained heavily female, as few men moved the opposite way. Federal data show that last year less than 2% of preschool and kindergarten teachers were men.

In the last 40 years, "women have said, 'Wait a minute, we are competent and assertive and ambitious,'" claiming a wider range of roles, said Michael Kimmel, executive director of the Center for the Study of Men and Masculinities at Stony Brook University. But "men have not said, 'We're kind, gentle, compassionate and nurturing.'" As the Durons and other families have discovered, messages of gender norms trickle down early. In Oregon, Griffin Bates was stunned when the little boy she was raising with her lesbian partner at the time came back from a visit with Grandma and Grandpa without his beloved tutu and tiara.

"They were perfectly OK with his mother being gay," Bates said. "But they weren't OK with their grandson playing dress-up in a tutu."

Boys stick with typically masculine toys and games much more consistently than girls adhere to feminine ones, Harvard School of Public Health research associate Andrea L. Roberts found. Biologically male children who defy those norms are referred to doctors much earlier than biologically female ones who disdain "girl things," said Johanna Olson of the Center for Transyouth Health and Development at Children's Hospital Los Angeles. Even the criteria for diagnosing gender dysphoria were historically much broader for effeminate boys than for masculine girls.

Why? "Masculinity is valued more than femininity," University of Utah law professor Clifford Rosky said. "So there's less worry about girls than about boys."

Gender stereotypes do seem to have loosened: The Global Toy Experts survey found that most mothers would let their own sons play with dolls and dress-up sets, even if they shied from buying them for other boys. Parents in some parts of Los Angeles said their boys got barely any flak for choosing pink sneakers or toting dolls to school. And in a recent online survey by advertising agency DDB Worldwide, nearly three quarters of Americans surveyed said stay-at-home dads were just as good at parenting as stay-at-home moms.

But while attitudes may have shifted, Rosky said, "nothing changes until men are willing to act."


Some experts say economic barriers have stopped men from moving further into feminized fields. Jobs held by women tend to pay less, an imbalance rooted in the historical assumption that women were not breadwinners. Women had an economic reason to take many of the jobs monopolized by men, particularly college-educated women trying to climb the economic ladder.

"But if men made the switch, they'd lose money," New York University sociologist Paula England said. Yet it isn't just economics that keeps men from typically female jobs. Men are still rare in nursing, for instance, despite respectable pay. England and other scholars see that dearth as another form of sexism, in which things historically associated with women are devalued.

Men who do enter heavily female fields are often prodded into other ones without even searching, as other people suggest new gigs that better fit the masculine stereotype, said Julie A. Kmec, associate professor of sociology at Washington State University.

While women have "come out" to their families as people who want a life outside the home, men have not "come out" at work as involved fathers, Kimmel said. And that, in turn, holds many working mothers back, Risman argued.

Familiar measures of progress toward gender equality, such as women working in management or men picking up housework, began to plateau in the 1990s. Cohen found that in the first decade of the millennium jobs stayed similarly segregated by gender — the first time since 1960 that gender integration in the workplace had slowed to a virtual halt.

"If men don't feel free to go into women's jobs," said Risman, a scholar at the Council on Contemporary Families, "women are not really free."

o What is the authors claim in this article? ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

o Do you agree or disagree with the claim? Explain. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________

o With a partner, discuss the role you would like to have in a partnership or marriage.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________


ORWELL AND ME: Margaret Atwood Monday June 16, 2003 *annotate the text*I grew up with George Orwell. I was born in 1939, and Animal Farm was published in 1945. Thus, I was able to read it at the age of nine. It was lying around the house, and I mistook it for a book about talking animals, sort of like Wind in the Willows. I knew nothing about the kind of politics in the book – the child's version of politics then, just after the war, consisted of the simple notion that Hitler was bad but dead. So I gobbled up the adventures of Napoleon and Snowball, the smart, greedy, upwardly mobile pigs, and Squealer the spin-doctor, and Boxer the noble but thick-witted horse, and the easily led, slogan-chanting sheep, without making any connection with historical events. To say that I was horrified by this book is an understatement. The fate of the farm animals was so grim, the pigs so mean and mendacious and treacherous, the sheep so stupid. Children have a keen sense of injustice, and this was the thing that upset me the most: the pigs were so unjust. I cried my eyes out when Boxer the horse had an accident and was carted off to be made into dog food, instead of being given the quiet corner of the pasture he'd been promised. The whole experience was deeply disturbing to me, but I am forever grateful to Orwell for alerting me early to the danger flags I've tried to watch out for since. In the world of Animal Farm, most speechifying and public palaver is bullshit and instigated lying, and though many characters are good-hearted and mean well, they can be frightened into closing their eyes to what's really going on. The pigs browbeat the others with ideology, then twist that ideology to suit their own purposes: their language games were evident to me even at that age. As Orwell taught, it isn't the labels - Christianity, Socialism, Islam, Democracy, Two Legs Bad, Four Legs Good, the works - that are definitive, but the acts done in their name. I could see, too, how easily those who have toppled an oppressive power take on its trappings and

habits. Jean-Jacques Rousseau was right to warn us that democracy is the hardest form of government to maintain; Orwell knew that to the marrow of his bones, because he had seen it in action. How quickly the precept "All Animals Are Equal" is changed into "All Animals Are Equal, but Some Are More Equal Than Others". What oily concern the pigs show for the welfare of the other animals, a concern that disguises their contempt for those they are manipulating. With what alacrity do they put on the once-despised uniforms of the tyrannous humans they have overthrown, and learn to use their whips. How self-righteously they justify their actions, helped by the verbal web-spinning of Squealer, their nimble-tongued press agent, until all power is in their trotters, pretense is no longer necessary, and they rule by naked force. A revolution often means only that: a revolving, a turn of the wheel of fortune, by which those who were at the bottom mount to the top, and assume the choice positions, crushing the former power-holders beneath them. We should beware of all those who plaster the landscape with large portraits of themselves, like the evil pig, Napoleon. Animal Farm is one of the most spectacular Emperor-Has-No-Clothes books of the 20th century, and it got George Orwell into trouble. People who run counter to the current popular wisdom, who point out the uncomfortably obvious, are likely to be strenuously baa-ed at by herds of angry sheep. I didn't have all that figured out at the age of nine, of course - not in any conscious way. But we learn the patterns of stories before we learn their meanings, and Animal Farm has a very clear pattern. Then along came Nineteen Eighty-Four, which was published in 1949. Thus, I read it in paperback a couple of years later, when I was in high school. Then I read it again, and again: it was right up there among my favorite books, along with Wuthering Heights. At the same time, I absorbed its two companions, Arthur Koestler's Darkness At Noon and Aldous


Huxley's Brave New World. I was keen on all three of them, but I understood Darkness At Noon to be a tragedy about events that had already happened, and Brave New World to be a satirical comedy, with events that were unlikely to unfold in exactly that way. (Orgy-Porgy, indeed.) Nineteen Eighty-Four struck me as more realistic, probably because Winston Smith was more like me - a skinny person who got tired a lot and was subjected to physical education under chilly conditions (this was a feature of my school) - and who was silently at odds with the ideas and the manner of life proposed for him. (This may be one of the reasons Nineteen-Eighty-Four is best read when you are an adolescent: most adolescents feel like that.) I sympathized particularly with Winston's desire to write his forbidden thoughts down in a deliciously tempting, secret blank book: I had not yet started to write, but I could see the attractions of it. I could also see the dangers, because it's this scribbling of his - along with illicit sex, another item with considerable allure for a teenager of the 50s - that gets Winston into such a mess. Animal Farm charts the progress of an idealistic movement of liberation towards a totalitarian dictatorship headed by a despotic tyrant; Nineteen Eighty-Four describes what it's like to live entirely within such a system. Its hero, Winston, has only fragmentary memories of what life was like before the present dreadful regime set in: he's an orphan, a child of the collectivity. His father died in the war that has ushered in the repression, and his mother has disappeared, leaving him with only the reproachful glance she gave him as he betrayed her over a chocolate bar - a small betrayal that acts both as the key to Winston's character and as a precursor to the many other betrayals in the book. The government of Airstrip One, Winston's "country", is brutal. The constant surveillance, the impossibility of speaking frankly to anyone, the looming, ominous figure of Big Brother, the regime's need for enemies and wars - fictitious though both may be - which are used to terrify the people and unite them in hatred, the mind-numbing slogans, the distortions of language, the destruction of what has really happened by stuffing any record of it down the

Memory Hole - these made a deep impression on me. Let me re-state that: they frightened the stuffing out of me. Orwell was writing a satire about Stalin's Soviet Union, a place about which I knew very little at the age of 14, but he did it so well that I could imagine such things happening anywhere. There is no love interest in Animal Farm, but there is in Nineteen Eighty-Four. Winston finds a soulmate in Julia; outwardly a devoted Party fanatic, secretly a girl who enjoys sex and makeup and other spots of decadence. But the two lovers are discovered, and Winston is tortured for thought-crime – inner disloyalty to the regime. He feels that if he can only remain faithful in his heart to Julia, his soul will be saved - a romantic concept, though one we are likely to endorse. But like all absolutist governments and religions, the Party demands that every personal loyalty be sacrificed to it, and replaced with an absolute loyalty to Big Brother. Confronted with his worst fear in the dreaded Room 101, where a nasty device involving a cage-full of starving rats can be fitted to the eyes, Winston breaks: "Don't do it to me," he pleads, "do it to Julia." (This sentence has become shorthand in our household for the avoidance of onerous duties. Poor Julia - how hard we would make her life if she actually existed. She'd have to be on a lot of panel discussions, for instance.) After his betrayal of Julia, Winston becomes a handful of malleable goo. He truly believes that two and two make five, and that he loves Big Brother. Our last glimpse of him is sitting drink-sodden at an outdoor cafe, knowing he's a dead man walking and having learned that Julia has betrayed him, too, while he listens to a popular refrain: "Under the spreading chestnut tree/ I sold you and you sold me ..." Orwell has been accused of bitterness and pessimism - of leaving us with a vision of the future in which the individual has no chance, and where the brutal, totalitarian boot of the all-controlling Party will grind into the human face, forever. But this view of Orwell is contradicted by the last chapter in the book, an essay on Newspeak - the doublethink language concocted by the regime. By expurgating all words that might be


Highlight any interesting passages and the places that show how impactful Orwell writing was for Atwood.

troublesome - "bad" is no longer permitted, but becomes "double-plus-ungood" - and by making other words mean the opposite of what they used to mean - the place where people get tortured is the Ministry of Love, the building where the past is destroyed is the Ministry of Information - the rulers of Airstrip One wish to make it literally impossible for people to think straight. However, the essay on Newspeak is written in standard English, in the third person, and in the past tense, which can only mean that the regime has fallen, and that language and individuality have survived. For whoever has written the essay on Newspeak, the world of Nineteen Eighty-Four is over. Thus, it's my view that Orwell had much more faith in the resilience of the human spirit than he's usually been given credit for. Orwell became a direct model for me much later in my life - in the real 1984, the year in which I began writing a somewhat different dystopia, The Handmaid's Tale. By that time I was 44, and I had learned enough about real despotisms - through the reading of history, travel, and my membership of Amnesty International - so that I didn't need to rely on Orwell alone. The majority of dystopias - Orwell's included - have been written by men, and the point of view has been male. When women have appeared in them, they have been either sexless automatons or rebels who have defied the sex rules of the regime. They have acted as the temptresses of the male protagonists, however welcome this temptation may be to the men themselves. Thus Julia; thus the cami-knicker-wearing, orgy-porgy seducer of the Savage in Brave New World; thus the subversive femme fatale of Yevgeny Zamyatin's 1924 seminal classic, We. I wanted to try a dystopia from the female point of view - the world according to Julia, as it were. However, this does not make The Handmaid's Tale a "feminist dystopia", except insofar as giving a woman a voice and an inner life will always be considered "feminist" by those who think women ought not to have these things. The 20th century could be seen as a race

between two versions of man-made hell - the jackbooted state totalitarianism of Orwell's Nineteen Eight-Four, and the hedonistic ersatz paradise of Brave New World, where absolutely everything is a consumer good and human beings are engineered to be happy. With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, it seemed for a time that Brave New World had won - from henceforth, state control would be minimal, and all we would have to do was go shopping and smile a lot, and wallow in pleasures, popping a pill or two when depression set in. But with 9/11, all that changed. Now it appears we face the prospect of two contradictory dystopias at once - open markets, closed minds - because state surveillance is back again with a vengeance. The torturer's dreaded Room 101 has been with us for millennia. The dungeons of Rome, the Inquisition, the Star Chamber, the Bastille, the proceedings of General Pinochet and of the junta in Argentina - all have depended on secrecy and on the abuse of power. Lots of countries have had their versions of it - their ways of silencing troublesome dissent. Democracies have traditionally defined themselves by, among other things - openness and the rule of law. But now it seems that we in the west are tacitly legitimizing the methods of the darker human past, upgraded technologic ally and sanctified to our own uses, of course. For the sake of freedom, freedom must be renounced. To move us towards the improved world - the utopia we're promised - dystopia must first hold sway. It's a concept worthy of doublethink. It's also, in its ordering of events, strangely Marxist. First the dictatorship of the proletariat, in which lots of heads must roll; then the pie-in-the-sky classless society, which oddly enough never materializes. Instead, we just get pigs with whips. I often ask myself: what would George Orwell have to say about it? Quite a lot.


What Women Want Now Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2009 By Nancy Gibbs

If you were a woman reading this magazine 40 years ago, the odds were good that your husband provided the money to buy it. That you voted the same way he did. That if you got breast cancer, he might be asked to sign the form authorizing a mastectomy. That your son was heading to college but not your daughter. That your boss, if you had a job, could explain that he was paying you less because, after all, you were probably working just for pocket money.

It's funny how things change slowly, until the day we realize they've changed completely. It's expected that by the end of the year, for the first time in history the majority of workers in the U.S. will be women — largely because the downturn has hit men so hard. This is an extraordinary change in a single generation, and it is gathering speed: the growth prospects, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, are in typically female jobs like nursing, retail and customer service. More and more women are the primary breadwinner in their household (almost 40%) or are providing essential income for the family's bottom line. Their buying power has never been greater — and their choices have seldom been harder.

It is in this context that the Rockefeller Foundation, in collaboration with TIME, conducted a landmark survey of gender issues to assess how individual Americans are reacting. Is the battle of the sexes really over, and if so, did anyone win? How do men now view female power? How much resentment or confusion or gratitude is there for the forces that have rearranged family life, rewired the economy and reinvented gender roles? And what, if anything, does everyone agree needs to happen to make all this work? The study found that men and women were in broad agreement about what matters most to them; gone is the notion that women's rise comes at men's expense. As the Old Economy dissolves and pressures on working parents grow, they share their fears about what this means for their children and their frustration with institutions that refuse to admit how much has changed. In the new age, the battles we fight together are the ones that define us.

A Quiet Revolution

In the spring of 1972, TIME devoted a special issue of the magazine to assessing the status of women in the throes of "women's lib." At a time when American society was racing through change like a reckless teenager, feminism had sputtered and stalled. Women's average wages had actually fallen relative to men's; there were fewer women in the top ranks of civil service (under 2%) than there were four years before. No woman had served in the Cabinet since the Eisenhower Administration; there were no female FBI agents or network-news anchors or Supreme Court Justices. The nation's campuses were busy hosting a social revolt, yet Harvard's tenured faculty of 421 included only six women. Of the Museum of Modern Art's 1,000 one-man shows over the previous 40 years, five were by women. Headhunters lamented that it was easier to put a man on the moon than a woman in a corner office. "There is no movement," complained an activist who resigned her leadership position in the National Organization for Women two years after it was founded. "Movement means 'going someplace,' and the movement is not going anywhere. It hasn't accomplished anything."

That was cranky exaggeration; many changes were felt more than seen, a shift in hopes and expectations that cracked the foundations of patriarchy. "In terms of real power — economic and political — we are still just beginning," Gloria Steinem admitted. "But the consciousness, the awareness — that will never be the same."

So it's worth stopping to look at what happened while we were busy ending the Cold War and building a multicultural society and enjoying the longest economic expansion in history. In the slow-motion fumbling of family life, it was easy just to keep going along, mark the milestones,


measure the kids on the kitchen door and miss the movement. In 1972 only 7% of students playing high school sports were girls; now the number is six times as high. The female dropout rate has fallen in half. College campuses used to be almost 60-40 male; now the ratio has reversed, and close to half of law and medical degrees go to women, up from fewer than 10% in 1970. Half the Ivy League presidents are women, and two of the three network anchors soon will be; three of the four most recent Secretaries of State have been women. There are more than 145 foundations designed to empower women around the world, in the belief that this is the greatest possible weapon against poverty and disease; there was only one major foundation (the Ms. Foundation) for women in 1972. For the first time, five women have won Nobel Prizes in the same year (for Medicine, Chemistry, Economics and Literature). We just came through an election year in which Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, Tina Fey and Katie Couric were lead players, not the supporting cast. And the President of the United States was raised by a single mother and married a lawyer who outranked and out earned him.

It is still true that boardrooms and faculty clubs and legislatures and whole swaths of professions like, say, hedge-fund management remain predominantly male; women are about 10% of civil engineers and a third of physicians and surgeons but 98% of kindergarten teachers and dental assistants, and they still earn 77 cents on the dollar compared with men. They are charged higher premiums for health insurance yet still have greater out-of-pocket expenses for things as basic as contraception and maternity care. At times it seems as if the only women effortlessly balancing their jobs, kids, husbands and homes are the ones on TV.

Now the recession raises the stakes and shuffles the deck. Poll after poll finds women even more anxious than men about their family's financial security. While most workers have seen their wages stall or drop, women's earnings fell 2% in 2008, twice as much as men's. Women are 32% more likely than men to have subprime mortgages, leaving them more vulnerable in the housing crisis. The Guttmacher Institute found that the downturn has affected the most basic decisions in family life. Nearly half of women surveyed in households earning less than $75,000 want to delay pregnancy or limit the number of children they have. At the same time, women are poised to emerge from the downturn with even greater relative economic power as the wage gap narrows. A new survey by GfK Roper for NBC Universal gives a whole new meaning to the power of the purse: 65% of women reported being their family's chief financial planner, and 71% called themselves the family accountant. According to a Mediamark Research & Intelligence survey, they make 75% of the buying decisions in American homes. Together, women control more wealth than ever in history.

Progress is seldom simple; it comes with costs and casualties, even challenges about whether a change represents an advance or a retreat. The TIME survey provides evidence of both. At the most basic level, the argument over where women belong is over; the battle of the sexes becomes a costume drama, like Middlemarch or Mad Men. Large majorities, across ages and incomes and ideologies, view women's growing role in the workforce as good for both the economy and society in general. More than 8 in 10 say mothers are just as productive at work as fathers or childless workers are. Even more, some 84% affirm that husbands and wives negotiate the rules, relationships and responsibilities more than those of earlier generations did; roughly 7 in 10 men say they are more comfortable than their fathers were with women working outside the home, while women say they are less financially dependent on their spouse than their mother was.

This is not to say there's nothing left to argue about. More than two-thirds of women still think men resent powerful women, yet women are more likely than men to say female bosses are harder to work for than male ones. Men are much more likely to say there are no longer any barriers to female advancement, while a majority of women say men still have it better in life. People are evenly split over whether the "mommy wars" between working and nonworking mothers are finally over.

But just as striking is how much men and women agree on issues that divided them a generation ago. "It happened so fast," writes Gail Collins in her new book, When Everything Changed, "that


the revolution seemed to be over before either side could really find its way to the barricades." It's as though sensible people are too busy to bother bickering about who takes out the garbage or who deserves the corner office; many of the deepest conflicts are now ones that men and women share.

Especially in the absence of social supports, flexible work arrangements and affordable child care, it's hardly surprising that a majority of both men and women still say it is best for children to have a father working and a mother at home. Among the most dramatic changes in the past generation is the detachment of marriage and motherhood; more men than women identified marriage as "very important" to their happiness. Women no longer view matrimony as a necessary station on the road to financial security or parenthood. The percentage of children born to single women has leaped from 12% to 39%. Whereas a majority of children in the mid-1970s were raised by a stay-at-home parent, the portion is now less than a third, and nearly two-thirds of people say this has been a negative for American society.

Among the most confounding changes of all is the evidence, tracked by numerous surveys, that as women have gained more freedom, more education and more economic power, they have become less happy. No tidy theory explains the trend, notes University of Pennsylvania economist Justin Wolfers, a co-author of The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness. "We looked across all sectors — young vs. old, kids or no kids, married or not married, education, no education, working or not working — and it stayed the same," he says of the data. "But there are a few ways to look at it," he adds. "As Susan Faludi said, the women's movement wasn't about happiness." It may be that women have become more honest about what ails them. Or that they are now free to wrestle with the same pressures and conflicts that once accounted for greater male unhappiness. Or that modern life in a global economy is simply more stressful for everyone but especially for women, who are working longer hours while playing quarterback at home. "Some of the other social changes that have happened over the last 35 years — changes in family, in the workplace — may have affected men differently than women," Wolfers says. "So maybe we're not learning about changes due to the women's movement but changes in society."

All the shapes in the puzzle are shifting. If there is anything like consensus on an issue as basic as how we live our lives as men and women, as lovers, parents, partners, it's that getting the pieces of modern life to fit together is hard enough; something has to bend. Equal numbers of men and women report frequent stress in daily life, and most agree that government and businesses have failed to adjust to the changes in the family. As the Old Economy dissolves before our eyes, men and women express remarkably similar life goals when asked about the importance of money, health, jobs and family. If male jobs keep vanishing, if physical strength loses its workplace value, if the premium shifts ever more to education, in which achievement is increasingly female, then we will soon be having parallel conversations: What needs to be done to free American men to realize their full potential? You can imagine the whole conversation flipping in a single generation.

It's no longer a man's world. Nor is it a woman's nation. It's a cooperative, with bylaws under constant negotiation and expectations that profits be equally shared.

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o Assess the levels of bias in this article (if any). o Do you find the author credible? Explain why or why not using evidence from the text.


A MODEST PROPOSAL by Dr. Jonathan Swift 1729

For preventing the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden on their parents or country, and for

making them beneficial to the public.

It is a melancholy object to those, who walk through this great town, or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads and cabin-doors crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags, and importuning every passenger for an alms. These mothers instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time in strolling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants who, as they grow up, either turn thieves for want of work, or leave their dear native country, to fight for the Pretender in Spain, or sell themselves to the Barbarians.

I think it is agreed by all parties, that this prodigious number of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is in the present deplorable state of the kingdom, a very great additional grievance; and therefore whoever could find out a fair, cheap and easy method of making these children sound and useful members of the common-wealth, would deserve so well of the public, as to have his statue set up for a preserver of the nation.

But my intention is very far from being confined to provide only for the children of professed beggars: it is of a much greater extent, and shall take in the whole number of infants at a certain age, who are born of parents in effect as little able to support them, as those who demand our charity in the streets.

As to my own part, having turned my thoughts for many years, upon this important subject, and maturely weighed the several schemes of our projectors, I have always found them grossly mistaken in their computation. It is true, a child just drop from its dam, may be supported by her milk, for a solar year, with little other nourishment: at most not above the value of two shillings, which the mother may certainly get, or the value in scraps, by her lawful occupation of begging; and it is exactly at one year old that I propose to provide for them in such a manner, as, instead of being a charge

upon their parents, or the parish, or wanting food and raiment for the rest of their lives, they shall, on the contrary, contribute to the feeding, and partly to the clothing of many thousands.

There is likewise another great advantage in my scheme, that it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children, alas! too frequent among us, sacrificing the poor innocent babes, I doubt, more to avoid the expense than the shame, which would move tears and pity in the most savage and inhuman breast.

The number of souls in this kingdom being usually reckoned one million and a half, of these I calculate there may be about two hundred thousand couple whose wives are breeders; from which number I subtract thirty thousand couple, who are able to maintain their own children, (although I apprehend there cannot be so many, under the present distresses of the kingdom) but this being granted, there will remain a hundred and seventy thousand breeders. I again subtract fifty thousand, for those women who miscarry, or whose children die by accident or disease within the year. There only remain a hundred and twenty thousand children of poor parents annually born. The question therefore is, How this number shall be reared, and provided for? which, as I have already said, under the present situation of affairs, is utterly impossible by all the methods hitherto proposed. For we can neither employ them in handicraft or agriculture; they neither build houses, (I mean in the country) nor cultivate land: they can very seldom pick up a livelihood by stealing till they arrive at six years old; except where they are of cowardly parts, although I confess they learn the rudiments much earlier; during which time they can however be properly looked upon only as probationers: As I have been informed by a principal gentleman in the county of Cavan, who protested to me, that he never knew above one or two instances under the age of six, even in a part of the kingdom so renowned for the quickest proficiency in that art.


I am assured by our merchants, that a boy or a girl before twelve years old, is no saleable commodity, and even when they come to this age, they will not yield above three pounds, or three pounds and half a crown at most, on the exchange; which cannot turn to account either to the parents or kingdom, the charge of nutriments and rags having been at least four times that value.

I shall now therefore humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection.

I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricasie, or a ragoust.

I do therefore humbly offer it to public consideration, that of the hundred and twenty thousand children, already computed, twenty thousand may be reserved for breed, whereof only one fourth part to be males; which is more than we allow to sheep, black cattle, or swine, and my reason is, that these children are seldom the fruits of marriage, a circumstance not much regarded by our savages, therefore, one male will be sufficient to serve four females. That the remaining hundred thousand may, at a year old, be offered in sale to the persons of quality and fortune, through the kingdom, always advising the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month, so as to render them plump, and fat for a good table. A child will make two dishes at an entertainment for friends, and when the family dines alone, the fore or hind quarter will make a reasonable dish, and seasoned with a little pepper or salt, will be very good boiled on the fourth day, especially in winter.

I have reckoned upon a medium, that a child just born will weigh 12 pounds, and in a solar year, if tolerably nursed, increased to 28 pounds.

I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children.

Infant's flesh will be in season throughout the year, but more plentiful in March, and a little before and after; for we are told by a grave

author, an eminent French physician, that fish being a prolific diet, there are more children born in Roman Catholic countries about nine months after Lent, the markets will be more glutted than usual, because the number of Popish infants, is at least three to one in this kingdom, and therefore it will have one other collateral advantage, by lessening the number of Papists among us.

I have already computed the charge of nursing a beggar's child (in which list I reckon all cottagers, laborers, and four-fifths of the farmers) to be about two shillings per annum, rags included; and I believe no gentleman would repine to give ten shillings for the carcass of a good fat child, which, as I have said, will make four dishes of excellent nutritive meat, when he hath only some particular friend, or his own family to dine with him. Thus the squire will learn to be a good landlord, and grow popular among his tenants, the mother will have eight shillings’ neat profit, and be fit for work till she produces another child.

Those who are more thrifty (as I must confess the times require) may flea the carcass; the skin of which, artificially dressed, will make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen.

As to our City of Dublin, shambles may be appointed for this purpose, in the most convenient parts of it, and butchers we may be assured will not be wanting; although I rather recommend buying the children alive, and dressing them hot from the knife, as we do roasting pigs.

A very worthy person, a true lover of his country, and whose virtues I highly esteem, was lately pleased, in discoursing on this matter, to offer a refinement upon my scheme. He said, that many gentlemen of this kingdom, having of late destroyed their deer, he conceived that the want of venison might be well supplied by the bodies of young lads and maidens, not exceeding fourteen years of age, nor under twelve; so great a number of both sexes in every country being now ready to starve for want of work and service: And these to be disposed of by their parents if alive, or otherwise by their nearest relations. But with due deference to so excellent a friend, and so deserving a patriot, I cannot be altogether in his sentiments; for as to


the males, my American acquaintance assured me from frequent experience, that their flesh was generally tough and lean, like that of our school-boys, by continual exercise, and their taste disagreeable, and to fatten them would not answer the charge. Then as to the females, it would, I think, with humble submission, be a loss to the public, because they soon would become breeders themselves: And besides, it is not improbable that some scrupulous people might be apt to censure such a practice, (although indeed very unjustly) as a little bordering upon cruelty, which, I confess, hath always been with me the strongest objection against any project, how well sever intended.

But in order to justify my friend, he confessed, that this expedient was put into his head by the famous Salmanaazor, a native of the island Formosa, who came from thence to London, above twenty years ago, and in conversation told my friend, that in his country, when any young person happened to be put to death, the executioner sold the carcass to persons of quality, as a prime dainty; and that, in his time, the body of a plump girl of fifteen, who was crucified for an attempt to poison the Emperor, was sold to his imperial majesty's prime minister of state, and other great mandarins of the court in joints from the gibbet, at four hundred crowns. Neither indeed can I deny, that if the same use were made of several plump young girls in this town, who without one single groat to their fortunes, cannot stir abroad without a chair, and appear at a play-house and assemblies in foreign fineries which they never will pay for; the kingdom would not be the worse.

Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern about that vast number of poor people, who are aged, diseased, or maimed; and I have been desired to employ my thoughts what course may be taken, to ease the nation of so grievous an encumbrance. But I am not in the least pain upon that matter, because it is very well known, that they are every day dying, and rotting, by cold and famine, and filth, and vermin, as fast as can be reasonably expected. And as to the young laborers, they are now in almost as hopeful a condition. They cannot get work, and consequently pine away from want of nourishment, to a degree, that if at any time they

are accidentally hired to common labor, they have not strength to perform it, and thus the country and themselves are happily delivered from the evils to come.

I have too long digressed, and therefore shall return to my subject. I think the advantages by the proposal which I have made are obvious and many, as well as of the highest importance.

For first, as I have already observed, it would greatly lessen the number of Papists, with whom we are yearly over-run, being the principal breeders of the nation, as well as our most dangerous enemies, and who stay at home on purpose with a design to deliver the kingdom to the Pretender, hoping to take their advantage by the absence of so many good Protestants, who have chosen rather to leave their country, than stay at home and pay tithes against their conscience to an episcopal curate.

Secondly, The poorer tenants will have something valuable of their own, which by law may be made liable to a distress, and help to pay their landlord's rent, their corn and cattle being already seized, and money a thing unknown.

Thirdly, Whereas the maintenance of a hundred thousand children, from two years old, and upwards, cannot be computed at less than ten shillings a piece per annum, the nation's stock will be thereby increased fifty thousand pounds per annum, besides the profit of a new dish, introduced to the tables of all gentlemen of fortune in the kingdom, who have any refinement in taste. And the money will circulate among ourselves, the goods being entirely of our own growth and manufacture.

Fourthly, the constant breeders, besides the gain of eight shillings sterling per annum by the sale of their children, will be rid of the charge of maintaining them after the first year.

Fifthly, this food would likewise bring great custom to taverns, where the vintners will certainly be so prudent as to procure the best receipts for dressing it to perfection; and consequently have their houses frequented by all the fine gentlemen, who justly value themselves upon their knowledge in good eating; and a skillful cook, who understands how to oblige his guests, will contrive to make it as expensive as they please.


Sixthly, this would be a great inducement to marriage, which all wise nations have either encouraged by rewards, or enforced by laws and penalties. It would increase the care and tenderness of mothers towards their children, when they were sure of a settlement for life to the poor babes, provided in some sort by the public, to their annual profit instead of expense. We should soon see an honest emulation among the married women, which of them could bring the fattest child to the market. Men would become as fond of their wives, during the time of their pregnancy, as they are now of their mares in foal, their cows in calf, or sow when they are ready to farrow; nor offer to beat or kick them (as is too frequent a practice) for fear of a miscarriage.

Many other advantages might be enumerated. For instance, the addition of some thousand carcasses in our exportation of barreled beef: the propagation of swine's flesh, and improvement in the art of making good bacon, so much wanted among us by the great destruction of pigs, too frequent at our tables; which are no way comparable in taste or magnificence to a well grown, fat yearly child, which roasted whole will make a considerable figure at a Lord Mayor's feast, or any other public entertainment. But this, and many others, I omit, being studious of brevity.

Supposing that one thousand families in this city, would be constant customers for infants’ flesh, besides others who might have it at merry meetings, particularly at weddings and christenings, I compute that Dublin would take off annually about twenty thousand carcasses; and the rest of the kingdom (where probably they will be sold somewhat cheaper) the remaining eighty thousand.

I can think of no one objection, that will possibly be raised against this proposal, unless it should be urged, that the number of people will be thereby much lessened in the kingdom. This I freely own, and 'twas indeed one principal design in offering it to the world. I desire the reader will observe, that I calculate my remedy for this one individual Kingdom of Ireland, and for no other that ever was, is, or, I think, ever can be upon Earth. Therefore let no man talk to me of other expedients: Of taxing our absentees at five shillings a pound: Of using neither cloths,

nor household furniture, except what is of our own growth and manufacture: Of utterly rejecting the materials and instruments that promote foreign luxury: Of curing the expensiveness of pride, vanity, idleness, and gaming in our women: Of introducing a vein of parsimony, prudence and temperance: Of learning to love our country, wherein we differ even from Laplanders, and the inhabitants of Tupamaro: Of quitting our animosities and factions, nor acting any longer like the Jews, who were murdering one another at the very moment their city was taken: Of being a little cautious not to sell our country and consciences for nothing: Of teaching landlords to have at least one degree of mercy towards their tenants. Lastly, of putting a spirit of honesty, industry, and skill into our shop-keepers, who, if a resolution could now be taken to buy only our native goods, would immediately unite to cheat and exact upon us in the price, the measure, and the goodness, nor could ever yet be brought to make one fair proposal of just dealing, though often and earnestly invited to it.

Therefore, I repeat, let no man talk to me of these and the like expedients, 'till he hath at least some glimpse of hope, that there will ever be some hearty and sincere attempt to put them into practice.

But, as to myself, having been wearied out for many years with offering vain, idle, visionary thoughts, and at length utterly despairing of success, I fortunately fell upon this proposal, which, as it is wholly new, so it hath something solid and real, of no expense and little trouble, full in our own power, and whereby we can incur no danger in disobliging England. For this kind of commodity will not bear exportation, and flesh being of too tender a consistence, to admit a long continuance in salt, although perhaps I could name a country, which would be glad to eat up our whole nation without it.

After all, I am not so violently bent upon my own opinion, as to reject any offer, proposed by wise men, which shall be found equally innocent, cheap, easy, and effectual. But before something of that kind shall be advanced in contradiction to my scheme, and offering a better, I desire the author or authors will be pleased maturely to consider two points. First, as things now stand, how they will be able to


find food and raiment for a hundred thousand useless mouths and backs. And secondly, There being a round millions of creatures in humane figure throughout this kingdom, whose whole subsistence put into a common stock, would leave them in debt two millions of pounds sterling, adding those who are beggars by profession, to the bulk of farmers, cottagers and laborers, with their wives and children, who are beggars in effect; I desire those politicians who dislike my overture, and may perhaps be so bold to attempt an answer, that they will first ask the parents of these mortals, whether they would not at this day think it a great happiness to have been sold for food at a year old, in the manner I prescribe, and thereby have avoided such a perpetual scene of misfortunes, as they have since gone through, by the oppression of

landlords, the impossibility of paying rent without money or trade, the want of common sustenance, with neither house nor cloths to cover them from the inclemencies of the weather, and the most inevitable prospect of entailing the like, or greater miseries, upon their breed forever.

I profess, in the sincerity of my heart, that I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this necessary work, having no other motive than the public good of my country, by advancing our trade, providing for infants, relieving the poor, and giving some pleasure to the rich. I have no children, by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past child-bearing.

**After reading “A Modest Proposal” work with a partner to find examples of extreme ways of solving societal problems. You can use major political figures like

Donald Trump, the Clintons, John Adams, etc. Find at least three examples from three different political leaders or regimes and add them to the chart below. They

don’t have to be solutions that were actually implemented but can include ones that were suggested.

“MODEST PROPOSALS”

Politician “Problem” “Solution” I.E. The Central Committee of the

Communist Party of China

Chinese cities were becoming too dense for the country. There was a need for population control

Create a law that only allows people to have one child (exceptions for ethnic minorities i.e. the non-Han Chinese). Adverse impact for twins, girls, etc.


On Modern Feminism, From A Male Perspective FJ Rocca July 31, 2015 at 8:25am OPINION Western Journalism

A small contingent of women (probably today’s feminists) take the same position as other “minorities” that there is a large majority keeping them down. They are playing on political correctness to accomplish certain goals they define improperly as those of women in general. But the concept is false on two levels.

First, it defines women as a class, a mass, a collective. Women are individuals, just as men are. Each woman has a mind, heart, lungs, brain, the capacity to learn, act, and achieve, and the ability to choose her own goals. And, by the way, the 2010 census tells us that women are a majority, not a minority. They comprise 50.8% of the U.S. population.

Second, it defines women’s goals as universal. They aren’t. Because each woman can define herself as well as decide what to do with her life’s energies. Many women become lawyers, doctors, politicians, business owners, technicians, cab drivers, school teachers, IT specialists… (As the King of Siam says in The King and I, “et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.”) Lo and behold, some women even choose to be housewives, mothers, homemakers, and matriarchs.

Yes, women have not always received proper treatment in society at large. According to the great historical author Barbara Tuchman, many women in the Middle Ages chose the convent over a marriage in which they would be dominated, often cruelly, by a husband who thought they were chattel. Up until the early 20th century, women did not have the vote. There was a glass ceiling forty or fifty years ago. My wife once told her father she wanted to be an architect. He discouraged her. It was unlikely, he explained, that a woman could be accepted in that profession.

But not anymore. Women are seen in all walks of life and a great many of them are visibly and admirably successful. Ask Condoleeza Rice. Ask Carly Fiorina. I’d say ask Hillary Clinton, but she takes the lying narrative to new heights, as does Michelle Obama, who recently claimed that America had somehow been unfair to her. Sure.

The narrative is false because certain people use it as an excuse, a tactic. Without the narrative, they can’t portray women as victims, and being victims is the way they gain sympathy—and inspire guilt in all the rest of us. This is not the way most women feel, of course. Most women nowadays work. They have jobs and responsibilities outside child rearing or cooking dinner (which they do in addition to doing their outside jobs). Women feel like individuals. They act like individuals. They don’t act like a class, a mob, or a collective, because they aren’t one.

The narrative may be partly a plot to elect Hillary Clinton, the intent being to inspire the kind of guilt that got Obama elected because he was black. However, Carly Fiorina is also a candidate and willingly puts the notion down. It is true that the position of women in the society has improved, but in the minds of most women it is probably about the same as it has always been because human nature does not change. Women want marriage, family, solvency, and children. They want a home and all the other “entitlements” they’ve always had, including having men open doors for them and buy them diamonds. They want to be attractive and sexy and often easily compete on an intellectual level with men. They don’t really need to compete, of course. They just need to be what they are – naturally smart and talented in many areas – and they need to take credit for what they do.

By the way, getting a woman elected president does not improve the lot of women in general, because achievement is not a class thing. It’s an individual thing. A woman who wants an education can get one, even if she doesn’t have a university door held open for her, even if she isn’t married, or even if she isn’t encouraged by a father to become an architect. She can work hard and make her own way. Nobody is holding women back. In fact, it is rare among men to even stereotype women nowadays. Not only is it politically incorrect, but it’s also repugnant to everyone but the crudest types.

Nobody needs permission to achieve, at least not in American society. It’s what makes our country desirable for women, unlike Muslim countries where women are less than chattel, and in many Hispanic countries where males often engage in traditional misogynistic attitudes. There are pockets in our society where the attitude toward women in general is negative, but women do not need to remain in those pockets. They can break free fairly easily—by reading books, acquiring skills, and learning to move themselves forward and upward in society.

Attitudes are only attitudes. The glass ceiling no longer holds anyone down if she exhibits intelligence, talent, and the will to work smartly hard. The best ammunition with which to fight a fictional war on women is to ignore the enemy that doesn’t exist.

***Socratic or informal debate***


Digging -SEAMUS HEANEY

Between my finger and my thumb The squat pen rests; snug as a gun. Under my window, a clean rasping sound When the spade sinks into gravelly ground: My father, digging. I look down Till his straining rump among the flowerbeds Bends low, comes up twenty years away Stooping in rhythm through potato drills Where he was digging. The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft Against the inside knee was levered firmly. He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deep To scatter new potatoes that we picked, Loving their cool hardness in our hands. By God, the old man could handle a spade. Just like his old man. My grandfather cut more turf in a day Than any other man on Toner’s bog. Once I carried him milk in a bottle Corked sloppily with paper. He straightened up To drink it, then fell to right away Nicking and slicing neatly, heaving sods Over his shoulder, going down and down For the good turf. Digging. The cold smell of potato mold, the squelch and slap Of soggy peat, the curt cuts of an edge Through living roots awaken in my head. But I’ve no spade to follow men like them. Between my finger and my thumb The squat pen rests. I’ll dig with it.

Power of the Pen:


This Is A Photograph Of Me -Margaret Atwood 1939

It was taken some time ago At first it seems to be a smeared print: blurred lines and grey flecks blended with the paper;; then, as you scan it, you can see something in the left-hand corner a thing that is like a branch: part of a tree (balsam or spruce) emerging and, to the right, halfway up what ought to be a gentle slope, a small frame house.

In the background there is a lake, and beyond that, some low hills. (The photograph was taken the day after I drowned. I am in the lake, in the center of the picture, just under the surface. It is difficult to say where precisely, or to say how large or how small I am: the effect of water on light is a distortion. but if you look long enough eventually you will see me.)

Relate the ideas present in this poem to Offred feelings of obliteration on page 228. (After she saw a picture of her daughter). Think about the structure of the poem, the narrator, and figurative meaning. Write a short response below:

Identify the following directly on the poem: Imagery (circle) ¡ Personification (underline) ___ Simile (box) o What could the following symbolize: The Hills: The Lake: The House: The Light: The Slope:


Character/Group Chart: I suggest you fill this out as you read. This will help you on the quizzes and the final for this unit. This is for your benefit J Names/Groups What the

name implies Their function

Their status in Gilead

Associated Clothing

Relevant quotes (page numbers...)

Offred

Ofglen

Serene Joy

Aunts

Eyes

Wives

Commanders

Marthas

Unwomen

Unbaby

Econowives

Angels

Guardians

Daughters


Get in the know: Define the following terms with your group. Each term should be followed by an example from film or television. For example, “The Hunger Games” is a dystopian tale.

ð Dystopian:

ð Satire:

ð Utopian:

ð Gilead:

ð American Puritanism:

ð Feminism:

ð Christian Fundamentalist Movement:

ð “Take Back the Night” Campaign: *Once you are done, you will share with the class.

Definition: Example:









DYSTOPIA IN REAL LIFE Events represented in Atwood’s novel are real things that have

happened within western Christian society. In groups of 4-5, find

information on your assigned topic and answer the questions

below on poster paper (you will share with the class). Best

poster wins...

v Group 1/4: Birth control policies (i.e. Ceausescu) +

Sterilization of women (i.e. United States V. Native American women)

v Group 2/5: Sanctioned hangings/tearing apart of human beings (i.e. Dismemberment & Iran) + Legal caste systems

v Group 3/6: Preventing literacy (women and slaves) + Denial of property rights

Answer the following:

1. Where it happened 2. When it happened 3. Why it happened (reason) 4. What were the effects 5. What power/influence pushed these policies (i.e.

religion, politics, etc.) 6. Does it still go on anywhere in the world? 7. Is it too unrealistic to happen today? In America? 8. An image that represents your topic.


analyzation: after chapter 2 With a partner

1) What impressions have you gained from chapter one of the narrator and her circumstances? How so? ____________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2) What do you not know that you would have expected to find out from the first chapter of a novel?

____________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3) What might be the author’s purpose in keeping such knowledge from her readers?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

4) After reading chapter two, make a list of all the ways the Gilead “powers that be” control people’s lives

especially those of women. You will be able to add to this list as you continue reading.

__________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________


Literary analysis : after chapter 4 Using the description in chapter three, draw up a detailed description of Serena Joy in the space below

[appearance, character and behavior].

Look up the biblical quotations used chapter four and explain the possible meaning and the ways in which Gilead has twisted biblical terms for its own purpose:

o ‘The car is...a Whirlwind, better than the Chariot - 2 Kings 2:11

o ‘perhaps he is an Eye’ - Proverbs 15:3

o ‘Some of you will fall on dry ground, or thorns’ - Luke 8:4-15

o ‘Blessed be the fruit’ - Genesis 1:28

o ‘Praise be… I receive with joy’ – 2 Corinthians 1:3 / Luke 8:13


Making Connections: after chapter 6 (WALLàPAGE 43)

Atwood said of her novel 'There's nothing in the book that hasn't already happened.’ The Wall, which Atwood describes as being ‘hundreds of years old’ has been used in Gilead for a sinister purpose. Use your smart phones to look up other examples of the use of walls by political regimes. Look for ones that may reflect ideas of oppressive regimes. (Examples can be found in places like Berlin, Ireland, Iraq, etc.) Write your discoveries and examples of what was done in the “wall” below.


Compa r e & Con t r a s t : after chapter 8 After reading chapter seven, look up information about the growth of the feminist movement in America around the 1970-80s. With a partner, discuss some of the similarities from the feminist movement that you see today regarding present day movements. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ How many instances can you find in this chapter in which Offred compares and contrasts her past life and her present existence? What is the effect of these constant comparisons? Effects: ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Past Life

Present Life


The Women of Gilead: Think about the portrayal of women and men in this novel. Think about the different groups associated with each type of woman or man. Today we will focus on the women and break down each group. The class will be divided into five groups and you will be assigned a group of women. Each group will create a poster with all necessary information about their women and then we will have a debate (winning group will be awarded points on the next quiz) to decide which group has the most prosperous chances in Gilead. After chapter 12

Groups:

§ The Marthas § The Aunts § The Handmaids § Women at Jezebel’s § The Commanders’ Wives.

Each poster should contain the following:

§ Key quotations § Atwood’s purposes in creating the grouping § Specific individuals belonging to that group § Characterization of the group § Pictures § Statement showing prosperous position in society


The power of language Think about the well-known government documents we have. Look one up (i.e. The Declaration, Constitution, etc.) and compare and contrast the language used to the language used by the government of Gilead. In your groups, answer the following questions: (50-word minimum for each question). After chapter 11

1) Is our government manipulating the meaning of words in the same way that the government of Gilead does? Explain.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2) How do people in power dictate the meaning of language? ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3) How do people outside of power re-appropriate or challenge the official uses and meanings of language (i.e. women taking back the word “b!tch)?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

4) Do we need to fear the kind of social change that lead to Gilead in 2016? ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

5) What warnings for our society are present in The Handmaid’s Tale? ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________


GENDER ROLES: After reading “'Men are stuck' in gender roles, data suggest”, Girl, and after chapter 18, answer the questions below: Explain the gender expectations for both genders in today’s society? Women Men

What impact have gender expectations had on you? I’ve been impacted by gender expectations because...

I haven’t been impacted by gender expectations because...

List some of the negative and positive results of complying to the rule of law in Gilead. Positive Negative

With a partner come up with a prompt rooted in gender norms using the three texts as a catalyst. In other words, come up with an essay prompt that addresses issues mentioned in the texts and class discussion. This should be a prompt that asks the writer to analyze and make connections. No summary or compare and contrast questions. PROMPT: __________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________


Lyrical Synthesis: Think about what we have read

so far. Atwood, attempts to make social commentary on several issues. Pick three songs that discuss government rebellion, female expectations and/or religion as it pertains to “The Handmaid’s Tale”. (after chapter 20) track Artist explanation i.e. I'm Just a Girl

No Doubt This song is about a woman's frustration over socially defined gender roles. She expresses frustration about being expected to wear pink and finding a man. She wants to be a girl but not in that restrictive way.

Critical Thinking: Based on what you’ve read thus far, what is the authors underlying message? Find at least one quote that backs up your claim. PLEASE CITE PAGE NUMBER. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


Analytical paragraph: Think about some of the satirical attacks Atwood makes in her novel. Does she aim for easy targets? Is she unfairly selective in her ideas? Is she too negative, with no solutions offered? In this paragraph, you discuss how convincing you find the world she creates. Start your paragraph with either ‘I believe Gilead is a realistic depiction of a place because…’ or ‘I believe Gilead is not a realistic depiction of a place because…’. (after chapter 25) __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________

ANALYTICAL PARAGRAPH OUTLINE Thesis

-Tells the reader how you will interpret the significance of the subject matter under discussion. -Makes a claim that others might dispute

Intro

Provide a foundation of understanding. Provide a context for your quote to make your analysis more effective

Quote

Choose a quote that supports, clarifies, or illustrates your point. Make sure it is relevant. Properly document in parentheses after the quote, when necessary. Make sure to embed the quotation in a sentence. Ex: He stated in frustration, “…” (94).

Analysis

Explain the connection between the quote and your paragraph thesis. Here, you prove your point, elaborate on your idea, and explain your claim. Stay focused on your topic.

Transition/linking ideas

Link ideas with words or phrases that you use in the sentence (Further, Another example, This idea appears, etc.)

Lead into second quote Same as above Quote Same as above Analysis Same as above Concluding thought related to thesis

Maintaining focus throughout the paragraph solidifies your points. Look to write a sentence that brings the ideas presented together.


Power of the Pen! After reading Seamus Heaney’s poem “Digging” (he compares his pen to the spade used by his father) think about how much do you agree with the following statement: “The pen is mightier than the sword”. In what ways is Atwood using the pen as a weapon? Make a list of the topics or issues which Atwood is using this dystopian novel to shed light on or attack.

O_________________________________________________________________________

O_________________________________________________________________________

O_________________________________________________________________________

O_________________________________________________________________________

O_________________________________________________________________________

@Once you have complete the list, choose one that you believe is still relevant today. Use the space below to explain, using current examples, why it is still relevant. __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________


Symbolization: Atwood plays with symbolism throughout the novel. She used colors (red, white, blue, green, brown, black), names (Serena Joy), activities (reading/gardening), things (flowers/salvaging), biblical references (Jezebels), etc. With a partner, decide on at least seven symbols and analyze their figurative meanings. Add examples to each cloud puff and discuss the meanings you associate with each symbol. (after 30)

v How has the author used these symbols to convey the struggle for identity & autonomy when it comes to the characters? Gilead? __________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Symbols

I.E. Symbolic Names: Group Names: Marthas, Aunts, Angels, etc. Individual Names: Offred *Offred’s name is symbolic because it isn’t her real name. It is the name of the commander she serves. “Of Fred”. Represents patriarchy. Also, the color red is in the name, which represents....


Salvaging: In chapter 42, we have a scene where a man is literally being torn apart by a group of women. This is his punishment for raping a woman according to authorities. Consider the different forms of punishment that exist in the world (though we may not tear people apart, is our way of punishment any better?) Are they appropriate? Does the consequence usually fit the crime? With a partner, look of some of the punishments for rape, homosexuality, murder, and drug possession in at least three different countries. Once that is complete, we will have an open forum class debate on capital punishment as it pertains to the United States.

Crime & Punishment worldwide

Country Crime Punishment United States of America

§ Rape

§ Homosexuality

§ Murder

§ Drug possession

§ Rape § Homosexuality § Murder § Drug possession

§ Rape

§ Homosexuality

§ Murder

§ Drug possession


§ Rape

§ Homosexuality

§ Murder

§ Drug possession



Socratic

After reading a male perspective on modern feminism (end of the novel) think about the following statement: “A male reader will find the novel’s view of men unacceptably negative.” Use both to write down potential questions or statements for the Socratic seminar. #Socraticmse

1) ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2) ____________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3) ____________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

4) ____________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

5) ____________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“Feminism”??


Choices: extra credit Up to 25 points Towards the end of the novel, Offred has a choice to make. Her decision could have grave consequences. Think of a time when you had to make a decision and decide which path to take. Check out this online tale of two pathsà http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/youre-afraid-taking-wrong-path-life-need-read.html

Task: Create a road map with two divergent road options. One path represents the path you chose and the other represents what would have happened if you decided on the other path. Each road should contain images and words that depict what happened down the path you chose and what would have happened down the opposite path.

Requirements: Size: you will need anything bigger than an 8x5 Images: you need at least five images (obstacles/accomplishments) on each path Writing: you will need short text explanations of each image presented

Rubric: 30 points total Effort 5 points

Student shows that he/she took substantial time to create the images and write thoughtful explanations

Visuals 10 points

At least ten total images are present and all images are visually appealing.

Neatness 5 points

The visual is orderly.

Content 10 points

Students meet all the requirements.


Societal Analogy: This is a dystopia. Now that you have completed the novel, your group is tasked with creating a unique dystopian world. Popular novels like “Brave New World”, “Fahrenheit 451”, and “1984” are all under the umbrella of dystopia. Think about why all of these novels are so impactful as you begin to create your own society. *You will need poster paper* Requirements for creating your own Dystopia:

1. Decide on a futuristic setting 2. The means by which your society will be controlled (i.e. technology “i-robot”, corporation media

“Minority Report”, religion, etc.) 3. Explain what criticism you will be making: a current trend, societal norm, political system, etc. 4. Explain what type of protagonist will you have? (Will they question the system, escape, conform?)

a. Include: i. The name of your Dystopian Society (represents your new society)

ii. A ‘Declaration of Independence’.Write a brief statement describing the reasons you formed a dystopian society

iii. Dystopian motto/slogan and symbol iv. A list of ten rules that regulate your society (make sure I understand why

these rules are in place) v. An explanation of how your government will be structured and make decisions (anarchy,

dictatorship, democracy, etc.) vi. Answer why dystopias are effective ways to make social commentary?


Symbolic Interpretation: !Name:__________________________Per:______!

!! Step,1:!Make!a!list!of!the!2.3!of!the!most!significant!quotes!regarding!one!of!the!

following!symbols;!remember!to!include!page!numbers!for!each.![Flowers,!Religion,!

colors!i.e.red,!Makeup,!Harvard,!etc.]!!

!! Step,2:!Based!on!the!quotes!you’ve!collected,!determine!what!you!think!would!be!the!

best!interpretation!of!your!chosen!symbol.!!

!! Step,3:!Research!what!others!see!as!reasonable!interpretations!of!these!symbols.!Write!

down!2!of!your!favorite!interpretations.!Provide!support!for!why!you!think!one!

interpretation!is!strong/reasonable!or!provide!support!to!refute!the!other!

interpretation.!!

!! Step,4:!Create!a!visual!representation!of!one!symbol.!Include!the!“title”!(name!+!

meaning!of!symbol),!a!visual!representation!of!the!symbol,!the!most!significant!quotes!

from!the!novel!in!relation!to!the!symbol.!!

!

Symbol:____________________________!1.,The!most!significant!quotes!+!page!

numbers:!

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________!

2.,Your!interpretation!of!the!symbol:!

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

___________________________________!!

!

3.,Researched!interpretation!you!agree!with!

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________!

!!

4.,Researched!interpretation!you!disagree!with!

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

____________________________________

Visual,representation:,


Practice Essay: Pick one of the essay prompts below to write a five-paragraph essay. Please include specific evidence from the text that ties back to your thesis! You can use your book as a reference tool (please be conscious of how much time you have to write):

1. Margaret Atwood would call the novel “speculative” (theoretical rather than demonstrable) rather than “science” fiction. What do you think this might mean?

Or 2. “The Handmaid’s Tale” has been referred to as ‘a dire warning’. What elements of our own society is

Margaret Atwood warning us about, and how does her warning work?

______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________


______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________


“K

eepers”


“The Handmaid’s Tale” Terminology: § Identipass: Universal identification cards used to move around Gilead (esp. checkpoints).

§ Jezebel: An old-fashioned term for a woman who is regarded as evil or morally corrupt. It comes from an Old Testament story about a Phoenician Princess named Jezebel who encouraged idolatry.

§ Matriarchal: System where women are the head of the family group and the community. § Patriarchal: Society in which men are the head of the family, community, and social groups. § Pornomarts: Stores selling pornography, which were outlawed soon after the suspension of the

Constitution.

§ Prayvaganza: Public ceremonies segregated by gender. Women's are usually for group marriages, men's for military victories.

§ Rachel and Leah Centers: Centers where women are re-educated to prepare them for being Handmaids.

§ Salvaging: Public executions, also segregated by gender. Particicutions (ceremony where handmaids physically punish the enemy of the regime) also take place at women's Salvagings.

§ Sectarian Roundups: Government-sponsored purges of people belonging to religious groups other than that supported by the Gilead state.

§ Sons of Jacob Think Tanks: The groups that originally devised the general plan for Gilead, including how they would take over the government and how they would re-order society.

§ Soul Scrolls: Machines that write out prayers. They are automated, so people can purchase prayers that will be written out by the machines.

§ Testifying: One of the activities at the Re-education Center. Testifying involves sharing misdeeds such as illicit sexual activities (including rape), abortions, etc. from previous lives while the Aunts lead the other women in a chant condemning the speaker. This activity is supposed to help Handmaids understand why they deserve - and are even lucky - to be in this position.

§ The Republic of Gilead: The name of the new country that stands in the place of what used to be the United States of America.

§ The Wall: The wall that used to circle part of Harvard University's main campus, and has now been converted to a site where bodies from the Salvagings are displayed.

§ Underground Femaleroad: Similar to the Underground Railroad from the abolition era, the Underground Femaleroad is a network of safe houses through which people attempt to smuggle women out of the country, usually into Canada


COOL VOCABULARY: • Fraternize – to socialize or associate oneself with insatiability • Greed – the inability to be satisfied

• Palimpsest – a manuscript written over a partially erased document in such a way that the original shows through

• Parody – a humorous imitation of something • Approbation – approval

• Audacity – boldness; confidence

• Beseeching – asking or begging • Candor – complete honesty

• Collusion – the plotting between two or more people to commit an illegal act or wrongdoing

• Concubine – a lover; mistress

• Nuances – subtle differences • Shanghaied – tricked or forced into doing something • Sheepish – embarrassed; awkward • Sniveling – whining or crying • Totem – an object serving as a symbol of a clan or society, often used in rituals • Anecdotes – short, and often humorous, stories

• Appeased – fulfilled a want or need to soothe or keep pace

• Coquettish – flirtatious

• Deign – to do something considered to be beneath one’s status

• Dissipation – the overindulgence in physical pleasure (usually related to sex, drugs, or alcohol)

• Implacable – relentless; without mercy

• Importunate – demanding; unrelenting

• Obliterated – completely destroyed

• Ostentation – a showy display of wealth

• Palpable – able to be perceived by the senses • Querulous – argumentative and difficult to get along with

• Regimented – disciplined, well-ordered, and maintained • Stolidity – the state of being unemotional


IMPORTANT QUOTES • "Girls, felt-skirted as I knew from pictures, later in miniskirts, then pants, then one earring, spiky

green-streaked hair." Chapter 1, pg. 3

• "Yearning for something that was always about to happen, and was never the same as the hands that were on us there and then." Chapter 1, pg.3

• "Blessed be the fruit." Chapter 4, 19

• "the heart of Gliead, where the war cannot intrude except on television." Chapter 5, pg. 23

• "There is more than one kind of freedom...Freedom to and freedom from. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom to. Now you are being given freedom from. Don't underrate it." Chapter 5, pg. 24

• "She is a flag on a hilltop, showing what can still be done: we too can be saved." Chapter 5, 26

• "They are very interested in how other households are run; such bits of petty gossip give them an opportunity for pride or discontent." Chapter 5, pg. 27

• "[has not] fiddled with the gravestones, or the church either. It's only the more recent history that offends them." Chapter 6, pg. 31

• "Ordinary, said Aunt Lydia, is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary." Chapter 6, pg.33

• "I'll pretend you can hear me. But it's no good, because I know you can't." Chapter 7, 40

• "She doesn't make speeches anymore. She has become speechless. She stays in her home, but it doesn't seem to agree with her. How furious she must be now that she has been taken at her word." Chapter 8, pg. 46

• "Nolite te bastardes carborundorum" Chapter 9, pg. 52

• "We were the people who were not in the papers. We lived in the blank white spaces at the edge of print. It gave us more freedom." Chapter 10, pg. 57

• "I don't want to look at something that determines me so completely." Chapter 12, pg. 63

• "I wait. I compose myself. My self is a thing I must now compose, as one composes a speech. What I must present is a made thing, not something born." Chapter 12, pg. 66

• "Her fault, her fault, her fault, we chant in unison." Chapter 13, pg. 72

• "I have failed once again to fulfill the expectations of others, which have become my own." Chapter 13, pg. 73

• "Give me children, or else I die. Am I in God's stead, who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb? Behold my maid Bilhah. She shall bear fruit upon my knees, that I may also have children by her." Chapter 15, pg. 88


• "Moira had power now, she'd been set loose, she'd set herself loose. She was now a loose woman." Chapter 22, pg. 133

• "Maybe none of this is about control. Maybe it isn't really about who can own whom, who can do what to whom and get away with it, even as far as death. Maybe it isn't about who can sit can who has to kneel or stand or lie down, legs spread open. Maybe it's about who can do what to whom and be forgiven for it. Never tell me it amounts to the same thing." Chapter 23, pg. 135

• "There is something subversive about this garden of Serena's, a sense of buried things bursting upwards, wordlessly, into the light, as if to say: Whatever is silenced will clamor to be heard, though silently." Chapter 25, pg. 153

• "That was one of the things they do. They force you to kill, within yourself." Chapter 30, pg. 193

• "Better never means better for everyone, he says. It always means worse for some." Chapter 32, pg. 211

• "Agreed to it right away, really she didn't care, anything with two legs and a good you-know-what was fine with her. They aren't squeamish, they don't have the same feelings we do." Chapter 33, pg. 215

• "And Adam was not deceived, but the women being deceived was in the transgression. Notwithstanding she shall be saved by childbearing." Chapter 34, pg. 221

• "butch paradise." Chapter 38, pg. 249

• "There is something reassuring about the toilets. Bodily functions at least remain democratic. Everybody shits, as Moira would say." Chapter 39, pg. 252

• "The trouble is I can't be, with him, any different than I usually am with him. Usually I am inert. Surely there must be something for us, other than this futility and bathos." Chapter 39, pg. 255

• "It makes me feel more in control, as if there is a choice, a decision that could be made one way or the other." Chapter 41, pg. 269

• "The crimes of others are a secret language among us. Through them we show ourselves what we might be capable of, after all. This is not a popular announcement." Chapter 42, pg. 275

• "Dear God, I think, I will do anything you like. Now that you've let me off, I'll obliterate myself, if that is what you really want; I'll empty myself, truly, become a chalice. I'll give up Nick, I'll forget about the others, I'll stop complaining. I'll accept my lot. I'll sacrifice. I'll repent. I'll abdicate. I'll renounce." Chapter 45, pg. 286

• "Don't let the bastards grind you down. I repeat this to myself but it conveys nothing. You might as well say, Don't let there be air; or Don't be. I suppose you could say that." Chapter 46. pg. 291

• "Replaced the serial polygamy common in the pre-Gilead period with the older form of simultaneous polygamy practiced in the Old Testament times." Chapter 47, pg. 305


EXTRA CREDIT:: Prepare a travel brochure for Gilead. You can use the point of view of the “authorities” or the point of view of Moira to create your brochure. One would be approved by the authorities while the other would get censored. Alternatively, you can create a wanted poster for Offred (assuming she escapes). Include some description of her appearance, character, and crimes. Try to make the language sound like something the Gileadian authorities would use. Effort based scale 1-20pts


Anonymous Peer Grading:

Name on the project: _______________________________________

Rubric: Effort 5 points

Student shows that he/she took substantial time to create the images and write thoughtful explanations

Visuals 10 points

At least ten total images are present and all images are visually appealing.

Neatness 5 points

The visual is orderly.

Content 10 points

Students meet all the requirements.

Total points for each category:

___________Size

___________Effort

___________Visuals

___________Neatness

___________Content

Grade_____________

Short & honest explanation about what this student could do to improve his or her presentation:

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________ US


03/20/2017 05:28 pm ET | Updated 1 day ago

Women Wore ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Robes to The Texas Senate The activists were protesting several anti-abortion measures.

By Catherine Pearson On Monday, the Texas Senate considered several abortion-related bills, including Senate Bill 415, a regulation that would effectively ban a safe and common procedure used for second trimester abortions, which anti-choice legislators have taken to calling a “dismemberment abortion ban.” It passed and will now head to the House.

The Senate also inched forward with SB 25 ― a bill that would effectively allow doctors to lie to pregnant women if they detect a fetal anomaly and are concerned their patients might opt for abortion. It will likely head for a final vote on the floor this week.

But in the Senate chambers on Monday, a group of Texas women were having none of it. The activists arrived decked out in full red robes, an homage to characters in “The Handmaid’s Tale,” Margaret Atwood’s classic (and distressingly relevant) feminist tome.


The novel tells the story of a dystopian society in which women have no rights and many ― including the book’s protagonist “Offred” ― are forced to serve as breeders and wear heavy red robes. Sales of the book have soared since President Donald Trump’s election.

The scene in Texas sent a quiet warning to legislators that women are ready to push back against the recent increase in anti-choice legislation in states across the country. Pictures of the sheroes quickly made the rounds on Twitter with the hashtag #FightBackTX.

It’s not the only recent example of women using clothing to broadcast a message in legislative quarters. Democratic women wore white to hear President Trump’s first address to Congress last month, a nod to

the suffragists and a rebuke of misogynistic policies.

Offred would be proud.


Extra Credità 2 PTS Answer the following question: What is the “something” in this quote? “I don’t want to look at something that determines me so completely” (61) _____________________

The Handmaid’s Tale 1 1--66 ______/25 name_______________________________per

Fill in the blank: 1point 1. The narrator states, “we weren’t allowed out, except for our walks...” Write down 1 important details

about those walks. ____________________________________________________________________________________

2. What is time measured by in chapter 2? ____________________________________________________________________________________

3. Why does the color of blood define the narrator? ____________________________________________________________________________________

4. Who is Serena Joy? ____________________________________________________________________________________

5. Describe the “Marthas” in 1-‐2 words and the “Guardians” in 1-‐2 words? ____________________________________________________________________________________

6. The Republic of Gilead is located on this closed location... ____________________________________________________________________________________

7. What happens on the “wall”? ____________________________________________________________________________________

8. What did the narrator find scratched into the floor at the end of chapter 9? ____________________________________________________________________________________

9. What does the doctor propose during the narrator’s exam? ____________________________________________________________________________________

10. Who is it easier for the narrator to think of as dead?

Critical Thinking: 5points” 1. What does Aunt Lydia mean when she says, “We were a society dying...of too much choice”? How does that

contribute to the ability to sustain a society like The Republic of Gilead? ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________

2. What is the significance of the handmaid’s “wings”? ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. Think about our society and think about other societies. Is there still a fear of women being too visible? Explain. “to be seen—to be seen—is to be—her voice trembled—penetrated” (28) ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“I hunger to commit the act of touch” ... “There is more than one kind of freedom, said Aunt Lydia. Freedom to and freedom from. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom to. Now you are being given freedom from. Don’t’ underrate it. (24)

“The bell awakens me; and then Cora, knocking at my door. I sit up, on the rug, wipe my wet face with my sleeve. Of all the dreams this the worst”/. “One of the gravestones in the cemetery...has an anchor on it and an hourglass, and the words In Hope. Why did they put that above a dead person?”

Extra Credità3 pts “I watch for blood, fearfully, for when it comes it means failure. I have failed once again to fulfill the expectations of others, which have become my own (73).” Explain the significance of this quote.

______/25 name_______________________________per

Fill in the blank: 1point

1. What location does the narrator meet her friend Moira? ____________________________________________________________________________________

2. What happens at the “Testifying” ceremony? ____________________________________________________________________________________

3. What item does Serena Joy have that is considered a luxury to the handmaids? ____________________________________________________________________________________

4. Who is labeled the “head of the household”? ____________________________________________________________________________________

5. What is the name of the narrator? *Not a trick question ____________________________________________________________________________________

6. What incendiary (provocative) device is kept locked up so the servants won’t steal it? ____________________________________________________________________________________

7. What happened to Moira after she was taken to the Science Lab? ____________________________________________________________________________________

8. What act of affection is forbidden between the commander and the handmaids? ____________________________________________________________________________________

9. The Rachel and Leah center was also known as what? ____________________________________________________________________________________

10. What did Moira do with Aunt Elizabeth? ____________________________________________________________________________________

Critical Thinking: 5points 1. Discuss the characterization of Moira. How does her role as an antagonist of Gilead drive the plot?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2. “I tell myself it doesn’t matter, your name is like your name is like your telephone number...but what I tell myself is wrong. It does matter. I keep the knowledge of this name like something hidden, some treasure I’ll come back to dig up, one day. I think of this name as buried” (84). Explain the significance. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. Think about the relationship between Offred and her mother. Why did the author include flashbacks about her mother?____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The Handmaid’s Tale 2 69--133

ãMs. E Creationsÿ 57

“The pen between my fingers is sensuous, alive almost, I can feel its power, the power of the words it contains” (186)./”They force you to kill, within yourself (192)”

The Handmaid’s Tale 3 134--195 ______/25 name______________________________per

Fill in the blank: 1point 1. What violation does the Commander ask Offred to commit in chapter 23?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 2. What game did the Commander play with Offred?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 3. How old is Offred?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 4. How did Nick help the Commander and Offred meet secretly?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 5. What magazine did the Commander give Offred?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 6. Who asks Offred, “Do you think God listens”?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 7. Who said the following: “we are not each other’s anymore. Instead, I am his” (183)?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 8. Offred feels uncomfortable doing what in front of the Commander?

____________________________________________________________________________________ 9. Thanks to the Commander, Offred finds out what “Nolite te bastardes carborundorum means. What

does it mean? ____________________________________________________________________________________

10. How did Luke and Offred get caught? ____________________________________________________________________________________

Critical Thinking: 5points 1. The word “reconstruction” has been used quite a few times. Explain the significance of this word with regard to it use

in the novel. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2. Do you agree or disagree with the following statement from chapter 26, “Men at the top have always had mistresses...(163)” ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. Discuss the shift in Luke and Offred’s relationship once the new laws were being implemented.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


The Handmaid’s Tale 4 199--250 ______/25 name_______________________________per

Fill in the blank: 1point

1. What major holiday has been abolished? ____________________________________________________________________________________

2. There were two hangings on the wall. What letter was marked in red on their bodies? ____________________________________________________________________________________

3. What is the password Ofglen shares with Offred? ____________________________________________________________________________________

4. What does Serena Joy want Nick and Offred to do? ____________________________________________________________________________________

5. What happens that makes Moira slap Janine? ____________________________________________________________________________________

6. Who specifically said, “love is not the point”? ____________________________________________________________________________________

7. What information does Ofglen want Offred to get from the Commander? ____________________________________________________________________________________

8. What “favor” did Serena end up doing for Offred that made Offred upset? ____________________________________________________________________________________

9. What type of place did the Commander illegally sneak Offglen to? ____________________________________________________________________________________

10. What character makes a surprise reappearance? ____________________________________________________________________________________

Critical Thinking: 5points 1. What is significant about the names: Ofglen, Ofwarren, and Offred? What message is the author trying to portray?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2. Agree or disagree with the following statement: “Better never means better for everyone, he says. It always means worse, for some” (211). Explain using the text as a reference point. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. What is the historical significance of the “Underground Femaleroad”? Why would the author choose that

name?_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


The Handmaid’s Tale 5 251—295 ______/25 name_______________________________per

Fill in the blank: 1point 1. Offred does something that she thinks could be betrayal to Luke. What action was that?

________________________________________________________________________ 2. Offred shares her real name with what person?

________________________________________________________________________ 3. What big event is always segregated by gender?

________________________________________________________________________ 4. What is one thing that the wives are not allowed to do to handmaids?

________________________________________________________________________ 5. What happens to the man convicted of rape?

________________________________________________________________________ 6. What happened to “Ofglen”?

________________________________________________________________________ 7. What does Serena find out that causes her to call Offred a “slut”?

________________________________________________________________________ 8. What is Offred’s punishment supposed to be?

________________________________________________________________________ 9. What code word does Nick say that gives Offred a glimpse of hope?

________________________________________________________________________ 10. What is problematic about the ending?

__________________________________________________________________

Critical Thinking: 5points 1. “Ofglen is giving up on me. She whispers less, talks more about the weather. I do not feel regret about this. I feel

relief” (271). Why does the narrator feel “relief”? ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2. “Death makes me hungry. Maybe it’s because I’ve been emptied; or maybe it’s the body’s way of seeing to it that I remain alive, continue to repeat its bedrock prayer: I am, I am. I am, still. (281). Given the context, explain this quote. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. Explain the phrase, “Under His Eye”.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“And so I step up, into the darkness within; or else the light” (295)


KEY QUIZ 1 1. Twice daily, two by two, around the football

field 2. The bells 3. Everything they wear (except wings) is the

color red 4. Commander’s wife 5. Mathas work and guardians are security 6. Located on a closed university (Harvard) 7. The wall is where they hang bodies of

“criminals” gender traitors etc. 8. A phrase in a different language. Nolite te

bastardes carborundorum (Don’t let the bastards grind you down)

9. Impregnate her 10. Her daughter (must be 8 page 64)

a. EXTRA CREDIT: HER NAKED BODY

Critical thinking: ANSWERS MAY VARY

1. Answers will vary: If you prevent choice you can make society run one type of way with little uprising.

2. Answers will vary: Prevents them from being seen and seeing. A way to hide the women and prevent them from seeing truth. The wings are also white which could represent some form of purity.

3. Answers will vary: students should present thoughtful answers about the state of women anywhere in the wold.

KEY QUIZ 2 1. The washroom (end stall @2:30) 2. Where women tell their stories of rape,

abortion, etc. They have to say it’s her fault. 3. Perfume 4. The Commander 5. Offred 6. The bible 7. She could not walk, her feet didn’t fit into her

shoes, had trouble walking... 8. Kissing 9. The Red Center 10. Tied her up behind the furnace and took her

clothes a. EXTRA CREDIT: She is not pregnant

and has internalized societal expectations.


1. She is a rebel and is consistently pushing back against the regime. She reminds others that you can make a choice.

2. Answers will vary: but essentially this is a warning to remember who she was before the regime takeover. If she forgets, she will become part of the system.

3. Students should touch on the fact that they were at odds at times because her mother was a feminist. She still had love for her. .

KEY QUIZ 3 1. He wants her to kiss him/be alone with him 2. Scrabble! 3. 33 4. He was the signal (polishing the car, hat askew

she goes. If not she stays...except on ceremony days)

5. Vogue magazine

6. Ofglen 7. Offred 8. Reading 9. Don’t let the bastards grind you down 10. A neighbor snitched


1. Answer may vary: the idea of reconstruction could represent rebuilding.

2. Amir won the genetic lottery being born male. The double standard is that women are held to high expectations and shamed if they fall in love before getting approval from family etc.

3. Instead I am his. She felt like they fell into the role and he was the head of the house and she became the housewife.

KEY QUIZ 4 1. July 4th 2. J 3. Mayday 4. Procreate 5. She cracked and referenced her old life 6. Aunt Lydia 7. Anything she can 8. Showed her a picture of her daughter (228) 9. A hotel (for women to flirt or sleep with men) 10. Moira


1. The names show that they are the possession of men. They are property and not autonomous.

2. Answers will vary 3. Answers will vary: references the underground

railroad and the secret freeing of slaves. The author wanted to signify the enslavement of the regime and how difficult it was to escape.

KEY QUIZ 5 1. Sleeps with Nick 2. Nick 3. Salvaging 4. They can’t kill them 5. Torn apart by the women 6. She hanged herself. A new Ofglen has

replaced her and she is no longer part of the underground group

7. She found lipstick on her cloak 8. The eyes in a black van are coming to take her

away 9. Mayday 10. The ending is left open ended


1. Doesn’t have to be fearful or carry the weight of that secret. She can also stop fighting the system.

2. The idea of staying sane. Being hungry represents the need to reassure oneself of her existence.

3. This phrase means that you are always being watched. It is his eye to represent patriarchy. It also has some biblical representation as the “his” could represent God.


The Handmaid’s Taee Essay Prompts: Please pick one prompt to answer. Please make sure you have a hook, clear thesis, strong introduction and concluding paragraph. Use at least three specific examples from the text to address the prompt.

1. "Ordinary" said Aunty Lydia, "is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after time it will. It will become ordinary" (33). Analyze the methods used by the regime to condition women in Gilead and were those methods successful in restructuring society?

2. Atwood illustrates that a dictatorship can be

established by playing upon people’s fears and dissatisfaction with societal conditions. Examine how fear tactics helped create Gilead and keep the regime in place.

3. How are women’s bodies used as both a source

of power and powerlessness in “The Handmaid’s Tale”?


THE HANDMAID’S TALE ESSAY PROMPTS:

FOR ABSENT STUDENTS

Please pick one prompt to answer. Please make sure you have a hook, clear thesis, strong introduction and concluding paragraph. Use at least three specific examples from the text to address the prompt.

Language is used as a tool for power by the state of Gilead to oppress women and strip them of their identity. Analyze how language is used as a means of control throughout the novel?

This society has been “reconstructed” to create a new system of hierarchy for men and women. Discuss this new system and examine Atwood's depiction of structural oppression in the public and private life of these citizens.

“There is more than one kind of freedom”, said Aunt Lydia. “Freedom to and freedom from. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom to. Now you are given freedom from” (24). Examine the quality of life for the different types of women in Gilead and illustrate and analyze the methods used to ‘protect’ them “from”…


DAILY BREAKDOWN: I have class for 100 minutes every other day. I go through and stamp pages in the reader for completion when they have been assigned. *All articles are to be annotated by students. Day 1:

• Do now: What are the perceptions of sex and sexuality for your generation? Is fluidity acceptable? Free spirit attitude? Etc.

• Walk and talk. Share out. • Go through the first page of the reader and highlight the essential question • Powerpoint: Go over Lit. Terms ppt

• HOMEWORK: Read ch. 1-6 Day 2:

• Do now: What are some similarities between “The Yellow Wallpaper” and the first few chapters of “The Handmaid’s Tale”? Share out

• Read: “Haunted”...have students discuss the two questions at the end of the reading and then share out.

• Worksheet: Do page 27 “analyzation” and page 28 lit analysis. We can do this in groups outside depending on the weather.

• Read: “Girl” then have students get in groups of four...they will have five minutes to discuss the reading. Then we will discuss as a class

• Students will do a whip around (each student shares) to share thoughts on reading (10 seconds or less)

• Discussion: Students will participate in agree/disagree with a partner based on the statements at the end of the reading. Students should answer the last two questions on their own. Girl will be connected later after chapter 18

• HOMEWORK: Read ch. 7-12 and study for quiz on ch. 1-12 Day 3:

• Do now: Why don’t we have temporary birth control for men? • Quiz: on ch. 1-12 • Worksheet: students will complete the “Get in the Know” • Worksheet: the power of language. We can work through this as a class. • Group Activity: Students will get in groups and complete “Dystopia in Real Life”

(students can present findings) • HOMEWORK: Reach ch. 13-17

Day 4:

• Do now: What are some prevalent themes in chapters 1-17 and what purpose do they serve?

• Discuss the reading: specifically talk about Moira (what her character may foreshadow), Nick and his relationship with Offred, the idea of passive rebellion. Read page 94 as a class and discuss Offred’s statement that this isn’t making love or rape because she chose this path. Address the flashback to the “WAR” that resulted in Gilead.

• Read: “Men are Stuck in Gender Roles” and students will answer questions in partners • Worksheet: Do page 29 “Making Connections”

• HOMEWORK: Reach ch. 18-22


• Read “Orwell and Me” Day 5:

• Do now: What is the current culture around giving birth? • Quiz #2 • Worksheet: Gender Roles page 33 (prompt pulled from the three cited sources). Great

opportunity to discuss gender expectations • Worksheet: Lyrical Synthesis page 34

• Share out some of the lyrics (play one song that a student feels really fits) • Let students know they will be doing the FALL WRITE next class

• Read: “What Women Want” • HOMEWORK: Read 23-25

Day 6:

• Do now : Vogue magazine was something Offred got her hands on this section. Think about the American media and news. What are the ways in which women are portrayed that would justify Gilead banning all magazines?

• Share: prompts from page 33 • Discuss: 22-25 (Scrabble, Kiss me like you mean it, Nazi, Cora, Lotion/butter) • Watch: The Handmaid’s Tale episode 1

• HOMEWORK: Read 26-30 Day 7:

• Do Now: What is the significance of your name? How important is your name to your identity? If you don’t know the significance of you name look it up.

• Quiz #3 • Read: Digging and complete worksheet “power of the pen”. Have students discuss with

a partner how the pen can be a weapon. • Discuss: “What Women Want” and the reading from last night (split the class in three

sections: one section will focus on bringing up important conflict facing the narrator, section two will focus on sub characters, and the third section will pull specific quotes that are significant and explain why)

• HOMEWORK: Read 31-34

Day 8: • Fall Write (in class essay)

• HOMEWORK: Read 35-38 Day 9: MAKE SURE OTHELLO READERS ARE DONE

• Quiz #4 • Worksheet: symbolic interpretation (students will present at least one symbol and

explain) • Discuss 21-38 ending with “would you rather be a Jezebel or Handmaid” • Worksheet: Women of Gilead debate prep (students will be assigned the role of a

Jezebel, Handmaid, Martha, or Wife. Students will make posters arguing why their group has it best in Gilead...can extend this and allow students to create commercials, skits, prezi, or anything they believe would be persuasive).

• Presentation: students will prepare arguments and present in class (homework pass up for grabs) may need more time

• HOMEWORK: Read 39-43


Day 10:

• Do Now: Offred seems to be giving up. The tone of the novel has taken a turn. Read the following quote and agree or disagree: “It really bothers me when I see people rally around the word Hope. It is such a useless word. Hope is downright powerless and ‘wishy washy’. It contains no action. It is a word for the weak minded and unmotivated”. Explain.

• Presentation: students will present arguments if needed • Read: “A Modest Proposal” • Discuss: and complete activity (can we argue morals? Syrian refugees, black lives

matter, poor people, etc.) How does it relate to The Handmaid’s Tale (breeders, extreme solution to a problem, religious undertones, etc.)

• Worksheet: Students will complete page 38 “Salvaging” with a partner then share out • Discuss: split the class in three sections: one section will focus on bringing up important

internal and external conflicts facing the narrator, section two will focus connecting the current popularity of the book to the climate of America today, and the third section will pull specific quotes from the last two readings and explain significance)

• HOMEWORK: Read 44-46 Day 11:

• Quiz #5 • Debate: The Women of Gilead DEBATE (if we didn’t have time last class) • Worksheet: students work with a partner to fill out symbolisms on page 37. We will

share next class • Read: “On Modern Feminism, from A Male Perspective” • Socratic Seminar & Twitter: students will conduct a Socratic based on the article and

the reading. Questions can be posed by the class via twitter but all Socratic participants should have 2 questions or comments ready.

• HOMEWORK: Read historical notes • Finish symbolism page in reader (37)

Day 12: SET TIME TO PICK UP “OTHELLO”

• Do Now: Where are you now in terms of your life journey? Have you made decisions that have set your future self-up for success? Explain why or why not.

• Activity: Snowball fight to share symbols (students write up a symbol they thought was key and why and then crumble into a ball and throw across the room. We will do three rounds so students can see other interpretations of symbols)

• Worksheet: Analytical Paragraph/Essay tips 25-30 min • Group Activity: Students can work in groups to create their societal analogy (Winning

visuals (using any medium form) will get to drop the lowest quiz score) • HOMEWORK: Essay next class

Day 13:

• Students can only enter class if they know the password (MAYDAY OR Will Smith) • Unit Final: Students will take the entire class to write the in class essay. They will be

able to choose from three choices. Students who are absent will have an entirely different set of essay options to complete.

• Pick up Othello • TURN IN READERS


Reading schedule:


COMMON CORE STANDARDS: Haunted by the handmaid’s tale............................................................3

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.2 Determine two or more central ideas of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to provide a complex analysis; provide an objective summary of the text.

Girl............................................................................................................6

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.6 Analyze a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement).


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.1 Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters uncertain.

Orwell and me........................................................................................10

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.10 Read and comprehend literary nonfiction at the high end of the grades 11-CCR text complexity band independently and proficiently.

what women want now .........................................................................13

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.5 Analyze and evaluate the effectiveness of the structure an author uses in his or her exposition or argument, including whether the structure makes points clear, convincing, and engaging.

A modest proposal................................................................................16 « CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.6

Analyze a case in which grasping a point of view requires distinguishing what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant (e.g., satire, sarcasm, irony, or understatement).


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.11-12.1 Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 11-12 topics, texts, and issues, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.

Digging...................................................................................................22

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in the text, including figurative and connotative meanings; analyze the impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone, including words with multiple meanings or language that is particularly fresh, engaging, or beautiful.




« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.11-12.9 Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.

Character chart ...................................................................................24

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.1 Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters uncertain.

get in the know ....................................................................................25

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.11-12.6 Acquire and use accurately general academic and domain-specific words and phrases, sufficient for reading, writing, speaking, and listening at the college and career readiness level; demonstrate independence in gathering vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase important to comprehension or expression.


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.7 Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in different media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively) as well as in words in order to address a question or solve a problem.

Analyzation ...........................................................................................27

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.3 Analyze the impact of the author's choices regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story or drama (e.g., where a story is set, how the action is ordered, how the characters are introduced and developed).




« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.11-12.8 Gather relevant information from multiple authoritative print and digital sources, using advanced searches effectively.


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.3 Analyze the impact of the author's choices regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story or drama (e.g., where a story is set, how the action is ordered, how the characters are introduced and developed).


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.11-12.4 Present information, findings, and supporting evidence, conveying a clear and distinct perspective, such that listeners can follow the line of reasoning, alternative or opposing perspectives are addressed, and the organization, development, substance, and style are appropriate to purpose, audience, and a range of formal and informal tasks.


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.9 Analyze seventeenth-, eighteenth-, and nineteenth-century foundational U.S. documents of historical and literary significance (including The Declaration of


Independence, the Preamble to the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address) for their themes, purposes, and rhetorical features.

Gender roles ........................................................................................33

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.7 Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in different media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively) as well as in words in order to address a question or solve a problem.


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.11-12.1 Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.11-12.2 Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts, and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content.

Power of the pen ................................................................................36


Symbolization .......................................................................................37

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative, connotative, and technical meanings; analyze how an author uses and refines the meaning of a key term or terms over the course of a text

Salvaging ..............................................................................................38

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.11-12.4 Present information, findings, and supporting evidence, conveying a clear and distinct perspective, such that listeners can follow the line of reasoning, alternative or opposing perspectives are addressed, and the organization, development, substance, and style are appropriate to purpose, audience, and a range of formal and informal tasks.

Socratic ................................................................................................39

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.11-12.3 Evaluate a speaker's point of view, reasoning, and use of evidence and rhetoric, assessing the stance, premises, links among ideas, word choice, points of emphasis, and tone used.

Choices...................................................................................................40 Societal analogy ..................................................................................41

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.11-12.2 Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts, and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content.

Symbolic Interpretation ......................................................................42 « CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.3

Analyze a complex set of ideas or sequence of events and explain how specific individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop over the course of the text.

Essay .....................................................................................................43


« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.6 Determine an author's point of view or purpose in a text in which the rhetoric is particularly effective, analyzing how style and content contribute to the power, persuasiveness or beauty of the text.

Character chart Ms. E drawings .......................................................46

Handmaid terminology .........................................................................47

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.11-12.4 Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on grades 11-12 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies.

Cool Vocabulary ..................................................................................48

« CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.11-12.4 Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on grades 11-12 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies.

important Quotes..................................................................................49


Extra credit .........................................................................................50

(Bonus) Women wore handmaid’s tale robes to Texas senate..........53


ANTI-‐BIAS STRANDS: TEACHING TOLERANCE 9 ANTI-BIAS FRAMEWORK 9-12 Grade Level Outcomes and Scenarios

Haunted by the handmaid’s tale............................................................3

Girl............................................................................................................6

« IDENTITY 5 ID.9-12.5 Students will recognize traits of the dominant culture, their home culture and other cultures and understand how they negotiate their own identity in multiple spaces.



Orwell and me........................................................................................10 what women want now ..........................................................................13

A modest proposal................................................................................16



« DIVERSITY 10 DI.9-12.10 Students will recognize that diversity includes the impact of unequal power relations on the development of group identities and cultures.

Digging see ............................................................................................22


Character chart ...................................................................................24

get in the know ....................................................................................25


« JUSTICE 12 JU.9-12.12 Students can recognize, describe and distinguish unfairness and injustice at different levels of society.

Analyzation ...........................................................................................27






« JUSTICE 13 JU.9-12.13 Students can explain the short and long-term impact of biased words and behaviors and unjust practices, laws and institutions that limit the rights and freedoms of people based on their identity groups.



« DIVERSITY 10 DI.9-12.10 Students will recognize that diversity includes the impact of unequal power relations on the development of group identities and cultures.



Gender roles ........................................................................................33

« JUSTICE 14 JU.9-12.14 Students will recognize unfairness on the individual level (e.g., biased speech) and injustice at the institutional or systemic level (e.g., discrimination).


« JUSTICE 14 JU.9-12.14 Students will recognize unfairness on the individual level (e.g., biased speech) and injustice at the institutional or systemic level (e.g., discrimination).


Power of the pen ................................................................................36

« JUSTICE 12 JU.9-12.13 Students will analyze the harmful impact of bias and injustice on the world, historically and today.

Symbolization .......................................................................................37

Salvaging ..............................................................................................38

« JUSTICE 12 JU.9-12.15 Students will identify figures, groups, events and a variety of strategies and philosophies relevant to the history of social justice around the world.

Socratic ................................................................................................39

« DIVERSITY 10 DI.9-12.8 Students will respectfully express curiosity about the history and lived experiences of others and will exchange ideas and beliefs in an open-minded way.

Choices...................................................................................................40 Societal analogy ..................................................................................41

« DIVERSITY 10 DI.9-12.10 Students will examine diversity in social, cultural, political and historical contexts rather than in ways that are superficial or oversimplified.

Essay .....................................................................................................42 Character chart Ms. E drawings .......................................................46 Handmaid terminology .........................................................................47 Cool Vocabulary ..................................................................................48 important Quotes..................................................................................49 Extra credit .........................................................................................50 (Bonus) Women wore handmaid’s tale robes to Texas senate..........53

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