Boys and Girls by Alice Munro [PDF]

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Boys and Girls by Alice Munro Boys and girls is a short story written by Alice Munro focused towards a girl who was against the gender inequalities in the society and the society’s opinion of how the girl should behave and the restricted duties she had to perform (Archer, 2008). The girl preferred more to handle the responsibilities of a boy but that was not acknowledged by the society. The father of the girl owned a fox farm. He had a business of raising the foxes and then selling their pelts. She had a great interest in helping her father in his tasks but her mother wanted her to work inside to learn the household tasks and to perform the responsibilities assumed by a girl at that time. She never gave importance to them even hates to work in the kitchen. (philip) She believed that she has the capability to do more work than her younger brother Laird but due to male dominance during that time she was not encouraged towards her father’s work and her brother has the freedom of doing tasks of his choice. They had two horses Mack and Flora. His father decided to kill them to feed his foxes due to shifting trend of farmers towards usage of tractors instead of horses (Goldma, 1990). His father decided to kill Mack first but the girl was unhappy with his death and tried to save the female horse flora. The girl tried to help the horse in letting him run free which was chased by her father and Laird. When Laird told everyone that Flora ran away due to her sister’s mistake his father responded never mind she’s only a girl which placed the stereotypical tag on the girl. The story has majorly depicted the male dominance and gender inequalities during that period as the boys were have more liberty and dominance at that time while the women were blamed for any wrong act and have to live in a more restricted environment (Goldma, 1990).



Bibliography Archer, T. (2008). Alice Munro's Boys and Girls. American Literature. Goldma, M. (1990). Penning in the Bodies: The Construction of Gendered Subjects in Alice Munro’s ‘Boys and Girls. 62-67. philip, A. (n.d.). Boys and Girls: Summary & Analysis. Retrieved May 09, 2012, from School work helper- St Rosemary educational institute: http://schoolworkhelper.net/2011/06/alice-munros-boysand-girls-summary-analysis/