“I don’t know why femininity should be associated with weakness. Women should be free to express who they are without thinking, ‘I need to act like a man, or I need to tone it down to be successful.” That’s a very good way to keep women down.” ~ Zooey Deschanel
The above lines justify the present scenario with respect to women and a gender biased society affecting the education system as a whole. This article is channelized towards women and the stereotypic approach in regards to education system; the reason being even now women are being out casted form getting the basic primary education.
We talk about women empowerment, making special laws for them but why do we need them when there aren’t any properly utilized? How many women are allowed to continue with their studies in rural areas? I presume not many as most of them are stopped from going to school on considerations that they would be over educated for handling the household. So, where is the need coming from? It is like one is having an android phone and not being able to use it.
In the words of Oscar Wilde “one can never be over-dressed or over-educated”; two views with completely different perspectives. Most people might contradict saying that the scenario is changing, women are given equal opportunities, all geared up to challenge the patriarchal stereotypical approach; all arguments are true but to what extent, who all are included? Are the grass-root level people are also included into it, if not then does that mean education should only be limited to the cities and not to the villages? I would like to leave all these questions unanswered, and leave it upon the discretion of the readers to decide.
The negative attitude of parents towards the girl child and her education is one of the major reasons of low female literacy rates in India. In most of the families, boys at home are given priority in terms of education but girls are not treated in the same way. Right from the beginning, parents do not consider girls as earning members of their families, as after marriage they have to leave their parents.[3]I don’t want to offend anyone’s feelings or thoughts but it’s presumed that teaching would be the apt occupation for women. In other words, teaching is in the monologicalsing-song, for women only. The most hallucinating justification for this is that their motherhood and generosity would make them good teachers and secondly and the most vital reason being that they would be getting time to devote to their families, I’m not talking about professors or lecturers but school teachers.
On an ending note, I would like to say thousand laws can be passed, reservations might be done but what’s the use of them when we don’t have a proper infrastructure to explore them. Why have we not been able to eradicate this gender biased system of education?
“Objection: Women do not desire learning…
Answer: Neither do many boys…yet I suppose you do not intend to lay fallow all children that will not bring forth fruit of themselves” By : Bathsua Makin
Trishna Roy
Trishna is a law student at Damodaram Sanjivayya National Law University, Visakhapatnam. She is an active debater and has participated in various debates across the nation. Her interest lies in Human Rights and Constitutional Law.
