Attraction, Gender Roles, and Homosexuality: an Analysis of Brokeback Mountain
Attraction, Gender Roles, and Homosexuality:
An Analysis of Brokeback Mountain
Professor Frattaroli
P118D: Winter 2011
Introduction In this paper, I will identify examples from the film Brokeback Mountain that exemplify concepts of human sexuality – specifically, attraction; gender roles and socialization; and sexual orientation – in attempts to discuss the accurate portrayal of the concept within the scene, in concordance with known research findings regarding the aforementioned topics. In Brokeback Mountain, Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist are two young men living a pastoral life as cowboys/ranch hands; they meet each other for the first time in 1963 in Wyoming, to undertake a sheep herding job for the summer. Their employer’s one rule for them while up on Brokeback Mountain is that one of them has to stay with the sheep out in the fields overnight, and the other can stay at camp. After spending several weeks together enduring the job’s hardships, and with only each other for company, they slowly begin to build a relationship. While at first their relationship is platonic, it eventually evolves into a romantic one; Brokeback Mountain depicts in depth the struggles and complications - both internal and external – Jack and Ennis must deal with throughout the entirety of their relationship.
Attraction
Because Ennis lives the stereotypical cowboy lifestyle, he frequently tends to keep to himself; he has experienced many hardships throughout his lifetime, and is not prone to be particularly conversational. Jack, on the other hand, is easy-going and carefree; his ambitions in life to become a rodeo cowboy have helped him to develop into a loquacious individual – these personality characteristics are illustrated through Jack and Ennis’s first interactions with each other while up on Brokeback Mountain. While at first Jack and Ennis seem like polar opposites, by spending so much
An Analysis of Brokeback Mountain
Professor Frattaroli
P118D: Winter 2011
Introduction In this paper, I will identify examples from the film Brokeback Mountain that exemplify concepts of human sexuality – specifically, attraction; gender roles and socialization; and sexual orientation – in attempts to discuss the accurate portrayal of the concept within the scene, in concordance with known research findings regarding the aforementioned topics. In Brokeback Mountain, Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist are two young men living a pastoral life as cowboys/ranch hands; they meet each other for the first time in 1963 in Wyoming, to undertake a sheep herding job for the summer. Their employer’s one rule for them while up on Brokeback Mountain is that one of them has to stay with the sheep out in the fields overnight, and the other can stay at camp. After spending several weeks together enduring the job’s hardships, and with only each other for company, they slowly begin to build a relationship. While at first their relationship is platonic, it eventually evolves into a romantic one; Brokeback Mountain depicts in depth the struggles and complications - both internal and external – Jack and Ennis must deal with throughout the entirety of their relationship.
Attraction
Because Ennis lives the stereotypical cowboy lifestyle, he frequently tends to keep to himself; he has experienced many hardships throughout his lifetime, and is not prone to be particularly conversational. Jack, on the other hand, is easy-going and carefree; his ambitions in life to become a rodeo cowboy have helped him to develop into a loquacious individual – these personality characteristics are illustrated through Jack and Ennis’s first interactions with each other while up on Brokeback Mountain. While at first Jack and Ennis seem like polar opposites, by spending so much