Women In The Giver

Offspring Options: It’s a Mother of a Problem!
What is a mother? A woman who gives labor to a child, for one, but there is more to the equation, for example: a person who cares for a newborn, who raises the child, and who child considers their mother. When women become pregnant, they are faced with decisions and choices that, depending on their environment, they may not have a say in. Which begs the question: do women have a choice when it comes to procreation? Essentially, women within dystopian and utopian literature do not have the choice to (or not to) become pregnant because without them, the future of their collective communities would be compromised. When Charlotte Gilman wrote Herland in the late 1970’s, America was fighting for equality
At the age of twelve, everyone in the community is assigned a career meant to cater to their personalities. Citizens can apply for spouses but cannot procreate on their own, all children are labored from the birthmothers of this society. When the new born children are old enough, they go on to live with their nuclear families, proceed to be assigned their careers, and carry them out until they are sent to the House of the Old before being released from the community (Wang,
In fact, sex does not exist in either community. The births in Herland are seen as a miracle because women are allowed to conceive without men, their sisterhood is full of strength and pride directly linked to their ability to sustain themselves. Whereas in The Giver, adolescents are medicated during puberty in order to suppress the urge to have sexual desires. The act of carrying a child is connected to sexual acts in a vulgar way the community is not allowed to discuss. Does the presence of man inherently make conception an obscene act? The Giver in a society of both men and women outwardly cover up the process of natural conception, while Herland celebrates the joy motherhood brings without