In Rabindranath Tagore’s Punishment an ethical issue conveyed is male dominance. The men in this story are seen as superior to women in society which is what allows for Chandara’s death. The women had to be docile and submissive and do whatever the men wanted. The whole reason for Radha’s death was because she did not have his meal prepared and expressed herself. Dukhiram says to Radha, “Give me my food.’….the elder wife exploded,…’Where is there food? Did you give me anything to cook? Must I earn money myself to buy it?” This is seen as defiance from Radha and in his anger he believed it was acceptable to strike her. The problem with the situation is that it even crossed Dukhiram’s mind to act so viciously towards Radha. This is what Tagore makes a statement on and the fact that the man didnt even have to face punishment because his word and his brother;s word was automatically believed over Chandara’s.
Assignment 7
October 31, 2015 Written by al158379 | 2 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized
2 responses so far ↓
c.hazan // Oct 31st 2015 at 10:53 am
I like your analysis on the story. Every single thing that followed the murder including it, was ethically wrong. What caused the ethical issues is the fact that male dominance was a very strong apparent in society at the time. Women were clearly inferior to men, but as we do see in the story, Chandara had a backbone, because when her husband mistreated her by looking at other women, she left the house and ran away and he begged her to come back. So although male dominance was an issue in this situation, since it caused domestic violence to the highest degree, we see that the women did not accept it. They defied the male dominance, and that it was caused the murder. So male dominance is definitely a strong ethical issue here.
JMERLE // Oct 31st 2015 at 12:08 pm
Yes, nice, Alexandra. The quote you use is quite an interesting one, and seems to support the idea that the men are over-worked and take out their frustration on their wives. But your interpretation of male dominance is seen here, but if you could read a bit more deeply, perhaps you could get to a more specific focus, which might be better served by another quote. Also, you were to connect this issue to the ending. We’ll talk more about this in class.
Nevertheless, you capture an important issue here.
9/10