Representation of Gender Roles in Yerma by Federico Garcia Lorca
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S www.irss.academyirmbr.com April 2021
S International Review of Social Sciences Vol. 9 Issue.4
Representation of Gender Roles in Yerma by Federico Garcia
Lorca
MARYAM IMTIAZ
Lecturer, Department of English,
Bahauddin Zakarya University, Lodhran Campus, Pakistan.
Email: maryam.butt@bzu.edu.pk
Tel: 0309-7064161
Dr. MUHAMMAD ASIF KHAN
(Corresponding Author)
Assistant Professor, Department of English Literature,
The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Pakistan.
Email: drasifkhan39@gmail.com
Tel: 0300-9684466
Abstract
Garcia Lorca is one of the pioneers of modern drama. He was a critic of the status of women in the Spanish
society of his times. In his plays, he presents women as tragic characters. Yerma is a tragedy set in rural
Spain. The present study is an analysis of the presentation of gender roles in Yerma. The study incorporates
insights from feminists such as Simone de Beauvoir, Kate Millet and others. It focuses on the distinction
between ‘gender’ and ‘sex’, ‘biological essentialism’ and ‘social constructionism’ and ‘patriarchal gender
roles’. The study shows that in Yerma Lorca seems to be challenging the patriarchal gender roles. In the
play we find an inversion of patriarchal gender roles. The female protagonist is shown to be dominant and
she becomes a spokesperson for the needs, desires and sentiments of women. In Yerma, Lorca offers a
subversion of the traditional gender roles.
Keywords: Drama, Feminism, Gender, Patriarchy, Sex.
Introduction
Yerma (1934) by Garcia Lorca is a tragic play that uniquely represents gender to break the taboos. The play
is the tragedy of a woman that, though an ordinary character from real life, is not quite an ordinary person
in terms of gender. Lorca seems to be crushing social constructionism through the portrayal of gender roles
in this play. The present research focuses on gender studies as the theoretical framework to understand the
term gender and to seek out the nature of socially attributive roles. The representation of gender roles has
been implied as a research tool to analyze the concepts of biological essentialism and social
constructionism in terms of gender. The protagonist seems to be expressing her conjugal needs throughout
the text which demonstrate courage on the part of the writer who in the 1930s in the Spanish culture is
talking about a specific woman's (the protagonist) sentiments, emotions, conjugal needs, and her views
about men. The women in the play are observed to be discussing men in a way women used to be discussed
in the patriarchal plays. In Lorca‟s present play, men are invisible and do not hold a central place while
women are the focus and they criticize and discuss men. This inversion of the situation by the Spanish
writer makes him a critic of social constructionism.
ISSN 2309-0081 Imtiaz & Khan (2021) 341I R S www.irss.academyirmbr.com April 2021 S International Review of Social Sciences Vol. 9 Issue.4 The play opens with the women in sleep and a shepherd comes with a baby in his hands. The clock strikes and Yerma wakes up. Yerma has been shown as a married woman asking her husband Juan for a glass of milk as he is leaving for work. Maria enters and tells Yerma about her carrying a child, both talk about the baby, childbearing process, breastfeeding, and the preparation of diapers for him. After Maria's exit, Victor's arrival takes a new turn in the story. Victor is a shepherd who comes to meet Juan. As he leaves, Yerma‟s action shows her likeness for Victor. Yerma seems to be obsessed with the concept of bearing a child but her husband's rude behavior and his lack of attention to Yerma leads her to frustration. She consults a conjurer and visits the shrine out of her wish of having a child. The play then ends with Juan's murder by Yerma. The play is not as simple as it seems to be. Each line carries a deeper meaning. It shows the state of the woman who is devoid of love, affection, and physical interaction in her marital relationship. The play seems to be the counter-narrative to the patriarchal agenda that focuses on men only as the only living creature with emotions and passions. Literature Review Federico Garcia Lorca is famous for his tragic plays, particularly the rural tragedies. All of his plays projecting rural tragedies gained fame not only in the Spanish theater but in the theater outside Spain. The tragedy of the female protagonist is the benchmark of his plays. The critics attempt to understand Lorca's theater and his tragic characters along with the description of the strict Spanish society at the start of the twentieth century. The following is a brief account of previous studies carried out on the play Yerma. These studies have been enlisted in the chronological order. Don Loyl Volk (1968) views „sterility‟ as the major cause of Yerma‟s tragedy (p.46). He proposes that sterility here does not refer to a physical shortcoming of Yerma to procreate but her inability to revolt against social patterns and to reject the stringent code of honor. The author reveals the Lorcan attempt to unravel the bitter truth about society that does not let women fulfill their legal needs because of the double moral standards. This study also shows that strict social values leave illegal ways for women to achieve their legal needs. The tragic end of Yerma affirms the proposition of this study when she kills her husband and turns down the offer of an old woman for illegal procreation. The author throws light on two major aims of Lorca through this study: one is the depiction of claustrophobic patriarchal patterns and the unbreakable code of honor, the second is the depiction of women as responsible for their tragic end because of their inability to confront these patterns. Fusco and Tomassoni (2001) conduct the psychological interpretation of Yerma‟s dreams. They view Yerma as the heroine of “sterility” or rather “the heroine of impossibility to love” (p.2). To study this proposition, social restrictions made upon women on patriarchal patterns serve as the basis for their analysis. Due to the strict social pattern, Yerma is unable to have a man she loves because she is married to Juan who does not show affection for her. This is the reason Yerma creates her world of dreams that permit her to experience love according to her own will. This notion of love in their study has been taken as “love only in the form of illegitimate desire to procreate” (p.2). Their study reveals the helplessness of the woman living in a patriarchal society that leads her to murder her husband. In this way, she finds escape from "the psychosis of the Eros" (p.5). This study also throws light on the strict patterns of society while discussing the psychological interpretations of Yerma‟s dreams. In NurGlumserrIlker‟s (2017) opinion, Yerma is a lonely woman in Spanish society. Ilker has examined the position of Yerma as a woman in Spanish society and how she is left alone by her husband and by society because of her inability to bear a child. Ilker blames society for Yerma‟s alienation and Juan for depriving her of love and attention. In his view, this lack of love in her marriage leads her to fall for Victor in the play. This is the point where Yerma is seen stuck between her traditional behavior and her humanly desire (p.2). In addition to it, Ilker also interprets Yerma as a woman rejecting the double moral standards of society. Thus, he highlights Lorca's aim of depicting a female character that prefers to kill her husband and chooses to be alone forever instead of accepting the offer of bearing the illegitimate child. ISSN 2309-0081 Imtiaz & Khan (2021) 342
I R S www.irss.academyirmbr.com April 2021 S International Review of Social Sciences Vol. 9 Issue.4 Theoretical Framework Gender studies mainly deal with gender that segregates men and women socially. It is a concept that distinguishes the sex that is "biologically rooted" and gender that is "socially constructed" (Kate Millet, 1969). This segregation is based on male supremacy that serves as the foundation for patriarchal ideology. Speaking of gender, Raewyn Connell (1995), an Australian sociologist, writes, “in our culture, the reproductive dichotomy is assumed to be the basis of gender and sexuality in everyday life” (p.66). Judith Butler (1995) deals with the questions of gender and sex and comes out with a distinction between the two and rejects the socially constructed explanation of gender. She observes, “Taken to its logical limit, the sex/gender distinction suggests a radical discontinuity between the sexed bodies and the culturally constructed genders” (p.6). The present study utilizes some key concepts related to gender to evaluate Lorca's representation of gender roles in his tragic play Yerma. The first key concept is „social constructionism‟. Simone de Beauvoir (1961) in The Second Sex remarks that “humanity is basically male and man defines woman not in herself but as relative to him” (p.xvi). Kate Millet (1969, p. 670) also differentiates between „sex‟ which is rooted in biology and „gender‟ which is culturally constructed. The second concept relevant to our present study is that of „patriarchal gender roles‟. According to Linda L. Lindsey (2016), "Roles are performed according to social norms". She further explains her view through the example of different statuses such as male, female, mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters in the following words. “The status of mother calls for expected roles involving love, nurturing, self-sacrifice, homemaking and availability. The status of father calls for expected roles of a bread winner, disciplinarian, home technology expert, and ultimate decision maker in the household” (p. 2-3). The 1930‟s Spanish society reflected in Yerma is structured on a patriarchal setup. It is the ideology of the superiority of men. Lindsey (2016) sees patriarchy as, “male dominated social structures leading to the oppression of women” (p. 3). The present study seeks to find answers to the following research questions: Q1- Does the text of Yerma offer a critique of patriarchal gender patterns? Q2- How does the text of Yerma exhibit male and female roles in inversion from the traditional gender roles? Discussion and Analysis Lorca‟s play Yerma portrays the rural Spanish society of the early twentieth century as patriarchal, as the one which consists of honor and social standards. This is the greatest force that shapes the life of rural Spanish inhabitants. This society does not allow women to live their life according to their own will. Yerma says, “My husband is another matter. My father brought him to me and I accepted him” (Lorca, p.76). Preserving one‟s honor is the most important norm for men and women. Juan claims, “And the families have their honor and honor is the burden all of them must bear” (Lorca, p.92). Women are expected to be bound into the four walls of their house and not to be seen roaming on the roads. Juan says, “The sheep in the pens, and women in their houses” (Lorca, p.90). Even talking to other men is considered suspicious for women. The above illustrations from the text support the view that the Spanish society of the 1930s was the patriarchal one. Lorca, while living in a patriarchal society, advocates the woman, not as the second sex but as a living being who has all emotions and feelings which are necessary to men. He adopts the technique of inversion of gender roles to represent his stance before the patriarchal beings. Lorca destructs the concept of biological essentialism and social constructionism. He appears to be supporting Kate Millet's opinion about sex and gender that sex is biologically rooted that is natural but gender is socially constructed that is society's conspiracy to oppress women. Lorca portrays female characters that are strong, bold, and insubordinate and are well aware of their needs whether basic or physical. Men hold the invisible place in ISSN 2309-0081 Imtiaz & Khan (2021) 343
I R S www.irss.academyirmbr.com April 2021 S International Review of Social Sciences Vol. 9 Issue.4 Lorca's play. But it does not mean they are not the topic of discussion. They are quite clearly in focus but they share a few dialogues in the play and seem to be busy in their working life. As mentioned above, Lorca's female characters are not patriarchal ladies. They appear to be breaking the patriarchal conventions. The protagonist of the play, Yerma is not an ordinary patriarchal lady. Though she is part of that particular society and is bound by normative roles, but she has not observed them nor is she likely to have any fear of not having observed them. Yerma deviates from the prescribed female character. The marital relationship of Yerma and Juan has been shown as a female-dominated relationship. At the beginning of the play, the dialogue between Yerma and Juan about their first interaction after marriage shows that Yerma is not afraid of conjugal relations with her husband as girls are usually supposed to be. Yerma says, “I know girls who trembled and cried before they got into bed with their husbands. Did I cry the first time I went to bed with you? Wasn‟t I singing as I lifted the linen sheets?” (Lorca, p.68). This dialogue shows her deviation from the normative behavior of a girl who is expected to cry or be nervous at her first encounter with her husband. Power structure indicates this submissive behavior as the element of satisfying a male member's sense of being dominant over a lady and somehow it is the indication of her purity to men. Further, when Juan is leaving for work Yerma takes an initiative and embraces him. It is again an indication of a strong and bold portrayal of the female character: "[taking the initiative, Yerma embraces her husband and kisses him]” (Lorca, p.69). Yerma, the protagonist of the play has been portrayed as the new woman who is empowered and is not hesitant to share her feelings. Again she destructs the impression of a patriarchal wife who does not think or talk about another man. Here, Yerma shares her feelings of being trembled when she was touched by Victor and not by her husband. The inverted roles are also visible here. “Yerma [recalling] : Perhaps. One time… Victor…… took me by the waist and I could not say anything to him because I could not talk” (Lorca, p. 76). Lorca's protagonist is continuously breaking the claustrophobic behaviors associated with women and comes up with a completely different notion of gender behavior which crushes gender constructivism. The protagonist seems to be giving the notion of female gender roles which have no association of any expected behavior to women. The protagonist is not only ignoring the traditional gender behavior but is also revolting against it. She does not even take care of her husband‟s honor and does what is suitable for her in her depressive state of being deprived of her needs. Yerma spends the whole night on her house's doorstep as a protest. "Fifth Washer woman: She spent the night before last sitting on the doorstep, in spite of the cold!" (Lorca, p. 83). It crushes the weak and fearful image of a lady and presents her as brave and strong enough to be out alone at night. Many times in the play, the protagonist distinguishes herself from weak women. She appears to have strong masculine views even about delivery and the pain associated with breastfeeding and the childbearing processes. Again, she is breaking the social constructionist concept of gender and depicts gender as flexible with no cultural associations. In conversation with Maria, Yerma negates the pain of breastfeeding and childbearing. She considers those women weak who claim this entire journey as painful. Though she understands the nature of pain but still considers it healthy. Yerma here reminds us of those men who never experienced these situations and she asserts pain as pleasing. “Yerma: Bah! I‟ve seen my sister nursing her baby with her breast covered with scratches and it was very painful. But it was good pain----- fresh, new, necessary for health. Maria: They say children cause a lot of suffering. Yerma: That‟s a lie! Mothers who say that are weaklings, complainers! Why do they have them? Having a child is no bouquet of roses! We have to suffer for them to grow up. It must drain half of our blood. But ISSN 2309-0081 Imtiaz & Khan (2021) 344
I R S www.irss.academyirmbr.com April 2021 S International Review of Social Sciences Vol. 9 Issue.4 that‟s good, healthy, beautiful! Every woman has enough blood for four to five children…….” (Lorca, p.72). Female domination in marital life is another aspect of inverted roles. Throughout the play, Yerma appears to be a lady with a sharp tongue who argues with her husband and does not remain silent to perform her obedient wife's role. The Act 2, Scene 2 of the play is full of shreds of evidence of Yerma's domination over Juan. “Yerma: Change your way of thinking. Juan: Don‟t you know the way I think? The sheep in the pens, and the women in their houses. You‟re out too much! Haven‟t you always heard me say that? Yerma: You‟re right. The women in their houses. If the houses are not tombs………..” (Lorca, p. 90). The conversation shows that Yerma does not take responsibility for Juan's honor and goes frequently out. She does not only disobey but comes up with strong reasons to do that. She asserts talking to people is not a sin. Yerma says to Victor, “but women are another matter”, (Lorca, p.96). This statement is the rejection of men‟s definition of woman and an indication of the new definition of woman that is given by a woman. Not only Yerma but the Old Pagan Woman and the Second Girl in the play also show the empowered female characters that are aware of themselves. The pagan old woman talks about her youth and her being married twice. The second girl has no children and is not worried about having any: "Second girl: Anyway, since you and I don't have any, we live more peacefully" (Lorca, p.78). She rejects the power structure and duties which it attributes to her. The second girl exposes the oppression of women regarding domestic roles. She claims, "Women are stuck in their houses doing things they don't like" (Lorca, p.79). These remarks are a sufficient challenge to the patriarchal part of the Spanish society of 1930s. Thus it can be claimed that Lorca creates strong and empowered female characters that destruct social constructionism. He seems to be influenced by Kate Millet and Simon de Beauvoir in his assertion that women are not subordinate, submissive, other, or the second sex and that their gender is not inferior to any other member of the society. In other words, it is an attempt to destruct the power structure which has been portrayed by Lorca in an ingenious manner. Lorca represents men differently from the female characters. Male characters are shown to be the opposite of female characters. This impression has been created through the explanation of men by women. Men have been sexually objectified. They have been targeted by the female gaze as well. Many times in the play, Juan and Victor have been under Yerma‟s gaze. The gaze here is not a mere look but a look loaded with sexual desire. “The Fourth Washer Woman: There is something in this world called a „look‟. My mother used to say that.” (Lorca, p.84). These are her remarks about Yerma‟s gaze on Victor which is loaded with her unfulfilled desires. Lorca offers a clear description of female gaze, “A woman does not look at roses the same way she looks at a man‟s thighs. She „looks‟ at him” (Lorca, p.68). Both times the expression of „looks‟ in commas highlights Lorca's intention as well to put the male body under the female gaze. Mulvey (cited in Sherwin Christopher James, 2005), observes, "in a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female" (p.44). Contrary to this assertion, Lorca objectifies the male characters of his plays and this objectification is sexual as well. At the beginning of the play, Yerma says to Juan, "You work hard and you are not strong enough for much work" (Lorca, p.67). This dialogue makes Juan's sketch in the reader's mind which is Yerma‟s explanation of Juan's body. Not only are men objectified but have been explained by women to the audience. Men have been presented as the entity which is to fulfill female's libido. The assessment of a male‟s ability to fulfill female desire is expressed in Yerma in a manner that reveals the whole issue of Yerma and the reason for her frustration. Yerma‟s comments on Victor‟s singing are “What a strong voice! Like a gush of water filling your mouth” (Lorca, p.80) while about Juan she claims when Victor says your husband is ISSN 2309-0081 Imtiaz & Khan (2021) 345
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sadder, “Yerma: Yes, he is. That‟s his nature” (Lorca, p.80). Lorca has also destructed collective male
identity by not showing them in groups while women have been shown such as washerwomen.
Lorca has represented men as performing their patriarchal gender roles in terms of preserving honor. Juan is
a typical husband who dislikes talking of her wife to anybody. He even invites his two sisters who were
actually church devotees to keep an eye on Yerma. “Juan: That‟s why you are here, eating at my table and
drinking my wine! My work is in the fields and my honor is here. And my honor is yours as well” (Lorca,
p.90). He considers for a lady to be out of the house and talking to everyone a blot on his honor. “Juan: and
the families have their honor” (Lorca, p.92). And he even threatens to lock Yerma up. “I should force you;
lock you up, because that‟s what a husband is for!”(Lorca, p.93). These remarks clearly portray the role of a
husband in the Spanish patriarchal society of 1930.
Juan has been portrayed as the character having a male body but some feminine traits that break the notion
of gender, invert the roles, and support the assertions of Butler (1995). This conversation between Yerma
and Juan shows the jealousy and insecurity in Juan which are the typical feminine attributions.
“Juan: what are you doing still here?
Yerma: Talking.
Victor: Stay well. {He leaves}.
Juan: you should be at home.
Yerma: I stopped for a moment.
Juan: I don‟t understand what kept you.
Yerma; I heard the bird singing.
Juan: Oh, fine that's how you start people talking.
Yerma [firmly]: Juan what are you thinking? (Lorca, p.81).
It not only shows Juan's insecurity, jealousy, and doubts but also expresses Yerma‟s domination of Juan.
The play does not only depict the reversal of roles on the part of men but also destructs the collective male
identity as in the whole play male members have not been shown in a group while females have been
shown in groups in the form of washerwomen.
Conclusion
The analysis affirms this supposition that Federico Garcia Lorca has inverted the patriarchal gender roles in
the play Yerma. The inverted roles support the assertions of female critics such as, De Beauvoir, Kate
Millet, and Judith Butler that gender is only a socially created concept that seems to be the patriarchal
agenda to limit women and men to certain roles as gender roles. Biologically, these roles have nothing to do
with men or women as a sex. On one hand, Lorca destructs the social notions of gender roles and on the
other, this strategy to invert the roles has been implied as a technique to express women's needs, desires,
thinking, and emotions that were always explained by men only. This time woman takes the front position
and speaks about herself on her own. This has happened because of the ingenious approach and technique
of gender roles inversion. Lorca has provided the readers with a chance to get to know women through their
explanation of themselves and through their character which does not need any male explanation of them.
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