希腊罗马神话英文论文

Name: 赵海霞

Student number: 2011305201333

Teacher: 陈淑鸿

Class: 周五，5,6节（广告1102班）

Date:2013-6-10

the awakening of the female self-awareness

The ancient Greek and Roman mythology reveals the social reality of the oppression of females. So a sea of lively females with rebellious spirit and self-consciousness emerge in the mythology,

The ancient Greek and Roman mythology creates a divine world which is similar to human world. The gods are endowed with the characteristics of people, they are not perfect, like human beings with all kinds of desires.

Most of the goddess in the Greek mythology make no effort to hide their feelings and express their true nature without considering. Hera, Athena and Aphrodite are the three dominant goddess at Olympus. At the meantime they are the most representative of the goddess who are seeking the female self-consciousness and struggling for female’s equality.

Hera, as the queen of the twelve the Lord god at Olympus, has a great deal of power. Such a status and rights made Hera very proud and wayward. However, Hera also has her own sadness. As the god of the authority of female marriage, she tried to blame men for marital betrayal. Ironically, Her own marriage cannot get safeguarded. Zeus is sentimental and dissolute, constantly chasing beauties of heaven and earth. His irresponsible attitude plunges Hera into deep jealousy and anger. Thus She revenged on Zeus. But she suffered the relentless suppression. Instead, she was getting down to revenge on Zeus’s lovers to indirectly prevent Z eus’s dissolute behavior.

Hera has the courage to break the bondage of traditional marriage and fight for equal marriage. She has done her best to maintain the sanctity of marriage. However, her personal strength was not enough to change patriarchal society.

Artemis was one of the greatest goddess worshipped in Greece. She was the Hellenic goddess of the hunt, wild animals,wilderness, childbirth, virginity and young girls, bringing and relieving disease in women; she often was depicted as a huntress carrying a bow and arrows. She is a virgin goddess. She gave up everything as a woman from her heart, even the most basic and natural thing for women, fertility. She is not interested in the passion between man and woman. Thus her behavior thoroughly overturns the definition and shackles of women in the patriarchal society.

Aphrodite was the goddess of love and beauty. Zeus married her to the ugly and lame Vulcan. But she had fell in love with the Ares, thus, she combined with Ares and gave birth to several children. The story of Aphrodite reflects that in ancient Greece, girl’s marriage were often arranged by parents or other guardian when they were very young. The male’s family usually must give money gift to the female’s. It is quite ironic that the goddess of love can’t arrange her own marriage. Aphrodite became an unfaithful wife in Greek. However, in the eyes of women, she is courageous to revolt against the patriarchal society.

Aphrodite abandoned the traditional marriage, chose the free love, and threw challenge to the so-called morality standard in the patriarchal society. Monogamy was a popular form of marriage, but there are double standards for men and women. Male dominate the marriage, they can a lot of lovers, but female must keep loyal.