The Grapes of Wrath Gender Roles Quotes

The whole group watched the revolt. They watched Pa, waiting for him to break into fury. They watched his lax hands to see the fists form. And Pa’s anger did not rise, and his hands hung limply at his sides. And in a moment the group knew that Ma had won. And Ma knew it too.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 16. There is an important shift in gender and family roles here, as Pa Joad backs down in the face of Ma Joad’s revolt against his authority. Pa had agreed with the suggestion that Tom, Al and Casy stay behind with the broken car, while the rest of the group continue on. But Ma refuses to go along because she doesn’t want to split the family. Despite his humiliation, Pa yields to his wife’s wishes and the Joads stay together. It is clear that the power in the family has shifted from the eldest male to the indomitable Ma Joad.

"You done this ‘thout thinkin’ much," Ma said. "What we got lef’ in the worl’? Nothin’ but us. Nothin’ but the folks. We come out an’ Grampa he reached for the shovel-shelf right off. An’ now, right off, you wanna bust up the folks."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 16. Ma Joad has struck a blow for family unity. She has successfully won the argument against Tom and Casy and Al staying behind to repair one of the cars, while the others carry on the journey. Criticising her husband Pa for going along with the plan, she reminds him that all they have left in the world now is the family. Despite their homelessness, Ma is adament that the Joads must stay together.

And as the cars moved westward, each member of the family grew into his proper place, grew into his duties; so that each member, old and young, had his place in the car; so that in the weary, hot evenings, when the cars pulled into the camping places, each member had his duty and went to it without instruction: children to gather wood, to carry water; men to pitch tents and bring down the beds; women to cook the supper and to watch while the family fed. And this was done without command.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 17. In the transient migrant camps, everybody knows their place and role, even without having to told. This allows the camp communities to function like a well oiled machine. It is interesting that old traditional gender roles are followed, with men doing the heavy lifting and the women the cooking.

"Seems like times is changed," he said sarcastically. "Time was when a man said what we’d do. Seems like women is tellin’ now. Seems like it’s purty near time to get out a stick."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 26. When Ma Joad orders that the family quit Weedpatch camp in the morning to find cotton picking work up north, Pa Joad doesn’t react well. He attempts to save his role as leader of the family. But in doing so, he threatens to use a stick on Ma to regain dominance. This suggests that Pa is coming from a position of weakness in the family.

Ma put the clean dripping tin dish out on a box. She smiled down at her work. "You get your stick, Pa," she said. "Times when they’s food an’ a place to set, then maybe you can use your stick an’ keep your skin whole. But you ain’t a-doin’ your job, either a-thinkin’ or a-workin’. If you was, why, you could use your stick, an’ women folks’d sniffle their nose an’ creep-mouse aroun’. But you jus’ get you a stick now an’ you ain’t lickin’ no woman; you’re a-fightin’, ’cause I got a stick all laid out too."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 26. This is an important moment when we see how Ma Joad’s role has changed completely from a motherly to a leadership one in the family. Here she stands up to Pa’s threat to take a stick to her, by equally threatening him with a stick. Magnificently indominable as a wife, mother and woman, Ma reminds her husband that he has no right to control of the family since he has neither a job nor money. Pa’s loss of human dignity is evident in this chapter. Unable to find work in the new land of California, he is also losing his place as head of the family.

"I ain’t no good any more. Spen’ all my time a-thinkin’ how it use’ ta be. Spen’ all my time thinkin’ of home, an’ I ain’t never gonna see it no more."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 28. A downbeat Pa Joad says this to Ma after she offers to sort out the Wainwrights’ concerns about Al’s relationship with their daughter. Pa is finding it difficult to adapt to his changed circumstances, first losing his home and now his wife now taking over leadership of the family from him. The theme of the loss of human dignity is represented by a defeated Pa Joad.

"Man, he lives in jerks – baby born an’ a man dies, an’ that’s a jerk – gets a farm and looses his farm, an’ that’s a jerk. Woman, its all one flow, like a stream, little eddies, little waterfalls, but the river, it goes right on. Woman looks at it like that. We ain’t gonna die out. People is goin’ on-changin’ a little, maybe, but goin’ right on."

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 28. Themes of survival, gender roles and hope are addressed in this rousing speech of Ma Joad to Pa. When a despondent Pa says that their life is over and done, she declares that it isn’t. With unswerving optimism, she says that their kind of people will never die out, but will go on. She tells Pa how men live their lives in episodes, but for a woman life is all one flow, like a river. The point she is making is that women are more adaptable, they bend and flow over and around obstacles, but don’t break. They have a tenacity and perseverance that men don’t.

The women stood silently and watched. And where a number of men gathered together, the fear went from their faces, and anger took its place. And the women sighed with relief, for they knew it was all right – the break had not come; and the break would never come as long as fear could turn to wrath.
Tiny points of grass came through the earth, and in a few days the hills were pale green with the beginning year.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 29. In the face of great hardship and suffering, the migrant families show their resilience and strength. The women watch the faces of their men looking for signs of fear, but when the men come together that fear turns to anger. This gives the women hope that their men haven’t broken and they will survive. The men are looked to for the strength and will to go on. Although in the case of the Joads this gender role has turned a full 180 degrees, with Ma Joad her family’s tower of strength.

They heaped the mud up in a long embankment, and those who had no shovels cut live willow whips and wove them in a mat and kicked them into the bank. Over the men came a fury of work, a fury of battle. When one man dropped the shovel, another took it up. They had shed their coats and hats. Their shirts and trousers clung tightly to their bodies, their shoes were shapeless blobs of mud.

– John Steinbeck

The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 30. At the urging of Pa Joad, the men in the boxcars work as a team to build a makeshift dam following three days of heavy rain. The Joads’ boxcar is under threat because it is close to the swelling stream. While women get on with domestic work, the camp men work to prevent the Joads’ shelter from being flooded. The fact that nature will soon destroy the dam may be Steinbeck suggesting that men and women working seperately doesn’t work. This passage displays themes of kindness, community, survival, gender roles and perseverance.
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