How Is Daisy Sexualized In The Great Gatsby

The 1920’s were a time of social and economic reform. The 19th amendment was ratified which gave women the right to vote, getting women one step closer to overcoming patriarchal dominance. Women began to reform their physical appearance and became less sexualized with binded chests and short hair. This change in physical appearance made women feel more empowered but it does not remove men’s feelings of superiority as women were still limited from opportunities and treated as property more than a capable human. In The Great Gatsby, Daisy is motivated by money and loves her husband for his economic status and although Myrtle does display some Flapper-like ways such as her extramarital sex, she is also very sexualized and treated as a prize by …show more content…
Nick introduced himself as an unbiased narrator but he contradicts himself with his limiting views of women. He defines the women around him by the male beings in their life and focuses on their physical beauty ratherthan intellect. Nick does not include Daisy’s name when he mentions that he is going to Daisy and Tom’s home. “Across the courtesy bay the white palaces of fashionable East Egg glittered along the water, and the history of the summer really begins on the evening I drove over there to have dinner with the Tom Buchanans. Daisy was my second cousin once removed, and I'd known Tom in college” (5). He says that he is going to have dinner with the “Tom Buchanans” as if Daisy is not her own person but rather a part of Tom. It also implies ownership, as Daisy is treated as Tom’s property. Because Tom provides monetarily for Daisy, the home is seen as his. Daisy does not work for her material happiness, she relies on Tom for that and uses her attractive appearance …show more content…
She is identified as being more of a flapper. Even her name is a display of her character, instead of having a traditional feminine name she is given a universal name that can be for either male or female. However, Fitzgerald does not give Jordan the opportunity to be successful on her own, she had to cheat her way to the top. Nick remembers an incident after meeting Jordan. "At her first big golf tournament there was a row that nearly reached the newspapers- a suggestion that she had moved her ball from a bad lie in the semi-final round… She was incurably dishonest. She wasn’t able to endure being at a disadvantage..." (57-58). Jordan feels the need to cheat in order to win, possibly to overcome a gender stereotype. Genuine success seems foreign for women, so in order to reach her goal Jordan had to cheat. Jordan went to extreme measures in order to overcome gender expectations, but she does so deceivingly. All of the men are amazed and shocked by the independence of women like Jordan, when Nick first meets her he is stunned. “At any rate, Miss Baker's lips fluttered, she nodded at me almost imperceptibly… Again a sort of apology arose to my lips. Almost any exhibition of complete self-sufficiency draws a stunned tribute from me” (9). Gatsby is accustomed to women who are dependent on men, being around a woman who is completely independent is intimidating for