Artistic Representations of Women’s Sexuality in Ancient Greek: Lysistrata
Question
A bibliography must be included with your paper, with accurate and complete entries. Include all sources consulted in the preparation of your paper. No annotations are required for the bibliography. Citations are also required. You may use footnotes, end-notes or in-text citations. Be consistent in regard to the type of citation used.
Keep in mind the following:
• Your paper must have a clear thesis statement, presented in its introduction. This
statement answers your research question.
• Your paper must be argumentative;
• Your paper must be analytical;
• Your paper must be coherent;
• Your paper must have a conclusion.
Research Question
Women
in the ancient Greek world were considered second class citizens but I often
felt as though their strength in their femininity were misrepresented as weak. I
would like to explore the artistic representations of women in the ancient
Greek world, more specifically literary representations of women.
What
is the correlation, between the representation women’s sexuality and how women
are represented in art in the ancient Greek world?
5th century comedic plays


Solution
Artistic Representations of Women’s Sexuality in Ancient Greek: Lysistrata
In ancient Greece, men considered
women inferior and mostly used them as sexual objects and childbearing roles.
The women had no political rights and were regarded as second-class citizens.
They could not own land or participate in voting or influencing power dynamics
in the ancient Greek. Some art drawings, such as in pots, helped depict women's
role as bearing and rearing children and sometimes objects of sexual pleasure
for the men. This represented the women to be inferior to the male gender. However,
considering the rising feminist propositions at the time, most men
underestimated the representations of women as weak based on their sexuality
and femininity. One of the mediums the artists depicted women's power as
underestimated was through the ancient comedic plays during the 5th
century. One of the comedy films in ancient Greek that displayed the women's
sexuality representation in the country and how it could awaken the
underestimated power of women is Lysistrata.
In this paper, the film Lysistrata will be used to demonstrate that
although women's sexuality representations in ancient Greek depicted them as
sexual and childbearing objects, women had the potential to use their
femininity to shift the power dynamics from men to the female gender.
Firstly, women's sexuality was
considered weak and inferior to men, only to serve the purpose of home chores,
sexual pleasure, and childbearing. In places such as Athens, women were
considered weak compared to men due to the differences in women's bodies. They
were considered not strong and unable to be influential in power positions or
involvement in the war (Evoleary,
2018). Instead, the women were regarded as passive and second-class
citizens. They were barred from voting and denied other rights, including
owning land. These left women at home mostly spent their time doing house
chores and taking care of the homestead. Another essential role in the sexual
representation of women in ancient Greece was that they occupied a unique
position in bearing and rearing children (Evoleary, 2018). To an extent, most men preferred
that the children be male. Mothers who had male children were more valued than
giving birth to a female child. This is because it was considered that the male
child would grow to contribute to the essential tasks in the country, such as
being a provider, fighting in wars, or being involved in power positions (Evoleary, 2018). All the leaders
were majorly male, and women were considered inferior to work or get involved
in the power positions. Besides bearing children, men viewed women as sexual
objects to satisfy their desire for pleasure. Men could get involved in war and
sometimes spend time away from home where they could seek sexual pleasure from
several women.
The women's sexuality representations
are highly correlated to how literary illustrations in ancient Greek depicted
them. However, some of the films showed this representation of women as
inferior. They discussed how women could use this femininity to advance their strength
and shift power dynamics from men to women. One of the films that will be the
main center of this discussion is Lysistrata,
a comedic play produced in the 5th century, 411 BCE (Evoleary, 2018). The film is
contextualized during the period of ancient Greek, especially the Peloponnesian
war involving Athens and Sparta. In this case, the name Lysistrata is also from
the leading actor, a female showing how men undervalued women and only used
them as bodies to produce children and obtain sexual pleasure. However, she can
turn around this demonstrates that women can use their sexuality to make men
listen to them and consider them in decision-making positions. The comedy in
this film is derived from Lysistrata asking fellow women to deny the men sex
until they could yield to ending the war. This resulted in setting the
regulations under which the women could restrict the men's sexual pleasure,
including in extreme instances where a woman is forced to do the act, deny them
gratification, and does not show that they are experiencing pleasure. Through
her charismatic and robust leadership, she can control the women to remain
committed to the course until finally, the men agree to stop the war, leading
to a celebration through the magistrate's decision.
The film Lysistrata helps portray the ancient Greek representation of
women's sexuality. In this case, the depiction of the conditions leading to
women agreeing to participate in the plan of Lysistrata is due to how they are
treated as sexual objects and only left at home for childbearing and rearing
purposes. In the film, the women complain that the men go to war and leave them
at home. Considering how the Peloponnesian war had extended for years, the
women claimed that the men did not consider their interests of the women (Evoleary, 2018). In one
instance, Lysistrata argues that there are young women who would want to enjoy
their marriage and stay with their husbands. Still, the men who marry them are
too busy involved with the war to the extent that the women are only left at
home to grow into old age by themselves. In this case, the director tries to
discuss the feminist view of what composes a family and how the ancient Greek
women suffered in loneliness despite being in marriages which led to the
protest and willingness to contribute to ending the war and getting back their
families (Evoleary, 2018).
In terms of sexuality, this shows the changing roles where women who were
considered to stay at home, bear children and rear them now demand that such a
role should not only be the woman's duty, but also the men should be
responsible.
Women's sexuality representation is
also represented in Lysistrata as a
source of power shifts. Considering the perceptions of women as weak and not
able to be involved in power, let alone the war, it was difficult to imagine
that they could come out strong by just denying men sexual pleasure (Peralta, 2015). In this case,
the director uses the comedic input in the film to discuss how desperate men
can be to attain sexual pleasure and how women can use it as a valuable
approach to negotiating with the men to influence their perception by offering
them equal rights. Before the negotiations, women were politically weak (Peralta, 2015). Therefore,
getting involved in the war in ancient Greek could make the people emerge as
powerful and robust. Thus, the women's ability to successfully abstain until an
agreement was reached helped show that if the females united and demanded their
rights, eventually, they would become involved in powerful positions. On the
other hand, showing the desperation of men to obtain sex from women also
indicates the men's view of women as sexual objects (Peralta, 2015). In ancient Greece, women participated
in promiscuous sex, which attracted many men showing it was so valuable to them
(Peralta, 2015).
However, when they are deprived, they are left suffering, making them
vulnerable to yielding to the demands of women. During a debate in front of the
magistrate, Lysistrata argues that
women need to be involved in the decisions, including the involvement in war
and military campaigns because the consequence of choices made by men affects
everyone in the community (Peralta,
2015). The argument, therefore, indicates the women using a neutral
platform through which they argue their case and demand involvement in power
positions before they could yield to the demands of men to allow them to
continue having sexual pleasure. By using the confinement to place the women in
one area where they can defend themselves, the group of young women and older
women confront the men and eventually drive them away, indicating that women's
power was shifting. They could not be considered second-class citizens of
Athens anymore.
In conclusion, the comedic play Lysistrata helps to show women's
sexuality representations in Ancient Greek and the plight of women to have
equal rights and not be treated as second-class citizens. Therefore, the
literary expression became a medium through which feminists in the ancient
Greek could voice their concerns, especially by decrying that they were not
sexual objects to men but also crucial in playing their roles as mothers and
citizens of ancient Greece. Therefore, they needed to be involved in the
decision-making, which indicates the changing perceptions of women as weak and
inferior based on their sexuality at the period.
References
Evoleary. (2018). Lysistrata and the
Role of the Woman in Classical and Modern Society. Women in Antiquity.
Retrieved 15 April 2022, from https://womeninantiquity.wordpress.com/2018/11/26/lysistrata-and-the-role-of-the-woman-in-classical-and-modern-society/.
Peralta, J. (2015). Lysistrata and
gender roles in ancient Greece. City Tech Writer, 10, 28-29.
Retrieved 15 April 2022, from
https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/city-tech-writer-sampler/files/2019/07/Peralta-2015.pdf.




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