There Is No Unmarked Woman (Deborah Tannen)

Deborah Tannen's essay "There Is No Unmarked Woman" successfully illuminates the cultural peculiarity of judging women by their appearance or other factors, but not judging men for the same things. As Tannen points out, everything a woman wears says something about her. Men, by contrast, can opt to be unmarked and most do; they choose the standard, almost regulation dress that all men wear a light shirt, dark pants, and dark shoes, so they have not made any distinguishing choices that set them apart from other men and define them. For women, however, every choice a woman makes about herself that is detectible is used as a gauge to evaluate what she is like and pass judgment on her. What she wears and how she wears it becomes an advertisement of herself to the world around her. Being a woman is like living in a fishbowl where everyone can see you, and they are all taking note. Women are constantly being evaluated and "pegged," even though most people know that judging people by their appearance is unfair and misleading. True stories of people dressed in tatters who live in the slums but have millions of dollars stashed in their mattresses, or of ser

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Category: Psychology - T