The Great Leapfrog Race

The world is made up of many different people. Each of these individuals fall into a category, whether it be judged by their sex, the sports they play or the bands they listen to. For each different grad, we soak up certain expectations for the people in them. The tosh, The Great Leapfrog Race both reflects and challenges gender and course expectations. The Great Leapfrog Race, goes against the old western figure that men be quality to women. The idea that men are the dominant force has been widely reliable in civilized cultures, and has only now, over the past couple of decades, has it been challenged.In The Great Leapfrog Race, this is reflected when the egg-producing(prenominal), Rosie, shell the male, Rex, in a grainy of leapfrog. It is repeated again when the author writes that Rosie whipped ein truth boy she fought. This shows that she is the ace of the group, and so is the dominant force. However this does not mean that the boys accept it. The story reads that it was very humiliating to be digest by Rosie, and so the reader assumes that these boys dupe been brought up with the patriarchal view that men are superior to women.The gender expectations in this instance ware been challenged by the story. The writer has written this story, presumably from his own experience. This would imagine to the reader that he was brought up in a feministic environment. The general feeling of the story stands to prove this. Although we have no information on the author, the use of gaps and silences in which we make our own assumptions, lead the reader to take that his own influences in growing up, have had some bearing on this story.The author may have been brought up in a single sex home, most likely to be female his set about may have left when he was a child or he may have been taught to treat females as adequates through some other means. No matter how, it still shows the author reflects his experiences and his gender expectations into the story. Th ere are three main classes in conjunction. Upper class consists of kings and queens and other royal family much(prenominal) as presidents and sultans.Middle class is composed of bureaucrats, and the working class is comprised of cleaners, labourers and other lower class citizens . Each of these classes are defined by money, success, or job status. All of these different standards were invented by gild to unofficially class everybody into their importance in the world. Rosie comes under the latter category of working class, as her set out is a bricklayer. Another way that we recognise that she is working class is by the language used to pull out Rosie.In the first paragraph, she is said to be a tough little Irish kid who wore a turtle-neck sweater, unremarkably red. This suggest that she either did not care much for her appearance, or was used to going without pretty dresses and tog that other children her age would like and normally wear but that her father could not afford. The story excessively says that they lived in slum neighbourhoods which are often portrayed as the beginning for much violence and crime. indian lodge perceives children from working class families as being able to hold themselves, and being streetwise.Kids from the slums learn from a green age that this is the sort of world they are going to live in for the rest of their lives. These are the children more(prenominal) likely to shoplift and break into houses because their parents jobs do not provide for them as well. Girls from these sort of neighbourhoods are expect to be loathly and impolite, whereas heart class girls would turn their nose up at such antics as playing leapfrog and would much prefer play with their Barbie dolls than play with a group of filthy little boys.It would be a contradiction of our class expectations for Rosie to be concerned over her appearance or how many kids Barbie and vision have, because of her status as a working class girl. This story reflec ts societies views on class expectations of the working class, by letting Rosie be a tough little girl, not someone socially adept or worried over how long her nails were, but only interested in rough and tumble tomboyish activities as is expected for working class girls. Rex Folger comes from a middle class family.This is obvious from the first moment his temper enters the story. The story states that he was a natural born leader, he had beaten all the boys in the neighbourhood without any noticeable ill feeling, pride or ambition, and he was also a powerful and superior boy. All these things suggest, as well as the fact that he was from Texas, one of the southern states of the USA, notorious for its extravagant behaviour, that he is a middle class child. He has all the natural ability that a middle class child should have.Politeness was one of his strong points, even the other boys in the neighbourhood had to prey him that much. After a fight started between Rex and Rosie, he d eclined to hit her as he was taught that hitting women was the uniform of boxing his mother. That is another example in itself of him being middle class, as he said he was taught this rather than he believed it, which shows his educational ability off, at the same time as not in truth showing him his real feelings on the subject.This story gives off a realistic picture of middle class society and what we expect of them, using Rex as a symbolic figure for the majority of the middle class. The female is convergen as a lower class compared to the male as we established earlier. The patriarchal ideology is that males are dominant and logical whereas females should be timid, emotional and passive. In the story, the boys of the neighbourhood feel badly that Rosie is the one doing the dirty work so to speak and teaching Rex a lesson, when they believe that it is a mans duty to do such things.The desktop of the reader influences whether you sympathise with Rosie or Rex in the story. The readers views on certain issues including women in politics and equal rights evict have an impact on their interpret of the story. By leaving gaps in the storyline, the person reading the story is left to make assumptions based on their knowledge and experiences and so each reader go out most probably read the story differently, therefore, each person reading it will have their background somewhere influencing their thoughts on the subject.This demonstrates how each persons individual views reflect societies opinions through the story. The Great Leapfrog Race is a very interesting story about a little Irish tomboy, working class child named Rosie Mahoney. It tells the story of a little girl who beats the new kid-on-the-block, big bully Rex Folger, in a game called leapfrog. But the story isnt as simple as that. It also has a deeper meaning. It reflects society.Societies attitudes towards different people, from different classes and genders. It challenges the patriarchal ideology by letting female triumph over male. It uses all sorts of techniques to make the reader see that not everything that society sets out in its unofficial guidelines are correct. Roles can be reversed and women can prevail over men in many circumstances. This story reflects as well as challenges society views on gender and class role expectations.