Go Ma Joad!

When we're first introduced to Ma Joad, she is the epitome of motherly love and strength. As the novel progresses, there is a profound change in Steinbeck's portrayal of the matriarch. I am going to try to dance around my topic for questions on Wednesday, without the spoilers.

By chapter 18, Tom Joad asks, "My God, Ma. I knowed you when you was gentle. What's come over you?" (215) This is a far cry from the original description of a woman that had seen her tragedies and built strongly on them. A mother whose children looked to before allowing themselves an emotional reaction. She was the emotional lead of the family, and powerful in that position. (74) This did not change as the novel progressed.

Ma Joad had to change what she led in the family. From the emotional rock and foundation, to an actual out-in-the-world leader. I don't think she really changed what she was doing to lead, she just took over the "male part" of the family unit. This would be nearly unacceptable to the lifestyle of the farmer (nearly, because they all did accept it), yet her actions to take over were deemed "not lady-like", yet would be acceptable as a man. She grabs a tire iron and threatens physical harm to her own family in order to get her way. She grabs a stick to defend Rose of Sharon from the crazy religious lady. She threatens a cop with a frying pan.

As she's defending her rights with a frying pan, she tells the cop that if her men were there, they wouldn't allow that kind of talk to happen to her. Would this reaction to the cop's attitude by "her men" be any different if they threatened to physically stopped the cop from verbally abusing Ma Joad? Just a man's stance in a conversation could be perceived as a soon-to-be faced physical threat, is Ma Joad bad because she felt she needed to even the playing field with a tire iron/stick/frying pan? The irony (pun!) of Ma Joad being asked the gentle question from Tom Joad is a joke - the man killed someone with a shovel.

Poor Ma Joad. Do you think she would rather be back on the dust farm? There she only had to do the motherly things expected by society. On the road, she had to ADD the physical leadership responsibilities. In a society where women were considered the lesser half of the species, isn't a frying pan just a little coercion to convince the thick-skulled males of the time that her word was the new law? Is it any different than men-folk bowing up during a verbal conflict? Both actions deliver the same message - my way, and I'll back it up with a beating. Ma Joad, considered the "fairer sex", had no choice but to slap the silly men's egos down to accept her as a serious chief of the clan. Hey, Ma Joad, they laid this crap on you - you kick them around if they get out of line!