Well, one really low-hanging fruit there is gender roles: Arthurian characters as an expression of and further perpetuating said gender roles. Chivalry, big one, especially since I keep running into otherwise progressive members of the nerd community who fancy themselves chivalrous and like to imagine themselves as nobly protective of their wimminz.
And then later subversions in fantasy literature: it's harder to write about women deconstructing gender roles in our shifting modern day, but relatively easier to write about the female knight exploding into a medieval man's world (Alanna, I'm looking at you), especially when the medieval world is also fictional. Haven't there been a bunch of books in the last two decades about the "women behind the throne" in Arthurian and Shakespearian tales?
The last humanities course I took was Sociology 101 freshman year, so take my ramblings with a large a grain of salt as you please.
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And then later subversions in fantasy literature: it's harder to write about women deconstructing gender roles in our shifting modern day, but relatively easier to write about the female knight exploding into a medieval man's world (Alanna, I'm looking at you), especially when the medieval world is also fictional. Haven't there been a bunch of books in the last two decades about the "women behind the throne" in Arthurian and Shakespearian tales?
The last humanities course I took was Sociology 101 freshman year, so take my ramblings with a large a grain of salt as you please.