By Lyla Cass, Class of 2026

Description: Essay for Dr. Barnes’s VF English assignment on The Handmaid’s Tale—an analysis of the use of a Latin phrase in the novel. 

Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale represents the ways in which language forms identity, ideas, thoughts, and knowledge. The Handmaid’s Tale is a story told in the first person through the narrator Offred, which takes place in the future of a dystopian society in the U.S. The totalitarian regime, known as Gilead, places laws upon all women, stripping them of their identity and taking away their human rights. Women are not allowed to have possessions, jobs, or human rights. There is a hierarchy within Gilead, where men are distinguished as the highest position and infertile women at the bottom. It has constructed an atmosphere of fear, violence, and ambiguity by implementing harsh laws that come with severe punishments if not respected. Offred lives in a mimic household, where she is the Handmaid (a fertile woman), and the patriarch of the house is known as the Commander. Handmaids are not allowed to read or write, and their self-expression is restricted to entirely red clothing, except for their white wings. Red resembles their fertility, the color of menstrual blood. Deprivation of language and self-expression causes the Handmaid’s identities to be reduced to wombs dressed in red. In the society of Gilead, language is used against the oppressed women to further isolate them from society. Communication is limited and often not allowed between Handmaids; instead, language is used to manipulate. In Gilead, women are forced to fit into designated roles that are determined by their fertility. Their lives are primarily structured by a patriarchal society to maintain authority and prevent women from practicing any form of self-expression. When language is restricted, it impacts the self-perception of the Handmaids, their communication, self-identity, and community; the loss impacts the individual woman and the women as a whole. Through ancient languages, such as Latin, knowledge is transferred from the old world to modern life. In The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood implements a Latin phrase as a choice of rebellion against the Gileadian society or the option to submit to the patriarchal society.

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