Is 'Harry Potter' a sexist saga? | Slate.com

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Children's literature offers multiple possibilities to approach, from different angles, the cultural construction and the creation of models that can shape the vision of the world of future adults.

One of the most important sagas of this literature, in recent decades, is undoubtedly J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter. Its success, increased by its adaptations to the cinema, makes it a work with a strong impact for children and young people, which has become a mass phenomenon - generating endless queues to obtain the new volumes when they are released, but also conferences and research topics.

Gender stereotypes

The analysis, from a gender perspective, of any stereotypes that appear in the work, both in its dialogues and in its descriptions, can provide interesting data. Bearing in mind that this is the volume in which the main characters are introduced, it is the first volume of the saga that catches our attention here: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.

The dialogue in this work is used constantly to give more realism to the story while directly involving the reader in the action. It is through dialogue and descriptions that the author presents the protagonists of the story.

There is no single opinion on the characterization of Hermione and Harry. Some studies consider that Rowling knew how to create characters who, depending on the circumstances, take on active or courageous roles, which makes Hermione possess characteristics that go beyond traditional gender roles.

However, there is a lot more research to suggest that with the character of Hermione, the author has created a girl who, deep down, needs saving, or teachers at Hogwarts who will never be as wise than Dumbledore.

Speaking of Hermione

Hermione cannot be considered a positive female stereotype because she does not come across as a strong, self-confident young girl, which, moreover, , is blamed on his character and lack of emotional control, presented as signs of weakness compared to Harry or Ron's supposed strength or control. This trait is noted as recurring in Rowling's work, which uses speech and terminology more closely tied to the rational for the male characters, while the female characters are more associated with the emotional and the irrational.

In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, J.K. Rowling makes it clear from the start that Hermione is much more studious and intelligent than Harry and Ron, which leads to her being shunned by her classmates, who don't include it only when it needs to be saved. It was only after the girl's weakness was shown and demonstrated that she was part of the group: “From that moment, Hermione Granger became their friend.”

This action replicates what Marta Roqueta calls the "damsel in distress" trope, which explains how the young woman who seemed so confident and intelligent needs the protection and care of the story's male character who, in this way, recovers the leading role, reducing Hermione to that of the companion of the real hero, Harry Potter.

This type of characterization is also related to what other authors call the "trinity syndrome" and which shows how, in current children's and youth literature, there are very competent, intelligent female characters and courageous who hide gender prejudices: in these stories, these young women, when they make mistakes, need the intervention of a male character and this places them, once again, in an inferior position compared to them.

Collective imagination

Despite this characterization of the character of Hermione compared to that of Harry, we can observe that this work testifies to certain advances in children's literature with regard to the overcoming of the genre and the pursuit of equality. There's hardly any reference to physical stereotypes, and Hermione is characterized as a smart, determined girl – though she does come across as dependent on Harry afterward.

Harry Potter is already part of the collective imagination of those who discovered it in the late 1990s. Therefore, approaching it from a gender perspective is essential to destroy the stereotypes that generate and accentuate inequalities.

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