Blue Dahlia Blue Dahlia is about a widowed mother of two sons who has to move from her comfortable home in Michigan, back to her hometown of Memphis Tennessee. She moves there to be the gardener for the Harper House, an old mansion right outside of Memphis. The Harper House for as long as anyone can remember has been haunted by all of the old Harper brides who sing songs and roam the hallways at night. Mr. Harper tries to but in on Stella and Logan’s relationship later in the book, and tries to keep them apart. But no one can help the way those two feel about each other. They get on each other’s nerves, and under their skin with the way they do things, but they can’t fight their feelings for each other in the end. In this paper I’m going to talk about the novel Blue Dahlia, and five examples of things we have learned and talked about in our Marriage and Family class. First, I’m going to talk about the legitimate power Stella has over her two energetic little boys, ho she has been forced to raise all alone. The type of power Stella has over her sons is called legitimate, which means she is the one with all the power in the relationship. Her power is being derived from the fact that she is the mother of her sons and is able to make all of the decisions for them and what they do and how they are able to be raised. She has 100% power over both of them because it is only her taking care of them, doing everything for them and making all the choices for everything.
Second, I’m going to talk about sex roles. Stella works in the garden, which is a feminist role. Gender roles are what society expects of us and society expects woman to be able to cook, clean, and be able to work in the garden. She is just helping the sex role to be taken into place. But there is a difference between gender and sex. Sex is biological, and can’t change over time, whereas gender is not