Farrat’s assertion of his cross-dressing could be compared to John Proctor’s assertion of his name.

They both reach a point where they no longer want to feed into the conservative and repressive
nature of the communities they live in. while proctor literally gives his life to save his name and
preserve it, Farrat essentially commits “social suicide” by way of revealing his own secret

Ham antagonizes those who find pleasure in stirring drama and conflict by spreading rumours

The Crucible

- the normality of these actions underlies the absurdity of the accusations made against these
individuals furthering miller's chastisement of the fictitious nature of the trials and also the
ways in which outcasts are the first to be scapegoated

- the climate created by McCarthy

Prompt 1

- Convergent
o both towns are classist societies

- Dressmaker, Tilly provides another way to express class

How do The Crucible and The Dressmaker show social hierarchies adapting to or resting change?

1) Both Ham and Miller show how people are able to advance through their social
hierarchies via different means, framing the social structures governing Salem and
Dungatar as inherently hollow.

Dressmaker

- Gertrude adopts a new persona (Trudy) and develops a new vernacular

- Grocery girl to a Beaumont
- Gertrude is able to adapt, and traverse from being a “grocery girl”, a status that
constitutes a lower social position, to “Beaumont”; demonstrating how Dungatar’s rigid
institutions of class are ultimately hollow and susceptible to change.
- One’s name constitutes one’s class, illustrating how changing one’s name can transcend a
person’s social position.
-
o In this, Ham shows how in a conservative towns like Dungatar, one’s social
position is reflected by their appearance and speech.
o While Ham allows her readers to extol Gertrude’s meritocratic efforts for gaining
a higher social standing, her reduction to an arrogantly egotistical person strips all
our sympathy, particularly for when she is “Institutionalized into a sanatorium”.
Hence, while Ham’s destabilisation of rigid class structure suggest that class
structures are ultimately susceptible to change, she comments that those who
become so absorbed into their “newfound” position that they begin to neglect
their morals and descend into callousness, will consequently be punished.

The Crucible
- “children…bidden to speak”: Miller establishes the norm that children, and by extension
women, were strictly governed by individuals of higher social status. Abigail is able to gain
a new position of prestige whereby her “voice of heaven” becomes an omniscient voice of
who is “bewitched” and who is not, thereby representing her newfound authority she
yields over Salem. The fact that Danforth, a figure who embodies an omniscient stance
over Salem through his role as a judge, labels Abigail as possessing this “voice of heaven”
speaks to how Abigail has assumed a god-like status. In a Puritan town where God is
viewed as yielding complete authority over the Salemites, the positive religious
connotation evoked by the word “heaven” suggests how Abigail has assumed a god-like
status in Salem.
2) Although both authors elucidate how both communities’ social structure are susceptible
to change, the way they demonstrate characters responding to change differs. In The
Crucible, members attempt to eliminate social change by asserting and reinforcing their
authority over those who are of lower class. In contrast, social change is viewed as an
inevitable process, and therefore individual resist social change by seeking to romanticise
about the conservative nature of their town.

Dressmaker
-  Hamish O’Brien, who laments the fact that diesel trains are widely replacing steam
engines
Crucible
- Danforth and his hangings