Emma orchestrates a romantic entanglement between one of her naive protegees and the vicar, hoping it will prevent them from rejecting each other in favor of each other despite feeling strongly for both of them. Emma hopes this plan will also prevent her protegee from rejecting a farmer who truly loves her.
This disagreement between two friends goes deeper than simply class distinction; it’s about judging others according to their inner merits, as well as power and influence dynamics.
What’s the Point?
Emma Argue with Principal Figgins offers students the chance to explore numerous themes. In particular, it can help teach about effective conflict resolution strategies and the role that free speech has in a democratic society.
Further, it provides an opportunity to discuss the tension between students’ rights to express their opinions and schools’ responsibility of maintaining an ideal learning environment. Emma and Principal Figgins’ interactions raises important questions regarding open dialogue and whether established channels for addressing concerns are sufficient enough.
And finally, this dialogue provides an opportunity to examine Emma’s abuse of power and knowledge. Her refusal is marred by arrogance, condescension and ignorance which makes it more difficult for Knightley to listen.
What’s Your Line?
This scene pits Emma against Knightley, an older family friend and one of the most influential individuals in Emma’s community. This scene showcases Austen at her best: compelling readers to examine class lines, gender lines and power dynamics.
After her “incident on Box Hill,” Emma begins evaluating herself more carefully, taking stock of how her influence, knowledge and self-awareness has been misused in the past. She even returns to class and status issues by taking issue with Knightley again in their entirety.
Who’s Right?
While Emma and Knightley debate their respective families’ reliance, they also disagree over expectations regarding men and women. Emma advocates for true gentility to be defined by love and respect rather than superficial status symbols.
Emma exemplified this with her opposition to the suffrage movement. Emma believed that increasing women’s voting would not solve political corruption issues; therefore she insisted reformers focus more on social issues. This combination of feminism and anarchism made Emma an exceptional thinker during Progressive Era America, practicing free love while advocating for workers’ rights, supporting conscientious objectors from draft, criticizing marriage as oppressive and hypocritical – an unpopular viewpoint at that time resulting in her arrest less than two months after publishing Mother Earth.
Who’s Wrong?
Emma uses an ingenious strategy to switch the subject. Instead of discussing class differences, she brings up gender roles within marriage; an issue Knightley is particularly passionate about.
Emma is also an advocate of women’s rights and anarchism – two ideals she passionately believes in. Anarchism is a political ideology which holds that governments are no longer necessary, as people will form communities based around mutual interests and values.
Emma’s disagreement with Knightley recalls an argument she experienced on Degrassi: Gangsta Gangsta. In that show, the actress played Manny Nelson and had an on-again-off-again relationship with Evan Peters (now her current flame). Both parties were accused of domestic violence towards one another onscreen before eventually reaching a settlement and going on to collaborate on American Horror Story together.
What’s Your Conclusion?
Emma’s fight with Principal Figgins shines a spotlight on broader questions of freedom of speech and school policies, while raising issues regarding student rights while maintaining a productive learning environment.
Austen utilizes free indirect discourse as a method of subjective narration, sharing Emma’s thoughts more openly with readers than she would using a third-person narrative voice would permit. This helps readers empathize with and understand Emma better as characters.
After her experience at Box Hill, Emma is forced to take an honest evaluation of herself. She learns she has misapplied her knowledge and influence for selfish ends; also learning more about Knightley who champions real feelings over rules or privileges.