This
paper details the background of Elizabethan England in Shakespeare's time, in which there were many rigid standards
for social customs and marital traditions, but the Reformation was encouraging women to be more independent and to control their own lives, resulting in the emergence of a new "Renaissance woman". It is this conflict of ideas that is played out in "The Taming of the Shrew" and an
understanding of the times as put forth in this
paper, along with parallel examples from the text, adds to a richer understanding of the play.