Larbalestier, Justine: The Battle of Sexes in Science Fiction
The Battle of Sexes in Science Fiction
Writer: Justine Larbalestier
Genre: Science Fiction/Women's Studies
Pages: 295
The beauty of a student's final term at Seton Hill is that they have ONE required text to read, and that required text is a critical text. Most students wait to read their critical text after their thesis has been sent in for final approval, but not me. For starters, I suspect I'll be graduating a term late (I could be wrong!) and second, I wanted this text to simmer in my head so I had plenty of time to stew about what I wanted my own critical paper to be about, which will be written in October.
It's funny, because I don't think I would've ever found this book if not for the debacle concerning the Hugo Nominations this year and some of the, erm, shall we say...interesting comments made by writers and readers in the field. In various LJ posts where I followed the debate, Justine Larbalestier's text was frequently brought up, as was her recent publication, Daughters of the Earth: Feminist Science Fiction in the Twentieth Century (which I intend to read before writing my critical paper as well, even though I don't have to). The timing was great, because I knew I wanted to sink my teeth into another feminist perspective of SF, and this book certainly fit the bill.
I'd already read Joanna Russ's To Write Like a Woman, and I'm glad I have, because Larbalestier refers to it often in this text. However, there's a definite difference between Russ's text and this one. I often found that in many of Russ's essays, science fiction and feminism were often treated as separate subjects, whereas with Larbalestier's text, the two subjects are merged completely.
What's so fascinating about Larbalestier's text is that she doesn't simply examine the texts written by women or about women. She discusses the fandom as well, because everyone knows that fandom is as big a part of SF as the stories are. This is where light was truly shed: how it wasn't expected that women (housewives, sisters, daughters) would read the very first zines, how their letters were treated when published, and then the growing and on-going debates of women in SF (which at the beginning, "women" was synonymous with "love interest" and "sex" and therefore deemed not necessary for the sake of the story). This was fascinating stuff, and I'm so glad I've got my hands on this slice of SF history.
Also examined are the various roles that women writers and women protagonists play in SF societies. Much of it focuses on gender and sexuality, examining the roles of women and how certain futuristic societies do or do not play into the myth that societies with no men are inherently wrong. The text wraps up with an in-depth study of how James Tiptree, Jr--aka Alice Sheldon--transformed the notion of women's roles in SF, then caps off with an examination of the Tiptree award and how it came about.
Overall, I was pretty darned pleased with this text. Once again, I wish I had my hands on some of the stories mentioned, and Larbalestier finally got my curiosity piqued concerning James Tiptree, Jr, whom I haven't read and will now make a point of doing.
Two complaints:
1) Larbalestier spends some time discussing Ursula K. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness. While I read the book back in 2005, the essay, "Is Gender Necessary?" I've read twice, once last year and once this year (the second time was her revision of that essay, written years later). I feel pretty comfortable with the messages in the book and what Le Guin was trying to portray, so I was a little perplexed when Larbalestier proposed on page 103, "But there is nothing to say that each partner in the kemmering will remain that sex every time they go into kemmer."
There isn't? Are you sure? Because I'm 99.999999999% POSITIVE that somewhere between the book, the essay, and the redux of that essay it is stated that a single Gethenian can both sire and birth children, that one can be both father to one child and mother to another. And I know Larbalestier has read at least the same things I have, so I can't imagine where I would've gotten this conviction if not from those three sources. Can someone help me figure out the source of my assumption, right or wrong? ***
2) This isn't a complaint about the book so much as it is a thirst for a text that examines women in SF from the last twenty-seven or so years. I want this because I see so much happening now that is never touched upon in these kinds of essay books, which focus on the history (which is GREAT), but there's no current context to compare it too. I want a critical text that examines how women's roles have evolved in SF in books, shorts, television, and film, because there's certainly a lot to talk about. Sure, there's blogs for that, but blogs aren't required to be objective, nor are they required to support their opinions with outside sources.
If there IS something like this out there, can anyone link me up? If not, maybe one of these days when I find an extra heap of time hiding under the bed, I just might tackle the task myself. :) Oh yeah, that'll be the day...
***Mystery solved! Thanks, everyone!
Next up: The Hidden Worlds by Kristin Landon