On Mon, 8 Sep 1997 17:30:18 -0400 Nalo Hopkinson
<bl213@FREENET.TORONTO.ON.CA> wrote:
To bring this back on
> topic, one of the more appealing speculative aspects of feminist sf for
> me is the times when the literature allows me to imagine what it would be
> like to be in a female body that is comfortable exercising physical
> mastery. For which you don't necessarily need superior strength, just
> good training. That was one of the things I loved about the martial art
> in Elizabeth Lyn's books. Men and women sparred together.
>
> -nalo
>
> "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the
> small fruit that you eat."
> -my aunt
Thanks, Nalo, for bringing us back to the topic at hand; I too
have found in sf an exploration of what it would be like to be a woman
and to have a body that you could actually USE - as something OTHER
than a thing to seduce or reproduce (not that those aren't perfectly
good uses, but they do tend to limit women).
So to mention one of our foremothers again on the list,
Charlotte Perkins Gilman is one writer in the feminist sf/fantasy vein
who began exploring these issues a century ago -- she was aware even
then of changes in average heights, weights, and life expectancies with
improvements in diet and exercise. In _Herland_, the girls and women
of an all-female isolated society are tall, lean, swift, and strong,
because that's how they needed to become in order to survive. In a
short story called ""If I were a Man", she makes a similar point by
turning the issue on its head - she has the female protagonist wake up
one day in the dimensions and clothing of a male, who is surprised and
impressed not merely because her clothing is now eminently more
practical and endowed with a sufficiency of pockets (no need for
handbags!), but is delighted at the sense that the world is now *the
right size* for her.
I can't resist a comment on the question of "average", though
(sorry, it's the logician in me coming out). The problem with making
appeals to average anything, whether height, weight, or what have you,
is that a) it's easy to overlook how small the gap between averages is,
and b) the range of differences is effectively erased. Last time I
checked available statistics on average height (around 1991, I think),
average height for women was 5"4", but for men was only 5'7" -- hardly
the huge difference one might expect. Similarly, if we draw
conclusions and especially formulate policy based on what the "average"
man can do because he is "on average" taller/stronger/faster/whatever
than the "average" woman, we may force "below average" men into tasks
for which they are ill-suited, and prohibit "above average" women from
those same tasks, and vice versa. Short men are no better at tasks
demanding height than short women are, but they're likely to be asked,
even forced, to do them anyway, and conversely for women.
Edrie Sobstyl
School of Arts and Humanities
University of Texas at Dallas
P.O. Box 830688 Richardson Tx 75083-0688
(972) 883-2365
(972) 883-2989 (fax)
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