On 9 Sep 97 , Eleanor Arnason wrote:
> I have got to say, I don't see size as a big issue. This may
> be due to my
> friend Patrick, who is five foot three and 130 pounds. Pat works
> with people who are homeless and mentally ill -- for example, the
> combat vets who camp down by the Mississippi River. Size is not the
> issue. Rather, courage, street smarts and respect for other human
> beings is what makes Patrick able to do work that many other men,
> much larger than he is, will not do.
That's right, height and weight (relative to height) do NOT define
what you are or what you can do, partially because - as with your
friend Pat - other characteristics are as important or even more
important, partially because people learn to adjust to or to
compensate for their 'deficits'.
But I cannot agree that height does not have 'feminist' implications,
meaning that it affects the equal opportunities of men and women. Of
course, that does not mean that it is necessarily a BIG issue. I want
to stick to height here, weight and the body image of women
(certainly a BIG feminist issue) have been discussed before and
in that there are also other aspects involved.
As somebody has already pointed out, height is normally
distributed and the mean is only one characteristic of the
distribution. There are always people at the upper and lower end (men
and women) who have difficulties to find clothes, shoes, to drive
cars, who have to bow at every door, etc. because they deviate too
much from the average. That is one thing.
Some years back, the German airline Lufthansa raised the minimum
height for its pilots to 170 cm (I don't know the maximum height or
whether there _is_ a maximum height). As the average height of German
women is about 168-170 cm (depending on age) about half of the women
are excluded per se, but only about a quarter or a third of the men
(average height about 178-180 cm). There is certainly a need for
some restrictions as the measures in a cockpit cannot accommodate
all sizes but there is a lot of choice what height 'window' to pick.
I am certain that in a country with a lower average height (e.g.
Japan), smaller people are accepted as pilots.
General perceptions (and of course market research) are important in
industrial design, too. So, 10-20 years back the industrial standard
for kitchens offered 2 working heights: 83 and 87 cm, nowadays
one can also have 91 and 95 cm. Only part of that is due to better
service or to increased height of the women, part is that the kitchen
standard has been adjusted to accommodate men, too (now, that is real
progress).
But, I think, there are also more 'subtle' psychological aspects
in that tallness is easier associated with leadership,
aggressiveness, strength, etc. I wonder if it has to be like
that. For example, if all leaders in our societies were older
females, already a bit shrunk with age, would we associate
leadership with smallness or better less with tallness or still
better not with height at all. Or is it coded in our genes? On
rereading I have to admit that this example is skewed as many of our
present leaders are not tall.
To bring this (too long, sorry) email back to SF and to comparative
heights of women and men: I'd like to know whether with emancipation
(what is a good antonym for discrimination?) the height distributions
of men and women can and will overlay more as now or whether that is
only wishful thinking. If the latter, novels like 'Triton' in which
men and women are about the same height are 'only' fantasies, they
may influence our present skewed perceptions (a good thing of course)
but they do not explore a possible future or other possible
societies.
Petra
P.S.: Very dimly I remember to have read or seen at one time a
science fiction in which there is some reference to a society in
which women are taller and stronger than men. I cannot place it
and it is bothering me. Any suggestions?
** Petra Mayerhofer ** pm@ier.uni-stuttgart.de **
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