LOG9709B ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 14:07:54 +0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: emrah goker Subject: Re: Le Guin and Literary Silences In-Reply-To: <970905192923_2083875781@emout17.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 5 Sep 1997, Nicole Youngman wrote: > Would some kind soul please explain the concept of "literary silences" to > this budding sociologist? I had a feminist lit crit course a while back but > it seemed like the whole thing was about Foucault...I had a hard time paying > attention. ;-) As Baudrillard said, "Forget Foucault"! On second thought, better forget Baudrillard, too (if you are irritated by some ideas of postmodernism, and/or are an incurable modernist like me)... Coming to what a "literary silence" is (if I have not misinterpreted the concept): First of all, I believe it may be used both by postmodernist and modernist literary analyses. In the case of "non-thrash" (once again referring to the Strugeon's Law) SF, throughout the whole structure of the narrative, the writer always places, or integrates her/his ideological values/biases/creations, etc. To search for such ideological elements, a suggested method (not by me) is to try to spot, to "read" where the writer is silent about a subject, or an event, or whatever, whose integration into the matrix of the narrative will discomfort the writer. For example, if you were a writer devoted to the (former) Communist Party of the Soviet Union back in, say, 40s or 50s, you would be careful if you were writing a novel about village life. You would feel that you should be silent about certain aspects of poverty or inequality in rural life. There were supporters of "proletkult" drwing pictures of all-mighty commune villagers, handsome, over two meters, intellectual, etc. Literary silence can happen either in conscious avoidance or unconscious neglect of the disturbing elements. Hope I have not wrongly explained the concept. Also please note that I am not an expert on literature, only a curious reader of some theories about literature and of sociology of literature. So please CORRECT ME. EMRAH -"Insgiht! Insight! My kingdom for an insight!" ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 14:55:39 +0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: emrah goker Subject: Re: Le Guin and Literary Silences In-Reply-To: <970906210700_33601933@emout19.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sat, 6 Sep 1997, Eleanor Arnason wrote: > Gregory Benford is an extremely bright man with things to say that are worth > considering; but having reading several essays by him on hard SF, I think he > may have (I am trying to find a polite or neutral term and failing) a hidden > agenda when he writes about LeGuin. > > At present, he seems to be the chief spokesperson for the idea that "hard > SF" is the core of science fiction. Yes. Excellent. But isn't it too quick to blame his Le Guin criticism for being a result of his anti-feminist, masculinist bias? > The lists of hard SF writers -- their canon -- never seems to contain women > writers, though several female SF writers have impressive scientific > credentials. Hard SF writers tend to use utilitarian prose and to have a > limited interest in characterization. This last may be related to their lack > of interest in psychology and the social sciences. They also tend to > undervalue biology, though starting with THE TIME MACHINE or FRANKENSTEIN, > the biological sciences seem to be key to the development of science fiction. > Hard SF plots tend to be action driven. Hard SF writers tend to resolve > problems through violence; and they tend to have right of center politics. > > Now, I am not claiming that Benford's work always fits the above > description. I have liked some of his work a lot. But he seems to have a > tolerance I don't have for quite godawful, technophilic SF, stuff that > doesn't convince me for a moment; and I think there's a good chance that he > likely to undervalue psychology, the social sciences, writing by women, > "literary" writing, left of center writing and plots that are NOT action > driven and do not use violence to solve problems. > > So he may not be the ideal person to analyze LeGuin. I agree with what you say about Benford, a deeper (but for me pointless) analysis may reveal worse things about him, but: 1) I did not try to idealize him and launch an attack to Le Guin. I said I had in mind his article, tried to acknowledge the list guests with his views, and wanted to have their attention to the point. 2) Besides, I am an INCURABLE ATHEIST but will never _blame_ a narrative for not being so. And to Hades with Benford's Christianity (or was it Hell?) !! 3) By having people's attention to the (perhaps) moral authoritarianist aspects of her novel, I just wanted to start a discussion on the topic. 4) Maybe it would also be necessary to say that I am a FEMINIST and did never aim to use a non- (perhaps anti-) feminist writer and critic like Benford purposefully, in order to attack "soft" (whatever it is) or anarcho-feminist SF. Later I will develop my argument, I have got to go now... EMRAH -"Insight! Insight! My kingdom for an insight!" ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 14:05:35 GMT+100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Petra Mayerhofer Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT On 7 Sep 97 , MARINA YERESHENKO wrote: > Concerning the argument about male/female toughness in relation to > size, does anyone remember the discussion on related matter in > _Triton_ by Samuel Delany? The main character recalls how he was > always puzzled by illustrations in old books, where the woman would > always be shorter that the man. He was wondering why all women in > those books were midgets. And the person he was talking to offered > two explanations. One, that a man would prefer to go out with a > woman smaller than himself. ("That would mean a lot of really > unhappy tall women and short men", said Bron. "For what I heard, > there were", said the other guy.) The second explanation was, that > according to some research, parents were 70% less likeky to pick up > a baby, or play or talk to it during the first year of its life if > the baby was female. And since physical contact and attention are so > important for healthy development, this had to affect everything, > including the child's future height and bodyweight. This is on the > point of strength based on physical differences. I have not read 'Triton', but do I understand it correctly, that in that novel man and women are about the same height? A friend of mine has read somewhere that (in Germany ?) the average height of women has come closer to that of the men in the last decades (without mentioning that both are increasing). One reason given was the obvious, nowadays girls do NOT get less or worse food than boys. The other was, that with emancipation girls are no longer psychologically held back. That would mean that the relative average heights of women and men could be a measure of equal rights and opportunities. I was quite intrigued by that concept. It reminds of the variance in the average lifespans of women and men between the countries. I think it is generally accepted nowadays, that on average women live longer than men of the same gen pool, if they have the same opportunities, although nobody can say how much longer. There are only few countries in the world, in which the lifespans of women are shorter than that of men (e.g. India). As far as I know, the UN has integrated that fact in some sort of measure of equality of men and women. Please note, that that story about the average heights is only hearsay, I have not heard it from anybody else. Furthermore, I wonder how the pressure on girls and women to be thin, i.e. take less food in, does fit into this. So if somebody has some information on that (also contradictory), I'd be glad to receive it. Petra ** Petra Mayerhofer ** pm@ier.uni-stuttgart.de ** ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 15:21:15 GMT+100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Petra Mayerhofer Subject: Re: Id on flights In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.16.19970905125859.42ffa0ca@academic.truman.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT On 4 Sep 97 , Neil Rest wrote: > >The "anti-terrorism" measures in force at U.S. airports include the > >requirement that each passenger show a government issued > >identification before being permitted to board the plane. It is > >forbidden to give away a ticket, or to buy a ticket for another > >person; the name of the pasenger must be on the ticket. > > > >If you ask the personnel if they've ever heard of anyone who's ever > >heard of this . . . sorry, I can't quickly come up with a better > >adjective than "fascist" regimen ever interfering with an act of > >terrorism, they can't understand what you're talking about. It's > >for our own good, after all. On 5 Sep 97 , Martha Bartter wrote: > I guess I don't feel as strongly about this as you seem to. Most > Americans (over the age of 16 or so) have a "government issued" id > -- either a driver's license or an official equivalent. No one who > has purchased a plane ticket and shows this id gets taken off the > plane in handcuffs. At least, I haven't heard of such. > To me, "government permission" includes such proscriptions as > travel > to Cuba -- there's the gov't in action -- but not the request to see > id to fly any more than id to drive my car. Or do you consider this > also 'fascist'? On 5 Sep 97 , CMUNSON wrote: > Marina: Neil is right about this. You have to show a valid ID > to fly on the commercial airlines. People really don't question > this, but it constitutes a license to travel. I can't imagine > how many average folks who are unaware of this have been halted > at airports. > > All of this is in response to the Flight 800 crash, which they > thought was caused by terrorism, a link never proved. SNIP > This new restriction is just the tip of the iceberg. At the end > of the year something called "passenger profiling" goes into > full effect. This will be a computerized system designed to > identify potential "terrorists." I'm sure that lots of folks > will be inconvenienced by this. I have one acquaintance, who is > an American dissident, who has been hassled by this system when > they tried to travel. At first, I had to smile about these emails. I cannot remember a time when in Europe one had not to show his or her id at check-in and at the border control (the share of cross-border flights is of course higher in Europe than on the North-American continent). Apart from that everybody is screened, all luggage is screened, too (last time I was in London, I stood half an hour in line for that, including the check-in it took longer than the actual flight). Nowadays, some airlines question everybody closely about what they have put into their suitcases, if somebody had access to their suitcases ('were you alone while packing?'), if somebody gave you something to take with you, etc., all quite personal questions. When I reached that point in thinking about the emails, I quit smiling. However, although I see how much liberties we have lost with all these security measures, I would not like to bord a plane without them. >From the emails it is not completely clear whether in the US it is a government requirement to show your id at check-in or only a measure by the airlines. But, assuming the latter, to give the discussion a different twist, does anybody question that you have to show an id at the bank at an introductory visit? Or when you write a check? The necessity is seen by most people. But what is the difference to the airline? (By the way, I remember when I lived in the US for a year, how surprised I was that one Id (in this case my passport) was not sufficient to open a bank account. I had to bring a second one. The clerk told me condescendingly that my passport could be forged at every corner. I still don't know if everybody had to bring 2 Ids or only people without a US-American driver's license. I was completely taken aback, my passport was certainly harder to forge than a driver's license. ) Even if the airline really only want to put a lid on 'mis-use' of frequent flyers, does not have the company a right to specify the conditions under which it sells its product to the costumer as it wants? If the costumer does not want the product under these conditions, it does not have to buy it after all. And, it does not necessarily impair the 'license to travel'. There are still the possibilites to go by train, car or coach or on foot (yes, I know, it is more time-consuming). Of course, the companies have to keep within certain rules (no exclusion based on race, gender, handicap, sexuality, political opinion, etc.) besides the rules established as business standard. IMO, that 'passenger profiling' Chuck (?) has mentioned certainly impairs civil rights in an unacceptable way. Petra ** Petra Mayerhofer ** pm@ier.uni-stuttgart.de ** ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 10:33:00 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: DAVID CHRISTENSON Subject: Re: Back to SF MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii -- [ From: David Christenson * EMC.Ver #2.5.3 ] -- Sean said: > Still, I see Laura's point about wanting to keep the subjects so those > which concern feminism and SF, not one or the other. Me too. I'm currently on two mailing lists, this one and a "Minnesota politics" list. This morning I downloaded 21 messages from both lists, only a few of which had anything to do with the subjects at hand. Nothing wrong with the topics, and nothing wrong with an occasional diversion, but this morning it was like going to a Chinese restaurant and finding nothing but Italian food on the menu. -- David Christenson - ldqt79a@prodigy.com "Yet, throughout the book there exists the whole gamut of strange facts which we ourselves had been aware of for years, all carefully mustered to support a theory doomed by every process of logic to be forever incomprehensible." - Ray Palmer ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 10:38:47 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Catherine Caporusso <104525.2243@COMPUSERVE.COM> Subject: Re: Back to SF MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit As the person primarily responsible for the "silly," non-SF, but feminist discussion of GI Jane, I wanted to note that: 1) I have received a number of messages (which I have not read) about robots, which seem likely to be just as "off" the feminist subject as GI Jane is "off" SF. 2) It began because I was intrigued by the comparison of Demi Moore to three actresses who are known for playing the top three "tough" women movie characters - Sigourney Weaver, Linda Hamilton, and Angela Bassett - _all_ of whom are in SF movies (Aliens, Terminator 2, and Strange Days). ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 18:03:53 UT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Lesley Hall Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and Re this discussion: in many many societies the difference in height and strength of men and women has been probably due less to relative frequency of picking up and more to do with the allocation of food resources within the family; i.e. female members get less to eat (assumption that they *need* less) and also the model of the mother who may, in situations of hardship, starve herself to feed firstly the breadwinner and then the children, and probably the male children first of those. I can certainly remember, from my own experience, (female) servers in canteens at university and work, who automatically gave men larger portions than women (although 1 portion was automatically costed at a single price, no size differentials!). But would guess that the crucial time for adult size, re nutrition, would be infancy/early childhood. Lesley Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 16:06:35 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Debra Euler Subject: Re: GI Jane -Reply -Reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Sean Johnston wrote: >>Good point, but one correction: there's no 't' in Schwarzenegger. Sorry Sean, I always was terrible at German! And I'm sorry I missed your similar post last week, turns out my server bounced back a lot of messages. Debra Euler ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 15:27:45 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Re this discussion: in many many societies the difference in height and >strength of men and women has been probably due less to relative frequency of >picking up and more to do with the allocation of food resources within the >family; i.e. female members get less to eat (assumption that they *need* less) >and also the model of the mother who may, in situations of hardship, starve >herself to feed firstly the breadwinner and then the children, and probably >the male children first of those. > I can certainly remember, from my own experience, (female) servers in >canteens at university and work, who automatically gave men larger portions >than women (although 1 portion was automatically costed at a single price, no >size differentials!). But would guess that the crucial time for adult size, re >nutrition, would be infancy/early childhood. > Lesley > Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com Okay, so why are most women in this, the world's most diverse, culture usually shorter than men, as well as weaker in the upper body? -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 15:31:44 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Re this discussion: in many many societies the difference in height and >strength of men and women has been probably due less to relative frequency of >picking up and more to do with the allocation of food resources within the >family; i.e. female members get less to eat (assumption that they *need* less) >and also the model of the mother who may, in situations of hardship, starve >herself to feed firstly the breadwinner and then the children, and probably >the male children first of those. > I can certainly remember, from my own experience, (female) servers in >canteens at university and work, who automatically gave men larger portions >than women (although 1 portion was automatically costed at a single price, no >size differentials!). But would guess that the crucial time for adult size, re >nutrition, would be infancy/early childhood. > Lesley > Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com Interesting idea, though. Plausible, too. I just don't buy it. -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 21:02:37 UT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Lesley Hall Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and >Re this discussion: in many many societies the difference in height and >strength of men and women has been probably due less to relative frequency of >picking up and more to do with the allocation of food resources within the >family; i.e. female members get less to eat (assumption that they *need* less) [rest snipped] > Lesley > Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com >Okay, so why are most women in this, the world's most diverse, culture >usually shorter than men, as well as weaker in the upper body? >-Sean? a) you don't think there are cultural factors (e.g fear of fatness) which might cause inadequate or at least less adequate nutrition of girl children in 'the world's most diverse culture'? b) I'm not denying that there are _also_ other cultural influences. c) shorter than which men? Even I, a mere 5ft 1 in female, encounter men who are, without being persons of restricted growth, shorter than myself or very little taller. Are we really talking about 'most' women and 'usually' shorter, or is this just an assumption? What do the actual distributions of height, m & f, look like? Is there such an enormous differential? I doubt it. What might be the case is that there is in fact a far wider range of variation among men (e.g. more likely to be v tall or short). Lesley Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 17:30:18 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, Sean Johnston wrote: > > Okay, so why are most women in this, the world's most diverse, culture > usually shorter than men, as well as weaker in the upper body? > > -Sean > NH: Let me balance this by pointing out that many men are proportionally weaker in the legs than women, ie. given a woman and a man of similar size and strength, the man will tend to be stronger in the upper body than the woman, and the woman will tend to be stronger in the lower body than the man. So we're not talking strength vs. weakness here, but relative distribution along a spectrum, as well as gender-based differences in distribution of muscular strength on our frames. I guess the same would go for height. 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 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 18:08:32 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Edrie J Sobstyl Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII On Mon, 8 Sep 1997 17:30:18 -0400 Nalo Hopkinson 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) ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 20:17:11 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MARINA YERESHENKO Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: <1FCF8DF6670@iers1.ier.uni-stuttgart.de> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, Petra Mayerhofer wrote: > > I have not read 'Triton', but do I understand it correctly, that in > that novel man and women are about the same height? > Yes. Moreover, for both, average height was about 6'4", if I remember well, but most celebrities and people who was considered beautiful, were about 5'8". So I guess, the modern adoration of height has been done away with as well. Actually, after reading that book, I started paying attention on how many women are actually smaller than most of men, and on the relative height of people in couples. I think that in most cases, women are already the same height as men. Even though those, whom you can see with a guy, are usually thinner than average. Marina > A friend of mine has read somewhere that (in Germany ?) the > average height of women has come closer to that of the men in the > last decades (without mentioning that both are increasing). One > reason given was the obvious, nowadays girls do NOT get less or worse > food than boys. The other was, that with emancipation girls are no > longer psychologically held back. That would mean that the relative > average heights of women and men could be a measure of equal rights > and opportunities. > > I was quite intrigued by that concept. It reminds of the variance in > the average lifespans of women and men between the countries. > I think it is generally accepted nowadays, that on average women > live longer than men of the same gen pool, if they have the same > opportunities, although nobody can say how much longer. There are > only few countries in the world, in which the lifespans of women > are shorter than that of men (e.g. India). As far as I know, the UN > has integrated that fact in some sort of measure of equality of men > and women. > > Please note, that that story about the average heights is only > hearsay, I have not heard it from anybody else. Furthermore, I wonder > how the pressure on girls and women to be thin, i.e. take less > food in, does fit into this. So if somebody has some information on > that (also contradictory), I'd be glad to receive it. > > > Petra > > ** Petra Mayerhofer ** pm@ier.uni-stuttgart.de ** > "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society happens to be selling at the time." Naomi Wolf ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 21:26:11 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nicole Youngman Subject: Sociology of literature? << Also please note that I am not an expert on literature, only a curious reader of some theories about literature and of sociology of literature. >> The latter sounds intriguing--any suggested readings? And I'd LOVE to forget Baudrillard and Foucault, thanks for the invitation to do so! ;-) Nicole ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 20:45:34 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MARINA YERESHENKO Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I have another idea on why average women could be shorter than men. Even though I suspect that most of it exagerrated by perception. Since we are so used to women-midgets book illustrations and movie images, we could as well see it when it's not even there, because "it's supposed to be that way". Even if it's true, the number one reason would be unadequate nutrition of women in third-world countries, and the fashion of serf-starvation in first-world ones. I don't think I met a woman here in US that would not be obsessed with her weight. The best way to see it is to bring some cake or donuts to your office. You'll here more about "calories" than in Nutrition 101 class. What about the rest of the world, I can testify that people there sincerely believe that women need less food. My family does. "You can't feed a man with a salad. They need real food." (I usually replied something not very nice on that. But they knew I was strange). Another reason for the difference could be the fact that smaller women are considered more feminine (only in Western countries that changed a bit in 60's, with the advent of Twiggy), therefore prettier, therefore more likely to marry and pass on their genes. While the scary big woman would die old maidens. Natural selection. Some genes are gender-connected, so maybe height is one of them. Marina "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society happens to be selling at the time." Naomi Wolf ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 00:44:59 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jill Gillham Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, MARINA YERESHENKO wrote: > Another reason for the difference could be the fact that smaller women > are considered more feminine (only in Western countries that changed a > bit in 60's, with the advent of Twiggy), therefore prettier, therefore more > likely to marry and pass on their genes. While the scary big woman > would die old maidens. Natural selection. Some genes are gender-connected, > so maybe height is one of them. > It's going to be really interesting to look back on the issue in about 2010. From about my generation on, (I was born in 1972, same year as Title 9 passed) there's been a new emphasis on women and physical fitness and sports. When I was in high school, it was a Big Deal to make it on the women's basketball or volleyball teams. (A couple of sports where height is a very useful thing.) These days, something like women's basketball is getting a huge amount of publicity. 6'4" Rebecca Lobo is considered to be a good role model for girls. Volleyball player Gabrielle Reese is 6'2", very athletic looking, and is also a fashion model. I've got a hunch that there's a shift in the idea of how women should look out there. "It's kind of cool when you can bench press your husband." Amy Van Dyken- multiple Olympic champion. Jill Gillham jilkey@grfn.org http://members.aol.com/~ferndock2 \|/ \|/ D=|[[] "All-arm'd I ride, whate'er betide, =0: + =0: = \O/ Until I find the Holy Grail." /|\ /|\ |*| -- Alfred, Lord Tennyson [Go WINGS!] ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 00:23:25 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >"It's kind of cool when you can bench press your husband." Amy Van Dyken- >multiple Olympic champion. > Jill, I'd imagine so. :-) -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 00:06:05 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >On Mon, 8 Sep 1997, Sean Johnston wrote: > >> >> Okay, so why are most women in this, the world's most diverse, culture >> usually shorter than men, as well as weaker in the upper body? >> >> -Sean >> > >NH: Let me balance this by pointing out that many men are proportionally >weaker in the legs than women, ie. given a woman and a man of similar >size and strength, the man will tend to be stronger in the upper body >than the woman, and the woman will tend to be stronger in the lower body >than the man. So we're not talking strength vs. weakness here, but >relative distribution along a spectrum, as well as >gender-based differences in distribution of muscular strength on our >frames. I guess the same would go for height. 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 Nalo, Thanks. See my post to Lesley, where I elaborate a little, confirming what you say. -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 00:04:46 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >>Re this discussion: in many many societies the difference in height and >>strength of men and women has been probably due less to relative frequency of >>picking up and more to do with the allocation of food resources within the >>family; i.e. female members get less to eat (assumption that they *need* >less) [rest snipped] >> Lesley >> Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com > >>Okay, so why are most women in this, the world's most diverse, culture >>usually shorter than men, as well as weaker in the upper body? > >>-Sean? > >a) you don't think there are cultural factors (e.g fear of fatness) which >might cause inadequate or at least less adequate nutrition of girl children in >'the world's most diverse culture'? >b) I'm not denying that there are _also_ other cultural influences. >c) shorter than which men? Even I, a mere 5ft 1 in female, encounter men who >are, without being persons of restricted growth, shorter than myself or very >little taller. Are we really talking about 'most' women and 'usually' shorter, >or is this just an assumption? What do the actual distributions of height, m & >f, look like? Is there such an enormous differential? I doubt it. What might >be the case is that there is in fact a far wider range of variation among men >(e.g. more likely to be v tall or short). >Lesley >Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com Lesley, As far as I know, men are usually about a third bigger over all and a third stronger than women in the upper body while women are a third stronger than men in the lower body. I'll ask a doctor though, and confirm or refute this. -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 13:37:46 +0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Yvonne Kenyon Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I've been interested to read the discussion on height comparisons between women and men, not merely because it coincides with a university course i'm doing on representation and gender. In her essay "Sexual Difference and Sexual Equality" Alison Jaggar says: "... the ubiquitious context of sexual inequality has shaped not only our sex-differentiated genetic potential and the sex-differentiated ways is which we express that potential, but continues to influence our perception and interpretation of existing sexual differences, disposing us, for instance, to perceive a greater disparity between the sexes than exists. One example is the common perception that men are generally taller than women, a perception reinforeced by the norms of heterosexual coupling, even though the mean difference in height between women and men is only a few inches, whereas the normal distribution of height within each sex is over two feet." which is to say that there is a grreater discrepancy in height within the sexes than between the sexes. It isn't surprising that this misinformation gets re-represented in sf. Ciao Sian ruralrep@medeserv.com.au ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 07:50:18 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Carrie A Preston Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: from "MARINA YERESHENKO" at Sep 8, 97 08:45:34 pm Content-Type: text/plain > > I have another idea on why average women could be shorter than men. Even > though I suspect that most of it exagerrated by perception. Since we are so > used to women-midgets book illustrations and movie images, we could as > well see it when it's not even there, because "it's supposed to be that > way". This is certainly true. In psychology experiments, subjects (American college students) have been shown pictures of a woman or a man standing next to a doorway or other reference object and asked to guess the person's height. People estimate women to be shorter than men who are actually the same height. This holds true even when the people are *told* that a set of photographs is "matched" for height, i.e. for each picture of a woman in the set there is a picture of a man of exactly the same height. Women also tend to do this as much as men. --Carrie ******************************************************************************* Carrie A. Preston Carrie A. Preston 348 Mason Hall 3626 Cambrey Drive Michigan State University Lansing, MI 48906 East Lansing, MI 48825 (517) 321-0317 (517) 355 2136 presto10@pilot.msu.edu ***************************************************************************** There is water at the bottom of the ocean. --David Byrne ******************************************************************************** ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 10:24:55 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: joanna goltzman Subject: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Nalo Hopkinson 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." and Edrie J Sobstyl wrote: "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)." I am interested in what other people on this list have found SF lets them imagine about women. One of the reasons I am so interested in feminist SF is that it creates new female identities. Imagining women in non-traditional ways is one step along the way to changing traditional views of women. Joanna ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 11:42:31 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII NH: There's a photo out there of past bodybuilding champ Carla Dunlap, a 5' 3" woman, holding her 6' husband over her head. Wow. She's my hero. -nalo On Tue, 9 Sep 1997, Sean Johnston wrote: > > > >"It's kind of cool when you can bench press your husband." Amy Van Dyken- > >multiple Olympic champion. > > > Jill, > I'd imagine so. :-) > > -Sean > "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the small fruit that you eat." -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 08:55:35 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Maryelizabeth Hart Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" When overall changes in height are postulated in SF (eg. shorterr people bred for more efficient space travel, larger, heavier people postulated for settling on planets with greater gravity), is the perception of women being shorter than men carried through to the changes? And how does ethnicity play a part in all this? Back on the list, and missed you all. Maryelizabeth Mysterious Galaxy 619-268-4747 3904 Convoy St, #107 800-811-4747 San Diego, CA 92111 619-268-4775 FAX http://www.mystgalaxy.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 10:54:47 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: <199709091524.KAA13511@dfw-ix4.ix.netcom.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 9 Sep 1997, joanna goltzman wrote: > Nalo Hopkinson 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." > > and Edrie J Sobstyl wrote: > > "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)." > > > I am interested in what other people on this list have found SF lets them > imagine about women. One of the reasons I am so interested in feminist SF is > that it creates new female identities. Imagining women in non-traditional > ways is one step along the way to changing traditional views of women. > > Joanna > This, I think, is one of the great strengths of Charnas's Motherlines trilogy, particularly the 2nd and 3rd volumes. Charnas portrays women who have either been born into a society or adapted to societies where women are expected to participate in the full range of human activities, including many physical activities generally handled by men in our society. One of the problems with many female warrior stories, it seems to me, is that the female characters act pretty much like men when it comes to accomplishing physical activities. This doesn't strike me as entirely realistic. I know from experience, for example, that my wife, who is a small person and doesn't have a lot of physical strength even though she works out regularly, will often set out to accomplish a physical task (digging up a garden, flipping a matress, moving the refrigerator, sewing on a button) completely differently from how I, who am much stronger but much more clumsy, would do it. She'll do the job just as well, sometimes less quickly, sometimes more quickly, but she'll break it down into different parts or sub-routines than I would, use different tools, etc. I think we see some of this in Charnas's riding women and particularly in Alldera's invasion force in Fury. We see some of this in Eleanor Arnason's work as well. Mike Levy ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 19:44:03 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Eleanor Arnason Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, 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. All best, Eleanor Arnason ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 9 Sep 1997 18:42:08 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: patricia johnston Subject: Have Spacesuit Will Travel (NOT) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hello All, It seems that Wendy Lawrence (astronaut) has been dumped from the Mir mission, re (EVA) as she is Too-tiny to fit into the Russian eva spacesuit. Dr. David Wolfe, a strapping 5`10" 185 pound guy will replace her. The Big-Eating astronaut faces a light diet, as the food supplies on board were for the Too-Tiny astronaut. Nasa says they have time to replace the food canisters to accomadate the "meat and potatoes, sweet tooth" of Dr. Wolfe. Nasa also says that Wendy Lawrence will be on that flight to Mir in middle of September in the event Dr. Wolfe needs back-up. So what is Wendy to do, if Dr. Wolfe needs back-up? Does she have to eat the rations of Dr. Wolfe ? He prefers a meat potatoe diet,,,she prefers a light healthy diet. If Dr. Wolfe cannot do the eva walk,,,will Wendy do the walk? Perhaps she will be able to elongate her body by eating Dr. Wolfe`s rations, and thus fit into the Russian space-suit. Too-Tiny,,,,give me a break. Particia. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 14:12:23 GMT+100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Petra Mayerhofer Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In-Reply-To: <970909194226_624976778@emout08.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT 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 ** ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 13:53:57 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nicola Griffith Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In a message dated 97-09-10 09:39:05 EDT, Petra wrote: << 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? >> EE "Doc" Smith's _Lensmen_ series featured the planet of Lyrane, where the women were all gorgeous, strapping, *naked* six-footers, and the men were ugly little creatures with a tendency to fight each other to the death at the drop of a hat. Nicola ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 17:53:55 UT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Lesley Hall Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome >tallness is easier associated with leadership,aggressiveness, >strength, etc. I seem to recall hearing about something called 'the Napoleonic complex' named after a certain rather undersized French emperor! I believe there have been some--how serious I don't know--studies of the relationship in men between being under the average 'manly' height and aggression/assertion. Lesley Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 15:16:51 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In-Reply-To: <970910135230_1426234569@emout07.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >EE "Doc" Smith's _Lensmen_ series featured the planet of Lyrane, where the >women were all gorgeous, strapping, *naked* six-footers, and the men were >ugly little creatures with a tendency to fight each other to the death at the >drop of a hat. > >Nicola Nicola, And this is fiction (the men part)? -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 15:23:56 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >tallness is easier associated with leadership,aggressiveness, >>strength, >etc. >I seem to recall hearing about something called 'the Napoleonic complex' named >after a certain rather undersized French emperor! I believe there have been >some--how serious I don't know--studies of the relationship in men between >being under the average 'manly' height and aggression/assertion. >Lesley >Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com Lesley, I call it the Terrier Complex. Works like this: a terrier, usu. a small dog, makes a lot of noise to scare off threats. It has to since it can't do much else. The big dog, on the other hand, just sits on the porch. It could kick your ass. It knows it could kick your ass. You know it could kick your ass. It knows you know it could kick your ass, so why should it embarrass itself by throwing an unnecessary hissy-fit like the terrier? Doesn't work in every case, esp. when human 'big dogs' get a little full of themselves, but it's an interesting pattern. -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 15:11:18 -0900 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Pat Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 10 Sep 1997, Sean Johnston wrote: > > > > >EE "Doc" Smith's _Lensmen_ series featured the planet of Lyrane, where the > >women were all gorgeous, strapping, *naked* six-footers, and the men were > >ugly little creatures with a tendency to fight each other to the death at the > >drop of a hat. > > > >Nicola > > Nicola, > And this is fiction (the men part)? > I was utterly shocked, rereading this, to see how one of the Lensmen - a **diplomat!*** spoke to the chief of state. Something on the order of "See here, sister, you're so full of baloney ...."> Patricia (Pat) Mathews mathews@unm.edu ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 17:14:51 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Teragram Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >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? I would think that - at least to some extent - the perception of height as power is rooted in early childhood.The first people we 'look up to' (in a literal sense, at the very least) are our parents, the controllers of destiny and masters of our small universes, our 'gods'. As adults, having to literaly look up to another could reawaken (on a subconcious level, natch) these feelings. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 19:08:31 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Eleanor Arnason Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome I doubt very much if Petra is thinking of my writing, but I've done one novel plus a bunch of stories about the HWARHATH, a humanoid species where the women are taller and heavier than the men. I did this in order to explain why the HWARHATH women were able to control reproduction. I suspect that male dominance originated early in human history and derives from the kind of size dominance hierarchies that seem typical of many mammalian societies. I also suspect that male dominance now is cultural. Anyway, I think control of reproduction is THE big issue between men and women; and I wanted to create a society where women had absolute say in this area. But why did they have absolute say? Because -- like female hyenas -- they were larger than the males. Anyway, my novel -- translated into Russian, Italian and Spanish but not German -- is RING OF SWORDS. I just asked Patrick if he had ever felt at a disadvantage because of his size. He said, "Only in one area. I can't buy pants off the rack. But I've never thought, gee, if only I were eight inches taller; if only I could play basketball. I'm a good size. I don't take up space. I'm energy efficient." When size comes up as an issue in this culture, it's a front for sexism and class prejudice, since size is related to nutrition; and sometimes it's a front for racism, since people from different backgrounds vary in size. All three of these -- I agree -- are real problems. All best, Eleanor A. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 18:29:12 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MARINA YERESHENKO Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I totally agree with Alison Jagger. Men are considered to be bigger than women, because our idea of an average man is larger than our idea of an average woman. Our definition of "average" is influenced by what we believe to be "the norm". Therefore, when asked to visualize "typical" man and a woman, most of people will think of a guy being taller, just because we believe it should be that way. Marina On Tue, 9 Sep 1997, Yvonne Kenyon wrote: > I've been interested to read the discussion on height comparisons between > women and men, not merely because it coincides with a university course i'm > doing on representation and gender. > In her essay "Sexual Difference and Sexual Equality" Alison Jaggar says: > > "... the ubiquitious context of sexual inequality has shaped not only our > sex-differentiated genetic potential and the sex-differentiated ways is > which we express that potential, but continues to influence our perception > and interpretation of existing sexual differences, disposing us, for > instance, to perceive a greater disparity between the sexes than exists. > One example is the common perception that men are generally taller than > women, a perception reinforeced by the norms of heterosexual coupling, even > though the mean difference in height between women and men is only a few > inches, whereas the normal distribution of height within each sex is over > two feet." > which is to say that there is a grreater discrepancy in height within the > sexes than between the sexes. It isn't surprising that this misinformation > gets re-represented in sf. > > Ciao > Sian > ruralrep@medeserv.com.au > "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society happens to be selling at the time." Naomi Wolf ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 18:36:45 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MARINA YERESHENKO Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Mike, Your wife does the same task differently not because she's a woman, but because she is not as strong as you are, as a human being. A man of her height and weight would not not accomplish something the way you do, either. And a woman of your size would not have a problem with that. Marina woman your size On Tue, 9 Sep 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > Charnas portrays women who > have either been born into a society or adapted to societies where women > are expected to participate in the full range of human activities, > including many physical activities generally handled by men in our society. > One of the problems with many female warrior stories, it seems to me, is that > the female characters act pretty much like men when it comes to accomplishing > physical activities. This doesn't strike me as entirely realistic. I know > from experience, for example, that my wife, who is a small person and > doesn't have a lot of physical strength even though she works out > regularly, will often set out to accomplish a physical task (digging up a > garden, flipping a matress, moving the refrigerator, sewing on a button) > completely differently from how I, who am much stronger but much more clumsy, > would do it. She'll do the job just as well, sometimes less quickly, sometimes > more quickly, but she'll break it down into different parts or > sub-routines than I would, use different tools, etc. I think we see some > of this in Charnas's riding women and particularly in Alldera's invasion > force in Fury. We see some of this in Eleanor Arnason's work as well. > > Mike Levy > "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society happens to be selling at the time." Naomi Wolf ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 13:19:11 +0200 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Anitra E. Heiberg Lykke" Subject: height and gender bodies Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Edrie J Sobstyl wrote: "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)." This discussion on body size and height, reminded me of a short story in where men or women could change their sex. By cloning they had a body "grown" for them of the other sex. Then they "just" put the old brain in the new body. It made for interesting episodes when the main character, a woman, came home to her husband as a man. The story explored gender-roles a little, but could probably have made more out of it. It did give us (women)a feeeling of what the difference in body meant for how one is treatad, seen from both sides. I'm sorry I can't remember who wrote it, or the title unfortunately, it is probably located in one of the 6 stored boxes of sci-fi books. -Anitra ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 08:04:03 -0500 Reply-To: lguerra@ibm.net Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Luz Guerra Subject: Re: height and gender bodies MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Anitra E. Heiberg Lykke wrote: > > Edrie J Sobstyl wrote: > > "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)." > > This discussion on body size and height, reminded me of a short story in > where men or women could change their sex. By cloning they had a body > "grown" for them of the other sex. Then they "just" put the old brain in the > new body. > It made for interesting episodes when the main character, a woman, came > home to her husband as a man. > The story explored gender-roles a little, but could probably have made more > out of it. > It did give us (women)a feeeling of what the difference in body meant for > how one is treatad, seen from both sides. > > I'm sorry I can't remember who wrote it, or the title unfortunately, it is > probably located in one of the 6 stored boxes of sci-fi books. > -Anitra This is my first posting to FEMINISTSF, I've enjoyed reading ya'll's conversations on size and gender this past week. I find XENA entertaining on various levels, and I love the size difference between the powerful (butch?) Xena and her diminuitive female companion -- who Xena almost always defers to on matters of heart/spirit (true power?). I think in this society power is represented as/by size: men are SUPPOSED to be BIGGER than women (more powerful, more intellectually capable, braver in the face of danger, etc) and what we often see is either what is projected or what we perceive -- and not necessarily what is reality in terms of weight, body mass, etc. Women's power is also represented by size: thin, petite, compact women are praised. A facet of what we call "eating disorders" is the inability to SEE one's own body (and I suggest often the bodies of others) as they really are in terms of weight, body mass, etc. In this sickness, a woman might FEEL more powerful the thinner, smaller she is, even as she is physically weak and dying. She is SUPPOSED to be smaller.... Anne McCaffrey's short story "The Ship Who Sang" (Women of Wonder: The Classic Years) is fascinating in many respects, and particularly in it's exploration of society's use of people whose bodies it finds completely unusable and the development of other aspects of their (nonphysical) being. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 09:17:16 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII NH: Hmm, I dunno. My lover (male) and I are about evenly matched for height, reach and strength, as I am with a couple of other male friends, now that I think on it. But with us, the average holds true. Their upper bodies are stronger, and my lower body is stronger. We are all comfortable with physical labour, but we do accomplish tasks differently. However, none of this is as simple as that. I was raised in the tropics, where we had the option of going barefoot a lot of the time. As a result, if I drop something, I'm as likely to pick it up with my toes as to bend over and use my hands. But the first time a Canadian friend saw me do that, she was absolutely bowled over. Huge generalisation, I know, but she figured she simply had spent so much time in shoes that she hadn't figured out how to move her toes. -nalo On Wed, 10 Sep 1997, MARINA YERESHENKO wrote: > Mike, > Your wife does the same task differently not because she's a woman, but > because she is not as strong as you are, as a human being. A man of her > height and weight would not not accomplish something the way you do, either. > And a woman of your size would not have a problem with that. > > Marina > > woman your size On Tue, 9 Sep 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > > > Charnas portrays women who > > have either been born into a society or adapted to societies where women > > are expected to participate in the full range of human activities, > > including many physical activities generally handled by men in our society. > > One of the problems with many female warrior stories, it seems to me, is that > > the female characters act pretty much like men when it comes to accomplishing > > physical activities. This doesn't strike me as entirely realistic. I know > > from experience, for example, that my wife, who is a small person and > > doesn't have a lot of physical strength even though she works out > > regularly, will often set out to accomplish a physical task (digging up a > > garden, flipping a matress, moving the refrigerator, sewing on a button) > > completely differently from how I, who am much stronger but much more clumsy, > > would do it. She'll do the job just as well, sometimes less quickly, sometimes > > more quickly, but she'll break it down into different parts or > > sub-routines than I would, use different tools, etc. I think we see some > > of this in Charnas's riding women and particularly in Alldera's invasion > > force in Fury. We see some of this in Eleanor Arnason's work as well. > > > > Mike Levy > > > > > "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society > happens to be selling at the time." > Naomi Wolf > "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the small fruit that you eat." -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 10:30:55 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Nalo Hopkinson wrote: > I was raised > in the tropics, where we had the option of going barefoot a lot of the > time. As a result, if I drop something, I'm as likely to pick it up with > my toes as to bend over and use my hands. But the first time a Canadian > friend saw me do that, she was absolutely bowled over. Huge > generalisation, I know, but she figured she simply had spent so much time > in shoes that she hadn't figured out how to move her toes. > > -nalo I don't know, I've lived my entire life in the upper midwest of the United States, but I pick things up with my toes all the time. Of course everyone I know thinks it's weird. Perhaps a survey is in order. How many people on this list... Mike ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 10:45:52 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Edrie J Sobstyl Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997 10:30:55 -0500 Michael Marc Levy wrote: > > Perhaps a survey is in order. How many people on this list... > > Mike Back when I smoked, waaaayy back in my early 20s, I could get a cigarette out of the pack, put it in my mouth, and light it with a Bic lighter, all using my toes. A great party trick. The practice of yoga also emphasizes toe flexibility as part of its all-over body awareness. 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) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 12:12:38 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Edrie J Sobstyl wrote: > > Back when I smoked, waaaayy back in my early 20s, I could get a > cigarette out of the pack, put it in my mouth, and light it with a Bic > lighter, all using my toes. A great party trick. NH: :) And transferable to so many other tasks... -nalo > "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the small fruit that you eat." -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 12:11:10 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > > Perhaps a survey is in order. How many people on this list... > > Mike NH: LOL! Yeah, how many prehensile-toed people out there? Now, *that's* science fiction! (Oh, hell; let me explain that last sentence; I went to the Clarion sf writers' workshop in '95, where the question "Why is this science fiction?" seemed to come up a lot in critiques. After a while, we started to invent really silly responses to it.) BTW, last evening I saw the indie sf film "Conceiving Ada" by Lynn Hershman Leeson. It's about a woman scientist who tries to recreate Ada Lovelace, daughter of poet Lord Byron, and the person who seems to have invented the first computer program in 1843 (this is from the program notes--from the film, I understood her to have invented the first computer programming language, inspired by Charles Babbage's 'calculating engine). Honourably intentioned film, but I found it to be really clunky science fiction. Seemed to have been written by someone who neither knows the genre, nor felt any responsibility to check her science. For instance, at one point a doctor forbids a perfectly healthy, active woman with a normal pregnancy from exercising until her pregnancy is over. I don't want this to turn into a spoiler so I'll stop here, but if anyone else sees it, I'd love to hear what you think. Ada Lovelace sounds like a great topic for a feminist sf treatment. There's also a cameo appearance by Timothy Leary, who was obviously in the latter stages of cancer when they filmed--he was absolutely gaunt. That was difficult to watch; reminded me of my dad's death from cancer. -nalo > "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the small fruit that you eat." -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 08:53:28 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Neil Rest Subject: Re: height and gender bodies In-Reply-To: <199709111119.NAA18732@medulla.isv.uit.no> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "Anitra E. Heiberg Lykke" wrote: >Edrie J Sobstyl wrote: > >"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)." > > This discussion on body size and height, reminded me of a short story in >where men or women could change their sex. Have you read the early John Varley stories? Many of them are in the same setting where sex-change is a minor out-patient surgery people have done at will. (Incidentally, Varley is unusually tall.) Neil Rest ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 09:29:11 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Lindy S. L. Lovvik" Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Michael Marc Levy wrote: > > On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Nalo Hopkinson wrote: > > > I was raised > > in the tropics, where we had the option of going barefoot a lot of the > > time. As a result, if I drop something, I'm as likely to pick it up with > > my toes as to bend over and use my hands. But the first time a Canadian > > friend saw me do that, she was absolutely bowled over. Huge > > generalisation, I know, but she figured she simply had spent so much time > > in shoes that she hadn't figured out how to move her toes. > > > > -nalo > > I don't know, I've lived my entire life in the upper midwest of the > United States, but I pick things up with my toes all the time. Of course > everyone I know thinks it's weird. > > Perhaps a survey is in order. How many people on this list... > > Mike Using one's toes and feet reminds me of the Feline-type beings in "Uhura's Song" by Jane Kagan. Yes. . A star trek book. Forgive me. There are two groups of these beings and they have been separated for about 2,000 years. They both have prehensile tails. One group believes that utilizing one's tail for anything other than decorative uses is equivalent to picking one's nose in public. The other group uses the tail for swinging, showing affection, picking fruit. . . I vote for using every appendage we have. Toes and feet are more than just things to walk upon. Imagine, wasting a perfectly good prehensile tail. . . Lindy E.S. This really is a fun book. I love the characters, for whom I read it over and over. . .I need to visit them every-so-often. E.E.S. Yes. I use my feet and toes to manipulate objects. -- If you can't say anything nice. . . come right over here and sit by me! http://www.best.com/~laorka ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 11:30:04 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Edrie J Sobstyl Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII nalo, you are an imp! e. On Thu, 11 Sep 1997 12:12:38 -0400 Nalo Hopkinson wrote: > On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Edrie J Sobstyl wrote: > > > > > Back when I smoked, waaaayy back in my early 20s, I could get a > > cigarette out of the pack, put it in my mouth, and light it with a Bic > > lighter, all using my toes. A great party trick. > > NH: :) And transferable to so many other tasks... > > -nalo > > > > > "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the > small fruit that you eat." > -my aunt 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) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 18:07:12 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Eleanor Arnason Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome I just checked with Patrick, who is not only small but grew up with terriers. They are ratting dogs and extremely good at what they do. According to Pat, she's seen terriers go after rats almost as big as they are. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 20:55:44 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Marilyn Nulman Subject: Re: height and gender bodies Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" About thirty years ago, James Morris, a six-foot-something, adventure-loving writer and reporter who traveled the world climbing mountains and crossing deserts, had a sex-change operation and became Jan Morris, who, in her book "Connundrum" reported feeling helpless and incompetant in areas (like changing tires) in which "he" had always been most able. She wrote about her delight in flirting, blushing, and other stereotypical "female" behaviors, and about how much she enjoyed having doors held for her, etc. It seemed to me that Morris's ideas of what it meant to be a woman were superficial, much more about appearances than reality. This took place in England in the late sixties. Sex roles seemed more immutable then than they do today. Come to think about it, I don't hear much about sex-change operations lately. Are they out of style? Made unnecessary by our relaxing of gender roles? Or just so common that no one notices? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 20:09:25 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MaryKay Bird-Guilliams Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In-Reply-To: <970910185601_1146056690@emout15.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I'm replying to a part of this last message that referred to male dominance and size. For a really well-done recent treatment of this subject, read Sex on the Brain by Deborah Blum who does a really excellent job of interpreting the lastest in gender biology. It turns out nothing is simple, but it makes highly entertaining and thought provoking reading. quote from above mentioned book "I think underneath all the conflict over gender differences is a tacit acceptance of male as normal." Kim Waller (male scientist at Emory U.) Mary K. Bird-Guilliams marykbg@wichita.lib.ks.us Reference Librarian Wichita Public Library ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 21:09:41 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Heather MacLean Subject: Re: sex change operations Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 08:55 PM 9/11/97 -0400, Marilyn Nulman wrote: >This took place in England in the late sixties. Sex roles seemed more >immutable then than they do today. Come to think about it, I don't hear >much about sex-change operations lately. Are they out of style? Made >unnecessary by our relaxing of gender roles? Or just so common that no one >notices? > > Hohooo. Oh my goodness, no they're not out of style--I know of at least 20 Female to Male (FTMs) conversions being considered, or en route, among my friends, as well as a couple MTFs... But you're right, you don't hear about it much. Why would you? This is a personal operation, a (w)righting of "natural" wrong... Perhaps gender roles are the replacement terminology for sex roles; I'm not quite sure what you're referring to here.. Heather =). hmaclean@kent.edu http://kent.edu/~hmaclean ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 22:14:46 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Eleanor Arnason Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome Eeek. I just hit the wrong key and sent a half-finished message. Anyway, re terriers... They make a lot of noise because they are extremely high strung, not because they are not tough. Would you want to take on a rat as big as you are? Pat also says, "I don't make a lot of noise. I'm really very quiet." Which is true, though I have a wonderful story involving Patrick and Harlan Ellison. All best, Eleanor A. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 21:29:05 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MARINA YERESHENKO Subject: Re: Have Spacesuit Will Travel (NOT) In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970909184208.00696580@deepcove.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I can bet anything this has nothing to do with the spacesuit sizes. The reason is much more simple -- "Fixing the space station that men had trouble with is not a job for a woman." Russia is the most sexist country in Europe, in case you did not know. If Wendy Lawrence was the "right size", they would say they had "limited bathroom facilities for females due to emergency conditions on the station", or something else. There is no way they would let a girl to tamper with high technology equipment, it's not a sewing machine or something. Besides, it would not be gentlemen-like to send the poor little girl for such a dangerous task. Geez, I haven't been there for three years and this still makes me mad. Marina On Tue, 9 Sep 1997, patricia johnston wrote: > Hello All, > It seems that Wendy Lawrence (astronaut) has been dumped from the Mir > mission, re (EVA) as she is Too-tiny to fit into the Russian eva spacesuit. > Dr. David Wolfe, a strapping 5`10" 185 pound guy will replace her. The > Big-Eating astronaut faces a light diet, as the food supplies on board were > for the Too-Tiny astronaut. Nasa says they have time to replace the food > canisters to accomadate the "meat and potatoes, sweet tooth" of Dr. Wolfe. > Nasa also says that Wendy Lawrence will be on that flight to Mir in middle > of September in the event Dr. Wolfe needs back-up. So what is Wendy to do, > if Dr. Wolfe needs back-up? Does she have to eat the rations of Dr. Wolfe ? > He prefers a meat potatoe diet,,,she prefers a light healthy diet. If Dr. > Wolfe cannot do the eva walk,,,will Wendy do the walk? Perhaps she will be > able to elongate her body by eating Dr. Wolfe`s rations, and thus fit into > the Russian space-suit. Too-Tiny,,,,give me a break. > Particia. > "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society happens to be selling at the time." Naomi Wolf ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 22:01:18 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MARINA YERESHENKO Subject: Re: height and gender bodies - Xena Comments: To: Luz Guerra In-Reply-To: <3417EC43.6031@ibm.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Luz Guerra wrote: > > I find XENA entertaining on various levels, and I love the size > difference between the powerful (butch?) Xena and her diminuitive female > companion -- who Xena almost always defers to on matters of heart/spirit > (true power?). What do you think about Callisto? She seems a better warrior than Gabrielle, and a thinner/younger/more attractive woman than Xena. She's also evil. Sometimes I wonder if a young attractive blonde who fights better than men _could_ be cast as a good character (apart from the impression than the woman who plays Callisto is a way better actress than Lucy Lawless, with all due respect). Or is it imperative that a girl who's strong, smart, and beautiful, has to be a bitch? Marina "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society happens to be selling at the time." Naomi Wolf ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 22:10:35 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: MARINA YERESHENKO Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > I've lived my entire life in the upper midwest of the > United States, but I pick things up with my toes all the time. Of course > everyone I know thinks it's weird. > > Perhaps a survey is in order. How many people on this list... > > Mike > Me too! :) I grew up in Central Asia and as a kid, walked barefoot a lot. However, I don't think it somehow affects upper/lower body strength relation. Besides, I've never heard that women's lower bodies were stronger than men's. Why would that be? Marina "Femininity is code for femaleness plus whatever society happens to be selling at the time." Naomi Wolf ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 22:21:51 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In-Reply-To: <970910184910_-565588754@emout17.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit > They make a lot of noise because they are extremely high strung, >not because >they are not tough. Would you want to take on a rat as big as you are? > > Pat also says, "I don't make a lot of noise. I'm really very >quiet." Which >is true, though I have a wonderful story involving Patrick and Harlan >Ellison. > > All best, Eleanor A. Eleanor, Okay, what I was trying to say was that I subscribe to the idea that truly strong and tough people don't need to yell and make a bunch of noise. I'm thinking of Clint Eastwood here, whose characters I consider the toughest I've seen. It's easy to tune out somebody yelling since we live in a noisy world, but try tuning out silence or a whisper. In my case, I automatically strain to hear it. It's a convoluted issue, I suppose, but to bring it to FemSF, in my stories, I try to make my female characters who are tough be as quiet, menacingly so, as possible not because I don't want to hear from them but because I believe, clichéd as it is, that actions speak louder than words. -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 23:57:52 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Ada Lovelace: was: Re: New Female Identities In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Nalo Hopkinson wrote: > BTW, last evening I saw the indie sf film "Conceiving Ada" by Lynn > Hershman Leeson. It's about a woman scientist who tries to recreate Ada > Lovelace, daughter of poet Lord Byron, and the person who seems to have > invented the first computer program in 1843 (this is from the program > notes--from the film, I understood her to have invented the first > computer programming language, inspired by Charles Babbage's 'calculating > engine). Honourably intentioned film, but I found it to be really clunky > science fiction. Seemed to have been written by someone who neither > knows the genre, nor felt any responsibility to check her science. For > instance, at one point a doctor forbids a perfectly healthy, active woman > with a normal pregnancy from exercising until her pregnancy is over. I > don't want this to turn into a spoiler so I'll stop here, but if anyone > else sees it, I'd love to hear what you think. Ada Lovelace sounds like > a great topic for a feminist sf treatment. > > -nalo I believe Lovelace is a character in Gibson and Sterling's The Difference Engine. Wasn't it typical of Victorian medical idiocy (at least as applied to women of the middle and upper classes) to treat even a healthy pregnancy as if it were a severe illness and attempt to severely curtail the woman's lifestyle? Mike ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 00:04:01 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of wome In-Reply-To: <970910184551_792869229@emout16.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Eleanor Arnason wrote: > I just checked with Patrick, who is not only small but grew up with > terriers. They are ratting dogs and extremely good at what they do. According > to Pat, she's seen terriers go after rats almost as big as they are. > Eleanor, When did Patrick become a "she"? First Raphael, then Al, now Patrick? What brave new world that has such gender confusion in it! Mike ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 08:03:31 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, MARINA YERESHENKO wrote: > a lot. However, I don't think it somehow affects upper/lower body > strength relation. NH: Sorry, didn't mean to imply a correlation between the two. Just went off on a wingy tangent, which I'm wont to do. > Besides, I've never heard that women's lower bodies > were stronger than men's. Why would that be? NH: *Proportionally* stronger, as I understand it. I was taught it when I was a fitness instructor. No theories as to why it's so. -nalo "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the small fruit that you eat." -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 08:06:30 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Ada Lovelace: was: Re: New Female Identities In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > > Wasn't it typical of Victorian medical idiocy (at least as applied to > women of the middle and upper classes) to treat even a healthy > pregnancy as if it were a severe illness and attempt to severely curtail > the woman's lifestyle? NH: This was a doctor in 1998, instructing the protagonist (the scientist who's trying to recreate Ada). But yes, the film does at one point show bits of Ada's life in her time, and quite vividly depicts her doctor's attitude to women and pregnancy. -nalo > "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the small fruit that you eat." -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 07:27:38 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >> Besides, I've never heard that women's lower bodies >> were stronger than men's. Why would that be? > >NH: *Proportionally* stronger, as I understand it. I was taught it when >I was a fitness instructor. No theories as to why it's so. > >-nalo > I thought it was potentially stronger. Maybe it's both... -Sean ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 13:50:28 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: L Garforth Subject: Re: SF and Ecology In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970904100618.006be798@tezcat.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 4 Sep 1997, Neil Rest wrote: > I read it quite a while ago, so my impressions are clearer in my memory > than details. I recall, for instance, the use of foams for things like > housing. The combination of characteristics, chemical and phusical, > necessary for a substance to be used for fast-setting foam houses is long > and complex. There is nothing anywhere near the combination of cheap, > easy, not-too-high-tech, and environmentally innocuous taken for granted in > the book. Disciplines like chemistry, materials engineering, process > engineering are extremely complex. So maybe he just didn't set it far enough in the future? The point here is surely as much to do with the social context of sci/tech research, and the social choices 'we' make (hmm, right) about which avenues are pursued as the complexity or difficulty of the particular science involved? I mean, I suppose, can we distinguish between scientific and social (im)possibility? By the way thanks for clarifying and sorry to pick up on it after so long; my e-mail access is limited to work and I'm not here all that often. > > Of course. It is impossible for me to walk up the side of a building. It > is impossible to light a mtach on a bar of soap. It is impossible to state > a logical argument, or a truth, in such a way that everyone will agree to it. > > (On the other hand, I've been vigorously recommending _Ecology and > Revolutionary Action_ [if I got the title precisely right!] for decades, > just about since Murray Bookchin wrote it.) Good - Bookchin is my favourite green guru too. I'm re-reading _Woman on the Edge of Time_ at the moment and I'm really noticing how much Piercy's ideas run parallel to Bookchin's brand of social ecology; she seems too to intuitively grasp the connectedness between domination and subjection of peoples and that of nature to culture without reducing either one to the other. Thanks! Lisa ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 08:59:00 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Huey Alcaro Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At the time Lovelace lived, pregnant women were told to avoid exercise, as well as just about everything, including going out and about in public. Huey >On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > >> >> Perhaps a survey is in order. How many people on this list... >> >> Mike > >NH: LOL! Yeah, how many prehensile-toed people out there? Now, *that's* >science fiction! (Oh, hell; let me explain that last sentence; I went to >the Clarion sf writers' workshop in '95, where the question "Why is this >science fiction?" seemed to come up a lot in critiques. After a while, >we started to invent really silly responses to it.) > >BTW, last evening I saw the indie sf film "Conceiving Ada" by Lynn >Hershman Leeson. It's about a woman scientist who tries to recreate Ada >Lovelace, daughter of poet Lord Byron, and the person who seems to have >invented the first computer program in 1843 (this is from the program >notes--from the film, I understood her to have invented the first >computer programming language, inspired by Charles Babbage's 'calculating >engine). Honourably intentioned film, but I found it to be really clunky >science fiction. Seemed to have been written by someone who neither >knows the genre, nor felt any responsibility to check her science. For >instance, at one point a doctor forbids a perfectly healthy, active woman >with a normal pregnancy from exercising until her pregnancy is over. I >don't want this to turn into a spoiler so I'll stop here, but if anyone >else sees it, I'd love to hear what you think. Ada Lovelace sounds like >a great topic for a feminist sf treatment. There's also a cameo >appearance by Timothy Leary, who was obviously in the latter stages of >cancer when they filmed--he was absolutely gaunt. That was difficult to >watch; reminded me of my dad's death from cancer. > >-nalo > > >> > >"There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the >small fruit that you eat." > -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 09:11:40 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Joel VanLaven Subject: Re: New Female Identities (was average heights of women and men, which was GI Jane) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 11 Sep 1997, Nalo Hopkinson wrote: > BTW, last evening I saw the indie sf film "Conceiving Ada" by Lynn > Hershman Leeson. It's about a woman scientist who tries to recreate Ada > Lovelace, daughter of poet Lord Byron, and the person who seems to have > invented the first computer program in 1843 (this is from the program > notes--from the film, I understood her to have invented the first > computer programming language, inspired by Charles Babbage's 'calculating > engine). Honourably intentioned film, but I found it to be really clunky > science fiction. Seemed to have been written by someone who neither > knows the genre, nor felt any responsibility to check her science. For > instance, at one point a doctor forbids a perfectly healthy, active woman > with a normal pregnancy from exercising until her pregnancy is over. I > don't want this to turn into a spoiler so I'll stop here, but if anyone > else sees it, I'd love to hear what you think. Ada Lovelace sounds like > a great topic for a feminist sf treatment. There's also a cameo > appearance by Timothy Leary, who was obviously in the latter stages of > cancer when they filmed--he was absolutely gaunt. That was difficult to > watch; reminded me of my dad's death from cancer. As an Ada programmer with a particular interest in feminist matters, I happen to know alot about the subject. I don't know anything about child-rearing aspects. However, here is a synopsis of her life as I know it. The only legitimate daughter of Lord Byron, her mother was very, very pissed with her father (wonder why) and didn't want Ada to be anything like him. So, she hired all sorts of Math tutors for her daughter who seemed to have talent in Math. Our Hero was a very good mathematician who (among other things) translated some really important math text from one language to another (which involves a lot of math). She became "best friends" with Charles Babbage who was working on mechanical calculation "engines" that are considered the first modern computers (conceptually). Ada helped him with that work and (among other things) described how one "engine" could be used to do many different problems by combining intermediate results and so on... Since that is the essence of computer programming, she is consider the first computer programmer. She also explored the essence of computing from a theoretical perspective and is so consdered one of the first computer scientists. The language Ada was designed in the late-70's early-80's at the request and funding of the US department of defence. (they pushed a lot in computers) and was named in her honor. In Ada's personal life: she became an alcoholic and compulsive gambler. She finally kicked those habits only to get cancer and die in her 30's just after coming to terms with who her father was. She was buried beside him at her request. _The Difference Engine_ by Gibson and Sterling is a Steam-Punk novel in which Ada is an elusive, revered genius who in addition to being a compulsive gambler and an alcoholic is also flighty and promiscuous. A sort of idiot savant if you ask me. She may have actually been that way but I certainly don't want to think so. -- Joel VanLaven ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 09:24:56 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Huey Alcaro Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (was: GI Jane and In-Reply-To: <199709091150.HAA48908@pilot12.cl.msu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Carrie, Can you provide the source for the info below? I'd like to use it in connection with a course I teach. Thank you. Huey >This is certainly true. In psychology experiments, subjects (American >college students) have been shown >pictures of a woman or a man standing next to a doorway or other reference >object and asked to guess the person's height. People estimate women to be >shorter than men who are actually the same height. This holds true even when >the people are *told* that a set of photographs is "matched" for height, i.e. >for each picture of a woman in the set there is a picture of a man of exactly >the same height. Women also tend to do this as much as men. > >--Carrie > >******************************************************************************* >Carrie A. Preston Carrie A. Preston >348 Mason Hall 3626 Cambrey Drive >Michigan State University Lansing, MI 48906 >East Lansing, MI 48825 (517) 321-0317 >(517) 355 2136 >presto10@pilot.msu.edu >***************************************************************************** >There is water at the bottom of the ocean. > --David Byrne >******************************************************************************* >* ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 10:10:25 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Tanya Wood Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (not about sf and f) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Dear all (especially Nalo), I've been interested to read the discussion...Did you know I've always wondered why, at the gym, my lower body is at least as strong as the males (pumped up gym jocks excepted) on wieghts, and my upper body is, well, pathetic, really. Nice to know I'm not suffering from some wierd deformation (although I have noticed the same trend in other women). When I was at school, I asked my (female) gym teacher what the cross-over between less hearty males and fit women was in terms of running: and she answered 3%: i.e. only the top 3% of women are faster than the the bottom 3% of men: is this not a major under-estimation? I was quite depressed about this. It seemed wrong (not to mention unjust) to me, looking over my class mates: the young women seemed alot more impressive than they were being given credit for, and the young men a lot less. I read, the other week, an article in our local "Outreach" magazine, which really pissed me off, about the recently started female basketball league. The columnist said it was both boring and a waste of time as women were obviously simply not any good at basketball (compared to men), and then painted himself as a heroic anti- political correctness warrior for daring to point out that women were shorter and less strong than men.Wish I could throw this stuff back in his face- obviously wants us out of the gym, chained barefooted to the stove, and not doing any sport at all. I know that this is not sf&f discussion, but its still the feminist part. How about a tag on the subject line, marking off less directly list relevant stuff out, so people can hit the delete key more easily, if digressions are annoying? Tanya. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 11:13:18 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (not about sf and f) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 12 Sep 1997, Tanya Wood wrote: > How about a tag on the subject line, marking off less directly list > relevant stuff out, so people can hit the delete key more easily, if > digressions are annoying? NH: Yeah, there's a thought. Listmistress, any rulings? As to women athletes, I think it was my athlete brother who told me that as it becomes more expected to have female high performance athletes and women in general who exercise more, women athletes' records are getting closer to the mens'. The variances we've talked about will probably always be there, but they are less likely to be exaggerated by systemic barriers that prevented women from getting physical. -nalo "There are two kinds of dates; the kind that you go out with, and the small fruit that you eat." -my aunt ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 10:42:39 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Kate Bolin Subject: For anyone who will be in New Orleans in early December MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Poppy Z. Brite will be doing a reading of her new book, a Courtney Love biography, at Tulane University's Newcomb College Center for Research On Women on December 3rd at 7 pm If you want a chance to tell her she's a hack....there's your opportunity... ;) Kate Bolin webmistress at the Center ------------------------------------------------------------------------- "But never forget who I was, what I am, and what I can do." --Delenn Kate Bolin http://studentweb.tulane.edu/~kbolin Dymphna http://studentweb.tulane.edu/~kbolin/dymphna Delenn Deserves Better http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Cavern/9060 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 12:14:24 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Debra Euler Subject: For anyone who will be in New Orleans in early December -Reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Poppy Z. Brite may be a hack, but she's a rich hack. She got a disgustingly large advance for the Courtney Love bio. Debra Euler ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 12:58:03 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sean Johnston Subject: Re: Average heights of women and men (not about sf and f) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" and she >answered 3%: i.e. only the top 3% of women are faster than the the bottom >3% of men: is this not a major under-estimation? I was quite depressed >about this. It seemed wrong (not to mention unjust) Perhaps the sample wasn't big enough, but how can a