From LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU Tue Dec 29 16:03:42 1998 Date: Tue, 29 Dec 1998 17:57:47 -0600 From: "L-Soft list server at University of Illinois at Chicago (1.8c)" To: lquilter@HOOKED.NET Subject: File: "FEMINISTSF LOG9811D" ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 12:03:07 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 22-11-1998 1:19, S.M. Stirling said: >-- if morals are arbitrary matters of preference, then there is no >alternative >to settling all disputes by power -- ie., force and terror. > >Is female genital mutliation just another local custom, immune from judgement >by outsiders, for example? While giving out free copies of The Critique of Pure Reason will abolish genital mutilation worldwide, eh? But I suppose Kant is another Evil Man, since he *did* say that any universal moral could only be formal, and without specific content. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 07:41:38 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: *Dark Water's Embrace* MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit J Dawley: > And homosexuality is strictly forbidden. As in reality, this doesn't mean it never happens... And maybe it will mean the survival of the colony.> S P O I L E R S P A C E I would not say that it is homosexuality that is the potential salvation. The book is very clear about the fact that three participants are need to conceive healthy children in that the humans have now mutated into something "alien". They now need their own "Sa". This is a new paradigm, not homosexuality. >I thought its treatment of sexuality and the pain of being >an outsider was very moving > Yes, agree completely. However I was ultimately disappointed with the conservative message. That alternate sexual behavior should/must be accepted because it is the new means of pro-creation. This is not the same advance/growth for the community as learning to accept alternative sexual interactions because that is what people choose to do. It is suggested that the world Gabriella came from accepted the fact the she had a marriage partner that was female. Her sexual choice was despised when fertile women became a scarce resource. I do not see sexual choice in and of itself being argued for in the colony. The colonists are being asked to accept a new (and required for survival) means of procreation. donna ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 11:13:30 -0500 Reply-To: Kate.Elliott@sff.net Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Alis Rasmussen Subject: The Gate to Women's Country MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Kirsten wrote: >I didn't find GATE to be moral at all -in fact it struck me as downright > perverse. To say that men are simply natural-born killers, that they're > damaged, and the only way to *fix* them is to *kill them all off* except for > those few sports that lacked the killer genes -- Lady! This is --my-- first post to the list, but I wanted to respond to defend, I guess, a novel that I like a great deal. This is how I have interpreted GATE, of course, but I think the points Candice brought up about Greek mythology are key to understanding the book: That is, that it is a tragedy, and written as such. I never understood that the point of the book was that men are natural born killers but rather that --these-- people in --this-- situation decided on this mechanism, however flawed it is, to 'save' what remained of society. Without the Greek mythos embedded in the text, I would agree with your assessment, but with it, I think Tepper opens up an entire deeper level of meaning: that Stavia and the others know that what they're doing is in many ways morally horrific. This is how I've always read the book, but again, I read it as a tragedy. Alis ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 10:44:18 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country (potential spoiler stuff) Comments: To: Kate.Elliott@sff.net MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Alis Rasmussen wrote: > Without the Greek mythos embedded in the text, I would agree with your > assessment, but with it, I think Tepper opens up an entire deeper level > of meaning: that Stavia and the others know that what they're doing is > in many ways morally horrific. > > This is how I've always read the book, but again, I read it as a > tragedy. > > Alis I agree. I would also like to add a couple more points: 1. References to Telemachus: The men in the garrison evoke the name of Telemachus. In the Odyssey Telemachus is looking for his father (Odysseus). It is his driving force. The men in GTWC are also, in a profound sense, "looking for their fathers." There is more about Telemachus to pay attention to with reference to GTWC, by the way. 2. The men in my Population and Culture class were not offended by GTWC, but rather intrigued by the politics and the eugenics and ecological implications. One man told the class that he found himself thinking about whether he would have been one of the men who remained in the garrison, or whether he would have been one of the men who returned through the Women's Gate. Several students responded by talking about social pressure. Even the women had considered what they might have done under the same circumstances. In addition to reading the book as tragedy, one might also read it from the perspective of inner developmental struggles -- in other words, viewing the characters are archetypes involved in life-course decisionmaking, ala Bolen, Erickson, Jung, etc. Candice Bradley Appleton WI ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 13:07:19 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country, Mythology, Greece SPOI... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/21/98 6:31:15 PM Mountain Standard Time, MythKC@AOL.COM writes: << Telling the Big Lie like that certainly didn't seem very "womanly" to me. Plus the hidden agenda to eliminate gays because they didn't fit the Plan . . . I mean, all of it, it was quite a nightmare scenario to me. -- agreement. It all seemed rather fascist to me. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 13:51:05 CST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Barbara Benesch-Granberg Subject: Re: Off to See the Wizard MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Gemini Walker wrote: >A search on amazon.com brought up for me > > Wicked: the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West > >...is that the true title? Because of it is, I will order it. If >it's not the same book, then I will continue to look for the one you >mention. > >...geminiwalker >chuard@earthlink.net >http://home.earthlink.net/~chuard Yup, that's it - blame my faulty memory for the confusion. Barbara Benesch-Granberg BJBenesch@hotmail.com ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 14:13:36 CST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Barbara Benesch-Granberg Subject: Re: vampire jobs MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Jennifer Krauel wrote: >At 02:17 PM 11/13/98 -0500, SM wrote: >>In a message dated 11/13/98 7:41:14 AM Mountain Standard Time, >>Robin_Reid@TAMU-COMMERCE.EDU writes: >> >>>I esp. love the werewolf one)--heartily recommended.> >> >> >>-- heartily recommended here as well; they're a hoot, and very >>skillfully done. The werewolves run a sheep farm, and were involved >>in the Dutch Resistance during WWII. ("they're very territorial", >>as one character remarks.) She does a beautiful job of showing >>'humans' who have rather 'doggy' natures, pack organization, >>scent-clues and all. > >Can you please cite an exact title reference here for my shopping >list? The werewolf one is Blood Trail - others in the series are Blood Lines, Blood Pact, and Blood Price. I haven't read the others yet, but I heartily recommend Blood Trail as well - I'm a big fan of werewolf stories of all sorts, and I really liked the werewolf sheep farmers. Very very cool. Barbara Benesch-Granberg BJBenesch@hotmail.com ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 12:31:06 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country & Tepper's concept of evil In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sun, 22 Nov 1998 10:44:18 CST." <36583F62.F86F6CB2@athenet.net> I think it's also worth noting that Sheri Tepper seems to really favor the idea that evil is *not* inherent in human nature, that true, ideal humanity has had evil removed from it. So in GtWC there's a breeding program to breed out evil (though I too found that the way in which she dealt with homosexuality was, at best, poorly thought out). In her _True Game_ series, most explicitly in the Jinian books, evil is an absence of true humanity. In _Gibbon's Decline and Fall_, it's essentially inected from the outside. I forget the exact setup in the _Marianne_ books, but I think there's something similar. She's certainly got some groups of people who come in for a lot of heat, but I think it's worth considering this overall philosophy if you're trying to figure out (O unrewarding task!) just what she was thinking. Now, although she does explore the ways in which normally-good people can behave badly, I still don't find her paradigm wholly convincing. But I love GtWC, and the fact that I think the "science" of it (breeding out aggression) is flawed doesn't make the book less enjoyable. There are some brilliant snippets of people living outside the norms, people clearly happy that way; it's obvious that the women of the Council believe that what they do is horrible but necessary. The scenario of Women's Country isn't put forward as the Right Way: it's a picture of what would happen if you decided to do it. I also just love Tepper's writing. She's got the best made-up names ever, and she's got an amazingly fertile imagination. I like her books in part because of their exploration of feminist issues, but also because they're fun to read. When I reread _The True Game_ last year, when it was reissued, I recognized all kinds of hints at the politics that become more overt in her later books (the stagnation of academia and the situations in which men use women as non-person breeding objects are two images I found); but when I read them the first time, I just thought it was the most amazingly fascinating imaginary world I'd seen in ages. jessie ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 15:43:46 +0100 Reply-To: terriergraphics@cybertours.com Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Terri Wakefield Organization: Terrier Graphic Design Subject: Re: vampire jobs MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit If you like werewolves, have you read Pat Murphy's NADYA yet? Set in the 1830's, two women traveling West, one of them a wolfwoman. A dark fantasy, with a bit of American history thrown in. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I'd love to see this book developed into a series. Terri > I haven't read the others yet, but I heartily recommend Blood Trail as > well - I'm a big fan of werewolf stories of all sorts, and I really > liked the werewolf sheep farmers. Very very cool. > > Barbara Benesch-Granberg > BJBenesch@hotmail.com > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 18:35:26 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: *Dark Water's Embrace* (SPOILERS) In-Reply-To: <001d01be1615$73655e60$47b11b26@donna> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit At 07:41 AM 11/22/98 -0500, Donna Simone wrote: >I would not say that it is homosexuality that is the potential salvation. >The book is very clear about the fact that three participants are need >to conceive healthy children in that the humans have now mutated into >something "alien". They now need their own "Sa". This is a new >paradigm, not homosexuality. I guess I was trying not to get into too much detail in my original summary. What I meant is that if Anaïs had not been interested in a sexual relationship with another woman then she never would have discovered her capabilities as a "sa". Of course, if she were *only* interested in women it wouldn't have worked either. >I was ultimately disappointed with the conservative message. That >alternate sexual behavior should/must be accepted because it is the >new means of pro-creation. This is not the same advance/growth for >the community as learning to accept alternative sexual interactions >because that is what people choose to do. I don't think that was the intended message, though I guess it's easy to take it that way. There are two main reasons I don't think Leigh meant it that way: Gabriela's story and the character of Dominic. Gabriela was not a "sa" but I certainly felt that the way she was treated was abominable and inexcusable. Though she wryly comments that maybe the rest of the survivors needed to scapegoat and shun someone to pull themselves closer together, I don't think this really holds up under examination. Shig and his son Dominic after him are simply intolerant and very powerful personalities and she and Anaïs pay the price. I think it's also obvious that the taboo against homosexuality serves no useful function -- it is merely hatemongering. (After all, they are perfectly capable of artificially inseminating women.) A question I thought was less well dealt with was, what if a woman doesn't want to have any children? And, by extension, what if a "sa" doesn't want to be a reproductive go-between? Some more questions I was left with: how exactly did Anaïs become a "sa"? It certainly wasn't through natural selection. It's implied that KaiSa's sacrifice had something to do with it, but aside from the intervention of some deity I can't see how it happened. And what was with the grumblers? Supposedly they were "devolved" descendents of the Miccail, but from the descriptions they seemed to be identical and they even seemed to speak the same language! Why were there no deformed or mutated specimens as there were among the humans? And how did they get to their present state? ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/jedhome.htm Listening to: Tori Amos -- From the Choirgirl Hotel "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 18:50:26 -0500 Reply-To: releon@syr.edu Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Rudy Leon Organization: Syracuse University Subject: Re: TGtWC, building utopia In-Reply-To: <199811222031.AA11509@nsl-too.pa.dec.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT One of the things I love best about Gate is that it takes on that part of utopian fiction which no one ever takes on -- the 'how' of creating that perfect world. And I think that one of the strongest lessons, for me, was that utopia never happens without tough choices by a few. Can you imagine trying to rebuild a world by a consensus- based process?! It would never get out of committee! As a side note, I also really loved how taken by surprise I was at the eugenics program. I can usually guess an ending before it happens, so anything so I really value any book as carefully crafted as Gate, with the answer in hidden in full plain sight from the go. When Starhawk came out with Walk to Mercury, I got very excited at first because I was dying to read the story of how a group of old ladies in San Francisco held back the forces of nihilism and built their perfect, groovy, consensual world. Needless to say, that wasn't Walk to Mercury... The closest I've seen for how one creates a world is Suzy Charnas' Furies, and from what I've heard, the fourth book, due out any day now, deals with more of Alldera and co's nitty gritty rebuilding of their world in the face of all their hatred and distrust. I'm *really* looking forward to it -- If Suzy is still onlist, maybe she could correct this if I have it wrong. When I taught Gate I tried to get at the differences between Iphigenia as it appears in Gate and as Euripedes (I think it was him) wrote it....they were so very very different that i didn't get very far. has anyone put sustained attention to that? Rudy Leon PhD Candidate Dept. of Religion Syracuse University releon@syr.edu ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 19:26:44 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Dark Water's Embrace* (SPOILERS) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit >......What I meant is that if Anaïs had not been interested in a sexual >relationship with another woman then she never would have discovered her >capabilities as a "sa". Of course, if she were *only* interested in women >it wouldn't have worked either.> Yes, but we are left room to suspect her interest was because she was a sa. The desire being a biologically determined thing even if the social structure was not there yet. >>I was ultimately disappointed with the conservative message. >> >I don't think that was the intended message, though I guess it's easy to >take it that way. > I agree to disagree >A question I thought was less well dealt with was, what if a woman doesn't want to have any children? And, by extension, what if a "sa" doesn't want to be a reproductive go-between?> Yes, I agree that this issue was not concluded in any satisfactory way. Or in a way that the author revealed clearly _what_ he was trying to say about it. >Some more questions I was left with: how exactly did Anaïs become a "sa"? >It certainly wasn't through natural selection.> The dark waters embrace. >It's implied that KaiSa's sacrifice had something to do with it, but aside from the intervention of some deity I can't see how it happened. And what was with the grumblers? Supposedly they were "devolved" descendents of the Miccail, but from the descriptions they seemed to be identical and they even seemed to speak the same language! Why were there no deformed or mutated specimens as there were among the humans? And how did they get to their present state?> In my reading (and it has been 4-5 months gone by now) the sacrifice of the Sa precipitated the eventual elimination of all Sa. This left the Miccail without the key DNA to prevent mutation. The Grumblers were mutated or "devolved" Miccail. The mutation due to effects of the "dark waters embrace". That is what they ended up as without the "healing/preventative" participation of the third sex. The parallel devolving being the humans deforming/mutating into the same alien constituency as the native Miccail/Grumblers and discovering the necessity for the Sa/third sex to prevent deformity/devolving completely. I am not being clear...but it has been awhile and i no longer have the book. I enthusiastically passed it on to more readers. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 23:04:25 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Re: TGtWC, building utopia Comments: To: releon@syr.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Rudy Leon wrote: "When I taught Gate I tried to get at the differences between Iphigenia as it appears in Gate and as Euripedes (I think it was him) wrote it....they were so very very different that i didn't get very far. has anyone put sustained attention to that?" Yes, it was Euripides. He wrote two plays about Iphigenia: Iphigenia in Auris and Iphigenia in Tauris. I too tried to pay attention to the differences -- even downloaded the actual play (there are several links on the web). But I didn't have time to sit and do a scene by scene comparison. I starting out by circling all the pieces of the play in Tepper's book. Alas. It's something I'd still like to do -- or better yet, take the easy way out by hearing from somebody else who actually managed to do it. I'd be curious if there were any published articles about GtWC and Greek mythology. Grad students (like Rudy!) often know these things! I have a little Iphigenia handout (links, info, artwork, music, text, my class discussion questions) that I gave the students when we discussed Tepper. I will share this with anyone who requests it. By the way, one of my students "reminded" me that Iphegenia's ghost and other characters in GtWC kept speaking about Helen as "that bitch" etc. I went back and read about Helen, and all I can figure is that Helen's weakness had been a seminal cause of the Trojan War. Candice Bradley Appleton, WI ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 01:50:02 -0400 Reply-To: asaro@sff.net Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Catherine Asaro Subject: She is really Kate Elliott MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Alis Rasmussen wrote: > This is --my-- first post to the list, but I wanted to respond ... Alis!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Welcome to the listserv. Folks, Alis is being much too demure ... For those of you who don't know, Miss Rasmussen also happens to be Kate Elliott, author of the JARAN series, the KING'S DRAGON Cycle, and THE GOLDEN KEY, with Jenifer Roberson and Melanie Rawn. Among other books. :-) She is also tuckerized in my next book, as a brilliant mathematician who makes a cameo appearance to save the day with her genius. Best regards Catherine Asaro http://www.sff.net/people/asaro/ ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 11:16:24 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: TGtWC, building utopia Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 23-11-1998 6:04, Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne said: >By the way, one of my students "reminded" me that Iphegenia's ghost and >other characters in GtWC kept speaking about Helen as "that bitch" etc. I >went back and read about Helen, and all I can figure is that Helen's >weakness had been a seminal cause of the Trojan War. This is the story as I was thaught it when very young - I don't know if it's the version of the Iliad, but I guess so. (I don't know if what you wanted to know was the legend itself, we get thaught this things very early in our schools but then we have a fixation on the silliest aspects of classical culture that you don't, I think, so in the off chance that you don't know the legend I'll tell it: I don't want to sound patronizing, but when I was in Critters I *did* read a critique by a quite well-educated person that didn't know who Priamus was). Once Paride (?), one of the sons of Priamus king of Troy, was called upon to judge the relative beauty of Aphrodite, Hera and Atena. All of them tried to rig the vote, Hera promising him uncounted riches, Atena infinite wisdom, and Aphrodite the love of the world's most beautiful woman. Paride chose Aphrodite, and therefore she made Helen fall in love with him. The other two goddesses didn't appreciate and swore to destroy him and his city. Helen was the wife of Menelaus (I guess: I know all this names in their Italian version) king of, if I'm not mistaken, Sparta. She eloped with Paride and when Priamus refused to send her back the Acheus (?) princes waged war on the city. Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnonn, was then sacrificed to ensure that the war was favourable. The greeks always held what people did beacuse a god made them against them. Don't ask me. Ask them. ;-) Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 11:31:27 -0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anna Mazzoldi Organization: Freelance Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF In-Reply-To: <1c7661cd.36575878@aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On 21 Nov 98, S.M. Stirling wrote: > Is female genital mutliation just another local custom, immune from > judgement by outsiders, for example? I don't know how many times I've seen this specific example quoted in discussion of cultural relativism or relative morality (in all kinds of forums, both Net and RL). Are there no other examples around, that people seem to be able only to come up with this one? What's the exact fascination with it? --- Anna Mazzoldi writing from Dublin, Ireland mazzoldi@iol.ie http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/ (Translation links and more) <*> I know a good tagline when I steal one. <*> ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 08:44:49 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: TGtWC, building utopia Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Re the several posts, questions and comments on GTWC and the Greek myth... I was intrigued that Tepper used this particular story as the glue in her book. It resonates with feminist issues. For instance -- the Euripides version is slightly different from the "standard" re-tellings of the story from Homer. It is more sympathetic to Iphegenia and her mother Clytemnestra than other versions, even in his own time. The fact that Iphegenia loves and forgives her father (scenes in the play between them are sweet and rather homey) and willingly hands herself over is a contrast to a more traditional idea of the girl fighting her fate. (Tepper, I think bought into this willingness to sacrifice for the "greater good.") Iphegenia's father, Agamemnon, insulted Artemis by boasting he was a better hunter than she and by violating her sacred grove. She stilled the winds so that the ships could not sail to assault Troy. In order to make the winds blow, Agamemnon sacrificed Iphegenia. That's the bottom line but it is not that simple. Agamemnon sent word to Clytemnestra to bring Iphegenia (her favorite and youngest daughter) so that the girl could be betrothed to Achilles, the great young warrior/hero. He lied. He kills the girl. Clytemnestra never forgives him and eventually -- after the devastating war with Troy in which both sides lose much although the Greeks presumably "won" -- Clytemnestra kills her husband to avenge her daughter's death. Some critics read into the story of the Trojan War, which begins here with the ships sailing (made possible only by the sacrifice of Iphegenia), a metaphor for the patriarchal Greeks overwhelming the matriarchal Trojans. The murder of Iphegenia echoes on and on. Her mother kills her father. The son (Orestes) then kills his mother and is pursued by the furies for the matricide. All the father/mother/daughter/son turmoil and death in the ancient story seemed to me to be a perfect fit for Tepper's investigation. best, phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 07:58:13 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Re: Foucault (oh dear, OT again) >>> Lesley Hall 11/20 2:49 PM >>> My own worst complaint about F is his falsely-universalist stance; i.e. he never comes out and positions himself in his arguments - much of his historical stuff (esp on sexuality) is very French-specific but he makes a lot of generalising assertions ...one of my former professors (and favorite people), the woman who introduced me to Foucault, moved from Minneapolis to Laramie (and yes, while visiting her I did visit the famous Michael Shepherd bar, I think) This move caused her to repudiate most of her previous beliefs, or at least modify them. (That's another story...it's like living in a foreign country out in Laramie--I mean, the whole town really reminded me of living in the foreign community abroad--really insular, with a huge pressure to conform but also a an ability to tolerate/smooth over certain kinds of differences.) And her remark about Foucault was that while criticizing other people's totalizing narratives, he created a meta-totalization, the whole post-modern take on things. As I understand it, there's been people from outside N.America and Europe challenging the whole modern/post-modern periodization and with it the inherent Western/First World bias of postmodernism. That is, say they, modernism--with its specific forms of industrialization and abuse--ended in the First World but rolled on elsewhere. So the Foucauldian outlook (what a heady thing it must be for dear Michel to have become an adjective) only applies in a very limited fashion. There's also a very fine song by a band called Scritti Politti (by "fine", I mean oleaginous and Eurotrashy...) called "Jacques Derrida"....Imagine a drum machine, a sort of bosa nova kind of thing. And I will quote for you: "I'm in love with Jacques Derrida/read a page and I know I needta/Take apart my baby's heart...." It goes on into an actual approximate overview of Derrida. Just to recap, if anyone else would like to discuss Foucault and his charms and failings off-list, that would be just peachy, and you can feel free to email me. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 08:23:13 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Re: Foucault (oh dear, OT again) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit >>> "S.M. Stirling" 11/20 10:32 PM >> -- well, no. I responded with an attack on Foucault's ideology, combined with examples of how it worked in his own life. He was, after all, a philosopher and philosophy is the study of how we should live. (Jane continues, in High Dudgeon (I've spent years studying High, or Classical, Dudgeon, and can converse in Low with effort and a dictionary) Begging your pardon, but I didn't feel that you made an adaquate case that Foucault's life was bad because he elected to follow his own philosophy. Nor do I feel that you dealt in any detail with the actual content of his work. You made some generalizations and then referred to a television interview from the sixties. My Lord, I've been on television, and I would hate to be judged on my appearance there. You allege that Foucault is a bad person based on some rather vague allegations about his behavior after being diagnosed with AIDS, without telling us where you read them or giving details--did he choose to practice unsage sex without warning his partners? Did he continue to practice S/M? What? (And I'd like to add that as far as historians can tell, Abraham Lincoln knowly passed syphilis along to his wife, which rendered her the crazy and unpleasant woman so often reviled by historians. Does this behaviour--which I would label radically evil, given that there wasn't even the medical care now available for AIDS available then for syphilis--render Lincoln's political philosophy also radically evil? ) Mind you, I'm not saying that you don't have your facts right. Since I don't know your sources, I have no idea. But if you're going to get down to the nitty gritty about Foucault's sexual behaviour without sourcing it, then yes, it does seem a smidge ad hominum. Speaking of which, how do you feel about Foucault's homosexuality and his involvement in S/M? I do hope that neither of these things are factors in your designation of Foucault as "radically evil". Just as a fact check: when did Foucault speak approvingly of the Khmer Rouge? There was a period before the real news came out of Phnom Penh when even Noam Chomsky spoke words of qualified approval. For all I know, Foucault approved of them till the bloody end, but it is worth knowing the date on this. Geez. I'm not even that big a fan of Foucault. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 09:02:41 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit >>> "S.M. Stirling" 11/21 6:19 PM >>> Is female genital mutliation just another local custom, immune from judgement by outsiders, for example? It might be more productive, on occassion, to use slightly less inflamatory examples. That way we could, perhaps, argue without the ick factor, and then apply the results to the more emotionally fraught issues. This way, we just have the subtext that SM Stirling is heroically against FGM, while by implication Foucault and the rest of us are ignoring, tolerating or encouraging it. Which is patently ludicrous. But heck, I'll deal with it. Okay. Let's say that both I and someone who supports hacking off women's labia are moral absolutists. (See? I don't flinch from the ick factor) Since we are patently not interested in the material causes for either stance, or interested in historicizing what's happening, we'll just talk philosophy. I say I'm right. God says so. Or possibly Rousseau, or Wollstonecroft. The other person says he's right, and cites tribal legend, native philosophy, or Victorian ideas about women. (That's right, lots of FGM in the West, that haven of humanitarian concern and feminism) We sit and argue philosophy for a while, and then I decided to take my Western weapons and overrun his country. Because neither of us actually has any proof beyond the plausibility of our arguements. I find it really strange to believe that somehow, if we only adhere to our 18th century human rights doctrine, our adversaries will just knuckle under with no bloodshed. To conti! ! nue--after having overrun this fellow's country at tremendous loss of life, I will establish (let's assume) a totally disinterested state which will preserve local culture except for female genital mutilation. But meanwhile, I will be under vigorous air attack from the EU for my impossible trade policies, which cause loss of life and declining health for everyone. The question about female genital mutilation is what can be done about it--a question conveniently overlooked in debates about Western morality versus secular humanism. Because no one wants to talk about material causes or actual action--they just want to posture about their own moral stances. Which count for zero--ZERO mind you--if you aren't active in the world. Do we place nations that practice FGM under sanctions? What kind of sanctions? Iraq style sanctions? China style sanctions? This is leaving out the question of how we will respond to accusations of various abuses that will come up as soon as we try this. Do we really trust our country to disinterestedly apply sanctions to anyone? What really disturbs me is the reduction of actual human suffering to an ethics problem which is usually used as a club to beat those one disagrees with. To deal with this in moral relativist terms, I'd simply say that while you can make a pretty plausible case for FGM being horrible, painful, unjust and terrible, unless you have a direct telephone link to God, it's rather hard to prove that it's wrong in some absolute sense. It's rather hard to prove that the universe operates according to some large law of right and wrong, by which what humans do on one small planet is _wrong_. All it comes back to is two different people screaming at each other that their absolute moral systems don't permit each other to do things. Moral relativism, in short, is descriptive of how the world works. To bring this back to feminist sf, I am reminded of the language used by the Anarresti in the Dispossessed. When they wanted to say a thing was important, they said it was "central" rather than "higher". Analogously, we might do better to think of things as "unfair" or "cruel" rather than right or wrong. It's pretty easy to prove that FGM is unfair and cruel, and you can define those a little more easily anyway. If we wanted to position ourselves on the cutting edge of moral debate, we could work to integrate anthropological understandings of cultures WITH ideas of justice and fairness, rather than just dividing into opposite camps. BTW, SM Stirling, I attempted to post you some things on Foucault. Did you get my messages? My email is a little funny, and I'm not sure whether you are preparing to crush my puny intellect like a little bug or whether you just didn't get what I sent. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 11:16:53 -0400 Reply-To: Patricia Monk Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Patricia Monk Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF In-Reply-To: <199811231132.LAA30703@mail.iol.ie> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Female genital mutilation (a.k.a. "female circumcision") has always seemed to me to be the ultimate in culturally sanctioned mutilation and oppression of women by men. I doubt, however, that "fascination" is the word - at least, in the usual sense of the word - If John Brunner was right when he said "Absolute evil . . . consists of treating a human being as a thing" (Shockwave Rider), then certainly this act should qualify. I am coming to believe that "cultural relativism" may well be a politically correct weasel phrase to camoflage indifference to a problem, at least in some cases. But I don't have any idea where I can go from there. ************************************************************** Dr Patricia Monk patmonk@is.dal.ca Department of English Dalhousie University HALIFAX Nova Scotia B3H 2S3 ignorance is curable * stupidity is forever ************************************************************** On Mon, 23 Nov 1998, Anna Mazzoldi wrote: > On 21 Nov 98, S.M. Stirling wrote: > > > Is female genital mutliation just another local custom, immune from > > judgement by outsiders, for example? > > I don't know how many times I've seen this specific example > quoted in discussion of cultural relativism or relative morality > (in all kinds of forums, both Net and RL). Are there no other > examples around, that people seem to be able only to come up > with this one? What's the exact fascination with it? > > > --- > Anna Mazzoldi writing from Dublin, Ireland > mazzoldi@iol.ie > http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/ (Translation links and more) > > <*> I know a good tagline when I steal one. <*> > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 10:16:12 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: *Dark Water's Embrace* (SPOILERS) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit I wrote: > What I meant is that if Anaïs had not been interested in a sexual > relationship with another woman then she never would have discovered > her capabilities as a "sa". Of course, if she were *only* interested > in women it wouldn't have worked either. And donna simone replied: > Yes, but we are left room to suspect her interest was because she > was a sa. The desire being a biologically determined thing even if > the social structure was not there yet. Then how to explain Leigh's extremely sympathetic portrayals of lesbian women? I think we're talking around one another a little here... I thought it was clear that the way Gabriela was treated was NOT OK, despite the perceived reproductive imperatives of the rest of the group. I took his meaning to be more that some people will never become tolerant of difference unless they are forced to by bitter necessity. And some, like Dominic, will NEVER accept it. In Anaïs's case, she discovers that she holds a power that Dominic cannot challenge effectively, but even if she was not "sa", Dominic's behavior would not be "right," unless we are to assume that "might makes right". I think it's clear that Leigh does not believe that. As a side issue, didn't it seem odd that there wasn't a single gay man in the book? I wrote: > Some more questions I was left with: how exactly did Anaïs become a > "sa"? It certainly wasn't through natural selection. And donna simone returned: > The dark waters embrace. Yes. But how did it work? I was hoping for some explanation on Leigh's part, but there is none. Is the lake some kind of alien intelligence? Is there some kind of nanotechnology guiding the development of some species? And why only the Miccail and humans and not the other species on the planet? And why not just fix the males so their sperm was not defective? (Seems like that would be a little easier than creating a whole new sex!) I got the strong feeling that Leigh just sketched in these elements to create his "thought experiment" and was more concerned with the characters and the emotional part of the story. I wrote: > And what was with the grumblers? [...] And how did they get to > their present state?> donna again: > In my reading (and it has been 4-5 months gone by now) the sacrifice > of the Sa precipitated the eventual elimination of all Sa. This > left the Miccail without the key DNA to prevent mutation. The > Grumblers were mutated or "devolved" Miccail. The mutation due to > effects of the "dark waters embrace". That is what they ended up as > without the "healing/preventative" participation of the third > sex. What I was trying to say is that the grumblers did not seem different enough from the Miccail to explain their cultural collapse. But I can overlook that, I suppose. -- Janice E. Dawley ............. Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/jedhome.htm Listening to: Tori Amos -- From the Choirgirl Hotel "Reality is nothing but a collective hunch." - Lily Tomlin ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 10:48:39 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Debra Euler Subject: She is really Kate Elliott -Reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain >>>For those of you who don't know, Miss Rasmussen also happens to be Kate Elliott, author of the JARAN series, the KING'S DRAGON Cycle, and THE GOLDEN KEY, with Jenifer Roberson and Melanie Rawn. Among other books. Yes, like the upcoming THE BURNING STONE, which Alis will be diligently proofreading while everyone else is enjoying Thanksgiving dinner. Alis, you can't escape your editors...muwahahahahahahaha... Debra ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 11:00:33 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Re: BDG Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit >>> Mike Stanton 11/21 3:00 AM >>> , in 'qualtitative research', the researcher seeks to 'explain' rather than just 'measure', looks for 'meaning' rather than just 'facts', and 'participates' rather than just 'observes'. This is just what I mean about the need for mixed systems and the difficulties of social justice. Neither quantitative nor qualitative research seems like it's going to work alone. I mean, you can get all kinds of numbers, say, about anorexia nervosa. But those numbers don't tell you how to fix the problem, or even the exact cause. It's more prevalent among white upper middle class girls getting an advanced education than among anyone else--number show that. Does this mean that class pressures are the most serious? Does this mean that gender pressures affect lower class girls less, or does it mean that lower class girls have less leeway to express those pressures? You have to ask people their opinions, read journals, etc, etc, all of which doesn't exactly give you numerical exactitude. But all the while, anorexics are sitting in hospitals or at home, starving themselves. Eventually we have to take some kind of leap of faith and propose a cause and hence a treatment. And to get back to historicization, people writing about modern medical care have pointed out that one of the reasons biological causes for mental illness are a popular explanation is the decline in money for medical care. Why pay someone a lot to talk about your problems, when you can just medicate them away? Which is not to say that I don't believe in biological causes, just that there are other factors at work, one suspects. Can we talk about feminist sf soon? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 11:16:17 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Re: Re [*FSFFU*] "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit >>> Anthea Hartley Stanton 11/21 9:02 PM >>> Add to that the fact that the better brains avoid the mock sciences like the plague... (Smiling, but with the teeth revealed, even the chipped incisor.) Yes, that's right, the better brains work only with NUMBERS, which are PERFECT and reveal UNIVERSAL TRUTHS. Anything worth saying can be said with numbers. Honestly. I have friends among you science types, but speaking as a historian, well, hey, you all have egos the size of Norfolk. No offense or anything, but while I couldn't statistic my way out of a broom closet I am considered a dab hand with Qing Dynasty literature, and relatively reliable on American political movements and their roots. And isn't it a little convenient to define your discipline as the one that attracts the best minds? You know, they say that the best minds don't go into teaching, get involved with the soft sciences, or muddy themselves with politics. It must be awfully nice to be one of the best minds, since you don't actually have to work with actual people except for the ones who've been educated just like you. Well, back to wallowing in ignorance and self-deception. Splash! ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 11:48:08 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Moral relativism (OT)--was Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit >>> "S.M. Stirling" 11/21 6:16 PM >>> My favorite quote on _cultural_ relativism comes from something once said by Sir Charles Napier, a British provincial governor in India in the 1840's. " You may follow your national custom... and then -we- will follow -ours-." It would be a low form of arguement for me to point out the real nature of the British track record in India--where they behaved a deal better than in most of their colonial possessions. I did want to address this idea that all good things--humanitarianism, feminism, etc--originate in the West. Imbedded in this statement are several ideas: 1. That ideas have one origin point; 2. That somehow originating philosophy makes the West the "winner"; 3. That ideas exist in a kind of vacuum The idea of human rights began to develop in the West around the time that colonization was happening, and went on developing right through the great growth of various empires. This doesn't invalidate concepts of human rights or feminism, but it does reveal that a lot was going on in the West at this time. These ideas about human rights didn't stop colonial behavior every bit as disgraceful as suttee. Many cultures were mashed down under the Western boot; many of them, like India, went on to refine concepts of human rights that came from the West. To my mind, yeah, it's great to invent something, but improving and expanding that thing is pretty important too. I won't deal with Ghandi here, but if you look at the anti-logging initiatives run by women in south India--well, that's something we in the West have learned from. Or at least I have, as well as several people I know. (You could raise one arguement against Western human rights ideas--that we lie. We still kill people all over the world, we still support tyrants. But our constant self-agrandizing and philosophizing obscures what actually happens.) Western ideas of human rights, that is, grew right when the West was having major contacts with the non-West. It's not a matter disinterested Western people and so on. It's inaccurate to say that the East has no concept of human rights. Perhaps some of you have read Kurt Vonnegut's essay suggesting that all people group themselves into giant artificial families that have to provide help to their members? In old China, family obligation of that kind was taken tremendously seriously, much in the way Vonnegut describes it. Yeah, people fell through the cracks. Yeah, it's not the same as the Western concept. But the idea of ruthless Asians doing each other down in a barbaric struggle for supremacy--very Hegelian, in fact--well, that's just not true. (When Westerners first got to China, it seemed far more civilized than things were back home) But the point is, all this assumes that the study of history and philosophy is part of some big contest--like so many "bad" points for Asia prove forever that the West wins. Or so many bad pieces of colonial behaviour prove that the West is bankrupt. Neither West nor East is so monolithic, nor is it so easy to assess events. But then, as Paul Fussell obseved in his book BAD: the dumbing of America, Americans want easy knowledge, knowledge that doesn't challenge them or what they believe, or require any nuance. Yes, let's all cheer smug colonial governors who put down those bad Hindus with a few well chosen and patronizing words. After all, this conclusively proves the superiority of moral absolutism. Or of the West. Or that Foucault was some kind of bad icky fag. Or something. One more day while the universe burns. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:46:10 -0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Yvonne Rowse Subject: Family Tree MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I've just finished reading Family Tree by Sheri Tepper. I loved it, thought it was fabulous. So my question is, somewhere, not long since but lost in the list, someone referred to Gibbons and Family Tree as being below average Tepper. Why? I haven't read Gibbons yet but I really did like FT. Any comments anyone? Yvonne ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 10:12:57 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah Subject: Re: Family Tree In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 23 Nov 98 17:46:10 GMT." <000401be1709$42bed620$32055cc3@softnet> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >I've just finished reading Family Tree by Sheri Tepper. I loved it, thought >it was fabulous. So my question is, somewhere, not long since but lost in >the list, someone referred to Gibbons and Family Tree as being below average >Tepper. Why? I haven't read Gibbons yet but I really did like FT. I would suspect that this is because many people felt it ending up being (a) a bit too much male-bashing and (b) an excessive use of deus ex machina. I loved reading it, but at the end I found myself saying, "But...well, but...and what about...and where did that come from...and surely..." I don't want to spoil the surprises, which is why I'm not being more specific. So I felt that that was a flaw; and I've talked to several people who felt that it reduced their enjoyment of the book. I wouldn't say you shouldn't read it, though. jessie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 12:15:02 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Robin Reid Subject: _Gate to Women's Country_ Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Jeannette asked (I hope--sometimes the multiple layers of recopying makes me make mistakes): "I would be interested in knowing what list members think of books like The Gate to Women's Country and Shadow's End in particular - are they just examples of "let's just get rid of all the men and we'll have solved all our problems" genre of writing?" GATE is not my favorite one (GRASS/RAISING THE STONES/SIDWSHOW is probably in the top ranks), but it does not present an easy solution by getting rid of all the men. It is a feminist dystopia, rather than a utopia: the novel is set in a post-environmental (nuclear/) future in which only small communities have survived. The focus on North America leads to a rather homogenous culture--and the novel is also heterosexist in nature (seems to assume homosexuality does not exist). In one small community, the women control the government, economics, technology, etc.--in another, the men do. What happens over the course of a novel is one young woman from Women's Country grows up and ends up traveling to the patriarchal/religious/fundamentalist community (I think Tepper is much more in favor of getting rid of all patriarchally based fundamentalist religious fanatics, not just the men!). There is a sting in the society created by the women: male children can choose to leave the city for the camp of military male men who live outside the protect it (only one group of men, Servers??, live in the city, which is called "Women's Country."). I don't want to give away the ending which is quite a shocker if you make certain assumptions about women governing; I'll only note that many of the women do not know the "secrets" their government keeps, and there is a ritual public performance of a "revised" version of _The Trojan Woman_ which (argh forgot the original playwright's name!!!) which seems totally off the wall at the start but makes perfect sense at the end. Part of the young female protagonist's growing up is discovering the secrets of women's country! I find it a fascinating work, well worth your time, although the lack of ethnic and sexual diversity which bothers some readers have to be acknowldged. Robin ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 14:54:21 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 4:43:06 AM Mountain Standard Time, mazzoldi@IOL.IE writes: >Are there no other examples around, that people seem to be able only to come up with this one? What's the exact fascination with it?> -- because it's (a) horrible -- roughly equivalent to castration -- and (b) widespread -- hundreds of millions of women alive today have been mutilated. Personally, I would consider this to be a Very Bad Thing. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 14:57:35 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Debra Euler Subject: Re: Family Tree -Reply Comments: To: jss@PA.DEC.COM Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain >>> Jessie Stickgold-Sarah - 11/23/98 1:12 PM >>> >I've just finished reading Family Tree by Sheri Tepper. I loved it, >thought it was fabulous. So my question is, somewhere, not long since but >lost in the list, someone referred to Gibbons and Family Tree as being >below average Tepper. Why? I haven't read Gibbons yet but I really did >like FT. >> I would suspect that this is because many people felt it ending up being (a) a bit too much male-bashing and (b) an excessive use of deus ex machina. I loved reading it, but at the end I found myself saying, "But...well, but...and what about...and where did that come from...and surely..." I don't want to spoil the surprises, which is why I'm not being more specific. So I felt that that was a flaw; and I've talked to several people who felt that it reduced their enjoyment of the book. I wouldn't say you shouldn't read it, though. S P O I L E R S I was *really* disappointed with THE FAMILY TREE. I'm probably misremembering a lot, because I read the last 2/3 really quickly, just to get to the end. There were a lot of deus ex machina problems, and a definite female=good, male=bad theme. I found the "fantasy" scenes , before Tepper drops the bomb, quite charming, vintage Tepper, but I had a really hard time with the book once she revealed that these were intelligent talking animals. Why, for example, do these future non-humans (doesn't seem right to call them animals) live in analogues of pre-modern human societies? As far as I could tell, it was just to make the reader feel comfortable with the idea of the characters as sentient beings. Wasn't there any better way to do that? Especially from such a talented novelist? And once the big bomb dropped, that the horse-like beings were really humans who were acting as beasts of burden to the non-humans as penance for all the bad things humans did to animals, all I could do was roll my eyes and say, "Oh, come on!" Possibly the stupidest thing I have ever read from a writer I really admired. Debra ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 11:58:46 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah Subject: Re: She is really Kate Elliott -Reply In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 23 Nov 98 10:48:39 EST." Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >Yes, like the upcoming THE BURNING STONE, which Alis will be >diligently proofreading while everyone else is enjoying Thanksgiving >dinner. Hurrah! When's it coming out? jessie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 15:09:22 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 8:09:54 AM Mountain Standard Time, JFrankln@FAMPRAC.UMN.EDU writes: >Let's say that both I and someone who supports hacking off women's labia are moral absolutists. (See? I don't flinch from the ick factor) -- clitoris too. Often combined with sewing up the gentital opening, leaving only a tiny hole for urination. I've seen it. >Because neither of us actually has any proof beyond the plausibility of our arguements. -- that's necessarily so. >I find it really strange to believe that somehow, if we only adhere to our 18th century human rights doctrine, our adversaries will just knuckle under with no bloodshed. -- cultural influence helps. You don't convert people by argument, but by making them feel dowdy, inferior, out-of-fashion and out-of-date, un-hip. MTV and CNN rule. "First World on the air tonight/First World calling with megawatt might." as the song goes. >Because no one wants to talk about material causes or actual action-- -- Oh, I'm willing to take actual action any time you like.... 8-). >To deal with this in moral relativist terms, I'd simply say that while you can make a pretty plausible case for FGM being horrible, painful, unjust and terrible -- this is the same thing as "bad" or "wrong". You've just changed the terminology. Why is one thing just and another unjust, unless you can judge them against some normative scale? Ditto "horrible" and "terrible". >To bring this back to feminist sf, I am reminded of the language used by the Anarresti in the Dispossessed. When they wanted to say a thing was important, they said it was "central" rather than "higher". Analogously, we might do better to think of things as "unfair" or "cruel" rather than right or wrong. -- a rose by any other name... This is Victorian euphemism at work; "limbs" rather than "legs". >If we wanted to position ourselves on the cutting edge of moral debate, we could work to integrate anthropological understandings of cultures WITH ideas of justice and fairness, rather than just dividing into opposite camps. -- justice and fairness are also culturally determined concepts, no? You've just pushed things back a level. Mystification. >BTW, SM Stirling, I attempted to post you some things on Foucault. -- sorry, didn't get anything by e-mail. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 15:35:39 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Moral relativism (OT)--was Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 12:18:58 PM Mountain Standard Time, JFrankln@FAMPRAC.UMN.EDU writes: >I did want to address this idea that all good things--humanitarianism, feminism, etc--originate in the West. -- humanitarianism, no; feminism, yes. >Imbedded in this statement are several ideas: 1. That ideas have one origin point; -- in practical terms, they often do, yes. Western Civ is the 700-pound green amoeba of civilizations, assimilating whatever's useful, taking it and running with it. The Chinese invented gunpowder and cannon. But oh, weren't they surprised by what we did with it! As Marx said, a sufficiently large quantitative difference becomes a qualitative one. _Und zo_ with innumerable other technological innovations and concepts; China was by far the most fertile source of those until the early Medieval period. (Paper, rudder, compas, to name just a few). Positional mathematics from India, etc. >2. That somehow originating philosophy makes the West the "winner"; -- all human action proceeds from mental states. "Ideas have consequences". Just as recent research reveals that the mind can affect the physical structure of the brain. Antibiotics start as ideas; so do gigawatt lasers. Universal suffrage is an idea given flesh. >3. That ideas exist in a kind of vacuum -- who said that? Ideas themselves are material things, since they exist in minds/brains. >The idea of human rights began to develop in the West around the time that colonization was happening -- well, no. It draws on classical antecedents, cross-fertilizing with certain notions unique to West European feudalism and Latin Catholicism. Alive and well by the 13th century, although of course not precisely in the modern form. Incidentally, Muslim travellers in the period of the Crusades were already remarking (with horror) on the extensive freedoms women enjoyed among the "Franks". If you want a "material basis" for that, there's the unique west European family system (late marriage, relatively low fertility, high incidence of never-married individuals). >These ideas about human rights didn't stop colonial behavior every bit as disgraceful as suttee. -- India is now a parliamentary democracy where a woman can be elected national leader. Also they no longer burn widows. (Brides, sometimes, unfortunately). These are good things, no? War and conquest aren't effective sticks to beat the West with; everyone does 'em. >I won't deal with Ghandi here, but if you look at the anti-logging initiatives run by women in south India--well, that's something we in the West have learned from. Or at least I have, as well as several people I know. -- amazing how Thoreau, Emerson et. al. get around... 8-). Gandhi was a genius at using traditional Hindu symbols for Westernized ends -- same form, different content. Although he was also something of a faker as well as a fakir, if you'll pardon the "jouissance". Like that spindle he was always making thread on; as one of the Indian National Congress contributers among the Indian owners of big mechanized cotton textile mills in Alamahabad said: "If only Bapuji knew how much it costs to keep him in his poverty!" >Western ideas of human rights, that is, grew right when the West was having major contacts with the non-West. -- well, no. See above. >It's not a matter disinterested Western people and so on. -- who said it was? >But the idea of ruthless Asians doing each other down in a barbaric struggle for supremacy--very Hegelian, in fact--well, that's just not true. -- who said it was? >But then, as Paul Fussell obseved in his book BAD: the dumbing of America, -- this is an e-mail list, not a graduate seminar. >Yes, let's all cheer smug colonial governors who put down those bad Hindus with a few well chosen and patronizing words. -- You approve of burning women alive? You're either for Napier or for suttee. There's no box marked "other" there, you know. (Glyph of "clunk!" sound as jaws of rhetorical trap snap closed... 8-). >Or that the West is... -- as a woman, you'd prefer to live in Afghanistan? >Or that Foucault was some kind of bad icky fag. -- bad icky sadistic lying creep, actually. Or is that a sly attempt to indirectly accuse me of homophobia? Tsk, tsk -- let's avoid name-calling. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 16:12:23 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Debra Euler Subject: Re: She is really Kate Elliott -Reply -Reply Comments: To: jss@PA.DEC.COM Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain It'll be in stores in March. Debra >>> Jessie Stickgold-Sarah wrote: >Yes, like the upcoming THE BURNING STONE, which Alis will be >diligently proofreading while everyone else is enjoying Thanksgiving >dinner. >>Hurrah! When's it coming out? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:20:17 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: _Gate to Women's Country_ Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit I agree with Robin that Tepper seems bent on destroying the patriarchal fundie religionists. Who wouldn't, the way they are portrayed, as an abusive society, especially towards women. A dystopia, to be sure, but not just getting "rid" of men. The gate, after all, swings both ways. And there are men in Women's Country. They are not respected by the "real men" in their barracks arranged around a phallic statue. I had other odd problems with this book, as much as I admired it and couldn't put it down once I started reading. There is a basic lack of trust in Women's Country that troubled me. And an odd scene made me look up from the book in surprise: Women in the countryside see a deer. They are astonished. Apparently the cataclysm wiped out most wildlife. While they admire the beauty of the animal, the first comment on it is that they will catch it and try to catch others to do captive breeding. A "wild" creature (read random events, surprise) is to be caged and manipulated. Still -- read it. lightly, phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:10:25 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: _Gate to Women's Country_ Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 9:35:03 PM, Robin wrote: <> Was it Trojan Women? (Euripides, by the way.) Someone earlier mentioned Iphegenia and that was what I remembered. My copy is out on loan so I can't check. Hmmm? phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:32:22 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: Moral relativism (OT)--was Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 8:51:01 PM, you wrote: <<_Und zo_ with innumerable other technological innovations and concepts; China was by far the most fertile source of those until the early Medieval period. (Paper, rudder, compas, to name just a few). Positional mathematics from India, etc.>> And we could hop over to early India. Gave us the zero. And what we call "arabic numerals" the Arabs got from India and called them (at least early-on) Indian numerals. phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:18:06 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Family Tree Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 2:25:42 PM Mountain Standard Time, jss@PA.DEC.COM writes: << I would suspect that this is because many people felt it ending up being (a) a bit too much male-bashing and (b) an excessive use of deus ex machina. >> -- the problem with essentialist arguments (of which Tepper is fond) is that they're defeatist. That's why the deus ex machina is so common in her books. If nothing can be done about sexism without altering the genetic makeup of the human species, then nothing can be done -- absent totalitarian genetic engineering (GTWC) or magic (several others). It's an argument for sitting down in a corner and snuffling about how nasty those brutes are. It's the same set of assumptions that anti-feminists use, except with the value signs reversed. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:37:37 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Moral relativism (OT)--was Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 3:35:06 PM Mountain Standard Time, Zozie@AOL.COM writes: << And we could hop over to early India. Gave us the zero. >> -- mmm, sorry if I was unclear; that's what I meant by positional mathematics. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:41:55 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Frances Green Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country Comments: To: Kate.Elliott@SFF.NET MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit On Sun, 22 Nov 1998 11:13:30 -0500 Alis Rasmussen writes: >Kirsten wrote: > > think Tepper opens up an entire deeper >level >of meaning: that Stavia and the others know that what they're doing >is >in many ways morally horrific. > Remember the women in charge called themselves "the Damned Few", and yes, I still break down in tears over the last chapter, after I don't know how many readings! ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:39:06 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Frances Green Subject: Re: Family Tree MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit On Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:46:10 -0000 Yvonne Rowse writes: >I've just finished reading Family Tree by Sheri Tepper. I loved it, >thought it was fabulous. So my question is, somewhere, not long since but >lost in the list, someone referred to Gibbons and Family Tree as being >below average Tepper. Why? I haven't read Gibbons yet but I really did >like FT. Any comments anyone? > >Yvonne > I loved FT, though it doesn't really measure up to Grass as a novel. It did remind me in some aspects of my other longtime favorite, Jinian Footseer. Gibbon, though with many marvellous elements, rather oops, possible spoilers suffers in my opinion from an enemy and a savior who are both alien to the human race, and it might have benefited from being tighter. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:34:14 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Frances Green Subject: Re: _Gate to Women's Country_ MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit On Mon, 23 Nov 1998 12:15:02 -0600 Robin Reid writes: >Jeannette asked (I hope--sometimes the multiple layers of recopying >makes me make mistakes): "I would be interested in knowing what list >members think of books like The Gate to Women's Country and Shadow's End >in particular - are they just examples of "let's just get rid of all the >men and we'll have >solved all our problems" genre of writing?" > While Tepper tends to be, shall we say, a trifle brusque with the X-chromosome-deficient sex, getting rid of men has never been her fictional agenda! It's difficult to comment on Gate without spoiling, but remember that in Shadow it was "kings and women" who have to deal with things. It can be tempting to read anti-man rather than anti-certain-men-and-women into her worth if one is reading in a hostile-to-men mood, but it really ain't so. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:45:46 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Moral relativism (OT)--was Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In fact, what the medieval and early-modern West was particularly good at was not so much invention as systematization -- taking concepts and applying or generalizing them. Organization, in other words; the world-view of analytical reductionism. This preceeded, and was (pardon the expression) seminal in, the scientific revolution proper; it developed the habit of breaking things down into the smallest possible component and then seeing how they could be fitted together in more efficient patterns. Eg., water mills had been known in Classical times, but not very widely applied; they were used only for grinding grain and, very rarely, for sawing stone. By the 11th century there were thousands of them all over Western Europe and they were being used for virtually every possible application of mechanical power -- driving the bellows of ironworks, fulling cloth, grinding dyes, etc. Another early example was military drill; the stuff that survives vestigially in ceremonies like Trooping the Color. Maurice of Nassau developed it, as a means of maximizing the firepower of the clumsy early firearms. He did it by breaking the physical action of loading a musket down into 9 or more separate steps, seeing how they could best be combined, then drilling the troops in performing each action mechanically and on the word of command. Then he expanded that to the unit level, teaching the soldiers to march and manouver in step and to centrally-directed signals. That turned the unit from a collection of individuals into a machine -- a killing machine, in this instance; it was sort of an early example of "division of labor" and the factory system. Plenty of non-Europeans got their first introduction to the concept by hearing some leather-lunged sergeant bellowing in French or English or Spanish or Russian: "Front rank, present your firelocks! Give fire! Reload in nine times! Second rank, present your firelocks!..." ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 18:19:23 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Tanya M. Bouwman-Wozencraft" Subject: Re: OT Off to See the Wizard Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 98-11-21 10:58:19 EST, you write: << IOW >> Sorry, I don't know this abbreviation, and couldn't figure it out. Would you please elaborate for me? Tanya PS. I second the gist of Donna's post which is that child molesters, like all abusers, cross all gender, class, etc.. lines. The fact that a person is a "model citizen" doesn't mean that that person can't possibly be a pedophile. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 18:24:00 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Dark Waters Embrace MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit and on for another round j. dawley: >Then how to explain Leigh's extremely sympathetic portrayals of lesbian >women? I think we're talking around one another a little here... I >thought it was clear that the way Gabriela was treated was NOT OK, >despite the perceived reproductive imperatives of the rest of the group.> Well to be honest, I did not see his portrayal as sympathetic. I saw it as planted as part of the "thought experiment" you refer to below. Yes, we see a acknowledged lesbian who is described as having a dead partner (tragic space death-how convenient those) whose story he resolves by having his colonist community banish her for a greater part of her life till death. She is in fact alone/outcast for the majority of the time we "know" her. Despite her portrayed brilliance and fine personhood. He does not have his society ever come to their growth or realization of their wrongs despite the many years passing and the "successful" growth to a colony of 100 or so. As a lesbian reading this book I saw the one lesbian character hatefully harassed and banished to isolation on a hostile unknown death-dealing planet for years and years until her unacknowledged lonely death. This is sympathetic? >I took his meaning to be more that some people will never become >tolerant of difference unless they are forced to by bitter necessity. >And some, like Dominic, will NEVER accept it.> Yes, absolutely that is one of his messages. In fact he hammers it mercilessly. I grew bored of Dominic and his hate long before the book was through. >In Anaïs's case, she discovers that she holds a power that Dominic cannot >challenge effectively, but even if she was not "sa", Dominic's behavior >would not be "right," unless we are to assume that "might makes right". I >think it's clear that Leigh does not believe that.> Yes, but Leigh also does not have any of the colonist welcome her and her partners until they show that they can help them have healthy babies. Prior to that, the colonists did no more support them then they did Gabriella. So in the narrative, Gabriella was never supported because she never had "something to offer". Her choices made her "useless" to the colony. Her choice to be homo-sexual and childless. The narrative let her die there never having been seen as valuable in those choices. The triad with Anais also were willingly banished to the same fate for choosing non-procreative sex. We can only perceive that they too would have died alone and banished except that they came "home" able to procreate hence were viewed in a new and valued light. Not by all, but by enough that they were able to start a new, and much stronger, colony of their own. So again I see a narrative that place no value on non-procreative choices but value on procreative ones. >As a side issue, didn't it seem odd that there wasn't a single gay man >in the book?> This absence made me even less able to view Gabriella as a sincerely sympathetic portrayal. If homosex was okay????? Then where was the interaction between Anais and the male partner with him being penetrated. If I may be so crude. But then that would have been sex for just pleasure. Again that is why I see the egg coming before the chicken. Anais was interested in the woman _because_ Anais was a Sa. Anais is not a woman at all. We read her as one, but it is revealed to us that she is to be back-read as a Sa. Like in the flashback passages. And the female partner at the instinctive level knew that Anais was Sa so to my reading there was only one lesbian character Gabriella. > >dsimone: >> The dark waters embrace.>> >Yes. But how did it work? I was hoping for some explanation on Leigh's >part, but there is none. Is the lake some kind of alien intelligence? Is >there some kind of nanotechnology guiding the development of some >species? And why only the Miccail and humans and not the other species >on the planet?> My memory sense is that there was life on the planet long before both the Miccail and the humans and that something destroyed the planet and left it toxic shall we say? It is not said directly but faintly (very) alluded to? I wish I had the book to check the passages but alas I do not. However I agree whole heartedly that it was not explained well _enough_. As to the other species....limited word count? >And why not just fix the males so their sperm was not >defective? (Seems like that would be a little easier than creating a >whole new sex!) I got the strong feeling that Leigh just sketched in >these elements to create his "thought experiment" and was more concerned >with the characters and the emotional part of the story. I do not recall their medical capabilities being _that_ far advanced but then I will take your word for it. To me that would have been a similar magic wand waving. >What I was trying to say is that the grumblers did not seem different >enough from the Miccail to explain their cultural collapse. But I can >overlook that, I suppose. I thought that they were in their own "alien" way as mutated as the humans were. I saw them as only needing to parallel the level of deterioration in the humans. I thought the _culture_ collapsed because _they_ thought they were being punished by their Gods for the KaiSa sacrificing itself. The saw the deformed or dead children, etc etc, and did not know the connection to the Sa "fixative" contribution so to them the consequences were spiritual punishment. personal aside: I hope you are not perceiving my commentary as antagonistic. This in fact is one of the more fruitful and mind expanding discussions I have had on the list about any book. I thank you for it. donna donnaneely@earthlink.net ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 16:38:54 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah Subject: Re: Dark Waters Embrace In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 23 Nov 1998 18:24:00 EST." <001901be1738$5b3722a0$fdb11b26@donna> I'm at home on the wrong computer so I can't quote other letters, but I hope you'll assume errors are due to misinterpretation, not an attempt to put words in someone else's mouth. I really liked this book. It addressed a set of issues I've always found interesting: what if you *don't* fortuitously end up with enough colonists to make a new world? What if you just don't have enough people? (And of course in this case there was more than the usual inbreeding going on.) I thought it was, at least, intended to be sympathetic to the lesbian characters. As several people have said about _Gate to Women's COuntry_, just because a society is portrayed in one way in a novel doesn't mean the author recommends that behavior. Let me offer an alternative reading of this storyline: Gabriella is shunned because the people of the colony are small-minded and bad, and because she is different, and because she doesn't fit the role demanded of her (childbearing). Anais is likewise shunned because she doesn't fit in the childbearing role, and because she is different. At the end, Anais is (sort of) reaccepted because she has found a childbearing role. I do see how this can be interpreted as saying that deviation can be accepted *as long as* it fits the higher plan. But what if we turn it around? Suppose the message that was intended is that for the greatest health of the community, each person must fulfil their own destiny? I know this sounds a bit grandiose, but work with me -- suppose we take this whole thing as a little bit more metaphorical, and say: the colonists have found their ideal of success (childbearing) and have interpreted it overly strictly, so that they are blinded to the variations that are actually better. Similarly, we might say that many people see "goodness" or "righteousness" or "family" as an ideal, but they define it too narrowly, they say "X and Y are good so Z is bad" -- what they get, in the end, is X and Y, but not goodness. People are all the time saying that divorce is just terrible because it destroys families. But my parents got divorced when I was three and the result was that I had two birthdays, two Christmas celebrations and one Channukah, ten grandparents who all adored me, and three parents. Now *that* is family! So maybe the meaning is more like: The colonists define success as having children. Foolishly, they imagine that this means a very specific set of behaviors. When people violate them, they're cast out. But hah! Those people are happier, more content, in love, *and* producing better kids. I'm not particularly wedded to this idea. I just saw the book as being more "you hidebound bigots have it all wrong, *and* your own smallmindedness will destroy you." The idea that Anais's Sa-nature makes everyone else straight again is interesting, though; I have no clever rebuttal to that. :) jessie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 19:41:15 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Steve and Jane MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I am delighted to observe two fellow listmembers enjoying each other. Perhaps it is time to share these obvious dialogues privately? Please? donna ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 19:03:33 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I don't think it's necessary to view Women's Country as either distopic or utopic. Rather, I think one of Tepper's gifts is the ability to imagine very complex worlds. The world of post-convulsion Women's Country is like a "real" world in that folks are faced with a variety of less-than-optimal choices. Someone on the list mentioned that the protagonists in GtWC are attempting to carve out a life for themselves in a world gone very wrong. Thus, there may be no "optimal" choices available. In the "real" world, for example, we have China. China is faced with impossible choices -- on the one hand to permit folks the freedom to have more than one child, and on the other, to face a tragedy of the commons of Malthusian proportions. The questions posed in GtWC are similar to those posed by China's one child policy: What do you do when freedom and survival are at odds? These are sophisticated questions, not the kinds of questions easily answered, not questions with comfortable or necessarily nice answers. These questions are nevertheless very real. I imagine that Women's Country is a world created to explore impossible choices -- choices with such serious consequences as the two different endings of the Iphigenia myth -- one in which she lives, and one in which she is sacrificed and dies. Either ending is horrid. As for the homosexuality issue (not even touching upon the fact that the characters in GtWC seem all to be white), I tried to imagine what the consequences for Tepper's story might had been had homosexuality have been a choice. Tepper may not have felt she could have had the same story, so she wrote homosexuality out with a quick technological fix. Would I have been able to write such a horrid story which depends so heavily on reproduction and have been able to retain homosexuality as part of the tale? I don't know -- but I think I would have tried. Perhaps my own "solution" would also have been glib (although probably socially rather than technologically glib). I don't know. On the other hand I am a baby boomer and Tepper was born in 1929 -- my worldview is different from hers (she is my mother's age). I think I am inclined to cut her some slack given how beautifully she has dealt with a difficult topic. Candice Bradley Appleton, WI ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 20:19:52 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 6:05:49 PM Mountain Standard Time, djbyrne@ATHENET.NET writes: >The world of post-convulsion Women's Country is like a "real" world in that folks are faced with a variety of less-than-optimal choices.> -- well, taking 45% of the population and having them do no useful work strikes me as sort of suboptimal, too. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 20:24:37 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 6:05:49 PM Mountain Standard Time, djbyrne@ATHENET.NET writes: >China is faced with impossible choices... The questions posed in GtWC are similar to those posed by China's one child policy. -- sort of a faux dilemma, since plenty of other countries have reduced their birth-rates purely by making it physically and socially possible for women to control their own reproductive destiny. When women have a choice, they don't have enormous broods -- this is as true in underdeveloped countries like Kenya as it is here. (Kenya's birthrate has dropped by 40% in the past 8 years.) >As for the homosexuality issue (not even touching upon the fact that the characters in GtWC seem all to be white), I tried to imagine what the consequences for Tepper's story might had been had homosexuality have been a choice. -- this is a fundamentally dishonest part of the book. When you segregate the sexes strictly (prisons, boarding schools) you get a lot of homerotic behavior. Tepper writes off not only gays, but situational homosexuality, as a result of hormonal imbalances during pregnancy (the "hen-ram" bit in the book). This is Just Not So. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 20:18:45 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Dark Waters Embrace Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 5:39:09 PM Mountain Standard Time, jss@PA.DEC.COM writes: >the colonists have found their ideal of success (childbearing) and have interpreted it overly strictly> -- it does seem odd. I mean, I know a fair number of lesbian mothers -- have these far-future castaways forgotten this is possible? 8-). ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 21:59:50 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Demetria M. Shew" Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/23/98 5:23:00 PM Pacific Standard Time, JoatSimeon@AOL.COM writes: << - well, taking 45% of the population and having them do no useful work strikes me as sort of suboptimal, too. >> Sure glad we don't do that! Our guys do great stuff, like, um. Corporations, Politics, Crime....you know, USEFUL stuff. Madrone, believing we can do better ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 05:16:57 MET Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anthea Hartley Stanton Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen Comments: cc: m_stanton@postmaster.co.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit On 23 Nov 98, at 11:16, Jane Franklin wrote: > Honestly. I have friends among you science types, > but speaking as a historian, well, hey, you all have > egos the size of Norfolk. No offense or anything, but > while I couldn't statistic my way out of a broom closet I > am considered a dab hand with Qing Dynasty literature, > and relatively reliable on American political movements > and their roots. And if in 100 years, your work is held up as a collection of superb examples of the historian's art, you will have proved yourself to be one of the "best brains". But how likely is that? How many historians from 1898 produced analyses etc which are regarded as universally valid today as Euclid's geometry from 300 BC? Look around you - how many of the people (in the sciences or otherwise) would you say were the "best brains" by my definition? Unless you're lucky, probably none. How many people's work will be remembered and USED in a century? Very few but almost all those few will probably come from the hard sciences. This is because of the way real sciences work; scientific knowledge has been built up from the work of many less than first-rate scientists (each checking the other) until one of the "best brains" (like Newton) synthesises an inchoate mass of information into a coherent "theory". Newton himself admitted this when he said that the only reason he saw so far was because he stood on the shoulders of giants. There've been many false paths, many blind alleys, but generation by generation we've advanced. The "mock sciences" don't work that way - which is why there's little or no continuity between generations of researcher. A sociological "Newton" would have to re-invent the entire profession by himself - he'd have no giants' shoulders to stand on. > You know, they say that the best minds don't go into > teaching, get involved with the soft sciences, or > muddy themselves with politics. It must be awfully > nice to be one of the best minds, since you don't > actually have to work with actual people except > for the ones who've been educated just like you. Tempting though it is to agree with your view of me as a "best mind" in an ivory tower, you're missed your mark. I'm a business analyst - I deal with people at all levels in all occupations literally all over the real world and even in the unreal world of academia. And, from what I've observed, the "best brains" (taking a less rigorous view of "best") go where the money and/or the prestige is - the "right" hard sciences & engineering, the health professions, politics and commerce/finance. AJ Anthea Hartley Stanton (ajhs@usa.net) _____________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________ Get free e-mail and a permanent address at http://www.netaddress.com/?N=1 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 23:48:50 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: Dark Waters Embrace In-Reply-To: <001901be1738$5b3722a0$fdb11b26@donna> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit At 06:24 PM 11/23/98 -0500, donna simone wrote: >As a lesbian reading this book I saw the one lesbian character hatefully >harassed and banished to isolation on a hostile unknown death-dealing >planet for years and years until her unacknowledged lonely death. This is >sympathetic? Yes, I think so, because it is clear that the author identifies with her and not with her persecutors. I can't count how many stories gain their tragic power from the mistreatment of a protagonist. If I care enough about a character to cry over his/her fate, that says to me that the author's treatment was sympathetic. :) >[Gabriela's] choices made her "useless" to the colony. Her choice to be >homo-sexual and childless. The narrative let her die there never having >been seen as valuable in those choices. But we as readers saw her value. >>As a side issue, didn't it seem odd that there wasn't a single gay man >>in the book? > >This absence made me even less able to view Gabriella as a sincerely >sympathetic portrayal. If homosex was okay????? Then where was >the interaction between Anais and the male partner with him being >penetrated. If I may be so crude. That's a good point. It just adds to my feeling that the author didn't think it through completely. That for some reason he found it more interesting or natural to imagine women together than men together. So the "male" part of Anaïs's sexuality was not expressed with Elio, though her "female" sexuality / physiology was fully expressed with Máire (along with the "male"). >But then that would have been sex for just pleasure. As for this... I don't see any indication that the author disapproves of sex for pleasure. The fact that the majority of the colonists don't approve of it just makes them look more prudish and repressed. >Again that is why I see the egg coming before the chicken. >Anais was interested in the woman _because_ Anais was a Sa. Anais is >not a woman at all. We read her as one, but it is revealed to us that she >is to be back-read as a Sa. Like in the flashback passages. And the >female partner at the instinctive level knew that Anais was Sa so to my >reading there was only one lesbian character Gabriella. Well, there was also Adari, the woman who fell in love with Gabriela after her first shunning. We don't hear much about her, though. Why do you think that Máire was attracted to Anaïs because she was "sa"? If the author thinks that attraction is based merely upon parts matching up why would he include any lesbian characters at all? I thought there was a somewhat bitter commentary on human nature underlying the story, actually -- that genuine, life-affirming emotion is extremely rare and should be grasped whenever possible, despite the risks. Anaïs, Máire and Elio succeed and Gabriela tragically did not. I don't think Leigh was implying that she deserved happiness any less than they did. >personal aside: >I hope you are not perceiving my commentary as antagonistic. This in >fact is one of the more fruitful and mind expanding discussions >I have had on the list about any book. I thank you for it. No, I didn't take your comments as antagonistic at all! Just fruitful disagreement. I have been enjoying the discussion also. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/jedhome.htm Listening to: Tori Amos -- From the Choirgirl Hotel "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 10:22:17 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: The Gate to Women's Country - meta-level comment In-Reply-To: <365A05E5.497565FA@athenet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Okey, what follows is a meta-level discussion on fiction, esp. SF or fantasy, and since this discussion and also the other current book discussion (Dark Waters etc) has generated my thinking I post it under the present heading rather than inventing an entirely new one. Can't resist commenting on the odd expectation of some of the participants in this and other discussions that a novel should be like a mathematical equation 2+2=4, or that it should be politically or morally "correct". There is something called poetic licence. Part of the character of a work of art is ambiguity, everything mustn't be resolved - or shouldn't be resolved. There must be space for reader interaction. It is like looking at a framed picture, all you see is that which is within the frame, not what is "in" the picture but outside the frame inside. See? Sometimes basic conditions are outside the frame in that way, and the reader is then invited either to figure out a solution by her/himself or by accepting it as a given axiomatic point of departure. A novel also must pose problems to us, that is it's life nerve, to make us think, not to present us with ready answers on how to act or think in specific situations, the latter is the work of politicians and religious leaders and the content of rousing pamphlets - but not the "mission" of a fiction writer. We must be given the chance to "continue the narrative". So, since novel's purpose is not to give clear and moral instruction, but instead contains built in questions and unclarities it leaves us with food for reflection and with things to debate between us like this very, very interesting discussion that has been generated by TGtWC. Also, you americans tend to divide the people of this world into so-called afro-americans or caucasian americans, and you seem to find it provocative if both groups are not present in a novel (not to mention representatives of different sexualities). Well, in Sweden, the home of political refugees (not to mention our own 4 indigenous minorities) from all corners of the world, at the last count we harbour over 100(!) different nationalities (and more than 80 religious views) - in all hues possible as far as skin colour is concerned, the only ones not represented are little green people. That is very invigorating, and it prevents you thinking in black and white stereotypes. But imagine the obstacles to a writer if he/she would be expected to represent this ethnic variety in a 200-page novel???? And treat everyone in a "just" way? So, a writer always has to make a selection depending on the issue of the novel (if there is one), and there is nothing inherently wrong in choosing to depict one kind of people and not another, to tell one kind of story and not the other. Sometimes novels has to be unpleasant and portray unpleasant characters, plots or solutions if they are to make us think at all, they can't all be set i Oz or Wonderland or having a setting that permits "showing us the way". The foundations after all is the positing of the questions: What if? Most important, fiction is not fact, it is a thought experiment, and it would be wrong to assume that every novel in an automatic and immediate way reflects the writer's thoughts, politics, world-view, sexuality, philosphy etc. The last "charitable" explanation that Tepper "omits" certain agenda's from her novels because of her date of birth might be true, on the other hand it might not. But it cannot be assumed or used as a valid explanation. It is far too easy to confuse a fictive writer with her/his fiction. As a conclusion, I found FT somewhat naive and simplistic, and stylistically not up to her usual standard, and not really ready for publication when she let it go. It was overly "talkative". As to TGtWC it presented both intellectually and morally very challenging questions, not the least because of the allusions and the interweaving of classical drama. One play which shouldn't be omitted in the comparison is Lysistrate or The love strike as it is more commonly known. It defintitely ties in. Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 10:47:41 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen In-Reply-To: <19981124041657.27358.qmail@www0t.netaddress.usa.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sorry, a lot of the did as a matter of fact. I work in a dialogue with my predecessors in my field which is art history. In my dissertation I quote both writers from the infancy of my discipline, as well as contemporary ones. We accumulate knowledge and make interpretations and we make and refine our synthesises as we go along - like Einstein turned the newtonian universe upside down and showed its invalidity. A number of the older scholarly works I referred to in my dissertation were printed before 1900, and many of their observations are still valid in a higher degree than in the sciences. And I've been on both sides of the fence, since I began my academic career studying maths and physics, then found it simply boring, since one doesn't exercise other parts of the brain enough, and switched. Also boring, since an equation can only have one solution, whereas the explanation of human behaviour may have many. And that's the real challenge! Also, the humanities and social sciences concern themselves about us, about humans which is the most important reflective field in the sciences. That the material is so complex that it cannot be reduced to numbers, is no reason to invalidate the work in progress. After all these disciplines were only invented and started developing their methodology approx. 150 years ago, so give some slack okey? They're still toddlers. but they walk better every day. I'm getting a bit tired with this positivist attitude towards the historical and social disciplines, once and for all - the assumption that all scholarly studies have to be "scientific" in the sense of natural science and technology and reducable to set formulas is a great misunderstanding. Their character is very different. I*ll see if I can dig up a reference to a very good study by a Norwegian author on this subject, and post it. Britt-inger At 05:16 1998-11-24 +0100, you wrote: >And if in 100 years, your work is held up as a collection of superb examples >of the historian's art, you will have proved yourself to be one of the "best >brains". But how likely is that? How many historians from 1898 produced >analyses etc which are regarded as universally valid today as Euclid's >geometry from 300 BC? > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 12:15:34 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen In-Reply-To: <19981124095339Z4336-29762+38@uria.its.uu.se> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I referred recently in to a very good book on the distinction between the humanities and the sciences, unfortunately it has only been published in Norwegian and Swedish, if anyone is that interested in the subject that they will sit down and learn the language in order to read it, the refererence is as follows: Nordenstam, Tore, Fra kunst til vitenskap, Oslo 1987 or the Swedish version Stockholm 1994. (that is From art to science) He has written a book in English which deals with a similar subject, though, with the title: Technocratic and humanistic conceptions of development, Stockholm 1985 Britt-Inger Britt-Inger.Johansson@konstvet.uu.se Ph.D. Dept. of Art History Uppsala slott, Soedra tornet H:0 752 37 Uppsala Uppsala University ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 07:43:44 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Dark Waters Embrace MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit And ever more on this fabulous book..... j. dawley: >Yes, I think so, because it is clear that the author identifies with her >and not with her persecutors. I can't count how many stories gain their >tragic power from the mistreatment of a protagonist. If I care enough about >a character to cry over his/her fate, that says to me that the author's >treatment was sympathetic. :)> On this point, one could successfully argue that Leigh was emotionally invested in each and every character. The book over all is tremendously humane. My initial reading felt the agony of each characters suffering. Yes, that is sympathy. On the level of interpreting the future Leigh perhaps envisions is where I part from this interpretation. At some point author's reveal what is their internal world view. The one perhaps that is not thought out because it part of their essential being. I am suggesting that at this level. The "unconscious" if you will. Leigh is presenting a world that, despite existing in what is a technologically and socially advanced future, still does not recognize the value of peoples partnering or sexual choices unless they "have a value" to the community. I would submit that Leigh is content at some level with seeing the world as a place where us "animals" are here to make more animals. And at some level, I find/found myself agreeing with that subtle message. That is really the saddest part of all for me, that even I have internalized the message. Or perhaps that _really is_ our purpose, despite these over developed brains with which we have been "blessed"? d simone: >>[Gabriella's] choices made her "useless" to the colony. >> j dawley: >But we as readers saw her value.> How come he didn't just make her a engine room grease monkey with a mean streak? Leigh makes her a brilliant scientist and a tormented soul to cement our sympathies, in case we do not care for "those lesbians". The deck is stacked to make the reader favor her _despite_ her sexuality. I suspect that you and I as a general rule _do_ value a woman like Gabriella. However there may be readers out there who agreed with the colonists choices and sided with the decisions that said procreation/mixing the gene pool were pre-eminent regardless of Gabriella's "heroism". Again, there is an element of the unreal about Gabriella. We see a parallel portrayal on tv. The tv lesbians are peripheral characters, slim, high-femme, educated, in steady hetero-mimicking relationships, etc. I.e they are portrayed as something the audience will accept as sympathetic. I would point back to your phrase about "thought experiment". I am convinced that Leigh the writer adores each of his creations, but I am not convinced that his point was to do a true rendering of a "lesbian", but more that Gabriella was a carefully constructed heroic character that positioned a frame of his argument about tolerance overall. For a comparison point on "rendering lesbian characters" I would point to the characters of "Claire" and "Fanny May" in K. J. Fowler's 'Sweetheart Season'. Fabulous book by the way. d simone: >>If homosex was okay????? Then where was the interaction between Anais and the male partner with him being penetrated. If I may be so crude.>> j. dawley: >That's a good point. It just adds to my feeling that the author didn't >think it through completely. That for some reason he found it more >interesting or natural to imagine women together than men together.> I am laughing _with you_ here at the pure understatement of this observation. j. dawley; >As for this... I don't see any indication that the author disapproves of >sex for pleasure. The fact that the majority of the colonists don't approve >of it just makes them look more prudish and repressed.> Well if you would stand with me over here :). No other humans in the book are portrayed having sex for "pleasure" except these three characters. Yet, the Miccail are portrayed as having very amorous and pleasurable relations in their triads. Can we not "read" this to mean that to humans the sex is not "pleasurable" because they were not mating the "right" way? I am recalling the scene with Elio where Anais "bursts" out. My interpretation is that throughout the narrative Anais is 'maturing' as this Sa sex. It is suggested from the historical representations that these Sa were powerfully attractive. Key to the Miccail accepting the limited/restrictive relationships they were allowed to enjoy with the Sa. I am arguing that Elio and Marie respond to Anais _because_ it is Sa, not because they are just a bunch of human folks who are suddenly drawn into a homo/hetero triad. The lack of other portrayals of "pleasurable" sex amongst colonists may in fact be intentional as opposed to lazy development on Leigh's part. An intentional set up for a narrative suggestion that desire is stirred within the colonists at the point when "true conception" is finally possible. I realize I am pushing a deeply embedded (if there at all ;) ) subversive reading, but it is fun to do so, no? j. dawley: >Well, there was also Adari, the woman who fell in love with Gabriela after >her first shunning.> Ah, excellent point, was she not very young compared to Gabriella? I read it as teen rebellion, or sympathetically, someone seeking more than the claustrophobic confines of the colony allowed, moreso than a sexual identity issue. j dawley: >Why do you think that Máire was attracted to Anaïs because she was "sa"? If the author thinks that attraction is based merely upon parts matching up why would he include any lesbian characters at all?> To the first question I refer to my comments above. To the second part I respond: "he wants to win the Tiptree and thinks the jury is rigged full of dykes????" I _am_ teasing here. Moreso I think Gabriella was "planted" to expose his first or superficial level of narrative argument: that humanity is grossly intolerant of differing behavior. What truly sophisticates his narrative is the secondary or meta level of narrative: that in fact we _do_ have to fulfill our biological imperative. j. dawley: > I thought there was a somewhat bitter commentary on human nature underlying the story, actually -- that genuine, life-affirming emotion is extremely rare and should be grasped whenever possible, despite the risks.> On this we are in complete agreement! (re: my view of the two narrative arguments above.) j dawley: < Anaïs, Máire and Elio succeed and Gabriela tragically did not. I don't think Leigh was implying that she deserved happiness any less than they did.> I agree. I actually hope Leigh does win the Tiptree so that I have an opportunity to meet him. donna ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 08:17:58 -0500 Reply-To: Anne Vespry Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anne Vespry Subject: OT: FGM and cultural relativism: Was: "Evil" Philosophers Comments: cc: Anna Mazzoldi In-Reply-To: <199811231132.LAA30703@mail.iol.ie> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > On 21 Nov 98, S.M. Stirling wrote: > > Is female genital mutilation just another local custom, immune from > > judgement by outsiders, for example? On Mon, 23 Nov 1998, Anna Mazzoldi wrote: > I don't know how many times I've seen this specific example > quoted in discussion of cultural relativism or relative morality > (in all kinds of forums, both Net and RL). Are there no other > examples around, that people seem to be able only to come up > with this one? What's the exact fascination with it? I think the old Chinese practise of footbinding used to be the example du jour, and (as has also been mentioned) suttee. I'd guess FGM remains as our current example because it is still happening, because it has a very high ick factor, and because (mostly) it happens far away from North America/Europe, so we (since, of course, the "we" who have these discussions are all "Westerners") can all feel morally superior. Me, I'd like to see more discussions where the examples of relative morality run the other way, perhaps (for example) questioning the "Western" belief that bulemia, anorexia, and constant dieting are acceptable forms of body modification despite the damage they do to women's bodies, lives and identities. Anne Anne Vespry ******* http://www.vex.net/~maverick After Stonewall Bookshop ***** never forget avespry(at) *** only dead fish ollisdotuottawadotca * swim WITH the stream ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 09:33:29 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Robin Reid Subject: Female Genital Mutilation Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I wasn't sure whether to label this topic as OT or not, given that FGM has been foregrounded in at least one novel by Sheri Tepper (_Sideshow_), a novel which also deals with the whole issue of moral relativism as (I think) practiced by some contemporary nations. Given the way people tend to assign this practice to "Other nations," I wonder how many people know when the LAST instance of female genital mutilation was recorded as being performed in the United States of America? Robin ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 09:44:04 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Robin Reid Subject: Aside on GATE Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I still remember reading a male critic's blurb which was printed on the cover of the novel. Cannot recall his name and the book is at home. He said the novel LACKED the BITTER FEMINISM of earlier writers (presumably, Russ and other "seventies utopian" writers)--and when you think about what actually happens in the novel, I wonder what he considers to be "bitter feminism." I also wonder how much of the book he read, tee-hee. About the play: I may well be wrong, have to check book, about whether the play was _Iphegenia_ or _Trojan Women_ -- it's been a few years since I read it, so don't take my word for it. Robin ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 10:08:16 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Re: Moral relativism (OT)--was Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit >>> "S.M. Stirling" 11/23 2:35 PM >> -- humanitarianism, no; feminism, yes. (Jane) Well, the Western form of feminism originated in the West, yes. There was no Wollstonecroft in China. It's like saying that fruit originated on apples trees and apples trees alone, because apples grow there and apples are fruit. -- in practical terms, they often do, yes. Western Civ is the 700-pound green amoeba of civilizations, assimilating whatever's useful, taking it and running with it. The Chinese invented gunpowder and cannon. But oh, weren't they surprised by what we did with it! (Jane) Uh, if the West assimilates other people's ideas then it does not originate them, no? Or at least not all of them. And it's a little vague to say that "the West" originated anything, come to think of it. And given the very approximate borders of the West, anyway. >2. That somehow originating philosophy makes the West the "winner"; -- all human action proceeds from mental states. "Ideas have consequences". Just as recent research reveals that the mind can affect the physical structure of the brain. Antibiotics start as ideas; so do gigawatt lasers. Universal suffrage is an idea given flesh. -- well, no. It draws on classical antecedents, cross-fertilizing with certain notions unique to West European feudalism and Latin Catholicism. Alive and well by the 13th century, although of course not precisely in the modern form. (Jane) Of course. It's funny how many people I've read who've alleged that the concept of the individual really only developed (or arose again, I suppose) in the West during the Renaissance. Funny, that was when Western people began exploring and taking over other places. Analogous today, I suppose, to the popular verbal support of Amnesty International and its ilk, while the actual money and behavior support Nike and their famous underpaid labor. I think this is rather interesting. If you want a "material basis" for that, there's the unique west European family system (late marriage, relatively low fertility, high incidence of never-married individuals). (Jane) Yes, this was exactly what I wanted, since it does in some of the self-serving rhetoric about how we have human rights through some innate wonderfulness. It renders the debate a bit clearer. -- India is now a parliamentary democracy where a woman can be elected national leader. Also they no longer burn widows. (Brides, sometimes, unfortunately). These are good things, no? (Jane) Why yes, they are good things. It's just that I would give a certain amount of credit to the locals for achieving them. War and conquest aren't effective sticks to beat the West with; everyone does 'em. (Jane) Yes, but the West is so much more effective. (And fraudulent, to my mind) -- amazing how Thoreau, Emerson et. al. get around... 8-). Gandhi was a genius at using traditional Hindu symbols for Westernized ends -- same form, different content. (Jane) Actually, this movement draws primarily on local culture and the traditional role of women as agriculturalists. I don't think it is more than loosely related to Emerson, Thoreau, et al. I'm not actually a big fan of Ghandi, inclining more to Orwell's view of him. >But then, as Paul Fussell obseved in his book BAD: the dumbing of America, -- this is an e-mail list, not a graduate seminar. (Jane) Geez. Just because I make an actual reference to an actual book. I assume that all your references are true, but--consider me someone humbly seated at your feet--I might like to check them out, just, as it were, to see them for myself. I thought, and still think, that your use of an anecdote about a British governor of India to put down moral relativism is pretty silly. The Brits in India certainly had one set of morals for themselves and another for the Indians, and had little trouble reconciling the two. De facto relativism. No fan of burning women, me. And I'm still appalled by the smugness of that story. I have rarely read a such a black pot denounce a kettle. Would I,being a woman and all, like to live under, say, the Taliban? Why, no. I wouldn't. However, here in the humane West, we're pretty eager to get along with the Taliban from a political angle. One could argue, in fact, that Western concepts of human rights can be used to critique the limitations placed by the West on human rights. To return briefly to Foucault, one could also argue that his distrust of master narratives and unitary class perspectives can also be used to critique the limitations on what he himself wrote. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 08:17:47 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Maryelizabeth Hart Subject: Welcome, Alis! / GtWC Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Welcome to the list, Alis! Hope you and the kids aren't suffering any lingering effects from the armadillo. +++++++ Has anyone considered that some of the problems with the status quo in GATE might have to do with the sweeping reform? Anyone compared GATE to Esther Friedman's PSALM OF MARY or SWORD OF HEROD? Enjoying the discussions of both Tepper and DARK WATER, 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, 24 Nov 1998 10:17:25 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Franklin Subject: Apologies all round Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit I don't seem to be able to stay on topic. Unsubscribing. Sorry, really. I just can't seem to behave appropriately. It's been a nice list, but I don't seem to be cut out for it. I should have quit a long time ago. I'm really sorry that I've made people mad. I didn't mean to. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 11:18:24 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Demetria M. Shew" Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 7:33:50 AM Pacific Standard Time, Robin_Reid@TAMU- COMMERCE.EDU writes: << LAST instance of female genital mutilation was recorded as being performed in the United States of America? >> I believe clitorectomy was practiced until quite recently to stop little girls from masterbating. And I think there are enclaves of recent immigrants who still practice FGM...raising the interesting question of , should we do it in hospitals where chance of infection is low, or let it be done at home with no antibiotics or anesthesia? (this is not MY question, I would stop it short, but have read articles about it...surreal, isn't it?) Madrone ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 11:30:28 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Frances Green Subject: Re: Welcome, Alis! / GtWC MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Umm ... "Psalms of Herod" and "Sword of Mary" ... And apologies for my sloppy typo referring to Tepper's worth rather than her work yesterday! On Tue, 24 Nov 1998 08:17:47 -0800 Maryelizabeth Hart writes: >Welcome to the list, Alis! Hope you and the kids aren't suffering any >lingering effects from the armadillo. > >+++++++ > >Has anyone considered that some of the problems with the status quo in >GATE might have to do with the sweeping reform? > >Anyone compared GATE to Esther Friedman's PSALM OF MARY or SWORD OF >HEROD? > >Enjoying the discussions of both Tepper and DARK WATER, > > >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, 24 Nov 1998 18:25:57 MET Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anthea Hartley Stanton Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Comments: cc: m_stanton@postmaster.co.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit On 24 Nov 98, at 10:47, Britt-Inger Johansson wrote: > Also boring, since an equation can only have one solution, > whereas the explanation of human behaviour may have many. > And that's the real challenge! Actually most equations have many solutions also - what you're thinking of is "solutions under particular constraints". > That the material is so complex that it cannot be > reduced to numbers, is no reason to invalidate the work in progress. How do you _know_ it can't be reduced to numbers? Because _we_ can't do it? Take a simple example: Ptolemy's theory of epicycles was once used to predict planetary motions although the maths was highly complicated. But by analysing data scientists had collected for years, Johannes Kepler found a far simpler and easier way. Perhaps there's a sociological or anthropological "Kepler" waiting out there. At one time this was a favourite theme in sci-fi. Asimov's _Foundations_ series is ultimately based on the concept because he postulates the development of "psychohistory" (a sort of "statistical mechanics" of human behaviour) for predicting behaviour of _groups_ of people a 1000 years ahead. > After all these disciplines were only invented > and started developing their methodology approx. > 150 years ago, so give some slack okey? They're > still toddlers. but they walk better every day. Many of hard sciences (solid state physics etc) are much younger yet their accomplishments are infinitely greater. The original argument accepted that the mock sciences are still toddlers, but very few real scientists believe that "they walk better every day". In fact, they've made little progress over the last 50 years while urgent problems in our societies just get worse. We can't afford to wait another 200 years while the mock sciences mature! Anyway academic or scientific enquiry doesn't work that way - even, I suspect, in art history. If you published a new theory on Gaugin's influence in van Gogh's _Self portrait with bandaged ear_, other academics wouldn't wait until the ink was dry before attacking it. The same thing is what's driven the real sciences to develop as fast as they have. > [The mock sciences'] character is very different. As I've said before, how do you know that? I've read many papers on the problem from both sides, and in the end everything boils down to unsupported opinions. My _own, personal, unsupported_ belief is that _a_ very likely path forward lies in the current research on the biochemical roots - particularly in brain chemistry - of behaviour. But the practical application of such research appears to be many decades in the future. AJ Anthea Hartley Stanton (ajhs@usa.net) ________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________ Get free e-mail and a permanent address at http://www.netaddress.com/?N=1 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 10:03:08 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jessie Stickgold-Sarah Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 24 Nov 1998 18:25:57 +0700." <19981124172558.12299.qmail@www08.netaddress.usa.net> I am totally failing to understand what the goal is of saying that everyone who isn't in the hard sciences is a "lesser mind". I'm an engineer, an *extremely* quantitative profession, and I've seen all kinds of stupidity, lesser minds, vicious professional antagonism, perfectly reasonable proposals torn to shreds "before the ink is dry" if I quote correctly, personal beliefs triumphing over logic and data blah blah blah. Nothing inspires me to believe that engineers (or physicists, or chemists, or whatever the "cool" sciences are today) are intrinsically better than people in economics or psychology or, for heaven's sake, the humanities. When I went to school I met a lot of people who liked to say that only people in engineering and the hard sciences are smart, and everyone else was lacking (because, if they weren't, they would have gone into those fields!). It sounded just as bigoted and lacking in any meaningful scientific objectivity then as it does now. grumbling, but fortunately granted a better mind by virtue of my chosen career path, jessie ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 13:14:13 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Big Yellow Woman Subject: Re: FGM MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Those interested in exploring the question of female genital mutilation should check out Alice Walker's _Possesing the Secret of Joy_ . She also did some nonfiction work and, I believe, a film documentary. Sorry I don't know the titles of the nonfiction or film. I do know there was an excerpt from her nonfiction work in MS. at the time it came out, perhaps around 1991? To me, perhaps the most distubing aspect of genital mutilation is that it is performed exclusively by women, usually on young girls, generation after generation. So the question most fascinating to me is about how the victims and survivors of oppression are taught to perpetuate that oppression on each other. This phenomenon cuts across other "isms". There is an incredible piece in Audre Lorde's _Sister Outsider_ that describes how Black women are taught to perpetuate hate among themselves, for themselves, for example. In just one sci fi example, Ursula LeGuin describes the persistent sexism of a colonial slave world even after the oppressors have been expelled in _Four Ways to Forgiveness_. These are all related patterns - as to why Female genital mutilation is so often used as the problem case in discussions of cultural relativism? Who can vouch for the motivations of others, but doesn't the actual cutting off and sewing shut a girl's genitals (to control her ravenous sexuality? To provide her husband a tighter and bloodier wedding night? To control her filthy excretions?) provide an undeniably concrete example of the violation sanctioned by a globally patriarchal culture? ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 13:37:20 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Big Yellow Woman Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Robin Reid wrote: > I wonder how many people know when the > LAST instance of female genital mutilation was recorded as being performed > in the United States of America? > > Interesting question, because it depends what "counts" as FGM. Has anyone else noticed recent articles on the way "genitally ambiguous" newborns are surgically altered to have "normal" genitals? Actually, there was a recent article in _On The Issues_ describing the experience of two(?)different women and their experiences of being so-altered (i.e., because the clitoris is "too large") Hmmm... Susan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 13:43:13 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Big Yellow Woman Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Demetria M. Shew wrote: > > In a message dated 11/24/98 7:33:50 AM Pacific Standard Time, Robin_Reid@TAMU- > COMMERCE.EDU writes: > > << LAST instance of female genital mutilation was recorded as being performed > in the United States of America? >> > > I believe clitorectomy was practiced until quite recently to stop little girls > from masterbating. And I think there are enclaves of recent immigrants who > still practice FGM...raising the interesting question of , should we do it in > hospitals where chance of infection is low, or let it be done at home with no > antibiotics or anesthesia? (this is not MY question, I would stop it short, > but have read articles about it...surreal, isn't it?) > > Madrone And why is it we routinely cut off the foreskins of male babies and never think twice? Talk about surreal. Where do you think the (alleged) fear of castration comes from anyway? Could it be early chilhood trauma? Geez! Susan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 13:56:52 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Big Yellow Woman Subject: Re: Family Tree MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Yvonne Rowse wrote: > >someone referred to Gibbons and Family Tree as being below average > Tepper. Why? I haven't read Gibbons yet but I really did like FT. > Any comments anyone? > I also just finished FT and thought it was better than Gibbon's DEcline and fall, but my main disappointment with both books was actually that they were so, shall I say, of-this-world, compared to the likes of Grass. I personally didn't think there was a good/evil dichotomy in FT equated with female/male. s p o i l e r The one "evil" male was possessed by a malevolent personality from the future, The Nature loving religion was led by a man and their leadership was otherwise mixed. I won't go on about that. Also, just wanted to clarify that at the end of FT, the humans were not atoning only for their treatment of animals/nature, but for the fact that they released the virus that would all but eliminate human life! (Which, in my most cynical moments, I can almost agree is a good idea.) But I also found it hard to believe that humans could maintain that sort of humility for 3000 years! Susan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 14:43:31 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 3:01:57 AM Mountain Standard Time, Britt- Inger.Johansson@KONSTVET.UU.SE writes: Also boring, since an equation can only have one solution, whereas the explanation of human behaviour may have many. And that's the real challenge! -- that's because we don't actually know the causes of human behavior; our observations and explanations of them are Aristotelian, pre-scientific, mere informed guesses. >That the material is so complex that it cannot be reduced to numbers, -- yet. A non-falsifiable (non-testable) hypothesis may be true, but it isn't scientific. >They're still toddlers. but they walk better every day. -- there's no evidence that any of the interpretations of the present are better than those of the past, merely different. Non-falsifiable hypothesis; ie., merely an opinion; like Marxism, or Freudian psychoanalysis. As the crude but illustrative saying goes, opinions are like ***les -- everybody's got one. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 15:48:01 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Moral relativism (OT)--was Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 9:10:43 AM Mountain Standard Time, JFrankln@FAMPRAC.UMN.EDU writes: >(Jane) Well, the Western form of feminism originated in the West, yes. There was no Wollstonecroft in China. It's like saying that fruit originated on apples trees and apples trees alone, because apples grow there and apples are fruit. -- no, feminism, period. Feminism is literally unimaginable in a society which hasn't been exposed to a fairly radical brand of rationalist individualism, which to date means us and those influenced by us. In a society still dominated by familialist ideologies, it has no intellectual "room". You can't have a Confucianist feminism; it's a contradiction in terms. At that, Chinese society was more receptive to human rights rhetoric than, say, the Islamic countries, because there were some analogues in Daoist thought. (I rather like Daoism; one of the few philosophies with a sense of humor.) However, note that when the confrontation in Tienamin Square took place, the contending parties were not appealing to neo-Confucian orthodoxy or Daoism respectively. They were acting in the name of Marxist-Leninism on the one hand, and democratic human rights on the other (complete with an imitation of the Statue of Liberty). In the long view, this is one of the unintended fruits of Lord Elgin's gunboats. Likewise, Taiwan shows that the Chinese are just as good at operating a liberal capitalist democracy as we are -- possibly better. A 17th-century white male Englishman named Newton discovered calculus, but there's nothing white, male, English or 17th century about it -- it's simply part of the furniture of the universe. Likewise democracy; we found it first, but it's a universal possession _in potentia_. NB: You'll find occasional statements of what is unquestionably feminist opinion in the Western tradition as far back as the 13th century. Not to mention foreshadowings in the Classical period, of course: Plato, for instance. Once you start thinking in a certain way, it follows fairly automatically. >Jane) Uh, if the West assimilates other people's ideas then it does not originate them, no? -- matter of definitions. >(Jane) Of course. It's funny how many people I've read who've alleged that the concept of the individual really only developed (or arose again, I suppose) in the West during the Renaissance. -- obsolete historiography. Most recent studies have tended to emphasise continuity between the medieval and Renaissance periods, rather than a sharp break. >Funny, that was when Western people began exploring and taking over other places. -- well, no. Latin Christendom (the original religious shell of Western civilization) has been expansive since its very beginnings -- the First Crusade was in 1099, after all, and it was only formally the first. It got more successful as time went on, both at missionary work and at physical takeovers. The _Reconquista_ in Iberia, for example, was important not only as a physical extension of the boundaries, but as a means of taking over and assimilating Arabic innovations (and Classical thought mediated through Arabic redactions). >(Jane) Yes, this was exactly what I wanted, since it does in some of the self-serving rhetoric about how we have human rights through some innate wonderfulness. It renders the debate a bit clearer. -- you don't think human rights are wonderful things? You're being a little unclear, here. I detect a certain animus against your own background... 8-). >(Jane) Why yes, they are good things. It's just that I would give a certain amount of credit to the locals for achieving them. -- certainly. Did anyone dispute it? It's also incontestable that these are Western institutions, and in so far as they've been adopted, it's by a process of cultural assimilation and borrowing. In terms of traditional Hindu or Muslim culture, they're incomprehensible and absurd or actively bad. (Eg., in Hindu literature, the worst sin a ruler can committ is to allow "mixture of castes".) The architects of the Raj's educational policy in the 1830's knew full well -- I can quote the contemporary statements -- that by introducing Western education they were nuturing the people who would throw the British out of India. There are now more people who speak and read English in India than there are in Britain. Racism was an attempt to square the circle, to conflate the (learnable) superiorities of Western civilization with biological accidents like pigmentation. A culture isn't like your skin; it's more like your clothes. >(Jane) Yes, but the West is so much more effective. (And fraudulent, to my mind) -- well, we're more effective at everything, for good or ill, because we've discovered how things actually work. Knowledge is power; ignorance (especially when you're unaware of it) is weakness. During the 1905 uprising against the Germans in what's now southern Tanzania, the local spirit mediums claimed to have a medicine (maji-maji) that would turn Mauser bullets to water. It didn't work -- in fact, one shrewd local chief told the emissaries that he'd join the revolt if the magic worked, and then put them in front of a firing squad to test it (predictable results). Julius Nyere, fruit of missionary schools, found a far more effective method. Worked for us -- worked for him -- works for anybody. Care to explain the "fraudulent", btw? >No fan of burning women, me. And I'm still appalled by the smugness of that story. I have rarely read a such a black pot denounce a kettle. -- Oh? In what way? Let's see... abolition of suttee... supression of the thugs... railroads... education... Did you ever see Monty Python's "Life of Brian"? 8-). The Raj was incontestably superior to the Mughal imperium, not to mention the anarchy of contending principalities that followed and which allowed the British conquest. It's even better for India to be democratically self-governing, but that was impossible without the episode of the _Angleski Raj_, which laid the physical and intellectual foundations for it. The modernization of Asia (including decolonization) is the confirmation of the dominance of the West, not its end. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery; Bangalore is now a world center of software development. >Would I,being a woman and all, like to live under, say, the Taliban? Why, no. I wouldn't. However, here in the humane West, we're pretty eager to get along with the Taliban from a political angle. -- news to me; last I heard, we were launching cruise missiles at them and discontinuing aid work because they tried to limit the operations of female employees of the NGO's and UN. The Taliban represents the traditional views of most Afghani men. The Soviet invasion and the civil war killed off the quasi-hemi-demi Westernized elite which imposed a more enlightened practice on some urban areas. The only quick way to overthrow the Taliban would be to invade the country, and rule it as a colony for a couple of generations, forcing more enlightened views down their thoats at the point of the bayonet. I'm all for that -- how about you? >One could argue, in fact, that Western concepts of human rights can be used to critique the limitations placed by the West on human rights. -- well, of course! It's been an ongoing story since the 18th century, if not before! What was the anti-slave-trade crusade, if not a case of holding the public's feet to the fire by pointing out the contradictions between their practice and their ideals? Ditto the struggle which compelled an (all-male) electorate to extend the vote to women -- mostly by sheer force of argument, relentlessly presented to the unwilling. It's called "Progress". Or if you want to get Kantian, the working-out of the Idea. The slavers and Wilberforce, Nietzsche and J.S. Mill, all part of the same process. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 15:59:59 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 11:04:26 AM Mountain Standard Time, jss@PA.DEC.COM writes: << I am totally failing to understand what the goal is of saying that everyone who isn't in the hard sciences is a "lesser mind". -- I don't think anyone said that. Merely that the "social sciences" aren't sciences. >Nothing inspires me to believe that engineers (or physicists, or chemists, or whatever the "cool" sciences are today) are intrinsically better than people in economics or psychology or, for heaven's sake, the humanities. -- nobody said they were. What was said (and is true) is that the institutions and methods of the hard sciences, over time, correct for these common human failings. That's a very different matter. Einstein would probably have been just as brilliant if he'd been a Talmudic scholar rather than a physicist. But he wouldn't have produced GR. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 16:04:50 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: FGM Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 11:20:42 AM Mountain Standard Time, shericks@PEOPLE-LINK.COM writes: << Those interested in exploring the question of female genital mutilation should check out Alice Walker's _Possesing the Secret of Joy_ . -- hearty seconding of that! Besides which, Walker has few rivals today as a prose stylist or for depth and subtlety of characterization. And much of her stuff is actually SF/F, or "magic realist", which is what you call fantasy when you don't want to end up on the fantasy shelfs at B&N. >To me, perhaps the most distubing aspect of genital mutilation is that it is performed exclusively by women, usually on young girls, generation after generation. -- the usual explanation is that it's essential to make women "clean" (ie., non-sexual). Those are extremely patriarchal societies. >provide an undeniably concrete example of the violation sanctioned by a globally patriarchal culture? -- well, there's patriarchal, and then there's patriarchal; a big enough difference in degree is a difference in kind. Our society is patriarchal to a certain extent, but we were never quite _that_ bad. FGM actually decreases male sexual pleasure as well, and very substantially. The primary cultural "purpose" seems to be to try and ensure paternity; the same reason women aren't allowed to drive cars in Saudi Arabia. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 16:06:30 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Alice Walker: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Walker also came up with a splendid definition of the 'role' of American blacks: she calls them the "mestizos of gringoland", which is both extremely witty and very true. Walker doesn't seem to be vulnerable to the myths of racial or cultural purity which ensnare so many writers and thinkers; mixture is a constant theme in her work. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 16:08:44 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 11:46:17 AM Mountain Standard Time, shericks@PEOPLE-LINK.COM writes: >And why is it we routinely cut off the foreskins of male babies and never think twice?> -- well, it's been declining in popularity for some time. There are some genuine medical justifications for male circumcision; it is correlated with lower cancer rates and makes catching STD's less likely. As against that, there's a certain degree of desensitization. All in all, I'm glad I was left as nature intended... 8-). ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 13:20:00 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Candioglos, Sandy" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" what was said is that "the 'better brains' avoid the 'mock sciences' like the plague" (Athena, on 11/21). That would certainly imply that anyone involved in 'mock sciences' (Psychiatry, sociology and the like - also Athena, earlier on 11/21) was not a 'better brain', wouldn't it? -Sandy -----Original Message----- From: S.M. Stirling [mailto:JoatSimeon@AOL.COM] Sent: Tuesday, November 24, 1998 1:00 PM To: FEMINISTSF@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU Subject: Re: [*FSFFU*] OT "Mock" science In a message dated 11/24/98 11:04:26 AM Mountain Standard Time, jss@PA.DEC.COM writes: << I am totally failing to understand what the goal is of saying that everyone who isn't in the hard sciences is a "lesser mind". -- I don't think anyone said that. Merely that the "social sciences" aren't sciences. >Nothing inspires me to believe that engineers (or physicists, or chemists, or whatever the "cool" sciences are today) are intrinsically better than people in economics or psychology or, for heaven's sake, the humanities. -- nobody said they were. What was said (and is true) is that the institutions and methods of the hard sciences, over time, correct for these common human failings. That's a very different matter. Einstein would probably have been just as brilliant if he'd been a Talmudic scholar rather than a physicist. But he wouldn't have produced GR. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 16:42:27 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Demetria M. Shew" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 1:17:30 PM Pacific Standard Time, JoatSimeon@AOL.COM writes: << Merely that the "social sciences" aren't sciences. >> Oh, my. Science, or Natural Philosophy, is the search for Truth. The scientific method, as we know it, certainly is one way of attending that search. But...qualitative analysis is simply too reductionist to be the only way. I refer you to Isaac Newton, who was so fearless in his search for Truth that he used not only Bacon's virile scientific method, but also the effeminate (Bacon's word) process of Alchemy AND immersed himself in a (heretical) study and analysis of the Bible. If Newton was open to so many possibilities and unafraid of censure by 'pure' scientists, dare we be less? Madrone ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 17:02:45 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Demetria M. Shew" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 1:36:31 PM Pacific Standard Time, sandy.candioglos@INTEL.COM writes: << better brains >> How does one define a "better brain" quantitatively and non-subjectively? Without circular argument? Madrone ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 23:15:35 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 24-11-1998 16:33, Robin Reid said: >I wasn't sure whether to label this topic as OT or not, given that FGM has >been foregrounded in at least one novel by Sheri Tepper (_Sideshow_) In "Un the Walls of the World" (IIRC) by Tiptree, too. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 22:43:02 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation In-Reply-To: <365B0C51.78D4@people-link.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >And why is it we routinely cut off the foreskins of male babies and >never think twice? Talk about surreal. Where do you think the >(alleged) fear of castration comes from anyway? Could it be early >chilhood trauma? Geez! > >Susan > Actually it does affect men's sensual possibilites too, even if it doesn't completely make them insensitive. Recent research (no footnote) indicates that this is also a questionable practice. Why don't someone write a novel so the topic maybe discussed without people feeling slightly guilty for raising the issue on a list supposedly aimed at feminist sf? Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 22:48:41 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Family Tree/Grass In-Reply-To: <365B0F84.70C9@people-link.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Actually, part of Grass resembles a story by CJ Cherryh if my memory doesn't trick me, and that was written earlier, yes, no? Might it have been something in Serpent's Reach or??? Britt-Inger At 13:56 1998-11-24 -0600, you wrote: >Yvonne Rowse wrote: >> >>someone referred to Gibbons and Family Tree as being below average >> Tepper. Why? I haven't read Gibbons yet but I really did like FT. >> Any comments anyone? >> >I also just finished FT and thought it was better than Gibbon's DEcline >and fall, but my main disappointment with both books was actually that >they were so, shall I say, of-this-world, compared to the likes of >Grass. I personally didn't think there was a good/evil dichotomy in FT >equated with female/male. > >s > > >p > > >o > > >i > >l > > > >e > > >r > >The one "evil" male was possessed by a malevolent personality from the >future, The Nature loving religion was led by a man and their >leadership was otherwise mixed. I won't go on about that. > >Also, just wanted to clarify that at the end of FT, the humans were not >atoning only for their treatment of animals/nature, but for the fact >that they released the virus that would all but eliminate human life! >(Which, in my most cynical moments, I can almost agree is a good idea.) >But I also found it hard to believe that humans could maintain that sort >of humility for 3000 years! > >Susan > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 23:06:14 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Well, a fundy is fundy whether in religion or in the faith of sience. Actually, the scientists I know laugh at the fundamentalist faith stance shown recently and shake their heads, whereas the politicians would listen attentively. It seems too much Asimov has been read and not appreciated as the fiction it is, and not a "scientific" paper. Biologism is the greatest enemy to feminism BTW, since it ascribes the inequalities to inherent structures, for instance in the bio chemistry of the brain and therefore unchangeable, whereas humanity scholars ascribe it to cultural and social influence and therefore changeable. Determinism or free will??? And free will cannot be quantified since if it is it is not free. Sorry, I can't help finding it naive to think that all things can be assessed and understood purely in the categories of the natural sciences - if that were the case they would be doing the social sciences and humanities research by now wouldn't they, with their superior brains and formulas? Or......? To me it seems that insecurity is at the bottom of this particular brand of faith and a desire for a "simpler", more controllable future, instead of the messy and unpredictable one facing us. Shall we return to feminist SF maybe? There are lots of email lists where the subject under this heading may be vented with more reason. For me, I want to concentrate on Time Runner which is being broadcasted on SF channel as of now. Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 17:44:02 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Demetria M. Shew" Subject: Re: OT Einstein/Talmud/Relativity Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 2:15:31 PM Pacific Standard Time, DMadrone@AOL.COM writes: << << better brains >> >> Wait. Einstein. I remember now...he was not a good mathematician. He had a real hard time in school, and went to work in the patent office. He discovered the General Theory of Relativity intuitively...not mathematically. When he tried to support his intuition with math, he realized his math just wasn't good enough. So he went to mathematicians and had them teach him the math, which was hard for him. So, when you think about it, he probably still would have discovered GR if he was a student of the Talmud and had time to think...whereas, if he had gone into math seriously he probably would have flunked out, lost self esteem and become a hot dog vendor. Of course, maybe then he would have been more appreciative of his wives and children and treated them a little better. Do you suppose the theory of relativity is more important than human felicity? I wonder what his wives really thought about it.... Madrone, still wondering why Tycho Brahe never married the mother of his children (was it because they were all girls?). ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 18:04:09 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Tanya M. Bouwman-Wozencraft" Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 98-11-23 15:10:24 EST, you write: << -- Oh, I'm willing to take actual action any time you like.... 8-). >> When? Where? What kind of action? And why does it have to be when someone else likes, why not when you like? Just being contentious. Tanya ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 17:28:26 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Re: Family Tree & Gibbon's Decline and Fall MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I liked Family Tree better than Gibbon's Decline and Fall. I felt that Gibbon's Decline and Fall suffered from some old-time feminism, stuff I couldn't relate as well to. I felt that I was from a different feminist generation than the book's protagonists. Tepper was born in 1929. My baby-boomer era struggles have been different. I like Family Tree for its ecological focus. Both my husband and I were amused by the characters and shocked and surprised by the ending (I'm not going to spoil it!). I have decided to use Family Tree in my Ecological Anthropology course next year because of the ecology, and also because of the "decision" made by the "horses." Tepper's books make great discussion material for intelligent college students because they posit crucial questions that (I think) we tend to try to avoid ourselves -- such questions as, "What would I do if I were in the same position with the same set of lousy choices?" My students rose to Tepper's challenge with The Gate to Women's Country, all 43 of them responding to the underlying "meta-issues" (as one person on the list so eloquently put it) with incredible sophistication (I'm so proud of them). I believe that the Ecological Anthropology class will do justice to Family Tree. Another reason I loved Family Tree: I love to think about weeds. When I was starting graduate school a couple decades ago, I dreamt about a wonderful shop in the desert that sold rare and beautiful wildflower seeds. These costly and ancient seeds were carefully collected and enclosed in small brittle packages. Each package contained just a few seeds. In the dream I handled the seeds as though they were precious jewels, aware that they contained valuable genetic material. In the dream I had to choose a only a few seeds to buy, just as I would have to choose what I would do with the rest of my life. I awoke from this dream feeling as if I'd had a revelation. It was a dream about "generativity" (Erickson's term), about doing work that would be meaningful for others who would come after me. (I do know what a Freudian would say about the dream!) I fell in love at that moment with wildflowers and weeds (wildflowers by another name) and have even done some anthropological research and writing on the topic -- what a neat experience! So when I discovered that Family Tree was about weeds and wild plants -- "plants out of place" -- and that is starts out with a weed that communicates -- I was absolutely entranced. It's nice to see the weeds have a victory for once. Family Tree suffers from a bit too much blatant black and white good and evil for my taste. But it's a good book, and I couldn't put it down. Tepper is a wonderful author. What a pleasure to read science fiction that is true literature. Candice Bradley Appleton WI ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 21:49:19 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 2:55:12 PM Mountain Standard Time, DMadrone@AOL.COM writes: << But...qualitative analysis is simply too reductionist to be the only way. I refer you to Isaac Newton, who was so fearless in his search for Truth that he used not only Bacon's virile scientific method, but also the effeminate (Bacon's word) process of Alchemy AND immersed himself in a (heretical) study and analysis of the Bible. If Newton was open to so many possibilities and unafraid of censure by 'pure' scientists, dare we be less? >> -- well, yes. Alchemy is a pile of crap; centuries of effort, not one result; that took chemistry. Lies are many, illusion is manifold; Truth is One. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 21:50:10 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 2:55:12 PM Mountain Standard Time, DMadrone@AOL.COM writes: >If Newton was open to so many possibilities and unafraid of censure by 'pure' scientists, dare we be less?> PS: In Newton's day, there _weren't_ any "pure" scientists; science was still separating itself from superstition. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 21:52:39 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 4:06:10 PM Mountain Standard Time, TMBouwman@AOL.COM writes: >When? Where? What kind of action? And why does it have to be when someone else likes, why not when you like? -- because I don't want to be thrown in jail, and the type of action I had in mind requires official sanction if that is not to result. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 23:17:45 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Demetria M. Shew" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 6:50:48 PM Pacific Standard Time, JoatSimeon@AOL.COM writes: << Alchemy is a pile of crap; centuries of effort, not one result; that took chemistry. >> Ah, but....alchemy provided the tools...furnaces, glassware, basic knowledge and procedures that started chemistry out. Many of the properties of elements were first discovered in the alchemists labs. AND alchemy had one thing that often is lost in mere mechanical science...honor, bravery in the face of institionalized dogma, responsibility to others (the poor, widows, children,yes, in spite of how trite that may sound) and a focus on the transformation of the researcher by the process and discoveries within the research. Perhaps if Bacon had not been quite so fastidious about gonadectomies for scientists, we would not have the current trauma of science researched and applied without thought to human consequences. Madrone ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 00:21:35 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: Dark Water's Embrace In-Reply-To: <003b01be17a8$13422880$39b11b26@donna> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit At 07:43 AM 11/24/98 -0500, donna simone wrote: >At some point author's reveal what is their internal world view. The one >perhaps that is not thought out because it part of their essential being. I >am suggesting that at this level. The "unconscious" if you will. Leigh is >presenting a world that, despite existing in what is a technologically and >socially advanced future, still does not recognize the value of peoples >partnering or sexual choices unless they "have a value" to the community. >I would submit that Leigh is content at some level with seeing the world >as a place where us "animals" are here to make more animals. Perhaps Leigh does not believe in onward marching progress in the social sense? I'm not sure that I do. When a small population is faced with an environment that makes individual survival and procreation extremely difficult a fair number may panic, become superstitious and repressive, etc. regardless of when they were born. Even the Miccail, who *had* a "sa" sex and seemed to be flourishing, were not tolerant and good (viz. the enslavement of the JaJe and the ravages of DekTe). I felt that his message was more that all that we can hope for is a certain percentage of decent folk at any given time, perhaps a "golden age" here and there in between cultural collapses... Am I depressing you? Speaking of depression... it occurs to me that this book is similar in some ways to Joanna Russ' *We Who Are About To...* Sadly I haven't read it yet so I can't make the impressive parallels and/or contrasts I would like to. :) >The deck is stacked to make the reader favor [Gabriela] _despite_ >her sexuality. Hm... do you really think that he made her such a likeable person just to overcome homophobia on the part of his readers? In this case it seems like it's hard to distinguish possible deck-stacking from simple not-quite-convincing characterization that could be due to any number of factors. >For a comparison point on "rendering lesbian characters" I would point >to the characters of "Claire" and "Fanny May" in K. J. Fowler's 'Sweetheart >Season'. Fabulous book by the way. I've been meaning to read some of Fowler's stuff. Perhaps this is where I will start. >j. dawley; >>As for this... I don't see any indication that the author disapproves of >>sex for pleasure. The fact that the majority of the colonists don't approve >>of it just makes them look more prudish and repressed.> > >Well if you would stand with me over here :). No other humans in the >book are portrayed having sex for "pleasure" except these three >characters. Yet, the Miccail are portrayed as having very amorous and >pleasurable relations in their triads. Can we not "read" this to mean that >to humans the sex is not "pleasurable" because they were not mating >the "right" way? I am recalling the scene with Elio where Anais "bursts" out. Why do you mention that scene? True, they both achieved orgasm, but presumably the same happens all the time. And Anaïs came away traumatized at her sudden transformation. As far as pleasurable sex goes, there is once again the example of Gabriela. And Anaïs' earlier relationship with Ochiba. One of the passages in the book that made the biggest impression on me (and which I think supports my point) is Anaïs' recollection of erotic moments in her life, when she says, "I suppose the wet piston mechanics of sex never aroused me as much as other things. Smaller things. More intimate things." Maybe because I identified with what she said so strongly, it had a ring of authenticity that said to me "the author really understands and sympathizes with this point of view." That eroticism can be completely separate from acts traditionally associated with babymaking; that in fact it is often destroyed by focusing on such acts. Whew! I am up way past my bedtime. So off goes the latest volley... ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/jedhome.htm Listening to: Tori Amos -- From the Choirgirl Hotel "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 22:41:16 -0700 Reply-To: camiller@gte.net Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Cathie Miller Subject: OT, ad nauseum MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Wow. I'm glad I'm not put off by OT posts. This science vs science thing is rife with possibilities for my next fiction project. But, enough (or, more) about me. Since you asked, I think the bottom line here (I'm a bottom-line woman) is, a lot of people have had their feelings hurt by the 'better brains' comment. I think the person who originated the 'better brains' comment should apologize. I happen to remember who the 'better brains' comment-originator was, however, if we all put our heads down on our desks, the person needn't reveal her/himself. A simple :-) sent anonymously should suffice. What I think doesn't really matter, though, when you think about it. Which I often do. No one said that hard science people were better than soft science people. This would pre-suppose that hard is better than soft and that better is better than not better. Basically, we all know some sciences are harder than others. We know this, usually, because it smarts when we fall on them. But this doesn't mean that some of us are smarter than others. Or that those of us who may be less smart are actually dumb ol' expendable whales in disguise. It simply means that some sciences are characterized by greater ease of control than others. Much of the time, control is the point. Many of us need more control than others of us. This doesn't mean that others of us are looser (except, maybe, sexually). It only means that others of us may be more secure in ourselves than those who aren't. I mean nothing whatsoever by this. I feel that meaning anything is less smart than simply blathering on about nothing. Now that I've exercised absolute-ly no control whatever on the subjectivity of this OT thread, may we get, or not get, back to some kind of common ground whereby we can continue to misunderstand each other? Helpfully, I remain, Chris, who has been no help whatsoever, but who was awake past her bed-time when she read her mail. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 23:31:56 PST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Claudia Lyndhurst Subject: Re: OT, ad nauseum Comments: cc: camiller@GTE.NET MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain On 24 Nov 98, at 22:41, Cathie Miller wrote: > What I think doesn't really matter, though, when you think about > it. Which I often do. Isn't it about time that we let the list owner play "list policewoman" if and when she thinks it's necessary? Is it really necessary for the same two or three people to start giving orders as soon as a discussion goes off track? Claudia ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:08:53 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: Apologies all round Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 24-11-1998 17:17, Jane Franklin said: >I'm really sorry that I've made people mad. I'm not mad. I'm very happy to read your posts. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:13:32 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: OT, ad nauseum Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 25-11-1998 8:31, Claudia Lyndhurst said: >Isn't it about time that we let the list owner play "list policewoman" >if and when she thinks it's necessary? Is it really necessary for the >same two or three people to start giving orders as soon as a discussion >goes off track? Heartily seconded. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:13:29 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Dark Water's Embrace In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19981125002135.0073c680@together.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 00:21 1998-11-25 -0500, you wrote: >At 07:43 AM 11/24/98 -0500, donna simone wrote: >Perhaps Leigh does not believe in onward marching progress in the social >sense? I'm not sure that I do. When a small population is faced with an >environment that makes individual survival and procreation extremely >difficult a fair number may panic, become superstitious and repressive, >etc. regardless of when they were born. Even the Miccail, who *had* a "sa" >sex and seemed to be flourishing, were not tolerant and good (viz. the >enslavement of the JaJe and the ravages of DekTe). I felt that his message >was more that all that we can hope for is a certain percentage of decent >folk at any given time, perhaps a "golden age" here and there in between >cultural collapses... Am I depressing you? > No, you make me think of Golding, Lord of the Flies, this theme is an old one in literature. Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:06:56 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science In-Reply-To: <8e01be1f.365b702f@aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 21:49 1998-11-24 -0500, you wrote: >Lies are many, illusion is manifold; Truth is One. > And that is originally a religious concept. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 06:53:51 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Offered in response to these comments and those I have received privately: >>Isn't it about time that we let the list owner play "list policewoman" >>if and when she thinks it's necessary? Is it really necessary for the >>same two or three people to start giving orders as soon as a discussion >>goes off track?>> >Heartily seconded.> So one is only required to honor community parameters when ordered to do so by a person in a position of authority? Would you loot a store in a power outage? For clarity sake I remind folks that this list is unmoderated. Thus honoring list parameters, a not uncommon net courtesy, is "self-policed" by the existing list members. I am assuming responsibilities that are mine to assume when I ask for members to discuss feminist SF. I am asking for members to respect the entire population of the list by posting to the list topic or subject. The point at which one goes off list in an attempt to control postings is the point at which we have acknowledged we can not chose this respectful behavior on our own. As I said in my previous post: "No one is saying people cannot freely discuss world events or the theoretical nuances of any topic under the sun. Some members would just prefer these issues be discussed elsewhere or privately as opposed to here on FSFFU. In my 20+ years of reading feminist SFF I have never found a space devoted to the discussion of said text (with the exception of WisCon for 4 days once a year). I am, I will admit, jealously possessive of this space. I will freely make an ass of myself to defend it as it is and I quote: ""Interested in talking to other people about the works of Ursula Le Guin, Marge Piercy, Suzy McKee Charnas, Elisabeth Vonarburg, Joanna Russ, and many others? Want to find out more about these authors, and other writers like them? The Feminist Science Fiction, Fantasy & Utopia ListServe is a space for discussion of this literature." (from FSFFU website)"" With the brilliance evident in the OT postings, surely the same members are well able to draw a parallel or comparative example from any of the hundreds of feminist science fiction or fantasy books we have all read? donna donnaneely@earthlink.net ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 07:16:56 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Dark Water segue MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit j dawley: >>Perhaps Leigh does not believe in onward marching progress in the social >>sense? I'm not sure that I do. When a small population is faced with an >>environment that makes individual survival and procreation extremely >>difficult a fair number may panic, become superstitious and repressive, >>etc. regardless of when they were born britt-inger: >No, you make me think of Golding, Lord of the Flies, this theme is an old >one in literature.> Both of these comments provide me a useful segue into the latest story I have read. FTR, Maureen McHugh's "The Cost To Be Wise" in P N Hayden's Starlight 1 collection. Briefly the context: An Earth colony is cut off from contact for an unidentified amount of time and than is "recontacted". The colonists, due to this circumstance, have "evolved" shall we say from the conditions under which they began their circumstance. The story drops us into Sckarline...a community intentionally organized by an earth couple whose intent in coming to this lost colony is to introduce an alternate variation of community, non-violent and self-sustaining, into what is a clan-oriented more violent, hunting-based cultural mileu. Through no apparent fault of their own, the entire community is destroyed by a clan but for two young adults. How and why this happens is a fascinating exposition. (Note: McHugh's next book takes place in this same locale) This a great story for drawing in a number of threads ongoing on the list I think. Moral relativism, Science in the service of humanity, etc. I would love to draw some moral absolutes about this story for it has stirred up a tremendous amount of emotion in me. McHugh does a marvelous job of drawing no clear lines from which one can point and say...."see _their_ right." All of the players are credible in their choices it seems to me. But oh my how painfully and horrifically it all plays out. I am struck at the multiple meanings of the title......at least what I read as multiple. Has anyone read it? Care to jump in? donna donnaneely@earthlink.net ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 13:33:38 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) In-Reply-To: <004d01be186a$46084660$f7b11b26@donna> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Since I returned to this list a fortnight or so ago after going no mail due to heavy work load, I have noticed that various OT discussions (apologize for having been unable to resist chiming in a few times) have been the cause for a majority of the postings to this list. Within reason OT discussions have their place as well, but the extent has been more than overwhelming lately. Is it usually this bad? Esp. as it has mainly been a stage for showing off and most of the contributions have had a tendency of running round in circles not leading anywhere. Aside from several examples of what I would refer to as pretty offensive patriarchal and generally chauvinistic behaviour/comments as well. To speak clearly it would seem Mr Stirling especially takes a delight in raising people's hackles. I hereby once again formally apologize and commit myself never to be provoked to OT discussions of no or very little relevance to the aim of this list ever again. I hope others will join me in this vow. I'm in complete agreement with Donna, that there are other outlets for most of the OT discussions that have been conducted here. Let's get back to business. I wish to add that the few book discussions contrariwise have been very rewarding and interesting to follow. Britt-Inger Britt-Inger.Johansson@konstvet.uu.se Ph.D. Dept. of Art History Uppsala slott, Soedra tornet H:0 752 37 Uppsala Uppsala University ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 13:54:19 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Dark Water segue In-Reply-To: <005001be186d$7f5c2640$f7b11b26@donna> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Both of these comments provide me a useful segue into the latest story I >have read. FTR, Maureen McHugh's "The Cost To Be Wise" in P >N Hayden's Starlight 1 collection. > >Has anyone read it? Care to jump in? > >donna Unfortunately not, but will try and find it. The grand tragedy as a literary genre has long antecedents and used to be the foremost before the 18th century when the middle genre that deals with more everyday topics was "invented" both for the stage and as the novel as we know it. Your summary indicates that this short story has the classical build up where every action or inaction irrevocably, unavoidably, and in one sense even logically, lead on to the final cataclysmic moment of destruction - and the reader/spectator with horrified attention intuits the progression towards the tragic end, unable to intervene. A beautiful chain of actions and decisions aimed towards achieving something good, but leading to the opposite, like an avalanche mounting up or a train slowly being derailed. I hope it doesn't sound ghoulish, but I really enjoy a good tragedy. Britt-Inger Britt-Inger.Johansson@konstvet.uu.se Ph.D. Dept. of Art History Uppsala slott, Soedra tornet H:0 752 37 Uppsala Uppsala University ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:06:44 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: marie Subject: Re: OT Einstein's wife MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="------------32079660939D798BD921C0FE" --------------32079660939D798BD921C0FE Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > >> > Wait. Einstein. I remember now...he was not a good mathematician. He had a > real hard time in school, and went to work in the patent office. He > discovered the General Theory of Relativity intuitively...not mathematically. > Well, I read somewhere he was married to this mathematician lady...and was kind enough to remember her 'help' in his Nobel acceptance speech.Marie ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:51:06 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lisette boily Subject: Re: OT Einstein's wife MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_004F_01BE1859.1F1246C0" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_004F_01BE1859.1F1246C0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Marie wrote: Wait. Einstein. I remember now...he was not a good mathematician. He had a real hard time in school, and went to work in the patent office. He discovered the General Theory of Relativity intuitively...not mathematically. Well, I read somewhere he was married to this mathematician lady...and was kind enough to remember her 'help' in his Nobel acceptance speech. Marie Yes, but Einstein arguably also drove his gifted mathematician wife (Einstein was hopeless with "numbers" apparently) to major nervous breakdowns as she was little by little relegated exclusively to the domestic sphere as his career rose. She moved from being a virtual partner in his early, unknown career days to a shadow, but with a considerable talent for mathematics, and nowhere to put that talent. Some have argued that without her early mathematics help, he would not necessarily have been able to translate his brilliant ideas in to the language of math. Einstein's also personal writings exhibit his general hostility to his family--not just wife, but two children as well--in terms of being tied down to the "meaninglessness" of domestic life. It's been a while since I read the stuff, but there is feminist work on this subject. There's even a play (or two) about "Mrs. Einstein," and at least one documentary that I can remember. I think there needs to be an "alternative history" written about her, where perhaps, she did not succumb. Lisette Boily, Toronto, Canada ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:55:02 -0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anna Mazzoldi Organization: Freelance Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On 24 Nov 98, S.M. Stirling wrote: > In a message dated 11/24/98 4:06:10 PM Mountain Standard Time, > TMBouwman@AOL.COM writes: > > >When? Where? What kind of action? And why does it have to be when > >someone > else likes, why not when you like? > > -- because I don't want to be thrown in jail, and the type of action I had > in mind requires official sanction if that is not to result. You playing macho here, by any chance? (Sorry, I'll stop this OT right now. But some people have been behaving a bit aggressively of late, I don't like it much.) --- Anna Mazzoldi writing from Dublin, Ireland http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/ (Translation links and more) - There is always a choice. -Granny Weatherwax ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 16:13:26 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 25-11-1998 12:53, donna simone said: >So one is only required to honor community parameters when ordered to do >so by a person in a position of authority? Would you loot a >store in a power outage? We'd probably rather not have lynch mobs either. If an "unmoderated" list has to be intolerant, yes, I'd prefer a moderated one. The rule of the majority is not always the best protection for individual freedom. And I am not convinced that a cozy village where everybody can look at your life and pass judgement is the best way to organize life. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 08:16:36 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Erin Garrett Organization: None Subject: Re: OT: Query raised by Aside on GATE MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------155C6613E4C91596857F54A9" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------155C6613E4C91596857F54A9 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Robin Reid wrote: > I still remember reading a male critic's blurb which was printed on the > cover of the novel. Cannot recall his name and the book is at home. He > said the novel LACKED the BITTER FEMINISM of earlier writers (presumably, > Russ and other "seventies utopian" writers)--and when you think about what > actually happens in the novel, I wonder what he considers to be "bitter > feminism." I also wonder how much of the book he read, tee-hee. Please excuse the mickey mouse nature of my questions, but I would appreciate any feedback. Sort of related to the reviewer's comment on "bitter feminism," I've been trying to get my mind around the distinction Elaine Showalter makes between Gynocritics and the Feminist Critique in "Toward a Feminist Politics," and, for whatever reason, I can't. It seems to me that Showalter is also distinguishing between "bitter feminism" (i.e., feminism of the 1970s, which she seems to portray as too narrowly focused on documenting and condemning patriarchy and patriarchal social structures) and a healthier means of recovering female experience ala texts written by women. I am stuck on how, if all recorded history and all parts of consumer culture are innately fallacious indicators of female experience because they are designed and disseminated by patriarchy, are women to successfully enter into gynocriticism? Purely by reading only texts by female authors? In general, aren't women authors as guilty of disseminating masculinist culture as men? Are we then to read only the "good" female authors (i.e., the subversive ones)? How is that going to show the fullness of female experience? Wouldn't that propagate an elitism similar to that used by the Academy to suppress women's texts in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as the flawed productions of "scribbling women" ? What about all the "potboilers," etc. of today and yesterday that are consumed by the majority of female readers? Isn't that class of fiction worthy of study as the class most produced and consumed? Is there no way that an examination of masculine representations of women (by both men and women) can lead toward a better understanding of female experience? Or is it simply that that part of women's studies has been so over done that it is now a cliché? Is she calling attention to feminism's "stuck" position (i.e., reexamining the same list of canonized texts written by male authors to the neglect of works by female authors)? If so, that I can understand as it seems to define my experiences with academia. Any thoughts? --------------155C6613E4C91596857F54A9 Content-Type: text/x-vcard; charset=us-ascii; name="vcard.vcf" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Description: Card for Erin Garrett Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="vcard.vcf" begin: vcard fn: Erin Garrett n: Garrett;Erin email;internet: egarrett@du.edu note: "Without a metaphor I cannot live." MWS, March 17, 1823 x-mozilla-cpt: ;0 x-mozilla-html: TRUE version: 2.1 end: vcard --------------155C6613E4C91596857F54A9-- ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:33:12 -0600 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: OT, ad nauseum Comments: To: Cathie Miller In-Reply-To: <365B9879.4D8A@gte.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Cathie Miller said: >Basically, we all know some sciences are harder than others. We know >this, usually, because it smarts when we fall on them. But this doesn't >mean that some of us are smarter than others. Might it be worth mentioning here that the word "hard" in the phrase "hard sciences" (or hard science fiction for that matter) has nothing to do with the notion of difficulty but rather is concerned with the extent to which the phenomenon being studied is mathematically quantifiable? In this sense traditional physics (although not some parts of cosmology perhaps) is harder than many areas of biology (although not some areas of genetics), but not necessarily more difficult. Mike Levy Michael M. Levy levym@uwstout.edu Department of English levymm@uwec.edu University of Wisconsin-Stout off. ph: 715-834-6533 Menomonie, WI 54751 hm. ph: 715-834-6533 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:56:10 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Suzy McKee Charnas--"Boobs" and The Conqueror's Child In-Reply-To: <365C4734.ACC5395E@bigfoot.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Taught Suzy McKee Charnas's "Boobs" to my mostly male science fiction class on Wednesday afternoon. By coincidence, the morning mail brought an advertisement from Charnas announcing the impending publication of her final Holdfast novel, The Conqueror's Child, due out from Tor in May. Charnas is also trying to set up a speaking tour for herself at various university and bookstore venues. If you're interested in inviting her, write to her at suzych@higherfiber.com "Boobs," which one the Hugo a few years back, is a powerful story about puberty, high school traumas, empowerment and revenge. It's also rather gruesome. Most, although not all, of my (male) students found the story upsetting and offputting for a variety of reasons. Several insisted that Charnas was, to quote the most vocal, "a lesbian manhater." One student even wanted to know if the author was "extremely ugly." The implication being, of course, that if the author were gay, ugly, or hated men, the story could be discounted as sour grapes. They really didn't want to consider the possibility that the story might have been written by a happily married, hetrosexual woman who might indeed have many male friends, but who still finds some male behavior objectionable in the extreme. The four women in the class, of course, had a radically different take on the story. Although they didn't necessarily feel comfortable with the moral ambiguities at the end of "Boobs" they enjoyed the revenge fantasy part of it. One woman, however, said that she was disappointed when the villain dies at the end (I'm being a bit vague here unpurpose) since she would have preferred that he simply be maimed for life! This sparked a couple of comments from the men in the class about women at heart being more violent than men, which led to other discussion. It was an interesting class. Mike Michael M. Levy levym@uwstout.edu Department of English levymm@uwec.edu University of Wisconsin-Stout off. ph: 715-834-6533 Menomonie, WI 54751 hm. ph: 715-834-6533 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 07:57:45 PST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Daniel Krashin Subject: The Family Tree MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain As long as we're on the subject of _TFT_... This is the only Tepper book I've read besides some of those Jinian Footseer books a long time ago. It kept me reading along, but afterwards, all the inconstencies and flaws in logic started to bug me. Frex: (SPOILERS AHEAD) # # # # # # --the mismatch between the two storylines, and the rushed quality to the story once the two storylines finally converge --the idea of all the nonhuman races building a society so similar to that of mankind, and that no one would figure out that all the books left over from the past were written by a different species --the cliched elements: the band of physically weak but brainy humans holding on after the disaster; the singular genius who uplifts species after species in his lab without anyone figuring it out and without much help --the sometimes annoying classical references: Cory is obviously Kore, but is Dora a Pandora figure? I like the way Tim Powers handles this a lot better, where he explicitly takes the legends and then warps them into his twisted sensibility. --The earlier storyline just trails off -- I didn't really feel satisfied with the explanation that the "Cory weed" was just going to be exterminated, anyway. --the uneven characterization of Dora: sometimes she seems like a humble cop, then suddenly she starts talking like a Earth First tree-hugger, for no apparent reason. This gets especially bad when she meets the leftist academic guy. Also, at the end she seems to take the murder of everyone she knows and loves in the world rather lightly. There were plenty of things to like, though: --the charming fairy-tale quality of the future storyline. I especially liked the sly reference to "1001 nights" and the reflections on why quests must always be made in primitive societies. --the characters of Dora and her husband are quite vivid and interesting, especially in the first half of the book --I liked the resoluteness of her anti-human feelings. I don't think that's always a bad trait in a writer; some of my favorite writers, Bukowski and Celine, don't think much of people as a species. >From others' reactions on this list, I gather this is not one of her strongest works. I am looking forward to reading the "Grass" trilogy and the new novel Real Soon Now. Danny -- -- ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 08:15:58 PST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Claudia Lyndhurst Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain On 25 Nov 98, at 6:53, donna simone wrote: > So one is only required to honor community parameters when > ordered to do so by a person in a position of authority? > Would you loot a store in a power outage? Nice choice of metaphor. Or is it just the most insulting statement you could think of to put an uppity "N*" in her place? This has to be the most incredibly racist slur I've been subjected to in my many years of hearing racist insults. Claudia ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 09:18:30 PST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Daniel Krashin Subject: OT India, Moral Relativism, yadda yadda yadda MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain I feel guilty about the recent explosion of OT postings, since it seems to have been triggered by my purely personal revulsion at the thought of discussing _Dhalgren_ with a roomful of Foucault- addled grad students. I am trying studiously not to comment on suttee, psychiatry, Nietzsche, India, or any of the other subjects on which I have strong opinions (all of which are BY GOD CORRECT, BTW). But I did want to post this quote from Arundathi Roy, the Indian author of _The God of Small Things_, from an article about the Indian nuke test that I found on the Nation website. (http://www.thenation/com) "As for the third Official Reason [that India tested its nuclear bomb]: Exposing Western Hypocrisy--how much more exposed can it be? What decent human being on earth harbors any illusions about it? These are people whose histories are spongy with the blood of others. Colonialism, apartheid, slavery, ethnic cleansing, germ warfare, chemical weapons--they virtually invented it all. They have plundered nations, snuffed out civilizations, exterminated entire populations. They stand on the world's stage stark naked but entirely unembarrassed, because they know that they have more money, more food and bigger bombs than anybody else. They know they can wipe us out in the course of an ordinary working day. Personally, I'd say it is more arrogance than hypocrisy." (Makes me proud to be a white guy :| ) Danny P.S. Please don't take this as an invitation to digress about nukes or colonialism or whatever, I just thought it was a good quote.-dk ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 12:33:26 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Demetria M. Shew" Subject: Re: OT Einstein's wife Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/25/98 5:11:30 AM Pacific Standard Time, hable@BIGFOOT.COM writes: << Well, I read somewhere he was married to this mathematician lady...and was kind enough to remember her 'help' in his Nobel acceptance speech.Marie >> The first wife was the mathematician. He treated her very badly, see post, and one of his sons had a nervous break down and had to be institutionalized. He divorced his first wife (divorce was just not done at this time, he got it by means of his acquired power as a 'respected' practitioner of pure science) and married a younger woman. BUT he was more interested in the personal comforts he got from marriage than in a relationship: probably should just have had a live in maid and weekend trips to town. His second wife was bewildered by his lack of attention. When Bacon condemned the female by referring to Nature as "she" and discussion how science would bring "her" under man's control, and man would "break her back" and penetrate her for her secrets (!) he also condemned the men who would practice his virile science. The alchemists, bless their moon-dazzled foolishness, at least had personal development and transformation as part of their science. They didn't equate lack of bias with lack of 'effeminate' behaviors. Madrone, wishing I could sit down and have a loooooong talk with Isaac ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 17:32:06 -0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Yvonne Rowse Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >On 25 Nov 98, at 6:53, donna simone wrote: > >> So one is only required to honor community parameters when >> ordered to do so by a person in a position of authority? >> Would you loot a store in a power outage? > >Nice choice of metaphor. Or is it just the most insulting statement you >could think of to put an uppity "N*" in her place? This has to be the >most incredibly racist slur I've been subjected to in my many years of >hearing racist insults. What? I don't know about donna but I don't actually keep track of who is who, other than when someone posts as frequently and with such a distinctive style as SMStirling. One of the odd things about email is that you can't see the colour of anyone's skin. You can't tell what sex they are unless they reveal it. I think it probable that donna had no intention of insulting *you* in a racist or any other way as I'm sure she'll tell you herself. yvonne ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:09:29 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/25/98 7:56:42 AM Mountain Standard Time, mazzoldi@IOL.IE writes: >You playing macho here, by any chance?> -- no, just acting according to Max Weber's insights. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:19:11 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT India, Moral Relativism, yadda yadda yadda Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/25/98 10:33:26 AM Mountain Standard Time, dkrashin@HOTMAIL.COM writes: >I am trying studiously not to comment on suttee, psychiatry, Nietzsche, India,> -- well, there you went and posted on 'em, combined with a concluding sentence calculated to prevent anyone from replying. Tsk! ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 21:33:17 MET Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anthea Hartley Stanton Subject: Kage Baker's _In the garden of Iden_ Comments: cc: m_stanton@postmaster.co.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I've just finished the best time-travel book I've ever read - Kage Baker's _In the garden of Iden_. Rescued as a child rescued from death/torture at the hands of the Spanish Inquisition by agents of a 24C time-travelling company called Dr Zeus Inc, the heroine (Mendoza) is surgically etc metamorphosed into a 'superheroic' botanist who travels through time collecting endangered plants. In the assignment the book covers, she goes with two other cyborgs to examine the garden of Sir Walter Iden in Kent during Mary Tudor's bloody, ultimately unsuccessful attempt to restore Catholicism to Britain. The main theme, though, of the book is the love story between Mendoza and Nicolas Harpole, a young Protestant. It's a beautifully written book which not only brings alive pre-Elizabethan England, but provides really superb insight into the nature of the Reformation in England from the viewpoint of a detached, almost alien, observer. AJ Anthea Hartley Stanton (ajhs@usa.net) ______________________________________ >From Amazon.com: Baker, Kage 1998. _In the Garden of Iden_ 313 pages (November 1998) Eos (Mass Market); ISBN: 0380731797. $4.79 (Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours). ____________________________________________________________________ Get free e-mail and a permanent address at http://www.netaddress.com/?N=1 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 21:35:19 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: OT, ad nauseum In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" A short reply. A long discussion of hard vs soft sciences, much resembling the current one was held approx. 1 1/2 years ago. Interested parties may study the listserv archive. Britt-Inger >Might it be worth mentioning here that the word "hard" in the phrase >"hard sciences" (or hard science fiction for that matter) has nothing to do >with the notion of difficulty but rather is concerned with the extent to >which the phenomenon being studied is mathematically quantifiable? In >this sense traditional physics (although not some parts of cosmology >perhaps) is harder than many areas of biology (although not some areas >of genetics), but not necessarily more difficult. > >Mike Levy > > >Michael M. Levy levym@uwstout.edu >Department of English levymm@uwec.edu >University of Wisconsin-Stout off. ph: 715-834-6533 >Menomonie, WI 54751 hm. ph: 715-834-6533 > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:22:40 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) In-Reply-To: <19981125161558.215.qmail@hotmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 08:15 1998-11-25 -0800, you wrote: >On 25 Nov 98, at 6:53, donna simone wrote: > >> So one is only required to honor community parameters when >> ordered to do so by a person in a position of authority? >> Would you loot a store in a power outage? > >Nice choice of metaphor. Or is it just the most insulting statement you >could think of to put an uppity "N*" in her place? This has to be the >most incredibly racist slur I've been subjected to in my many years of >hearing racist insults. > > >Claudia Huhh? I've read the quoted three sentences above several times, and I can't for the life of me figure out what it is that could possibly be interpreted as a racist slur? Am I, being a non-american, missing something? Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:47:09 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 25-11-1998 17:15, Claudia Lyndhurst said: >On 25 Nov 98, at 6:53, donna simone wrote: > >> So one is only required to honor community parameters when >> ordered to do so by a person in a position of authority? >> Would you loot a store in a power outage? > >Nice choice of metaphor. Or is it just the most insulting statement you >could think of to put an uppity "N*" in her place? This has to be the >most incredibly racist slur I've been subjected to in my many years of >hearing racist insults. Ehm, well, I seemed to have been included too. I doubt it is a question of race in my case - nobody can know which race I am since I never told anybody in the list - though I undoubtely felt a bit troubled, like you did, by the choice of arguments. I think it was perhaps a bit too strong, but I'd really like to defuse the situation. Ok, so I felt insulted. I've been a moderator, I know it's stressfull and people can overreact or maybe say the first thing they think without having the time or will to tone it down. I don't *think* she was being racist. I may be wrong, of course. I don't think she was being *deliberately* racist, anyway. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 23:46:29 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 25-11-1998 0:06, Britt-Inger Johansson said: >Biologism is the greatest >enemy to feminism BTW, since it ascribes the inequalities to inherent >structures, for instance in the bio chemistry of the brain and therefore >unchangeable, whereas humanity scholars ascribe it to cultural and social >influence and therefore changeable. Not everybody in biology would agree that inequalities are intrinsic, at least inequalities like intelligence, for example. See Stephen Jay Gould's The Mismeasure of Man, for example. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 17:50:48 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Bertina Miller Subject: Happy Thanksgiving! In-Reply-To: <737859db.3659c0f2@aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Happy Turkey day for those who partake and those who dont-happy reading!! Bertina bmiller@medmail.mcg.edu ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 18:55:32 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Barbara R. Hume" Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/24/98 10:46:17 AM Pacific Standard Time, shericks@PEOPLE-LINK.COM writes: << And why is it we routinely cut off the foreskins of male babies and never think twice? >> I thought it was to prevent infection. I was told that the foreskin tends to gather dirt and germs. I've never seen an adult male penis that still has the foreskin, but I've heard some mothers say that it isn't easy to keep in clean when they're kids. Lurima ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 17:11:03 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sarah Lawrence Subject: Re: "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen) In-Reply-To: <199811211038.FAA25770@apocalypse.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 5:38am -0500 on 1998/11/21, ME Hunter wrote: >I've heard a fair number of people dismiss psychology/sociology/political >science/anthropology (although, interestingly, not usually including >economics) as not being worthy of the name "science." I don't mean to be >contentious, but I'm curious. Those of you who feel that way, what is your >goal? Do you think these issues are not worthy of study? or that they should >be subsumed into some other category? that scientific methods of >experimentation should not be applied? that more scientific methods should >be applied (and how would you handle the ethics restrictions)? Do you see >any improvement in these fields over time? If so, how do you think this >differs from the progession of the hard sciences? If not, how do you think >these questions should be addressed? I think that you may be making the mistake of thinking that only in science is there any progress/growth of knowledge. But in fact, there is growth of knowledge in other spheres, and not only is there no need to try to squeeze every such field into "Science", it is a grave mistake to do so. A theory is scientific if and only if it forbids something. In other words, if it could in principle be (tentatively) shown to be false, by an empirical test. Only if a theory forbids something can it ever in principle fail an empirical test. All interesting theories in the fields of psychology, sociology, politics, economics and suchlike are, I conjecture, untestable in the rigorous sense I have given above; therefore, those theories are not scientific but philosophical. However, that does not mean that those fields are worthless, nor does it mean that those non-scientific theories are not very interesting and valuable. All it means is that they are not scientific. That is only a slur if you are a logical positivist or someone who thinks that anything that is not science is nonsense. Not being scientific does not equate to being nonsense! However, those in the field of human psychology, economics, or educational theory, say, are not making an innocent mistake when they call their philosophical theories "scientific". This label is often misapplied precisely because of the authority accorded to anything under the heading of "Science" and the very unfortunate lack of respect for anything labelled non-scientific. In other words, in many cases, calling these theories "Scientific" is a way of according them bogus authority in an attempt to avoid criticism that could actually address them. For philosophical theories are just as subject to refutation as scientific theories; just in a different way, through argument rather than through empirical testing. It is not that I consider these subjects unworthy of study -- far from it! It is just that in the more interesting parts of these subjects, theories simply are not and in principle cannot be scientific, because they do not and cannot forbid anything. Therefore, applying scientific methodology is impossible in principle and the result of pretending to apply it in these cases is what Hayek called "scientism". Sarah Lawrence ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 16:52:03 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Susan Armstrong Subject: OT: FGM and cultural relativism: Was: "Evil" Philosophers Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Me, I'd >like to see more discussions where the examples of relative morality run >the other way, perhaps (for example) questioning the "Western" belief that >bulemia, anorexia, and constant dieting are acceptable forms of body >modification despite the damage they do to women's bodies, lives and >identities. >Anne Vespry ******* http://www.vex.net/~maverick You forgot one of my favourites: Cosmetic breast implants. Our tits are small-to-medium, that means they're abnormal. Let's spend thousands of dollars to cut our chests open and stick bags of chemicals in there permanently... otherwise men won't like us or respond sexually to us (that threat's on a pretty primal level, isn't it!). This happens to be fresh in my mind, since I was surfing the other day and happened on a discussion list, populated (apparently) by a cross section of American women. They were having some incredible-but-true discussions, re: relationships. Some of them reported that their boyfriends had criticized their inadequate breast size and asked them whether they'd ever considered getting implants. And instead of reporting to the list "I immediately decked him and dumped him", these women were seriously considering going ahead and doing it. And the other women on the list took the question just as seriously, some encouraging them to do it so as to feel better about themselves. I can't remember any advice to "ditch that asshole immediately". And "we" Westerners loftily criticize FGM in other parts of the world? Let's set our own house in order. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't FGM generally done at the behest of mature women in the local culture, so that their girls will be marriageable (i.e., sexually attractive to men) and will fit into their society (rather than being considered different and abnormal). Needless to say, the obvious difference from Western-style "improvement" of female parts, is the element of consent on the part of the girls. But apart from that, what are the essential differences? (Not a rhetorical question... however I do know this is OT.) -- Susan anariska@smartt.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 19:43:20 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sarah Lawrence Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 6:55pm -0500 on 1998/11/25, Barbara R. Hume wrote: >In a message dated 11/24/98 10:46:17 AM Pacific Standard Time, >shericks@PEOPLE-LINK.COM writes: > ><< > And why is it we routinely cut off the foreskins of male babies and > never think twice? >> > >I thought it was to prevent infection. I was told that the foreskin tends to >gather dirt and germs. I've never seen an adult male penis that still has the >foreskin, but I've heard some mothers say that it isn't easy to keep in clean >when they're kids. As a European, where people don't generally believe in routinely chopping off bits of other people's genitalia in babyhood, I am appalled by this ignorant and utterly false idea. That argument could justify all manner of other barbaric practices. Maybe the vulva would be "easier to keep clean" if it were surgically altered at birth too (be sure to remove the clitoral hood -- bound to harbour unclean things) but to most women, that idea is nauseating. And yet women all over America blithely have their infant sons' genitalia surgically altered every day. And then everyone wonders why America has such high rates of erectile dysfunction and other related problems. The foreskin is not just a little piece of skin; it is an important part of the genitalia, and unless you have religious reasons, or there is some particular problem, I can see no good reason for leaving children with scar tissue on their genitalia. There is a superb web site that you should visit if you want to know what an intact penis looks like, and to see how the skin slides over the soft, moist glans of the intact male, protecting it from chafing, etc. This URL shows close-up photographs which provide some of the information some of you may want. The main page has some excellent links too. Look at the blood vessels in that "little piece of skin". http://www.foreskin.org/33.htm Sarah ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 17:55:44 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Keith Subject: Re: Dark Water's Embrace In-Reply-To: <19981125083145Z4879-15454+9@uria.its.uu.se> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 25 Nov 1998, Britt-Inger Johansson wrote: > At 00:21 1998-11-25 -0500, you wrote: >> I felt that his message > >was more that all that we can hope for is a certain percentage of decent > >folk at any given time, perhaps a "golden age" here and there in between > >cultural collapses... Am I depressing you? > > > No, you make me think of Golding, Lord of the Flies, this theme is an old > one in literature. > > Britt-Inger > And of course, We Who Are About To - maybe an old theme, but I love the pragmatic anger of that book. Kathleen ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 20:51:28 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Apology (was Off topic posts) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Before this goes much further allow me to respond to the following: >Nice choice of metaphor. Or is it just the most insulting statement you >could think of to put an uppity "N*" in her place? This has to be the >most incredibly racist slur I've been subjected to in my many years of >hearing racist insults.> To Claudia: I offer my most profound apology, delivered with humility, for the offense my remarks caused you. Though I fear this simple gesture can not ever be enough to assuage the level of hurt/anger I have caused. To the list: It is not for me to interpret for Claudia whether my comments were racist. She has perceived my commentary as racist. It is hers to define for herself. As the perpetrator of the offense, my first, and likely only option, is to apologize to her. I do not tolerate folks denying my observations of sexism or homophobia. I will not attempt to deny or explain away the racism of my comments here. I offer an apology to any other list member who took my commentary as racist or offensive in any way. Also to anyone who has taken offense from my many other posts on list parameters. I have been told privately that some have. My only intent has been to ask or encourage or insist listmembers honor our stated purpose here. donna donnaneely@earthlink.net ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 18:31:04 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Keith Subject: Re: OT: FGM and cultural relativism: Was: "Evil" Philosophers In-Reply-To: <199811260052.QAA06916@smartt.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 25 Nov 1998, Susan Armstrong wrote: I loved your post re: breast implants, but I have to answer this: > > Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't FGM generally done at the behest of > mature women in the local culture, so that their girls will be marriageable > (i.e., sexually attractive to men) and will fit into their society (rather > than being considered different and abnormal). Whatever Westerners choose to call it, the practice of cutting off the labia, or even "only" the clitoris of young girls is nothing more nor less than the hacking out of their bodies, for all their lives, without their consent and while it is still latent, the inextricably human capacity for sexuality. What is cut out of girls is the capacity to feel pleasure from sex and to choose that which pleases them. Men know this. Men think it's great. Read the U.S. or Canadian coverage sometime. No matter what group of option-less people actually carries this out, the beneficiary is the one group who has the luxury and power to let their sexual vanity main forever the lives of half the people of their world. Kathleen > Needless to say, the obvious difference from Western-style "improvement" of > female parts, is the element of consent on the part of the girls. But apart > from that, what are the essential differences? (Not a rhetorical > question... however I do know this is OT.) > > -- Susan > anariska@smartt.com > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 18:35:55 -0700 Reply-To: camiller@gte.net Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Cathie Miller Subject: puh-lease MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I said: > What I think doesn't really matter, though, when you think about > it. Which I often do. Claudia responded: Isn't it about time that we let the list owner play "list policewoman" if and when she thinks it's necessary? Is it really necessary for the same two or three people to start giving orders as soon as a discussion goes off track? to which I say: hmmm. 'giving orders' Okay. It's really tempting to play who can have the bigger chip on her shoulder, but instead... Because you missed my point (if I had one, which is questionable), here it (possibly) is, spelled out: HUMANS ARE VERY STRANGE. ISN'T IT FUN TO VIEW THE EXTREME HEIGHTS OF ABSURDITY WHICH WE CAN ACHIEVE? Maybe it seems as though my critique/satire was some method for showing how above all this I am (I, who helped carry the OT human vs whale intelligence thread to ridiculous lengths) however, it was simply, only, merely, the steam I blow off when there is excess giggling building beneath my surface. and, although my frivolous steam-blowing may be grossly insignificant when compared to, say, posting only when eager to police everyone else's (not one's own) racism... I will continue to blow off steam once in awhile. If the list-owner wants to talk to me, she knows where I am. Chris ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 20:45:27 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sarah Lawrence Subject: Implants In-Reply-To: <199811260052.QAA06916@smartt.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 4:52pm -0800 on 1998/11/25, Susan Armstrong wrote: >>Me, I'd >>like to see more discussions where the examples of relative morality run >>the other way, perhaps (for example) questioning the "Western" belief that >>bulemia, anorexia, and constant dieting are acceptable forms of body >>modification despite the damage they do to women's bodies, lives and >>identities. >>Anne Vespry ******* http://www.vex.net/~maverick > >You forgot one of my favourites: Cosmetic breast implants. Our tits are >small-to-medium, that means they're abnormal. Let's spend thousands of >dollars to cut our chests open and stick bags of chemicals in there >permanently... otherwise men won't like us or respond sexually to us (that >threat's on a pretty primal level, isn't it!). > >This happens to be fresh in my mind, since I was surfing the other day and >happened on a discussion list, populated (apparently) by a cross section of >American women. They were having some incredible-but-true discussions, re: >relationships. Some of them reported that their boyfriends had criticized >their inadequate breast size and asked them whether they'd ever considered >getting implants. And instead of reporting to the list "I immediately >decked him and dumped him", these women were seriously considering going >ahead and doing it. And the other women on the list took the question just >as seriously, some encouraging them to do it so as to feel better about >themselves. I can't remember any advice to "ditch that asshole immediately". I thought they were going out of fashion even with men, because they are so grossly artificial-looking and don't move like real breasts. ? It does seem to me somewhat ironic that we can feel queasy about the strange things some peoples do to their bodies, yet not turn a hair about squeezing potentially dangerous foreign bodies (that are likely to cause all manner of hideous problems later even if the surgery is successful, which it often isn't) into our bodies -- and not just anywhere, but into *breasts*! Sarah ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:23:18 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: Implants Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/26/98 3:02:57 AM, someone wrote: <> Years and years ago, in San Francisco, I was running with a fun crowd, one of whom was a female impersonator at a fancy club in North Beach. I helped him one night make his *falcies,* which he could make twirl in two different directions. Guess what we filled up those cups with (while swilling Argentina wine)... BIRD SEED!!!! AHH. nice memories. keep a light heart, phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:45:37 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: J Bocchino/Sarasota Cty Subject: Re: (OT) Female Genital Mutilation In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I always thought that the male circumcision was basically a religious custom; specifically, a jewish custom (ie old testament) ? which has been carried forth? That it really was a "cleanliness" issue such as the custom/decree/law not to eat pork (which could cause trich infections).. anyone have any more specific information as to its (western) originations?? Right of passage?? JB On Wed, 25 Nov 1998, Barbara R. Hume wrote: > In a message dated 11/24/98 10:46:17 AM Pacific Standard Time, > shericks@PEOPLE-LINK.COM writes: > > << > And why is it we routinely cut off the foreskins of male babies and > never think twice? >> > > I thought it was to prevent infection. I was told that the foreskin > tends to gather dirt and germs. I've never seen an adult male penis > that still has the foreskin, but I've heard some mothers say that it > isn't easy to keep in clean when they're kids. > > Lurima > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:55:28 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: J Bocchino/Sarasota Cty Subject: Re: OT: FGM and cultural relativism: Was: "Evil" Philosophers In-Reply-To: <199811260052.QAA06916@smartt.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII "Needless to say, the obvious difference from Western-style "improvement" of female parts, is the element of consent on the part of the girls. But apart from that, what are the essential differences? (Not a rhetorical question" ---I would say size....FMG is the taking away...implants are an addition...there must have been someone who has studied the west's love of excess... JB On Wed, 25 Nov 1998, Susan Armstrong wrote: > >Me, I'd > >like to see more discussions where the examples of relative morality run > >the other way, perhaps (for example) questioning the "Western" belief that > >bulemia, anorexia, and constant dieting are acceptable forms of body > >modification despite the damage they do to women's bodies, lives and > >identities. > >Anne Vespry ******* http://www.vex.net/~maverick > > You forgot one of my favourites: Cosmetic breast implants. Our tits are > small-to-medium, that means they're abnormal. Let's spend thousands of > dollars to cut our chests open and stick bags of chemicals in there > permanently... otherwise men won't like us or respond sexually to us (that > threat's on a pretty primal level, isn't it!). > > This happens to be fresh in my mind, since I was surfing the other day and > happened on a discussion list, populated (apparently) by a cross section of > American women. They were having some incredible-but-true discussions, re: > relationships. Some of them reported that their boyfriends had criticized > their inadequate breast size and asked them whether they'd ever considered > getting implants. And instead of reporting to the list "I immediately > decked him and dumped him", these women were seriously considering going > ahead and doing it. And the other women on the list took the question just > as seriously, some encouraging them to do it so as to feel better about > themselves. I can't remember any advice to "ditch that asshole immediately". > > And "we" Westerners loftily criticize FGM in other parts of the world? > Let's set our own house in order. > > Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't FGM generally done at the behest of > mature women in the local culture, so that their girls will be marriageable > (i.e., sexually attractive to men) and will fit into their society (rather > than being considered different and abnormal). > Needless to say, the obvious difference from Western-style "improvement" of > female parts, is the element of consent on the part of the girls. But apart > from that, what are the essential differences? (Not a rhetorical > question... however I do know this is OT.) > > -- Susan > anariska@smartt.com > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:34:11 -0600 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: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen In-Reply-To: <19981125224455.OJLN21309.fep01-svc@[212.216.41.161]> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 25 Nov 1998, Elethiomel wrote: > At 25-11-1998 0:06, Britt-Inger Johansson said: > > >Biologism is the greatest > >enemy to feminism BTW, since it ascribes the inequalities to inherent > >structures, for instance in the bio chemistry of the brain and therefore > >unchangeable, whereas humanity scholars ascribe it to cultural and social > >influence and therefore changeable. > > Not everybody in biology would agree that inequalities are intrinsic, at > least inequalities like intelligence, for example. See Stephen Jay > Gould's The Mismeasure of Man, for example. > > > Anna F. Dal Dan Or, for that matter, Joan Slonczewski, world class biologist, noted sf writer and feminist. Mike Levy ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 00:06:25 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Tanya M. Bouwman-Wozencraft" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 98-11-24 22:00:39 EST, you write: << PS: In Newton's day, there _weren't_ any "pure" scientists; science was still separating itself from superstition. >> How do we know that many hundreds of years from now people won't say the same thing about what you regard as the "pure" sciences today? Tanya ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 00:06:27 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Tanya M. Bouwman-Wozencraft" Subject: Re: "Evil" Philosophers and Feminist SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 98-11-24 22:00:43 EST, you write: << >When? Where? What kind of action? And why does it have to be when someone else likes, why not when you like? -- because I don't want to be thrown in jail, and the type of action I had in mind requires official sanction if that is not to result. >> Yet you were the one who responded, with "anytime you like". And you have only hinted at the answer to my question of what kind of action. Tanya ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 00:06:29 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Tanya M. Bouwman-Wozencraft" Subject: Re: Off topic posts(was OT, ad nas....) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 98-11-25 06:59:25 EST, you write: << With the brilliance evident in the OT postings, surely the same members are well able to draw a parallel or comparative example from any of the hundreds of feminist science fiction or fantasy books we have all read? >> Or haven't read, but might be interested in? Tanya (Who's always looking for more books to read :-)) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 00:10:54 -0500 Reply-To: Lilith Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Lilith Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I was debating on whether to send this in. Claudia Lyndhurst said: >>Nice choice of metaphor. Or is it just the most insulting statement you >>could think of to put an uppity "N*" in her place? This has to be the >>most incredibly racist slur I've been subjected to in my many years of >>hearing racist insults.> And Donna replied: >To Claudia: I offer my most profound apology, delivered with humility, for the offense my remarks caused you. Though I fear this >simple gesture can not ever be enough to assuage the level of hurt/anger I have caused. > >To the list: It is not for me to interpret for Claudia whether my comments were racist. She has perceived my commentary as racist. Well. Here's _my_ response (it's from Joanna Russ's book "What Are We Fighting For?"): (Russ quotes Julia Perez): "I've seen white women who will take all kinds of disrespect and feel it's okay because it's a woman of color and "i'm so racist anyway that she has a right to treat me that way.' "_Sarah_ (Perlman): 'That's the liberal guilt.' "_Julia_ (Perez): 'Right, I'm of the opinion that no one has the right to treat you in a disrespectful manner, no matter who you are.'" Donna: don't fall into the trap. Ms. Lyndhurst....I have read many previous posts from you on the list and I can't think of but one or two that did not contain some sort of reaction to a perceived racism in someone else's post...Far be it from me to judge what your experiences are, but microfine as your sensibilities seem to be, did it not occur to you that the immediate labelling of someone else's example of looters being a racist remark could be construed, in turn, racist? After all, not all looters the world over throughout history were "of color", or whatever the politically-correct phrase is. And to use looting as an analogy for an anarchistic situation is no more racist (or so I thought) as using the phrase "lynch-mob" to decribe a hostile situation. (e.g.: "The Republicans are a lynch-mob out to get the President.") Lilith ********************************************* ************Hell's Half Acre*************** * http://www.concentric.net/~Ligeia * ********************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 01:15:34 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Hmmm. Do I get to define any remark I please as anti-Scottish? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 01:26:44 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Kage Baker's _In the garden of Iden_ Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Second the motion. I do love a good time-travel story, and this is one. My only complaint would be a certain weakness in plot integration. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 07:37:40 MET Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anthea Hartley Stanton Subject: Re: Kage Baker's _In the garden of Iden_ Comments: cc: m_stanton@postmaster.co.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Just a little something that might amuse you as well as show how feminist sf can creep into the most unlikely places. An email friend, a retired man doing a degree in theology, tells me that this book became an instant "underground classic" in his faculty shortly after the hardback was released. Evidently it was recommended to students by a most misogynistic professor who believed the book gave a brilliant portrayal of martyrdom and its effect on the people who cared for the martyr(s). Indeed, said the good prof, it's the only novel by a woman he's ever thought worth reading! AJ Anthea Hartley Stanton (ajhs@usa.net) ________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________ Get free e-mail and a permanent address at http://www.netaddress.com/?N=1 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 01:39:12 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/25/98 6:57:17 PM Mountain Standard Time, donnaneely@EARTHLINK.NET writes: << It is not for me to interpret for Claudia whether my comments were racist. She has perceived my commentary as racist. It is hers to define for herself. >> -- this attitude is itself, of course, racist. Patronizing and (clandestinely) contemptuous; it implicitly assumes that (unlike us smart white folk) the person in question is an emotion-driven bundle of conditioned reflexes incapable of objectivity or reasoned argument. Classic "white liberal guilt" stuff. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 01:40:42 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT: FGM and cultural relativism: Was: "Evil" Philos... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/25/98 7:31:20 PM Mountain Standard Time, kmhouse@HALCYON.COM writes: >Men know this. Men think it's great.> -- actually, all the men I know share my opinion -- they think it's repulsive and find the thought of sexual contact with someone so mutilated horrifying. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 01:44:35 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Implants Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/25/98 8:02:57 PM Mountain Standard Time, sl@ENTERPRISE.NET writes: >I thought they were going out of fashion even with men, because they are so grossly artificial-looking and don't move like real breasts. ?> -- it's a class thing, to a certain extent, like big hair. Our culture recently developed a female body ideal with low body fat but large breasts. Since breasts are largely composed of fat tissue, this is absurd. Women in really good shape tend to have small breasts, naturally, because their body fat ratio is low. Of course, the human breast _is_ a cosmetic secondary sexual characteristic; the actual nursing of the infant doesn't require all that fatty structure, as witness most other mammals. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 01:45:26 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: (OT) Female Genital Mutilation Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/25/98 8:46:10 PM Mountain Standard Time, bocchij@SNOOPY.TBLC.LIB.FL.US writes: << I always thought that the male circumcision was basically a religious custom; specifically, a jewish custom (ie old testament) ? >> -- it used to be quite common among Christians in Europe and America too, supposedly as a sanitary measure, but has been falling out of favor. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 22:52:08 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: eva Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) In-Reply-To: <007e01be18df$4b3cc500$37b11b26@donna> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 25 Nov 1998, donna simone wrote: > To the list: It is not for me to interpret for Claudia whether my > comments were racist. She has perceived my commentary as racist. It > is hers to define for herself. As the perpetrator of the offense, my > first, and likely only option, is to apologize to her. I do not > tolerate folks denying my observations of sexism or homophobia. I will > not attempt to deny or explain away the racism of my comments here. i expect to be shown consideration when i speak from my experiences as a person of color, a woman, a bisexual. but i do not think it is at all useful or constructive for someone to simply bow zir head and say, "you're right, i'm a terrible oppressor. your insight into my subconsciously racist/sexist/homophobic motives must be flawless simply by virtue of the fact that you are a bisexual woman of color." that's (pardon my colorful language) fucked up. i don't need kneejerk white/male/het guilt any more than i need racism/sexism/homophobia. -> eva, how did all the members of FSFFU fit into this teeny little handbasket, and why is it getting so hot all of a sudden? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 02:30:33 -0500 Reply-To: Lilith Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Lilith Subject: OT liberal guilt MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hey everyone.... I _was_ trying to defend Donna against an egregious charge of racism ("the worst insult in all my years of..." indeed!), and somehow it seems to be getting turned around into a "don't oppress us with your white liberal guilt" party. I'm sure no one else here has ever had _that_ problem. I know the holidays often bring out the worst in people, but come on. I guess I should have used a different quote from Russ's book -- I used it for the quote about everyone deserving respect (meaning people of all races, etc.), not so much for the "liberal guilt" commentary. Must use more cut-n-paste. Happy Vegetarian Soy-Product Faux-Turkey Loaf Day, Lilith ********************************************* ************Hell's Half Acre*************** * http://www.concentric.net/~Ligeia * ********************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 00:04:19 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: eva Subject: Re: OT liberal guilt Comments: To: Lilith In-Reply-To: <000101be190e$a8f4bac0$69939bcf@ligeia.concentric> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 26 Nov 1998, Lilith wrote: > I _was_ trying to defend Donna against an egregious charge of racism ("the > worst insult in all my years of..." indeed!), and somehow it seems to be > getting turned around into a "don't oppress us with your white liberal > guilt" party. I'm sure no one else here has ever had _that_ problem. I know > the holidays often bring out the worst in people, but come on. the intent of my post was not to attack donna, but to claim that she should not feel obligated to unequivocally accept a charge of racism simply because she is white and the accuser is a person of color. i think i just happened to hit the "liberal guilt" button at the same time you did. -> eva ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 09:10:29 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Female Genital Mutilation In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 18:55 1998-11-25 -0500, you wrote: >In a message dated 11/24/98 10:46:17 AM Pacific Standard Time, >shericks@PEOPLE-LINK.COM writes: > ><< > And why is it we routinely cut off the foreskins of male babies and > never think twice? >> > >I thought it was to prevent infection. I was told that the foreskin tends to >gather dirt and germs. I've never seen an adult male penis that still has the >foreskin, but I've heard some mothers say that it isn't easy to keep in clean >when they're kids. > >Lurima > Nature has been taking care of that some million years now. It is only jews for religions reasons and americans for obscure reasons who practise circumcision on men. In Europe some boys with problems may be subjected to it, but it is not carried out automatically. In fact the forskin is there as a protection, since this part of male anatomy is very sensitive! It really isn't necessary, and should be discontinued because gain is less than the loss. Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 09:48:49 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 22:34 1998-11-25 -0600, you wrote: >On Wed, 25 Nov 1998, Elethiomel wrote: > >> At 25-11-1998 0:06, Britt-Inger Johansson said: >> >> >Biologism is the greatest >> >enemy to feminism BTW, since it ascribes the inequalities to inherent >> >structures, for instance in the bio chemistry of the brain and therefore >> >unchangeable, whereas humanity scholars ascribe it to cultural and social >> >influence and therefore changeable. >> >> Not everybody in biology would agree that inequalities are intrinsic, at >> least inequalities like intelligence, for example. See Stephen Jay >> Gould's The Mismeasure of Man, for example. >> >> >> Anna F. Dal Dan > >Or, for that matter, Joan Slonczewski, world class biologist, noted sf >writer and feminist. > >Mike Levy > Geez, I'd really like to leave this topic, but for clarity's sake - biologism does not equal biology, it is a special brand of biology which centres on bio chem as the only way to explain people's behaviour and where environment is considered as having no effect whatsoever. So, in this way of looking gender inequality is a direct result and an unavoidable one at that of biology. The only biologists I've heard referred to who supports this theory are - men. Wonder why? Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 10:01:52 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) In-Reply-To: <3ecc80ad.365cf790@aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 01:39 1998-11-26 -0500, you wrote: >In a message dated 11/25/98 6:57:17 PM Mountain Standard Time, >donnaneely@EARTHLINK.NET writes: > ><< It is not for me to interpret for Claudia whether my comments were racist. >She has perceived my commentary as racist. It is hers to define for herself. >>> > >-- this attitude is itself, of course, racist. > >Patronizing and (clandestinely) contemptuous; it implicitly assumes that >(unlike us smart white folk) the person in question is an emotion-driven >bundle of conditioned reflexes incapable of objectivity or reasoned argument. >Classic "white liberal guilt" stuff. > No it's not. It is the agreed-upon definition which guides decisions on what is for instance sexual harassment, a recognition of the other's hurt. If a person percieves something as harassment that person has the right declare so, the other is obliged to apologize for trespassing while still having the right also to explain if no ill will was intended. Nothing patronizing about that. As usual you're just trying to pour more oil on the flames to see what happens, like any boy with a chemistry box. Britt-inger ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 10:36:39 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) In-Reply-To: <3ecc80ad.365cf790@aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Might we possibly agree that communication on the web requires a certain degree of forbearance and generosity towards the other participants? And to try not to scan every nuance for possible malicious hints? Verbal communication without physical presence is more difficult, because normally we use our face and body in the communicative act as well as the level of the voice and the intonation. Therefore it is easier to misunderstand and misinterpret the counter part when all these physical aspects of communcation are not present. This in turn requires a will to appreciate what is being said, at the very least, literally and, preferably, with intention to aquit rather than judge when suspecting an insult. One statement is not enough as a foundation to interpret an implied insult, there has to be a recognizable, apparent and recurrent pattern. Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 09:48:47 -0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anna Mazzoldi Organization: Freelance Subject: Tolkien again (was: Re-reading Childhood Favorites) In-Reply-To: <199811091744.MAA63592@dept.english.upenn.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT (Still reading this oldish thread...) On 9 Nov 98, Robert Barrett wrote: > Ob feminism and Tolkien: [...] I > would have to say that I agree that Eowyn and Frodo trouble the > traditional patriarchal boundaries Tolkien sets up early on in his text. Someone else had mentioned the "feminine" character of Frodo. This is something I hadn't thought about, and I would like to hear more about it. In what sense is he "feminine"? Ciao, Anna --- Anna Mazzoldi writing from Dublin, Ireland mazzoldi@iol.ie http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/ (Translation links and more) <*> ebius tagline. This is a moebius tagline. This is a mo ... <*> ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 09:48:47 -0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anna Mazzoldi Organization: Freelance Subject: Tolkien (was: Re-reading Childhood Favorites) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Sorry, I've got the usual big backlog and only saw this post now: On 6 Nov 98, Bertina Miller wrote: > Marina I suppose you never read Tolkein's other works-poems, essays, short > stories and other novels in which women are the main characters! You made me curious now. What are the other novels in which women are the main characters? Ciao, Anna --- Anna Mazzoldi writing from Dublin, Ireland http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/ (Translation links and more) - There is always a choice. -Granny Weatherwax ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 11:31:05 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Elethiomel Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" At 26-11-1998 10:48, Britt-Inger Johansson said: >Geez, I'd really like to leave this topic, but for clarity's sake - >biologism does not equal biology, it is a special brand of biology which >centres on bio chem as the only way to explain people's behaviour and where >environment is considered as having no effect whatsoever. I didn't know that. I didn't think things had gotten so bad that there is a name for this class of people. Anna F. Dal Dan http://www.fantascienza.com/sfpeople/elethiomel Anna esta' en la linea ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 12:13:57 -0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anna Mazzoldi Organization: Freelance Subject: Re: Happy Thanksgiving! In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On 25 Nov 98, Bertina Miller wrote: > Happy Turkey day for those who partake and those who dont-happy reading!! I wouldn't have thought that you'd see a lot of Happy Turkeys around on Thanksgiving day... (Tho of course Irish turkeys don't notice, they're too busy worrying about Xmas, and Italian turkeys of course wouldn't know December from February, it's the eels that get nervous, in the North at least... wonder about Turkish turkeys... ok, ok, I'll stop now...) Ciao, Anna --- Anna Mazzoldi writing from Dublin, Ireland mazzoldi@iol.ie http://www.iol.ie/~mazzoldi/ (Translation links and more) <*> Back up my hard disk? I can't find the reverse switch! <*> ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 07:35:11 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Apology ( was OT...) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit S.M Stirling: >Patronizing and (clandestinely) contemptuous; it implicitly assumes that >(unlike us smart white folk) the person in question is an emotion-driven >bundle of conditioned reflexes incapable of objectivity or reasoned argument. >Classic "white liberal guilt" stuff.> LOL Well Steve if anyone knows about "patronizing and (clandestinely) contemptuous" commentary, it is certainly you. I tip my hat to you...you too are a "classic". delighted, donna ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 09:09:33 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/26/98 9:40:00 AM, Britt-Inger wrote: <> Second! phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 10:17:07 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Gate to Women's Country: Iphigenia, Persephone, etc. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Gate to Women's Country is a masterpiece -- I keep finding new "secrets" to uncover. By the way, the stuff I'm going to write below is *not* spoiler info -- but might even enrich the experience for those who plan to read the book. 1. Well of Surcease. My students asked me about the Well of Surcease which has a prominent role at the beginning of GtWC. I told them I didn't know. Here's what I've learned: "Surcease" means "to cease" and it is derived from the Latin root "ked-" which means to stop or to yield. At the beginning of GtWC, the women stop at the Well of Surcease to drink -- a ceremonial drink -- hoping to end the pain of having given up their sons. Recall also that the Gate to Women's Country has a pomogranite handle (again, at the very beginnning of the book) -- a symbol of Persephone, the Goddess of the Underworld and daughter of Demeter. "Surcease" sounds suspiciously like "Ceres" which is another name for Demeter. Is Demeter, the goddess of the harvest (growth, productivity, the opposite really of "ceasing") associated at all with 1) wells and water? 2) mourning for lost children? Yes! After Persephone is carried into the Underworld, Demeter, in her mourning for her lost daughter, begins to wander. At one point in her wanderings Demeter is offered well water by a woman named Baubo, who mocks her and is turned into a lizard. In Goddesses in Everywoman, Jean Bolen writes that Demeter is an archetype associated with "empty nest syndrome." So I think the Well of Surcease is the a Well of Ceres where one mourns for lost children. 2. Iphigenia: First off, let me recommend the searchable Internet Classics Archive, which one may find via a search engine on the web (I'm not putting in the web address because it will make this email unreadable to some). It has hundreds of Greek texts online. Second, a reread of the beginning of GtWC answers the question about the origins of the play Iphigenia at Ilium: It is "derived" from a "millenia-old" Greek play, the original text of which (Tepper lets us know) is at the back of the Marthatown script with some other appendixes. I am trying to read the various "original" plays -- right now, Iphigenia at Aulis (this is also available on video, in Greek, with subtitles) -- but also Trojan Women and Iphiginia at Tauris. The plays are short and easy to read. They are online at the Internet Classics Archive website. 3. As for the notion that Tepper might have had any utopian ideas about GtWC, well, that question is put to final rest on the last two pages of the book. I continue to have lots of questions about this book (for example, who is "the Lady"?). I'm reading it again! Candice Bradley Appleton, WI ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 12:01:45 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/26/98 2:14:06 AM Mountain Standard Time, Britt- Inger.Johansson@KONSTVET.UU.SE writes: >It is the agreed-upon definition which guides decisions on what is for instance sexual harassment, a recognition of the other's hurt. -- what a bundle of absurdities. If I say: "Nice day today" and you _perceive_ it as racism or harassment, it is? Have you ever read "Alice in Wonderland"? The bit where Humpty-Dumpty declares that words mean whatever he says they mean? I don't think so. Your subjective feelings (or mine, or anyone else's) have no bearing on the actual nature of the speech in question. That can be determined by any reasonable person of good will from the words and circumstances. >If a person percieves something as harassment that person has the right to declare so -- sure. And I have the right to declare the moon is made of green cheese. Nobody is under any obligation to take the statement seriously. >the other is obliged to apologize for trespassing -- in your dreams. >As usual you're just trying to pour more oil on the flames -- Aha. Nobody has a right to disagree with what you consider 'proper' and orthodox? When do the secret police come calling? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 12:02:51 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/26/98 2:40:00 AM Mountain Standard Time, Britt- Inger.Johansson@KONSTVET.UU.SE writes: >Verbal communication without physical presence is more difficult, because normally we use our face and body in the communicative act as well as the level of the voice and the intonation.> -- quite true. On-line communication is low-bandwidth. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 12:24:41 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Tolkien again (was: Re-reading Childhood Favorites) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/26/98 2:50:35 AM Mountain Standard Time, mazzoldi@IOL.IE writes: << Someone else had mentioned the "feminine" character of Frodo. This is something I hadn't thought about, and I would like to hear more about it. In what sense is he "feminine"? >> -- well, he does assume some characteristics traditonally thought of as "feminine"; he's largely passive, acted upon rather than acting (other people, notably Sam, do the stuff like fighting giant spiders); he suffers a lot, usually for other people's sake; his big moment is a renunciation (although he blows it). After that, he renounces all over the place; eg., he renounces the role of powerful heroic savior in the Shire. Of course, given Tolkien's background I think it might be safer to say that Frodo is Christ-like rather than feminine. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 12:26:20 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT "Mock" science (Was: BDG: Snow Queen Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/26/98 3:30:21 AM Mountain Standard Time, adaldan@TIN.IT writes: >Geez, I'd really like to leave this topic, but for clarity's sake - biologism does not equal biology, it is a special brand of biology which centres on bio chem as the only way to explain people's behaviour and where environment is considered as having no effect whatsoever.> -- ah, you mean sociobiology aka sociobiobull***t! Complete agreement there. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 11:29:32 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Re: Apology (Off-topic big time! ) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit These responses to Ms. Johansson (quoted at the bottom of this email) are sarcastic. I *really* don't want to read sarcasm online. It seems to me that sarcasm is basically *mean* -- and what did my 12-year-old son's psychiatrist say the other day? Oh, yes. "Sarcasm is the tool of a weak mind" (a quote from "Lost in Space"). No matter what Ms. Johansson did to offend in the first place (I didn't read some of the messages) my reading of her posts is that she is very straightforward and honest about her views. I respect that -- just as I respect divergent views in my classroom, no matter what they are, as long as they are expressed honestly. Sarcasm, on the other hand, is essentially dishonest. And it's an ineffective form of argument. If we don't agree with somebody -- even if they offend us -- we argue their points, we don't stoop to put-downs and sarcasm. I would prefer to see honest discussion rather than such statements as "in your dreams" or "the moon is made of green cheese." You won't "reach" somebody with whom you don't agree if you attack them or put them down. Isn't that basic common sense? Why can't the conversation be civil? Why do we stoop to the level of a 12-year-old boy (and an immature one at that)? So -- that's the end of my little flame. And I hope this stuff goes away. Let's talk about books. Please. Candice Appleton WI S.M. Stirling wrote: > In a message dated 11/26/98 2:14:06 AM Mountain Standard Time, Britt- > Inger.Johansson@KONSTVET.UU.SE writes: > > >It is the agreed-upon definition which guides decisions on what is for > instance sexual harassment, a recognition of the other's hurt. > > -- what a bundle of absurdities. If I say: "Nice day today" and you > _perceive_ it as racism or harassment, it is? > > Have you ever read "Alice in Wonderland"? The bit where Humpty-Dumpty > declares that words mean whatever he says they mean? > > I don't think so. Your subjective feelings (or mine, or anyone else's) have > no bearing on the actual nature of the speech in question. That can be > determined by any reasonable person of good will from the words and > circumstances. > > >If a person percieves something as harassment that person has the right to > declare so > > -- sure. And I have the right to declare the moon is made of green cheese. > Nobody is under any obligation to take the statement seriously. > > >the other is obliged to apologize for trespassing > > -- in your dreams. > > >As usual you're just trying to pour more oil on the flames > > -- Aha. Nobody has a right to disagree with what you consider 'proper' and > orthodox? When do the secret police come calling? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 12:35:43 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Apology ( was OT...) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit If someone says, for example: "Death to the dirty jewboys!" one may safely assume that they are an anti-semitic loon and general Nazi scumbag. And a Jewish person (or anyone else of sense) may rightly be offended and demand restitution and retraction. (Not to mention repentance.) If, on the other hand, someone says: "Zionism has unfortunately had a negative impact on the Palestinians," one may disagree, but it cannot be fairly called an anti-semitic remark. Those who _call_ it an anti-semitic remark are attempting, via rhetorical dishonesty, to use the well-deserved animus against anti-semites to silence an opponent; they are attempting to carve out ethnic and/or ideological "turf" in the world of ideas, and unilaterally set the terms of acceptable discourse there. This is true irregardless of the _feelings_ of the person accusing the speaker of anti-semitism. They might in truth feel insulted, attacked, injured and maligned just as much as the recipient of the remark of the genuine anti- semite. That, however, means nothing; the first remark is genuinely racist, the second is not. Does anyone disagree? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 13:12:03 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: Apology ( was OT...) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit A little flat water would be nice. For awhile at least. There is probably no satisfactory resolution to this, so why don't we all ship our oars for a bit and float and do drifting down the Deep River's Embrace, past the Slow River and beyond the Gate to Woman's Country and maybe on to... who knows -- a sudden whoosh and off to Basilisk Station? pace pace lightly lightly phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 19:16:28 -0500 Reply-To: feldsipe@erols.com Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: suzanne feldman Organization: or lack thereof Subject: Re: Hand of Prophecy Comments: To: J Bocchino/Sarasota Cty MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi JB-- > on my way to the bookstore for SPEAKING DREAMS and EAGERLY awaiting the > third novel....(how human to have the freed slaves in conflict over their > method of freedom...) Hope you enjoy SPEAKING DREAMS---and you may have to wait a Charnas-like long time for book three . My publisher hasn't mentioned the idea--I'm sort of holding the thoughts in my head until....whenever. Yours, Suze/Severna ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 10:44:03 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Cynthia Gonsalves Subject: Re: Apology ( was OT...) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 01:12 PM 11/26/98 -0500, you wrote: >A little flat water would be nice. For awhile at least. There is >probably no satisfactory resolution to this, so why don't we all ship our >oars for a bit and float and do drifting down the Deep River's Embrace, >past the Slow River and beyond the Gate to Woman's Country and maybe on >to... who knows -- a sudden whoosh and off to Basilisk Station? > >pace pace >lightly lightly >phoebe Sounds good to me, although Basilisk Station isn't the most peaceful place to go, especially if a certain RMN commander has anything to do with it. Have a good holiday season; happy reading and viewing! Cynthia -- "I had to be a bitch, they wouldn't let me be a Jesuit." -Matt Ruff in Sewer, Gas, and Electric Sharks Bite!!! http://members.home.net/cynthia1960/ ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 19:00:13 UT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Lesley Hall Subject: [FSFFU] Missing messages Is anyone else finding gaps and hiatuses in messages from the list? I found myself suddenly plunged in medias res into the Off-Topic imbroglio, and had obviously missed the initial stages. (This may be my server) Lesley Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:08:33 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: The Cost to Be Wise (was Dark Water segue) In-Reply-To: <005001be186d$7f5c2640$f7b11b26@donna> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" There are S P O I L E R S in this post. At 07:16 AM 11/25/98 -0500, donna simone wrote: >Has anyone read it? Care to jump in? Coincidentally... I also read this story recently. I was struck by its relevance to the colonialism / moral relativism discussion that has been so woefully off topic on this list. It poignantly places the reader on the horns of the dilemma: how to handle "first contact" with a culture that is much less industrialized than one's own? The Terrans in this story have taken the path of "appropriateness", only allowing trade of items that the natives can make themselves to keep them self-sufficient. History is rife with examples of local economies being destroyed by the introduction of outside trade. Often with the consent of the locals. (The protagonist, Janna, REALLY likes plastic.) But of course trade can't be policed completely and some of the natives get their hands on some guns. The confluence of several factors leads to the massacre of Sckarline. Britt-Inger Johannsson wrote: >Your summary indicates that this short story has the classical build up >where every action or inaction irrevocably, unavoidably, and in one >sense even logically, lead on to the final cataclysmic moment of >destruction - and the reader/spectator with horrified attention intuits the >progression towards the tragic end, unable to intervene. Not at all! That is one of the most interesting things about the story -- much of the action seems random or spontaneous and one is taken horribly by surprise by the ending. The story is something quite other than the Greek Tragic tradition (which is what your summary brought to my mind). A better example of the form of tragedy you are talking about is Mary Doria Russell's *The Sparrow*, which the BDG will be discussing in December. donna simone again: >McHugh does a marvelous job of drawing no clear lines from which one >can point and say...."see _they're_ right." All of the players are credible in >their choices it seems to me. Yes, the story was in some ways frustrating to read. I kept expecting some clear answer, an emotional payoff or catharsis, and it wasn't there. Like real life. There is no right answer here. But there is plenty of pain. This story intersects interestingly with Ursula Le Guin's Hainish tales, which all background a world-spanning confederacy called the Ekumen which is in the process of rediscovering worlds previously "seeded" with humans. (The Hainish stories include *Rocannon's World*, *Planet of Exile*, *City of Illusions*, *The Left Hand of Darkness*, *The Dispossessed*, several stories in *A Fisherman of the Inland Sea* and all of *Four Ways to Forgiveness*.) The Ekumen takes a similar approach to first contact, sending a few "mobiles" to each new world and cautiously establishing a presence based on non-interference in local culture (somewhat like the Prime Directive in Star Trek -- as if the Federation ever actually observed the Prime Directive!). Le Guin's approach is thought-provoking. She believes strongly that "all knowledge is local knowledge", that is that there is no pure objectivity, but she clearly believes in her own version of right and wrong. There is a tension between these two positions that I find very fruitful. Being human, we have beliefs, but how do we temper our actions based on those beliefs so that we do not infringe upon the rights of others? How can one simultaneously believe that one is right and that one may be wrong without being paralysed? There are no easy answers to these questions. They must be redecided with every passing moment. "The Cost to Be Wise" raises similar issues. The Terran teachers, Ayudesh and Wanji, have lived on this world for many years, somewhat like the "stabiles" of the Ekumen, and have strictly avoided introducing any "inappropriate" technologies. However, they have attempted to alter the conceptual world of the natives by teaching them English and giving them lessons in economics, history, etc. In Janna's narration they come across as important members of the community who are somewhat ineffective in their aims -- I gathered that they were partly responsible for the founding of Sckarline, a mixed community with no blood clan affiliations, but Janna, one of their brighter students, obviously has no understanding of the teachings she recites to her Terran guest. Their material influence is what is most important to her. And near the end, after Janna's father has been shot to death, Wanji breaks her own rules and gives Janna some high-tech body enhancements which she later uses to save her Terran guest. The moment of indecision that Wanji faces, "should I or shouldn't I give these to her?" seems a little silly in a life and death situation, like it's taking non-interference too far. And Wanji sees it too. There is more to say about this wonderful story, but I am late for Thanksgiving dinner! I look forward to the comments of others. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/jedhome.htm Listening to: Tori Amos -- From the Choirgirl Hotel "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:13:44 -0500 Reply-To: Lilith Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Lilith Subject: Re: Tolkien again (was: Re-reading Childhood Favorites) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Oh no -- no -- not the Frodo is Christ argument again.......... >Of course, given Tolkien's background I think it might be safer to say that >Frodo is Christ-like rather than feminine. > BTW - M. Stirling - despite what the Senate and the House would have us believe, there is no such word as "irregardless." The correct word is, of course, "regardless." On to other OT things...I personally _love_ reading sarcasm online - I prefer it to the usual mealy-mouthed "I won't say anything controversial for the fear of being thought Not Nice" which is of course a capital crime in the USA (to be Not Nice). There is a fine line - I think it is crossed when the stuff one posts stops critiquing what other people say and just starts slamming the people themselves. (There is criticism and then there are just flames, in other words.) Or that is my take on the matter. Lilith ********************************************* ************Hell's Half Acre*************** * http://www.concentric.net/~Ligeia * ********************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 20:43:56 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Apology (was Off topic posts) In-Reply-To: <18b68fd0.365d8979@aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8BIT Hmm, would touché be the appropriate word? He who lives by the (s)word, will perish by the (s)word. A fencer would do well in remembering that an opponent is just as likely to wield a sharp blade. Britt-Inger At 12:01 1998-11-26 -0500, you wrote: >-- in your dreams. > >>As usual you're just trying to pour more oil on the flames > >-- Aha. Nobody has a right to disagree with what you consider 'proper' and >orthodox? When do the secret police come calling? > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 21:09:38 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Gate to Women's Country: Iphigenia, Persephone, etc. In-Reply-To: <365D7F03.32A376D@athenet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I read Gate some years ago, and will definitely read it again now and slowly, savouring all the interesting allusions and meanings withing meanings. Your identification of the Well of Surcease with Ceres sounds plausible, at least the interpretation is close at hand, and Tepper definitely revels in details which have double meaning all through the novel. It is a pity she sometimes publishes too quickly, perhaps the publisher is pushing too hard for quick best sellers. And before all the publishers on the list start kicking me about for that remark, even though I'm not a novelist I have a best selling friend and I do know that at times she feels pushed to publish a little prematurely. Ignorant question, what exactly is *spoiler info*? Is it short for: this may ruin your reading if you haven't read the book yet or? Britt-Inger At 10:17 1998-11-26 -0600, you wrote: >Gate to Women's Country is a masterpiece -- I keep finding new "secrets" >to uncover. By the way, the stuff I'm going to write below is *not* >spoiler info -- but might even enrich the experience for those who plan >to read the book. > >1. Well of Surcease. My students asked me about the Well of >Surcease which has a prominent role at the beginning of GtWC. I told >them I didn't know. Here's what I've learned: "Surcease" means "to >cease" and it is derived from the Latin root "ked-" which means to stop >or to yield. At the beginning of GtWC, the women stop at the Well of >Surcease to drink -- a ceremonial drink -- hoping to end the pain of >having given up their sons. Recall also that the Gate to Women's >Country has a pomogranite handle (again, at the very beginnning of the >book) -- a symbol of Persephone, the Goddess of the Underworld and >daughter of Demeter. "Surcease" sounds suspiciously like "Ceres" which >is another name for Demeter. Is Demeter, the goddess of the harvest >(growth, productivity, the opposite really of "ceasing") associated at >all with 1) wells and water? 2) mourning for lost children? Yes! >After Persephone is carried into the Underworld, Demeter, in her >mourning for her lost daughter, begins to wander. At one point in her >wanderings Demeter is offered well water by a woman named Baubo, who >mocks her and is turned into a lizard. In Goddesses in Everywoman, >Jean Bolen writes that Demeter is an archetype associated with "empty >nest syndrome." So I think the Well of Surcease is the a Well of >Ceres where one mourns for lost children. > >2. Iphigenia: First off, let me recommend the searchable Internet >Classics Archive, which one may find via a search engine on the web (I'm >not putting in the web address because it will make this email >unreadable to some). It has hundreds of Greek texts online. Second, >a reread of the beginning of GtWC answers the question about the origins >of the play Iphigenia at Ilium: It is "derived" from a "millenia-old" >Greek play, the original text of which (Tepper lets us know) is at the >back of the Marthatown script with some other appendixes. I am trying >to read the various "original" plays -- right now, Iphigenia at Aulis >(this is also available on video, in Greek, with subtitles) -- but also >Trojan Women and Iphiginia at Tauris. The plays are short and easy to >read. They are online at the Internet Classics Archive website. > >3. As for the notion that Tepper might have had any utopian ideas >about GtWC, well, that question is put to final rest on the last two >pages of the book. > >I continue to have lots of questions about this book (for example, who >is "the Lady"?). I'm reading it again! > >Candice Bradley >Appleton, WI > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 18:11:12 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Robert Barrett Subject: Re: Tolkien again (was: Re-reading Childhood Favorites) In-Reply-To: <225c2d05.365d8ed9@aol.com> from "S.M. Stirling" at Nov 26, 98 12:24:41 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sic scribit S.M. Stirling: > > Of course, given Tolkien's background I think it might be safer to say that > Frodo is Christ-like rather than feminine. > "Christ-like" and "feminine" are not mutually exclusive terms in the Catholic background you reference here. Look at Caroline Bynum's books *Jesus as Mother* and *Holy Feast, Holy Fast* for fascinating discussions of the frequent occurence within medieval Catholicism of a feminine Jesus. At once point, Bynum examines a painting of a Christ lactating wine/blood. There's also Julian of Norwich's *Showings*, a late 14th/early 15th century Middle English mystical account in which Julian devotes much space to an explicitly maternal Christ. Tolkien's medieval studies may not have brought him into direct contact with any of these feminine Christs, but he did know in great detail the culture that allowed for such an androgynous savior. I don't see a feminine and Christological Frodo as a contradiction. Best, Rob -- Robert W. Barrett, Jr. * E-mail: rbarrett@dept.english.upenn.edu * World Wide Web: http://www.english.upenn.edu/~rbarrett/index.html * Dept. of English, Univ. of Pennsylvania * "What makes the muskrat guard his musk? Courage!" The Cowardly Lion (Bert Lahr), *The Wizard of Oz* (1939) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 19:17:51 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Asaro story in Asimovs Dec 98 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit For fans of Catherine Asaro there is an excerpt of a new story in Asimov's this month. Time to get out and scoop up a copy I suspect. site add: http://www.sfsite.com/analog/issues/1298/aurora.html ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 19:20:25 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Correctiion: Analog Dec 98 (Fw: Asaro story in Asimovs Dec 98) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Correction: the Asaro story is in Analog. Apologize. Web site is still correct. >For fans of Catherine Asaro there is an excerpt of a new story in >Asimov's this month. Time to get out and scoop up a copy I suspect. > >site add: http://www.sfsite.com/analog/issues/1298/aurora.html > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 20:22:50 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Mary-Ellen Maynard Subject: Re: Hand of Prophecy Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Suze wrote: <. My publisher hasn't mentioned the idea--I'm sort of holding the thoughts in my head until....whenever. >> I did very much enjoy Speaking Dreams - Thank you! Where can we reach your publisher to suggest book three? Would that help? Looking forward to more good books. Mary-Ellen Maynard Crystal Mist Glass ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 21:29:10 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: NESchaadt Subject: Re: [FSFFU] Missing messages? In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I only wish it was my server. It's the list...Mentalmasturbation by Big Brains. Hey, I'm impressed (oozing irony). Aren't you? (rhetorical question). NS At 07:00 PM 11/26/98 UT, you wrote: >Is anyone else finding gaps and hiatuses in messages from the list? I found >myself suddenly plunged in medias res into the Off-Topic imbroglio, and had >obviously missed the initial stages. (This may be my server) >Lesley >Lesley_Hall@classic.msn.com > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 22:40:56 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Ruth Jost Subject: OT:Defn of Harassment (longish) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Re snipped comments below: Under Australian legislation (doing some generalising here), sexual/racial harassment occurs where there is *unwanted conduct* that has the *effect* of offending,humiliating or intimidating someone *because of* their sex/race or other attribute protected by anti-discrimination law, *and* it was reasonable in the circumstances for the recipient to feel that way. "Unwanted conduct" may include comments etc etc and it need not be repeated. However generally there should be some evidence of *disadvantage* suffered by the complainant as a result of the conduct and a single comment would be unlikely to cause disadvantage unless it occurred in an already "hostile working environment", for example. Thus the test of whether or not conduct is harassment has both a subjective element (whether or not the *recipient* felt offended, humiliated or intimidated) and an objective element (whether it was reasonable to feel that way in the particular circumstances/context of that case). BTW this "reasonableness test" is generally a question for the tribunal or the judge and derives from the "reasonable person" test in english "tort" law. A related legal principle is the "egg-shell skull rule" also from tort law which says you "take the complainant as you find them" i.e in the harassment context a younger person may be more sensitive/powerless etc etc. It is important to note, however, that for a claim of harassment to be accepted under anti-discrimination law, it is necessary to be able to link the conduct complained of - the harassment - with the attribute possessed by the complainant that is protected under anti-discrimination law, i.e, the complainant's sex, race, age, disability etc. Unlike the US, in Australia anti-discriminaiton law employs a conciliation model that keeps 90% of cases out of the courts. Government anti-discrimination agencies administer the relevant legislation and decline complaints that do not fall under the legislative definition of harassment. (This is also the case in the UK and Canada and their legislation is very similar to ours). And so (finally) to SM Stirling's second example below: in Aus I think it unlikely this would be accepted as a complaint of racial harassment. The crucial questions would be: - whether there was a sufficient link or indication of a link between the behaviour complained of and the *race* of the complainant (I'm not aware of any case law rulings anywhere that Zionism constitutes "race", although being Jewish as in example 1 clearly does), - whether the recipient of the comment made was "offended, humiliated or intimidated", and if so - whether or not it was reasonable to feel that way in the circumstances. So, to answer SMS's final question, no, this anti-discrimination practitioner doesn't disagree. For a whole variety of reasons example 2 wouldn't meet the test for racist harassment or race discrimination in these parts. In fact, I doubt it would pass the first hurdle of being accepted for investigation by the administering agency. Goodness me, lengthy, technical *and* OT. Sorry everyone. >From under the desk, Ruth Snips follow: Britt-Inger.Johansson@KONSTVET.UU.SE writes: >It is the agreed-upon definition which guides decisions on what is for instance sexual harassment, a recognition of the other's hurt. --"S.M. Stirling" wrote: > If I say: "Nice day today" and you _perceive_ it as racism or harassment, it is? > I don't think so. Your subjective feelings (or mine, or anyone else's) have no bearing on the actual nature of the speech in question. That can be determined by any reasonable person of good will from the words and circumstances. > If someone says, for example: "Death to the dirty jewboys!" one may > safely assume that they are an anti-semitic loon and general Nazi > scumbag. If, on the other hand, someone says: "Zionism has > unfortunately had a negative impact on the Palestinians," one may > disagree, but it cannot be fairly called an anti-semitic remark. > That, however, means nothing; the first remark is genuinely racist, > the second is not. > Does anyone disagree? _________________________________________________________ DO YOU YAHOO!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 07:55:31 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: marie Subject: Re: OT:Defn of Harassment (longish) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="------------814C1951E4FA24AD03AD2422" --------------814C1951E4FA24AD03AD2422 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > Under Australian legislation (doing some generalising here), > sexual/racial harassment occurs where there is *unwanted conduct* that > has the *effect* of offending,humiliating or intimidating someone > *because of* their sex/race or other attribute protected by > anti-discrimination law, *and* it was reasonable in the circumstances > for the recipient to feel that way. > Thanks you for posting Ruth. It's not a cut and dry subjet, guidelines are welcome. Marie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 08:48:26 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: The Cost to Be Wise (was Dark Water segue) In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19981126140833.00707b48@together.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Wonderful, count me in, I just happen to be reading Sparrow at the moment and would like to discuss it. How does the BDG function? Is the discussion headed BDG and appears on this list or is it run on a parallell list? Do you report your interest to someone or just chime in? I really would like to get back to talking about books, which is why I signed on this list anyway. A better >example of the form of tragedy you are talking about is Mary Doria >Russell's *The Sparrow*, which the BDG will be discussing in December. > Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 08:47:02 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: CRONES Update MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To Potential New, and Already Established CRONES (Crazy Russ Old-timers...see www.breakingset.org for the clever ending ) Let us open discussion on chapter 5. I have posted a brief comment and will return with more questions soon. We have gotten the site listed with some search engines. I am chagrined to report that the first visitor from this effort has determined that we are slandering Joann Russ. More worrisome to me personally is that he reports that he is a personal friend to Joanna Russ. I am sore afraid to think that this gentleman may pass on to her that I, and we, have been disparaging her in any way by having this web site and forum. Those interested in reading the new posts or adding to my commentary on this issue should visit the forum here: http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=20889&article=79 Thanks to all for your thoughtful participation. peace, donna donnaneely@earthlink.net ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 08:58:39 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: The Cost to Be Wise MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Janice, Brilliant this! (again ) I am helping my sister move these past two days. But I will tackle a thoughtful response this evening on my return. What fun these discussions. affectionately, donna ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 08:10:54 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Re: CRONES Update MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In response to donna simone's note about the man who thinks folks on the list are slandering Joanna Russ: We have discussed Russ many times on this list, and in many ways. I remember one discussion several months ago that was *incredibly* positive, so much so that I surfed right over to Amazon.com and ordered a bunch of her books, e.g. To Write Like a Woman, How to Suppress Women's Writing, and others. I believe Russ was discussed at one point in the context of sci fi publishing by women. Am I right? It might be useful to point this person toward some of the other conversations we have had about Russ, and indicate to him that this is an open list, that many kinds of views are expressed here, and that in fact folks on the list have been buying Russ's books as a consequence of whatever it is we discuss! One of my diss advisors once told me not to worry about public critiques of my work -- if what you've said stirs up controversy (even if your work is misinterpreted) the work has made an impact. What's worse is to be ignored. Or to have your work not read. I imagine that Russ is a mature enough author and human being to take it. Candice Bradley Appleton, WI ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 09:20:16 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: No Name Available Subject: Re: CRONES Update Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit sorry everybody but how do i get myself off this list????? ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 11:58:02 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: The Cost to Be Wise (was Dark Water segue) In-Reply-To: <19981127084028Z5464-20384+65@uria.its.uu.se> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 08:48 AM 11/27/98 +0000, Britt-Inger Johansson wrote: >How does the BDG function? Is the discussion >headed BDG and appears on this list or is it run on a parallell list? Do >you report your interest to someone or just chime in? I really would like >to get back to talking about books, which is why I signed on this list anyway. The BDG discussions take place on this list. Usually a pre-assigned person kicks off the discussion on the opening day (December 7th for *The Sparrow*) with some general comments and questions and then people have at it. Each post should start with the letters BDG to indicate the subject matter and it is assumed that messages will include spoilers. For more information about the Discussion Group, visit the web page at http://www.wenet.net/~lquilter/femsf/bdg/index.html. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/jedhome.htm Listening to: Tori Amos -- From the Choirgirl Hotel "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 11:01:42 -0800 Reply-To: shander@cdsnet.net Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Sharon Anderson Subject: Help, please MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Okay, I know, we've discusssed this before. For bringing up an old thread, I apologize. But I need some suggestions. I belong to a mystery book club. We meet once a month to dine and disect a book. We are meeting next week. I'm not supposed to be "up" until the month after next, but if the person who is assigned the book for January doesn't make the December meeting, then by default it's my turn. We've got some rules: the book has to be available --right NOW-- in paper (trade is okay). Except for two or possibly three of us, this group wouldn't touch sf with a ten-foot-pole and disposable latex gloves. So, I'm looking for something which might cross boundaries here. Anybody know of some sf which is also a mystery.....and currently available? Thanks. Sharon L. Anderson ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 11:30:45 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Mary Ann Beavis Subject: Request for information MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I would appreciate it if you could share with me the names of any s-f/fantasy authors--male or female--who are non-white. The only ones I know of are Octavia Butler and Mary Soon Lee. Any suggestions that you could put forward would be most appreciated. Mary Ann ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 15:09:57 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Correctiion: Analog Dec 98 (Fw: Asaro story in Asimovs ... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/26/98 5:26:22 PM Mountain Standard Time, donnaneely@EARTHLINK.NET writes: << http://www.sfsite.com/analog/issues/1298/aurora.html >> -- cool! Haven't bought an Analog in a while (in a snit over their failure to review me) but I'm going to pick this one up. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 14:13:02 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Non-white sf/fantasy authors MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mary Ann Beavis wrote: > I would appreciate it if you could share with me the names of any > s-f/fantasy authors--male or female--who are non-white. I recommend Nalo Hopkinson's *Brown Girl in the Ring*, which won the Warner Aspect First Novel Context (1998). I enjoyed this book -- very different from other sf stuff I've read. Lots of Voudou, a decaying futuristic urban setting, nice cross-cultural content and language. It's a book that also might be enjoyed by older high school students. Candice Bradley Appleton, WI ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 15:16:45 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: OT:Defn of Harassment (longish) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/27/98 12:07:59 AM Mountain Standard Time, hable@BIGFOOT.COM writes: >Under Australian legislation (doing some generalising here), sexual/racial harassment occurs where there is *unwanted conduct* that has the *effect* of offending,humiliating or intimidating someone *because of* their sex/race or other attribute protected by anti-discrimination law, *and* it was reasonable in the circumstances for the recipient to feel that way. > Thanks you for posting Ruth. It's not a cut and dry subjet, guidelines are welcome. -- sounds reasonable. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 16:29:00 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "J.M. Jamieson" Subject: Re: Non-white sf/fantasy authors In-Reply-To: <365F07CE.C7C012E2@athenet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 At 02:13 PM 11/27/98 -0600, you wrote: >Mary Ann Beavis wrote: > >> I would appreciate it if you could share with me the names of any >> s-f/fantasy authors--male or female--who are non-white. Curious question - and I really never thought about it. But I guess one would be Samuel R. Delany who's short stories "Time Considered as a helix of Semiprecious Stones" and "Driftglass" remain stunning achievements as does his novella "The Ballad of Beta2". His memoir of the summer of '67 "Heavenly Breakfast" remains one of the great books about writing SF and living on 2nd Ave, not to mention Ace's royalty payments, among other things. Probably you should stay clear of "The Tides of Lust" which came out on Lancer in '73 and of course there is always _Dhalgren_. Mac -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP 6.0.2 iQA/AwUBNl8ZazSEreugaKRXEQL+YgCg5V/s2dQGiSQibS95ckmM+NdqQrkAniei jvcoviU85yiBhiZRtIXVCUGg =R932 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 16:55:36 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: Request for information MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >I would appreciate it if you could share with me the names of any >s-f/fantasy authors--male or female--who are non-white. > Recommend you check out the Decolores Project Bibliography. "DeColores Project" "The DeColores Project is an ongoing project which attempts to locate, recognize, and publicize the works of people of color in the field of speculative fiction (science fiction, fantasy, horror, magical realism, and fantastical literature of any type). " This is the address for the home page: http://www.netgsi.com/~obelesk/DeColores.html The actual bibliography with an introductory essay is at the following web site: http://www.netgsi.com/~obelesk/intro.html donna ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 16:00:50 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Mary Ann Beavis Subject: Re: Non-white sf/fantasy authors MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The reason I brought it up was because somebody mentioned an article by Charles Saunders on "Why Blacks Don't Read Science Fiction." It was written in 1980, so it's obviously dated, but I was sceptical about this claim, and want to refute in in a paper that I'm writing on feminist eutopian literature and feminist urbanism. Thanks to all of you who have replied to my question--you have given me a lot of great references! J.M. Jamieson wrote: > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > Hash: SHA1 > > At 02:13 PM 11/27/98 -0600, you wrote: > >Mary Ann Beavis wrote: > > > >> I would appreciate it if you could share with me the names of any > >> s-f/fantasy authors--male or female--who are non-white. > > Curious question - and I really never thought about it. But I guess > one would be Samuel R. Delany who's short stories "Time Considered as > a helix of Semiprecious Stones" and "Driftglass" remain stunning > achievements as does his novella "The Ballad of Beta2". His memoir of > the summer of '67 "Heavenly Breakfast" remains one of the great books > about writing SF and living on 2nd Ave, not to mention Ace's royalty > payments, among other things. Probably you should stay clear of "The > Tides of Lust" which came out on Lancer in '73 and of course > there is always _Dhalgren_. > > Mac > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- > Version: PGP 6.0.2 > > iQA/AwUBNl8ZazSEreugaKRXEQL+YgCg5V/s2dQGiSQibS95ckmM+NdqQrkAniei > jvcoviU85yiBhiZRtIXVCUGg > =R932 > -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 17:33:00 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: CRONES Update MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >In response to donna simone's note about the man who thinks folks on the list are slandering Joanna Russ:> Apology here for causing confusion. The man posting the comment was only referring to materials on the CRONES forum. _Not_ to material posted to FSFFU. donna ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 18:08:25 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "J.M. Jamieson" Subject: Re: Non-white sf/fantasy authors In-Reply-To: <365F2112.9CA8CFAD@duke.usask.ca> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 At 04:00 PM 11/27/98 -0600, Mary Ann Beavis wrote: >The reason I brought it up was because somebody mentioned an article >by Charles Saunders on "Why Blacks Don't Read Science Fiction." It was >written in 1980, so it's obviously dated, but I was sceptical about >this claim, and want to refute in in a paper that I'm writing on feminist >eutopian literature and feminist urbanism. Thanks to all of you who >have replied to my question--you have given me a lot of great references! If you can find them you might check out the original review _Quark_ which was edited by Delany and his wife Marilyn Hacker. It was a quarterly of speculative fiction and remains a stunning achievement and one of my most cherished sets. The editorials let alone the stories and the diversity of the authors are outstanding and might indeed be supportive of your Saunders' misgivings. The issues contain some fiesty little tales by Joanna Russ, Kate Wilhelm, and in #4 Vonda McIntyre among many many others. Don't miss that Delany memoir I mentioned. The circle around Ishmael Reed and his publishing house is of some importance as well although not all SF and certainly not a favorite name in feminist circles. It was an astonishing period for experiemental writing and SF of the English tradition and the Delany crowd and Reed's circle were very much at the centre and very public. See _19 Necromancers From Now_ edited by Ishmael Reed which covers the core of the black, latino, and chinese american writers. The line between experimental writing in whatever genre was really not drawn as tightly then. Very exciting time actually. Mac -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP 6.0.2 iQA/AwUBNl8w6DSEreugaKRXEQKD+wCeOVTYOa2QqK/nepexriJl0hyrHSMAoNQh biNvF8hRzpc6ABVDV4M8ICDR =TdCu -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 20:15:30 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Santanico Subject: Re: Request for information Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 11:30 AM 27/11/98 -0600, you wrote: >I would appreciate it if you could share with me the names of any >s-f/fantasy authors--male or female--who are non-white. The only ones I >know of are Octavia Butler and Mary Soon Lee. Any suggestions that you >could put forward would be most appreciated. > >Mary Ann Samuel R. Delaney and Steve Barnes are really the only ones who come to mind. When you think about it, it's kind of odd that there are so few non-Caucasian SF/Fantasy authors out there (that we know about anyway), isn't it? Santanico ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 11:10:42 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: donna simone Subject: Re: The Cost to Be Wise MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Cannot recall who asked, but yes spoiler space is to not ruin a book or story for those who have not read it yet. So ......... >There are > >S > >P > >O > >I > >L > >E > >R > >S j dawley: >I was struck by its relevance to the colonialism / moral >relativism........ It poignantly places the reader on the horns of the >dilemma: how to handle "first contact" with a culture that is much less >industrialized than one's own? And it is a "lost colony" which of course adds luscious complexity to the questions of how to handle "first contact". Is it interference? Or is it returning these "poor lost souls" to their "rightful" level of "development"? > The Terrans in this story have taken the path of "appropriateness", only >allowing trade of items that the natives can make themselves to keep them >self-sufficient. And of course one of them is "whisak", their variation on alcoholic beverage. So guns and liquor, sparsely populated area, etc... . Seems cliché, but what McHugh does with these familiar trappings is astonishing to me. She interrupted all of my expectations. And staying strictly with Janna as pov character intensified the mystery and sense of unexpectedness/confusion for me about how it all unfolds. >Britt-Inger Johannsson wrote: >>Your summary indicates that this short story has the classical build up >>where every action or inaction irrevocably, unavoidably, and in one >>sense even logically, lead on to the final cataclysmic moment of >>destruction - and the reader/spectator with horrified attention intuits the >>progression towards the tragic end, unable to intervene. j. dawley >Not at all! That is one of the most interesting things about the story -- >much of the action seems random or spontaneous and one is taken horribly by >surprise by the ending. Here here, I second this opinion. One does not know what is happening as it happens anymore than the pov character, Janna. Works brilliantly for leaving one with one's mouth agape at the end. I still cannot shake the final scene from my mind. There is something so painful about how Janna and Tuuvin are left standing there with their "gifts". j dawley: >Yes, the story was in some ways frustrating to read. I kept expecting some >clear answer, an emotional payoff or catharsis, and it wasn't there. Like >real life. There is no right answer here. But there is plenty of pain.> Yes! What makes it so brilliant. No clear answers. McHugh never tilts her hand at all to any pat moralistic interpretation, not even her own . j dawley: >This story intersects interestingly with Ursula Le Guin's Hainish tales....... There is a tension between these two positions that I find very fruitful. Being human, we have beliefs, but how do we temper our actions based on those beliefs so that we do not infringe upon the rights of others? How can one simultaneously believe that one is right and that one may be wrong without being paralysed? > I still cannot decide what _I_ would have done in Ayudesh and Wanji's position. Was their commitment to non-violence so total that all had to die rather than trade in guns? j. dawley: >>"The Cost to Be Wise" raises similar issues. The Terran teachers, Ayudesh >>and Wanji, have lived on this world for many years, somewhat like the >>"stabiles" of the Ekumen, and have strictly avoided introducing any >>"inappropriate" technologies. However, they have attempted to alter the >>conceptual world of the natives by teaching them English and giving them >>lessons in economics, history, etc. > Yes, this story's own example of all knowledge is local knowledge. No absolutes. Yet the terrans have an idea of what _they_ believe is right and wrong. For instance, they did not "stop" the whisak trading, but _did_ prevent the gun trading, why? Was that fair? Balanced? Who is to say. Also, it is clear that violence is done to women outside and within Sckarline. There is the one reference to "giving in to him, he wont do much" to make a violent attack stop. Yet we are told Ayudesh just exclaims when Mam is hit by the outrunners taking the whisak. Why was physical brutality uninterrupted against women, but having guns to equal the might of the clans so awful? j dawley: >In Janna's narration they come across >as important members of the community who are somewhat ineffective in their >aims........... And near the end, after Janna's father has been shot to death, >Wanji breaks her own rules and gives Janna some high-tech body >enhancements which she later uses to save her Terran guest.> I kept wondering long after what was so important about Veronique that she had to be saved rather than Ayudesh and Wanji saving themselves? Even at the "cost" of radically altering Janna biology in a permanent way. That is clearly an interference of grand proportion into the "local environment". Great great story to leave me with so much to think on afterwards. > The moment of indecision that Wanji faces, "should I or shouldn't I give >these to her?" seems a little silly in a life and death situation, like >it's taking non-interference too far. And Wanji sees it too. A outgrowth of the brilliant plotting and writing that! Yes, one does get exasperated that Wanji even hesitates to mull it over in her mind. Though the existence of these "safety kits" suggests that Wanji and Ayudesh both expected that the colony may be overrun and destroyed. Wanji says to Janna "...we decided that if the people who settled Sckarline couldn't have it, we wouldn't either." Now who was the "we"? Just Wanji and Ayudesh? How could they have survived alone there anyhow without guns if a clan or outrunners were destroying the place? Do they feel such a sense of ownership that suicide means they take Sckarline with them? I am still not sure how to read that passage into their motivations/intent. Any suggestions? >There is more to say about this wonderful story, > Yes, fabulous story. I am still chewing on it vigorously. I am so enthusiastic in fact that I just ordered the book that this story feeds: "Mission Child". And to whet appetites even further heres a short review comment On Mission Child: "McHugh weaves together anthropology, sociology, psychology, and gender relations in this wondrous journey. Janna assumes the guise of a boy for protection, but eventually becomes "Jan" to herself as well as others. Reminiscent of Ursula K. Le Guin's insightful works set in the Hainish universe, Mission Child will doubtless be nominated for a Tiptree Award for its exploration of Janna's gender identity." --Bonnie Bouman donna donnaneely@earthlink.net ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 12:29:44 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lisette boily Subject: Re: Non-white sf/fantasy authors MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In answer to an earlier post, I don't see why this query is curious at all. Luckily, it gets less necessary to ask this question with every passing year, but as with the question of previous decades: "Who are the women SF writers?" it is a logical response to a genre whose developmental tradition tended to be overwhelmingly male and white. Let's not forget Octavia Butler (if she has been mentioned and I neglected to notice, apologies), who is, let's just say it, a rather big American SF author, who is also African American. But Delaney, of course, would be the first one on the list, I'd guess. Along with the newcomer Nalo Hopkinson, who has been mentioned, and who is making a lot of waves, Walter Mosley, the famed African American mystery writer of the 1990s has just published a science fiction novel called, if memory serves, _Blue Light_. And these are just the "big" African American ones I can come up with right away. If we include "speculative" fiction in the SF genre, then it opens up so much more. As someone mentioned, the DeColores project should give you everything, just about. Lisette Boily, Toronto ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 11:48:50 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Candice Bradley and Daniel Byrne Subject: Tepper and Euripides etc. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit For folks interested in the play in The Gate to Women's Country, I've done some reading and have some information. Tepper has drawn on at least three of Euripides' plays to create "Iphigenia at Ilium." The first part of "Iphigenia at Ilium" is from Euripides' "Trojan Women," although even sections here are also from Euripides' "Iphigeneia among the Taurians" and "Iphigenia at Aulis" (where she was sacrificed). The ghost of Iphigenia is perhaps taken mainly from "Iphigeneia among the Taurians"; the scene at Troy along with the death of Astyanax and the lotting off of the women from "Trojan Women"; and perhaps some of Iphigenia's lines from the chorus of "Trojan Women." There are many references to "Iphigenia at Aulis." I have become Euripides-obsessed, thanks to having read Tepper. Now that I know something about him, I understand why Tepper was so deeply influenced by his work. The information about Euripides below comes from my reading of introductions to his plays, and from info available online at the Internet Classics Archive and the Perseus Project at Tufts University. Both are excellent sources of information on Greek literature and both are completely searchable. Euripides lived in the fifth century bc and was the first "modern" playwrite in the sense that he did not portray his characters heroically -- he wrote realistically -- a radical act. He was harshly criticized at the time for the realism and lack of heroism in his plays. Although he wrote more than 80 plays he came away with only a handful of awards. However, now he is ranked among the greatest tragic poets (do you hear that, Euripides?). Euripides was anti-war. He railed against the Trojan and Pelloponesian wars. He was appalled by the meaninglessness and stupidity of actions that led to war. He was appalled at what people -- what men -- will do for power (there's a wonderful speech criticizing Agamemnon near the beginning of "Iphiginea at Aulis"). He was appalled at the treatment of women, especially in the wake of war when which they became slaves and spoils of war. He was appalled by rape. I would say he was a feminist. He was definitely a pacifist. Anyway, it makes sense to me that a feminist sf/speculative fiction author would be influenced by the plays of Euripides. These plays are wonderful, and I highly recommend reading them. I especially recommend "Iphigenia at Aulis" and "Trojan Women." I have tried to transcribe "Iphigenia at Ilium" as Tepper has created it for The Gate to Women's Country. The transcription is in my files (nice plain text, easily transmittable over email) and I will send it to anyone who asks for it. Comments welcome. Candice Bradley Appleton, WI ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 19:49:14 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Britt-Inger Johansson Subject: Re: Tepper and Euripides etc. In-Reply-To: <36603782.A8007BB1@athenet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 11:48 1998-11-28 -0600, you wrote: > >I have tried to transcribe "Iphigenia at Ilium" as Tepper has created it >for The Gate to Women's Country. The transcription is in my files >(nice plain text, easily transmittable over email) and I will send it to >anyone who asks for it. Comments welcome. > >Candice Bradley >Appleton, WI > I would be very interested to look at it before my planned rereading of Gate, a direct result of the interesting analysis of it that have come forward of it. A friend of mine is doing a literary critique course in SF next semester, maybe this might be a good alternative books for it or for a later one, since it ties in with what traditionalists would refer to as "good literature". People who don't read SF haven't realised how far the genre has travelled since the early space cowboy era. This is one reason why classical authors are classical, they keep feeding authors with good material millennia after millenia. Britt-Inger ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 15:10:03 EST Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "S.M. Stirling" Subject: Re: Request for information Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit In a message dated 11/27/98 10:51:10 AM Mountain Standard Time, beavis@DUKE.USASK.CA writes: << I would appreciate it if you could share with me the names of any s- f/fantasy authors--male or female--who are non-white. The only ones I know of are Octavia Butler and Mary Soon Lee. Any suggestions that you could put forward would be most appreciated. -- Samuel Delany (black), William Sanders (Cherokee), Charles Sanders (black), Brenda Clough (Chinese-American), Michelle Sagara West (Japanese-Canadian).