Gethenians do not have a gender. And this is a struggle for Genly Ai to comprehend because he is a human. He is used to seeing females and males. Females and males are expected to act a certain way, so Genly sees the Gethenians as acting womanly or manly. For example, Genly thought that, "Estraven's performance had been womanly, all charm and tact and lack of substance, specious and adroit"(p.12). This shows that Genly thinks of their actions as girly or manly, in this case, womanly. And maybe as a joke, like "Oh hey, Estraven acted womanly there". The Getheians have no disticitive physical characteristics that a male or female have. So Genly relies on the way they act, until, perhaps, he finally sees them as they see themselves. Another thing that is difficult to comprehend is that they can mate even if they are brother and sister, and any Gethenian can produce a baby. This is hard because the humans have the mentality that a brother and sister can not mate, that it is wrong to do such a thing. It is hard to change your thinking after living so long with other factors that are not on different planets.
Adapting to this strange and new idea of something or someone not having any gender is challenging for Genly. He has to change his whole mentality of how he sees these people. It will take a lot of time, but I think one is capable of seeing another with no sort of gender and seeing them as they see themselves.
I agree that it would be hard to identify people without a gender, but it is understandable since we have grown up our entire lives with a mentality that everyone is assigned a gender. In chapter sixteen, Estraven asks Genly Ai the difference between the two genders and Genly responds by saying that "In most societies [gender] determines one's expectations, activities, outlook, ethics, manners- almost everything"(234). This shows us that Genly's planet is similar to the one we come from because our gender often determines the path our lives will take. I think the author's goal is to show us that if we look beyond a gender we can see people for who they really are, like you said.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the both of you. Genly isn't used to being around people who do not have a gender which is probably why he has a difficult time adapting to his surroundings. Everything on this planet is new to him, but just like Jocelyne said, this concept of having no gender is probably trying to show us that it's what's inside that counts, so Genly will most likely adapt to his surroundings and start seeing others as who they really are regardless of the fact that they have no gender.
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ReplyDeleteGabriel and I were talking about this so during class and I put myself in Genly's shoes. It's probably awkward checking out a person who looks feminine, but has impregnated some babies. And i agree with Iris's argument, this book has showed us that it's what inside that counts.
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