And have a perfectly good reason for doing so, I think.
One of the great early socialists said that the status of women in a society is a pretty reliable index of the degree of civilization of that society. If this is true, then the very low status of women in SF should make us ponder about whether SF is civilized at all.The women's movement has made most of us conscious of the fact that SF has either totally ignored women, or presented them as squeaking dolls subject to instant rape by monsters—or old-maid scientists de-sexed by hypertrophy of the intellectual organs—or, at best, loyal little wives or mistresses of accomplished heroes. Male elitism has run rampant in SF. But is it only male elitism? Isn't the "subjection of women" in SF merely a symptom of a whole which is authoritarian, power-worshiping, and intensely parochial?
The question involved here is the question of The Other—the being who is different from yourself. This being can be different from you in its sex; or in its annual income; or in its way of speaking and dressing and doing things; or in the color of its skin, or the number of its legs and heads. In other words, there is the sexual Alien, and the social Alien, and the cultural Alien, and finally the racial Alien.
- Ursula K. Le Guin, American SF and the Other
Remind me to explain how I got to the essay from Fictionwise. Long story.
Part of the problem, methinks, is that Sci-Fi is such a formulaic genre, *generally speaking*. I mean that in the best possible way, but there is, by now, a set of stock characters within Sci Fi and Fantasy (two genres that can really only be distinguished by setting and the source of the unbelievable technology), and noone has managed to do anything more creative than make some of those stock characters female. Which makes for an interesting role reversal, but it only works so far. So we go from "Sword and Sorcery" to "Sword and Sorceress", one of my favorite series of collections, by the way, but the only improvement made was the usual stretch of "Rape and Revenge" stories. You go from Barbarian heroes defending poor innocent women from rape by troglodytes to the Feminist hero defending poor innocent women from rape and abuse by (insert bad guy of the week here). Frank Herbert actually got creative with the Bene Geserit, but even then he was playing on some of the deepest fears about Woman as Other.
Reading her article I was reminded of Babylon 5 (admittedly, a TV show rather than literary, although it was arguably one of the more literate shows on TV recently.) It constantly questioned the idea of the other, of different political and social configurations, of gender and sexual assumptions... and nobody kicked more ass than Ivanova.
I think there are a few authors who have done better than this, Le Guin among them. Some folk object to her prose style, but I like C.J. Cherryh for some interesting feminine characterizations set in murky ethical situations (Pyanfar Chanur being among my favorites.)
Something to consider about the issue of stock characters (and here I'm back on my bandwagon) is that sci-fi and fantasy are modern iterations of epic, a genre not noted for its exquisitely detialed chaarcter study. It tends to rely on very predictable stereotypes, and it's the fact that they're moving around in a lot of plot interaction that conveys subtler meanings. Zelazny seems to take this to its most amusing modern extent, writing the entire Amber series wherein characterization is built ENTIRELY upon his heroes' reaction to circumstance, to relentless plot activity. But once he's done, both Corwin and Merlin are pretty damn well-rounded -- you've seen them in a hell of a lot of situations. (But, you're also totally right in that he's terribly shitty at writing women.)
See, this is why Samuel Delany is another of those few authors where I'll pick up anything with his name on it, no questions asked. He did a lot with the sexual/gender Other in the Neveryon series, and the text offered a critique of itself that. . .
. . . means I need more coffee.
Noticed a few books from lurker Nalo Hopkinson at Fictionwise, too, and Skin Folk is sitting in my cart, waiting until after the holidays. Though if anyone wants to buy if for me, I won't complain.