While creating the story The Left Hand Of Darkness the author Ursula K. Le Guin had to create a world completely different than the one we know, while maintaining certain characteristics known by the reader and Genly Ai in order to create a story we could understand, and partially relate to. To accomplish this Le Guin had to overcome gender roles in the society that we know. Not being for the planet Gethen the ambiguous nature of gender and sex roles create a barrier that becomes difficult for Genly Ai and the reader to comprehend.
“Gender roles are based on the different expectations that individuals have based on their sex and based on each society’s values and beliefs about gender.” (Blackstone 2003) In order to maintain androgynous characters …show more content…
Many people believe that Le Guin and made the setting of the novel to be on an androgynous planet almost as a way of fighting for gender equality, to many The Left Hand of Darkness is a book created with a feminist motives. “The Left Hand of Darkness evokes a powerful individual reader response because each reader must define his or her inner space where gender finds its own ideological space; the novel requires readers to resist a gendered reading of the narrative.” (Pennington, 352) The Left Hand of Darkness forces the reader to almost in a sense question some of the gender roles and characteristics that we have come to know. “Estraven was a courtier, a politician, and I a fool to have trusted him. Even in a bisexual society the politician is very often something less than an integral man.” (Le Guin, 12) While getting to know Estraven Genly Ai felt as if he couldn’t completely bring himself to trust Estraven. He gave of more of a masculine look, as well as being a politician which is generally a postion held by a male, but when he spoke and the way Estraven acted was more feminine causing confusion for Genly …show more content…
From almost all fictional works of literature, along with television programs there is no hiding the fact that we, society as a whole are influenced in daily life from these gender roles. One study observed characters in American and Dutch television; the study showed that though there was more male characters the difference was not by much (58% male and 42% female.) However one major difference that was observed was that out of all the male characters only 2.8% of them were depicted doing “household work.” Compare this to the 52.4% of the male characters that during the episodes had been seen doing something work related (coming home from work, at work, leaving for work, etc..) this is a big difference in male behavior on television. This isn’t just one sided thought, as for female characters less than half of them had be depicted doing an activity related to work. With only 33.3 percent of females portrayed at work there with 10.4 percent doing household work. (Emons, 40-47) Despite being just fictional television shows they still have an influence on people, especially the younger the audience the more easily they are influenced. One example of how Le Guin almost fights the gender role barriers in The Left Hand of Darkness is when Estraven and Genli Ai were forced to walk to Karhide. Despite at times Estraven displaying feminine qualities, and in Genli Ai’s eyes he himself would be considered the more
“Gender roles are based on the different expectations that individuals have based on their sex and based on each society’s values and beliefs about gender.” (Blackstone 2003) In order to maintain androgynous characters …show more content…
Many people believe that Le Guin and made the setting of the novel to be on an androgynous planet almost as a way of fighting for gender equality, to many The Left Hand of Darkness is a book created with a feminist motives. “The Left Hand of Darkness evokes a powerful individual reader response because each reader must define his or her inner space where gender finds its own ideological space; the novel requires readers to resist a gendered reading of the narrative.” (Pennington, 352) The Left Hand of Darkness forces the reader to almost in a sense question some of the gender roles and characteristics that we have come to know. “Estraven was a courtier, a politician, and I a fool to have trusted him. Even in a bisexual society the politician is very often something less than an integral man.” (Le Guin, 12) While getting to know Estraven Genly Ai felt as if he couldn’t completely bring himself to trust Estraven. He gave of more of a masculine look, as well as being a politician which is generally a postion held by a male, but when he spoke and the way Estraven acted was more feminine causing confusion for Genly …show more content…
From almost all fictional works of literature, along with television programs there is no hiding the fact that we, society as a whole are influenced in daily life from these gender roles. One study observed characters in American and Dutch television; the study showed that though there was more male characters the difference was not by much (58% male and 42% female.) However one major difference that was observed was that out of all the male characters only 2.8% of them were depicted doing “household work.” Compare this to the 52.4% of the male characters that during the episodes had been seen doing something work related (coming home from work, at work, leaving for work, etc..) this is a big difference in male behavior on television. This isn’t just one sided thought, as for female characters less than half of them had be depicted doing an activity related to work. With only 33.3 percent of females portrayed at work there with 10.4 percent doing household work. (Emons, 40-47) Despite being just fictional television shows they still have an influence on people, especially the younger the audience the more easily they are influenced. One example of how Le Guin almost fights the gender role barriers in The Left Hand of Darkness is when Estraven and Genli Ai were forced to walk to Karhide. Despite at times Estraven displaying feminine qualities, and in Genli Ai’s eyes he himself would be considered the more