In her 1983 commencement address, “A Left-Handed Commencement Speech,” Ursula K Le Guin offers a very straightforward yet motivational message to graduates of Mills College, an all female school. She states that women are foreigners in an extremely male-dominated society full of aggression and power and emphasizes her argument that women are peaceful compared to men, thus highlighting the difference between the two genders. She encourages her audience to live and succeed on their own terms rather than emulating “Machoman” by creating an emotional connection with her audience, establishing her credibility, and crafting an image of woman’s own country that effectively stresses the separation between men and women but appeals to the need for equality.
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In her opening lines she states “...the language of our tribe is the men 's language. Of course women learn it. We 're not dumb.” (Le Guin) Even as she is making the distinction between the two genders in this quote, she is connecting herself to women by using the word “we.” She doesn’t say “they’re not dumb,” but instead chooses to associate herself with the women she is addressing. Throughout the speech she doesn’t simply speak in second person as one might expect from a typical commencement speech. She addresses the audience in first person, making sure to include herself by frequent use of the words “we,” “our,” and “us.” This creates an emotional connection between Le Guin and her audience. Even though she’s focusing on the divide between men and women in society, she lets her audience know that she is also affected by the divide and can therefore empathize with …show more content…
In the real world where gender separation is an actuality, she argues that “Women as women are largely excluded from, alien to, the self-declared male norms of this society, where human beings are called Man, the only respectable god is male, the only direction is up. So that’s their country; let’s explore our own.” She continues on to describe the night side of a “country” that can only be navigated by going about it in our own peaceful way, rather than imitating “Machoman” to hopefully one day reach the day side where there are “high sierras, [and] prairies of bright grass.” In such a country, women can be natives at home, shamelessly forging their own paths. Although the night side of the country is a country separate from that of men, it gives hope that women can one day make it to the day side by living life through the night side and eventually achieving equality on the day side. This idea of separate countries encourages women to live life their way “without the need to dominate, and without the need to be dominated.” It presents a peaceful approach, which as Le Guin argued earlier, is more natural to
In her opening lines she states “...the language of our tribe is the men 's language. Of course women learn it. We 're not dumb.” (Le Guin) Even as she is making the distinction between the two genders in this quote, she is connecting herself to women by using the word “we.” She doesn’t say “they’re not dumb,” but instead chooses to associate herself with the women she is addressing. Throughout the speech she doesn’t simply speak in second person as one might expect from a typical commencement speech. She addresses the audience in first person, making sure to include herself by frequent use of the words “we,” “our,” and “us.” This creates an emotional connection between Le Guin and her audience. Even though she’s focusing on the divide between men and women in society, she lets her audience know that she is also affected by the divide and can therefore empathize with …show more content…
In the real world where gender separation is an actuality, she argues that “Women as women are largely excluded from, alien to, the self-declared male norms of this society, where human beings are called Man, the only respectable god is male, the only direction is up. So that’s their country; let’s explore our own.” She continues on to describe the night side of a “country” that can only be navigated by going about it in our own peaceful way, rather than imitating “Machoman” to hopefully one day reach the day side where there are “high sierras, [and] prairies of bright grass.” In such a country, women can be natives at home, shamelessly forging their own paths. Although the night side of the country is a country separate from that of men, it gives hope that women can one day make it to the day side by living life through the night side and eventually achieving equality on the day side. This idea of separate countries encourages women to live life their way “without the need to dominate, and without the need to be dominated.” It presents a peaceful approach, which as Le Guin argued earlier, is more natural to