Androgyny

For my final paper, I choose to read the novel “The Left Hand of Darkness” written by Ursula K. Le Guin. This story touches on many key topics including the importance of communication, trust, acceptance, gender, and love in a society. It always deals a lot with politics and what it means to be a traitor. All of these topics are combined to show the intent of the story, which is the importance of unity. The main character, Ai, goes to a foreign plant and tried to get the people of the planet to join other plants in an alliance, and to do so he must overcome all of these obstacles in order to accomplish his task and unite the universe. The narrator clarifies within the first page of the book that all of the stories he is about to tell aren’t necessarily all his, but that everything is one story. The title of the book may seem confusing, but it is explained in a quote Estraven says to Ai while their making their journey across the frozen wasteland. “Light is the left hand of darkness and darkness the right hand of light. Two are one, life and death, lying together like lovers in kemmer, like hands joined together, like the end and the way” (pg. 168). This poem is talking about unity. Light and dark holding hands signifies the unity of two complete opposites, just as Ai needs for the two kingdoms of Winter to join together and agree to join the alliance and complete his mission. The title of the book is what it is to call attention to this particular part in the novel and to…

The author David Ketterer claims that the psychological interpretation of Frankenstein by William Veeder is the most comprehensive. Veeder’s key premise is that Mary Shelley’s novels "reflect her lifelong concern with the psychological ideal of androgyny and its opposite, bifurcation-the harmonious balance of traits traditionally considered masculine and feminine, and the desolating polarization of these traits" (p.267). For example, in the novel, all the characters Shelley created reflect the…

before they wre even born. From that moment of discovery, we began socializing our children to be either masculine or feminine (Bloomfield, 2015). Gender-role stereotyping was a simplistic generalization about the differences in male and female behavior and interests expressed by each gender. The differences between males and females can be attributed not just on the sexual organ that they have. Sex hormones, such as testosterone and estrogen were considered to be contributors to the more…

John Maxwell Taylor an American author once said, “Inside every man there is a potential woman and inside every woman resides a potential man” (Taylor, 2015) for the majority this sentiment may not ring any truth however to some minority it does. Androgyny, according to Encyclopædia Britannica defines this term in two categories, from a biological aspect and a psychological one, it states from the biological stand point that androgyny is refers to persons with fully developed sexual organs of…

Androgyny is defined “in its most basic form, as the male and female in one body or entity” (Thurman, 58). Shaker theology is grounded on the fact that the spirit encompasses both, male and female, aspects, which in turn places male and female believers on equal playing fields. Both sexes have equal access to the gospel and equal opportunities to spread the word. Shakers also believe that the most defining difference between the sexes is reproduction. By removing this expectation of women, men…

Carolyn Heilbrun's work Toward a Recognition of Androgyny claims to be the first deep analysis of androgynous storytelling and symbolism in English literature. Essentially an extensive case study of stories and novels from Greek antiquity up to the 19th century, the essay argues that androgyny has existed as an ideal in storytelling for centuries, albeit as a “hidden river” (xx). More general statements on the androgynous ideal can often be inferred from the analysis of specific texts. Heilbrun…

Androgyny in Virginia Woolf’s Orlando Ningxin,Sun What is androgyny? It says “Androgyny is the state of being neither distinctly masculine nor distinctly feminine” in the Collins dictionary. In Virginia Woolf’s Orlando (1928), Orlando was such an androgynous person who was a man at first, then became a woman and eventually, she had both male and female characteristics. Actually, this mind can also be seen in Woolf’s other works,…

pair it with mothering (creation), and lunar (moon) symbolism. again the ancient celts used the snake symbol from the behavior and life cycle of this magnificent creature, the snake was a symbol of secret knowledge, cunning and transformation. snakes do not like the cold weather so they go off and hide. you see the snake everywhere even if you are not looking for it, it has many meanings and many cultures that uses the snake in some shape or form. As an animal totem, the snake surfaces into our…

In “Here Be Dragons,” James Baldwin opens and closes his essay by considering androgyny. Androgyny is important to him because it undermines the way how sexual orientation is looked upon in America, along with race. According to Baldwin, “The American idea of sexuality appears to be rooted in the American Idea of masculinity” (1). If one does not fit the male standards, then he would be treated ruthlessly. America seems to have set standards for each gender. If one cannot fit the male standards,…

Current research involving the psychological androgyny indicates that androgyny and adaptability are somehow linked. The Bem Sex Role Inventory has been widely used to measure masculinity, femininity and androgyny (Hoffman, & Borders, 2001). Sandra Bem, and others, theorized that androgynous individuals have positive advantages over those who are not “balanced.” It is often reasoned that because androgynous individuals integrate both masculine and feminine personality characteristics, they…