Science Fiction Gender Roles

Cathie201
11, October 2013
Science Fiction and Gender Roles Gender has become an epidemic topic that people always talk about in their daily life. Males and females as the two groups of gender, play their own role and undertake the respective responsibility no matter for themselves, families or society all the time. However, because males and females have different gender roles, different responsibilities and, different behaviors, this causes various social issues, the problems of gender roles are always controversial. Nowadays, the issues of gender roles still exist specifically in the patriarchal society. Therefore, a lot of excellent writers such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Theodore Sturgeon, and James Tiptree Jr, publish many science
fictions about gender roles, feminism and utopian society. Thus, we can ask ourselves-how these science fictions combine with gender roles? How do these science fictions influence the opinions of people about gender roles? And how do these science fictions help people easily understand gender roles? This essay will talk about these questions with evidence from “Herland” which was written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Herland is a science fiction work by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, relating a story about a utopian separatist feminism society. The story begins with the three men, Terry, Jeff and Van who come to some uncharted area with a scientific expedition. During the expedition, they hear some folk wisdom about a strange land which is hidden in the mountains and all citizens are women. The three men are interest in this unknown land so they decide to explore it. When they arrive in the women land, they are shocked by everything that they see on this land. As they explore the unknown country, the men see the obvious cultivation of the forests and the way that the roads are laid. Afterward, they meet three women who are totally different from the women they are accustomed to seeing in America. These women are stronger, more confident and more beautiful than the women in America. The most significant discovery is that the land is indeed a women country that does not have men. They then begin to learn the history of Herland. This is an ancient country which has already been established for more than two thousand years. This country originally has men, but because wars, natural disasters and incongruous internal contradiction; only a small number of women now live in this country. Although, Herland is a matrilineal country, it has a high level civilization. Everything in this country is orderly, peaceful and efficient. Everything that has happened in this country breaks the traditional opinion of people about women that women have to rely on men in order to live. Herland is like an extended family. All women work for everybody rather than themselves. This is an absolutely utopian separatist feminism society. Why do a lot of writes use science fictions to depict gender roles?
The answer is that science fictions can help people easily understand gender roles. There are several reasons. The first reason is that science fictions give a chance for writers to build a fictitious world which is nicer, more ideal, and more perfect than the real world. In this fictitious space, writers can throw off the defect of real world and build an ideal world that they want the real world to be. They can optionally exercise their imagination to write something which is impossible in the real world. Herland is a good example that combines science fictions with gender roles. Charlotte Perkins Gilman builds a world that only has women. It is impossible for this to happen in the real world. In the real world, women must rely on men and women must be weaker than men. However, in Herland, everything is fine without men. Even they think that the women in the modern world are weak. Because when Jeff wants to take the fruit basket from Celis who is his adored girl, Celis feels strange and she asks Jeff: “I do not understand. Are the women in your country so weak that they could not carry such a thing as that” (Gilman). In Herland, women are independent, they can help each other, but they never rely on anybody completely. The second reason is that science fiction can violate the natural order, after all this is an unreal world. For example, women can be pregnant and carry on the family line by themselves
without men. As the description in the book
“Then the miracle happened-one of these young women bore a child. Of course they all thought there must be a man somewhere, but none was found. And there, as years passed, this wonder-woman bore child after child, five of them-all girls” (Gilman).
This miracle thing can never happen in real world because it breaks the natural law. It is impossible for women to be pregnant and give birth to a baby on their own. The third reason is that science fictions give a chance for readers to better understand the flaws of their traditional opinions about gender roles in the real world. To be honest, people live in a patriarchal society all the time. People always think that women are weaker than men, women have to live with men and women just need to take care of their families. In fact, all these opinions are kind of gender discriminations. Nevertheless, gender discriminations are the flaws in people’s traditional opinions. For example, Terry who thinks the male chauvinism is predominant. In Terry’s opinion, women should and must be dominated by men, and women have to be obedient to men. However, Terry is driven out of Herland because of his male chauvinism. In Herland, the author builds a utopian separatist feminism society which concentrates on women. Through the description in the original text:
“She looked out across the fields to where some women were working, building a new bit of wall out of large stones; looked back at the nearest town with its woman-built houses; down at the smooth, hard road we were walking on” (Gilman).
The former shows that women are the same strong as man. Meanwhile, there is a paragraph that describes the construction of this country, “ a land in a state of perfect cultivation, where even the forests looked as if they cared for; a land that looked like an enormous park, only it was even more evidently an enormous garden” (Gilman). These situations never happen in the real world, because people always think these are the men’s responsibilities to do these a series of things. Therefore, when the three men saw what happened in front of them, they felt that it was amazing. This is the flaw of people’s opinion about gender roles. They always automatically ignore that women have the same abilities. After reading this novel, people will find the flaw in their opinion and they will understand that women have the same abilities as men. Thus, they will have more fair and more unprejudiced opinions about women. The fourth reason is that science fictions can give readers a special perspective of gender roles and society which is different from the realistic fictions. In general, realistic fictions always represent the real world and the normal thoughts of people. People live in a patriarchal society all the time; on the contrary, Herland provide a feminist society. After reading this novel, people must compare these two different social systems so as to think more about the importance of gender roles. They must think what the differences between these two societies are and what they should improve in their own society; so that they will have new cognition about gender roles.
All in all, science fictions combine with gender roles perfectly.
They provide a chance for writers to build an ideal world even if such a world breaks the natural order. In science fictions, writers can stand by a special perspective to depict and structure a story to reflect the importance of gender roles in the society. Also, science fictions make readers easily understand gender roles and make readers better understand what are the flaws of people’s traditional opinion about gender roles. The authors also can use their imagination to build an ideal society; after all science fictions are an unreal world. In conclusion, science fictions are one of means that incarnate the importance of gender roles, make people more easily understand gender roles and change the people’s traditional opinions about gender
roles.

Works Cited
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. Herland. 1. New York: DOVER PUBLICATIONS,INC, 1998. Print.