False Dichotomy

[jamiam]

So I finally picked up Woman on the Edge of Time, which I think Susan sent me a year or two ago. I settled down to read it, and I promptly bounced off the blurb at the back:"...the fascinating story of Connie Ramos, a Chicana woman in her mid-thirties, living in New York and labeled insane, committed to a mental institution. But the truth is that

Comments

[susansugarspun]

Yeah, but don't we all know by now that cover blurbs are always terrible? The hippie feminist utopia in the book is fundamentally underpinned by technology, they're just very controlled and mindful in the ways they choose to use it.

[jamiam]

AH-HA. So you WERE the person who sent me this book. I knew this ruse would draw you out!

(Seriously, it just showed up at my house unannounced one day, with no note. I think I started assuming it was you who'd sent it after you randomly waxed poetic online about it.)

[elysdir]

On a side note: I initially had a really hard time getting into this book, I think because I found the violence and other unpleasantness in the opening chapter too painful. (Well written, but painful to read.) But I came back to it later, and I remember liking the book overall a lot. I think I remember deciding that the utopia part was one of only two utopias I had encountered that sounded like places I would actually like to live (the other being KSR's _Pacific Edge_). Which may say more about me than about the book, and anyway it's been probably twenty years since I read it. But I figured it was worth tossing in another recommendation for the book's worthwhileness.

[kameron_hurley]

What was the Elizabeth Hand novel where the woman-dominated dystopia they were getting visions of was all illiterate women smearing filth on themselves and dancing naked around fires among the ruins of old cities? Was it Waking the Moon or something like that?

Yeah. This.

[jamiam]

Of course, that sounds like it's going too far in the other direction... and I do understand that both attitudes are reactions to cultural paradigms. And there's a whole lot of historical context missing from my 2012 perspective (and a great deal of cultural baggage that had not yet accrued in 1976).

But you would think, 35 years on, that I would be able to frame a decent question to create a balanced discussion. But I can't; somehow, I'm too emotionally involved.

(Jed, on the other hand, seems to be doing just brilliantly.)

[scarypudding]

I'll bring the Lego this year if you want to teach Engineering for Girls.

[jamiam]

Engineering for Girls is Saira's job; I'm Astrology that makes you cry.

The Lego idea is probably worth pursuing. But rather than toting them long-distance, I think maybe I'll consult Jackie Lee, and then put out a call for Legos. I'm sure there are plenty of local sources. I'd really like it it someone could bring one of those giant buckets.

And I'm pretty sure there was a party that featured soldering your own LED blink circuit. That would also be FANTASTIC at the gathering. (For appropriately-aged children and up.) There might be safety restrictions that apply the ballroom, however.

[jamiam]

And a more positive spin on Astrology that Makes you Cry would be to find a Starlab portable planetarium in Wisconsin that I could rent for a week and set up in the ballroom. But that's quite a BIT of effort.

[harvestar]

This guy has brought a Starlab to a Madison area library (even though he lives up in LaCrosse area). So perhaps it's not out of the question. I know I'd LOVE to do a local Con here with Starlab (and tried to at one point, but it wasn't allowed at the time to use it in a situation where people charged money to get in).

http://seeingstarswi.wordpress.com/starlab-star-parties/

[elysdir]

I think it would be possible to have really good WisCon panels on various aspects of this. I think there are a bunch of possible ways to frame it. Some examples (not very well thought out

[elysdir]

PS: If anyone wants to take any of these and revise/rework them and turn them into actual panel suggestions, feel free--I didn't polish them and won't likely get around to doing so, but if any of you want to improve and submit them, go for it.

[jamiam]

Thanks, Jed, I'm quite likely to take you up on that.

[ext_907066]

The blurb is accurate. It's a fascinating book, but that particular trope feels like the most dated part of it.

If you haven't, you need to read Donna Haraway's Cyborg Manifesto.

[jamiam]

Hah! Well, I shan't sic Susan on you, or vice versa, seeing as I haven't even done the homework of reading it myself yet.

[jamiam]

And no, I haven't read Cyborg Manifesto.

[elysdir]

In case you're interested, here's "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century" (1991), by Donna Haraway:

http://www.egs.edu/faculty/donna-haraway/articles/donna-haraway-a-cyborg-manifesto/

I've been hearing about it for a long time, and have read bits of it, but still haven't gotten around to sitting down and reading the whole thing.