In the Harraway article that we read she expresses hope in the possibility that we can be saved if we all learn to live as cyborgs, a blending of the human and the machine. Joanna Russ would appear to agree with this idea as her Utopian society Whileaway in The Female Man is made up almost entirely of cyborgs.
The people on Whileaway are trained to become one with technology from birth, and eventually it becomes a part of them. Although its description seems rustic and pastoral, the society of Whileaway is only possible through their use of and coexistence with technology. I have no idea what an induction helmet is, but it must be pretty awesome if “with their induction helmets on their heads, their toes controlling the green peas, their fingers the vats and controls, their back muscles the carrots, their abdomens the water supply,” (51). Not to mention that at some point they figured out how to not only have babies without any males, but to genetically modify those babies to an almost perfection.
My question is this: Is technology necessary to conquer nature? Not only trees and butterflies nature, but human nature, or more specifically female nature? Russ spends a great deal of time explaining to us that the idea of “female nature” or “maternal instincts” are just social constructs that are meant as a mode of domination by males (and other females as well). Men in the novel constantly assume that it is part of a woman’s DNA that she will be happy with pretty clothes, or that all she wants to do is sit on the couch and eat bon bons while her husband Climbs Everest (what is a bon bon anyway? I’ve always wondered that). So why is it so necessary that technology be so ingrained in her idea of a utopia. Women are only seen as strong enough to exist on their own on Whileaway, and only with the help of all their technology.
Janet would be considered the most advanced J, or most enlightened, in a way. However, her and the rest of the people on Whileaway are completely dependent on advances in technology to survive. Jael would be the strongest J physically, and the one could argue the toughest. However, she relies on her robot boy-toy for pleasure. Also, the women of Womenland are dependant on technlogiocal advances to survive using it as a means of commerce, namely baby farming and time travel. Jeannine seems to be the most connected to nature, with her cat (Mr. Frosty!) and her plant, but she seems to be the weakest of the J’s to me.
If Russ was attempting to get across the point that women can do whatever men could do and that the differences between the sexes is illusory, why this emphasis on technology?
I may have completely misread the novel. I am assuming that Whileaway is meant to be a utopia. It is possible that it was not meant to be and therefore everything I said above would be pretty much worthless.
I’m not convinced that Whileaway is meant to be a utopia. If it is, then I believe it’s in the original sense of Sir Thomas More’s coinage of the word: an absurd, satirical no-place that says more about our own society than about any kind of imagined “perfect” society.
Whether Whileaway is or isn’t a utopia doesn’t change the importance of your question about technology, though. It’s something to look at further in class. Given that the book isn’t hardcore science fiction, I am tempted to read those aspect of science fiction that do appear as metaphorical. For example, the induction helmet. Would this fantastical tool serve any kind of metaphorical meaning that might reflect upon our contemporary world (rather than upon Whileway)?