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Female Friends
I keep accidentally starting topics I'd like to see discussion on, on fridays. When everyone is about to pay more attention to real life than livejournal for a while. (At least that seems to be the pattern.)
None-the-less, I've had this on my mind for a bit and I wanted to bring it up:
Where are all the women friends in SF?
There are some celebrated friendships in fantasy and science fiction. Frodo and Sam. Gandalf and Sam. Han Solo and Chewbacca. Yoda and Obi-wan. Spock and Kirk. Friendships that involve great and enduring loyalties. The sturdy dependable friendships of men.
So where are the pairs of female friends? Where are the bosom friends who listen to each other's fears and cheer each other on? Where are the women who mentor younger women, and the younger ones who pull older ones out of their shells? Where are the women who pick up where the last woman left off or fell sick or needed a break, and keep their society going?
Increasingly, I see strong female characters in SF. But they are isolated. I do not see the social networks I see in the SF fannish community represented in the pages of our literature. I am starting to see some, mostly in SF written by women, and I wonder if our female friendships are such a mystery, that men do not see them clearly enough to depict them, or if strong female characters are still so close to men with breasts that though they've stepped up into the role of "one of the guys" to take on leading positions, they are still not friends with each other, and the supporting roles that might be taken up by other women are still given to people with hair on their chests.
I can think of exceptions, and am pleased to realize that one author who comes to mind is Robert Heinlein. Criticised in many ways for his depictions of women, he still wrote about women who were close, affectionate friends to one another, and who enabled each others' successes.
I'm trying to think of other well-known authors who have and I'm failing. Orson Scott Card? No. Asimov? Nope. Even some prominent female authors didn't in their best-known works. McCaffrey has something of a friendship between women in Crystal Singer, but it isn't close friendship. In the dragonrider books? There were only a few, not counting the bond between the queens and their riders.
This thought process started when I read Crystal Rain, by Tobias Buckell, on Monday. It's a great first novel, well paced, intriguing, with good characters and a well-realized world setting. And after I read it swiftly in one day (hey, I liked it, I'm telling you!) I found myself commenting to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
scalzi that I was wishing that some of the females were Characters (with a capital C) or that at least one of the Characters had really been female. There is one main character who is technically a woman but there is almost no way in which she takes a different role than a man might have, and her only friend is an older man.
Perhaps this is a general problem with science fiction, that in telling sweeping epics we tend to create characters who are terrible lonely and isolated. Very few of our characters have to call home to say they're running late but are on their way to dinner. Which is what I just did, so I've got to go. But please, tell me, are there any friendships between women in SF that you celebrate unto yourself? Where are they to be found and read?
None-the-less, I've had this on my mind for a bit and I wanted to bring it up:
There are some celebrated friendships in fantasy and science fiction. Frodo and Sam. Gandalf and Sam. Han Solo and Chewbacca. Yoda and Obi-wan. Spock and Kirk. Friendships that involve great and enduring loyalties. The sturdy dependable friendships of men.
So where are the pairs of female friends? Where are the bosom friends who listen to each other's fears and cheer each other on? Where are the women who mentor younger women, and the younger ones who pull older ones out of their shells? Where are the women who pick up where the last woman left off or fell sick or needed a break, and keep their society going?
Increasingly, I see strong female characters in SF. But they are isolated. I do not see the social networks I see in the SF fannish community represented in the pages of our literature. I am starting to see some, mostly in SF written by women, and I wonder if our female friendships are such a mystery, that men do not see them clearly enough to depict them, or if strong female characters are still so close to men with breasts that though they've stepped up into the role of "one of the guys" to take on leading positions, they are still not friends with each other, and the supporting roles that might be taken up by other women are still given to people with hair on their chests.
I can think of exceptions, and am pleased to realize that one author who comes to mind is Robert Heinlein. Criticised in many ways for his depictions of women, he still wrote about women who were close, affectionate friends to one another, and who enabled each others' successes.
I'm trying to think of other well-known authors who have and I'm failing. Orson Scott Card? No. Asimov? Nope. Even some prominent female authors didn't in their best-known works. McCaffrey has something of a friendship between women in Crystal Singer, but it isn't close friendship. In the dragonrider books? There were only a few, not counting the bond between the queens and their riders.
This thought process started when I read Crystal Rain, by Tobias Buckell, on Monday. It's a great first novel, well paced, intriguing, with good characters and a well-realized world setting. And after I read it swiftly in one day (hey, I liked it, I'm telling you!) I found myself commenting to
scalzi that I was wishing that some of the females were Characters (with a capital C) or that at least one of the Characters had really been female. There is one main character who is technically a woman but there is almost no way in which she takes a different role than a man might have, and her only friend is an older man.Perhaps this is a general problem with science fiction, that in telling sweeping epics we tend to create characters who are terrible lonely and isolated. Very few of our characters have to call home to say they're running late but are on their way to dinner. Which is what I just did, so I've got to go. But please, tell me, are there any friendships between women in SF that you celebrate unto yourself? Where are they to be found and read?
no subject
Are those friendships, or just good working relationships? Not that there aren't friendships at work too - I have quite a few. And I'm pleased to be friends with the other female engineer who works with me, and at least friendly with most of the other women who work there. But, you know, it's not easy for me to come up with current examples of the sort you mention, because I work in a male-dominated field. All of my supervisors are men until you get to the VP of operations and the VP of HR, neither of whome interact with me much - it's not in their job description. There are only two other women in the HCI sector and though they occassionally consult on my main project, most of the time I am working on projects where everyone else on the team is male. This year I'me working on a couple projects where the project manager is female, and that's cool, but I've only worked where I am for less than two years, so, no, I'm not going to be able to easily look around work and point to these friendships I'm talking about.
But last night we were out to a show, and my sister's old friend Cyndi was there, and there were chatting together and being silly, and I nudged Matt and said "See, female friends." It's not so rare as you say, and it's not fair to say I had to "span the continent" to create the list just because *my* friends are a bit of a diaspora, and because I didn't list all of my friendships, only a few. I don't feel like I have to demonstrate parity to argue for existence.
no subject
These are friendships: they'll go hang out after work, and elsewhere. The next thing is the important one: After one moves on to another company, they'll hire their friends from the old company to help form their team at the new company.
Strong female friendships are fairly rare in real life, and so they're fairly rare in SF.
Another reason they're rare in SF is that good fiction is based on conflict, not on getting along. Writing teachers stress this all the time: Conflict, more conflict, and then make it really hard for your protagonist.
There is another snarky sort of reason: Guys are assumed to need help, so they need a team; but women are expected to be able to do it all themselves, so they don't need help. Except maybe from some guy. ;-)
no subject
I've been trying to figure out why I disagree with what you're saying, and I think it's this: I see guys at the company where I work acting as you describe, but this does not equate to 'strong friendships' to me. It looks more like networking and mutual exchange of services. These guys will go play golf, or go to the pub at lunch, and will keep in touch when one of them moves on - but they never appear to *just* socialise, it's all about either work or other profitable activity (like doing each other's plumbing, or discussing how to make money on property). Female friendships just don't look like that, even if they are equally strong.
I don't know how far this is just me - I work in a mainly male environment, and all my strong friendships are outside of work. Having said that, I have female colleagues in the US, and we *do* support each other, help out each others' work initiatives, discuss decisions on career direction, and put each other in touch with useful people - we just don't socialise outside work, because we're on different continents.
Strong female friendships are fairly rare in real life
This is not my experience. I see female friends supporting each other through difficult times, holidaying together, going into business together, helping out with childcare to enable each other to get where they want to be, organising events...
Another reason they're rare in SF is that good fiction is based on conflict, not getting along
I can see where you're coming from, but the whole 'two of us against the world' thing can work for two women as well as two men or one of each... Groups conflict with other groups, and you have the added bonus of being able to threaten loved ones :)
I followed a link from
no subject
I am a 50 year-old woman, and I've been an sf fan since I was a child.
I've had numerous friendships and mentor relationships with women throughout my life, and so have all of the woman I know - though most of the women I've known who are older than I am did not have women mentors, they have certainly chosen to mentor younger women coming into the fields they broke into without women to mentor them.. I can think of at least five women in my life who have served as mentors to me at various points, from grade school to my current job. I can think of many women I've been in a situation to be a mentor to.
I've worked in many places where women go out together after work for a couple of beers, or spend time with each other's families on the weekends - just as men do, or groups of both men and women do.
I've worked in entirely women-run co-operatives, businesses and organizations where there's been a solid dynamic of teamwork, respect, friendly problem-solving, and open communication.
As a matter of fact, my experience in life would lead me to say that men, in fact, are less likely than women to form close friendships, and that mentoring would appear to be something that certain people with greater experience/access do for other people who they perceive as being new to a field of endeavour but who appear to show promise in that field.
I have no explanation for this difference, but the real-world experiences you have had are completely alien to me.
I do think it's true that there are few representations of these kinds of relationships in science fiction writing, but I've never felt that I lacked friendship from other women sf fans. In fact, my first experience of fandom was, as an adolescent fan of Star Trek, forming a group with three other young women that focused on writing (horrible) K/S slash and custom Mary Sue sotries for each other.