Female Roles in The Word For World Is Forest

One of the things I found most telling about the difference between the Terrans and the Athsheans is the role of their women. Ursula Le Guin seems to be making a social commentary on the human treatment of women in the time period she grew up during because on Terra, women are simply seen as property of males and designed to produce children. Her prime writing years were during major women's rights movements and probably led to the feminist undertones present in the novel. In the Athshean culture, the intelligence and roles of power are split between males and females. Males are responsible for the most powerful dreaming, but the women have all the political prowess and responsibilities. This harsh contrast with the Terran women as breeding objects further exemplifies the advanced sociological nature of the Athsheans. The women of the tribe are also hunters and warriors and seem to align with more ancient tribes of humans in their matriarchal rule. Le Guin, as a fiction writer, is able to create new worlds and fill them with the ideals and values she wishes where prevalent in real life human culture. The stripping of the respect of women through the act of rape is a common theme in The Word For World Is Forest and I find it particularly interesting that the spark to the entire destruction of the Terran colony by Selvar and the rest of the Athsheans was the rape and subsequent killing of his wife by Davidson. A violation of women is the initial reason for introducing violence into Athshean culture.

The Word for World is Forest

I didn't really like this book because it was confusing and hard to get into. Le Guin introduces a completely different world to the readers but doesn't explain anything. She makes up words like "spla" and "ansible" and makes us guess at what it means. She also mentions places with 2 different types of names and people of different "race" without giving readers more details. I also don't like how women are treated like farm animals by both humans and Athsheans. Also, after reading the Game of Thrones books, I'm really tired of reading about people getting raped and killed.

The Word For World Is Forest

"The Word For World is Forest" by Ursala Le Guin is a book that was very difficult to get into. This book was very hard to understand because Le Guin expects readers to understand most of the vocabulary in the book and the double meaning of certain words were confusing. Although the double meaning of words were confusing, they held a purpose and significance for the theme of the book. The double meaning of the words shows the different perspectives of the characters. Lyubov  thinks of the Athsheans as men by calling them by their names which shows that he respects them. Lyvbov not only thinks of Athsheans as living species but he calls them men which shows a deeper connection he wanted to form by understanding and not harming them. Davidson on the other hand calls Athsheans creechies which sounds very harsh and uncaring. Although creechies isn't a real word, we can tell by just listening to the word that it doesn't have a proper meaning making it sound like an object instead of a living being. By learning the different perspectives of Lyubov and Davidson, the reader is awaken by the overall emphasis on humanity. We are able to see through these two characters the differences in characteristics and purpose that humans may have and what we are capable of doing.

-Alice Lee

The Word for World is Forest

The Word for World is Forest by Guin is a very unique book, but can be easily compared to many other books and movies such as The Hunger Games and Twilight.  The setting is in its own little world, with many different races and cultures combined together; thus creating tension and even violence.  This was the only reading that I did not enjoy because it was too out of the ordinary, to the point where it was hard to understand what is going on.  I believe Guin passed the line with her story line when she was presenting her own world to the readers.  It was hard to pinpoint the objective of the characters and the races.  Women are apparently like toys while the males took control and were determined to make the world a better place.  Women are mentioned often in the story as simply producers.  There are no insights to the female's thoughts and opinions, and I believe if Guin included that in the story it would have been more insightful.

The Word for World is Forest

The novel the Word for World is Forest by Ursula Le Guin reminded me of several story lines and plots I have seen before.  We discussed a few of these in class; Pocahontas and Avatar portray similar stories in which a dominating party will colonize and abuse a native population in a fight for resources.  I believe that Le Guin’s use of multiple perspectives in the novel is a powerful technique.  The opening perspective is drastically different from the perspective of the native Athsheans’ which provides the reader with valuable insight into the mindsets of all of the characters.  This technique also makes it easier for the reader to make connections between cause and effect events and correlations within the story, such as the Athsheans’ motive for rebellion.

The word for world is forest

The World for World is Forest depicts the future of humanity with the unchanging destructive nature of human and the collateral damage that comes from it. This book assimilates the movie ‘Avatar,’ in a way that humans invade earthlike planet and destroy the nature and hunt down the native people. However, the story includes more themes such as slavery, racism, and sexism.  

Natives who live in the planet Athshe have tender nature. Humans who arrive in this planet take advantage of this and treat them like slaves. Unlike few individuals such as Dr. Lyubov who cares about the survival of the forest and its people, others only care about the wellbeing of humans. Humans do not consider the fact that they have abused the forest people and when the natives arise against them, they plan to wipe them out.

The concept of racism is well represented in the story. Even though the natives can carry out any activities (ex) speak, think, dream, and eat) that humans can, humans discriminate the natives because of their color and physical differences, calling them ‘primitives.’ They rape the female natives and disregard male natives, thinking the natives are less than humans.

It is quite weird to notice that women play no important role in the text. They were often treated as prostitutes and who need to be ‘shipped’ as wives of colonists. They do not have any voice in the text. 

From Creechie to Charlie: Reflections on the Vietnam War

In her book The Word for World is Forest, Ursula Le Guin tells the story of a large, nonviolent race of  small humanoids whose home planet comes under hostile siege by small group of heavily armed Humans wishing to strip it of its natural resources, scour the land, and then take it over.  While the setting and characters might differ, the story presented in the book is extremely similar to that of the Vietnam war; where the U.S. Government went to war with Vietnamese communist in Vietnam, in an attempt to stop the spread of communism in Vietnam, and preserve it and the countries surrounding it as our allies.  By creating similarities between the two settings, and contrasting them, Ursula Le Guin is able to reflect on and critique the U.S. Government and the entire idea of the War.  One of the most obvious similarities in the characters involved, and how they compare to each other.  In the book, the native Athsheans are large in number with no real central government, instead acting is large groups completely separate from each other; most of which are non-violent and a few of which engage the humans in hit-and-run attacks using stolen weaponry to bypass their technological disadvantage.  The humans, on the other hand, are small in number and mostly aggressive and xenophobic, calling the Athsheans "Creechies" and treating them as lower life forms, and trying to wipe them out with more advanced technology to make up for smaller numbers.  Here, we see the contrast to the Vietnam war, where mass amounts of small, decentralized Vietnamese or Vietcong squads engaged the American army in Guerrilla warfare; while most of the other Vietnamese were non-hostile villagers and citizens.  Similarly, the U.S. Army continued to fight against "Charlie" despite being outnumbered and continual losses, using Napalm and Agent Orange to kill them en masse, at the cost of the land and numerous bystanders lives.  In the book, Ursula makes it clear the Humans are the villians and that their actions are not only malicious but completely useless, and through this attacks the War as the same, that it is a evil and pointless war that would not be won.