Charis Poon gives the textual equivalent of “reaction videos“ to excerpts from Ursula K Le Guin, revealing shifting desires and identities over time in this eight-part series.

Published in conjunction with In Our Own Backyard, AAA's exhibition that explores the creative impulses and forms of gathering within the women’s movements in South Asia from the 1980s onward.

The essential gesture of the father tongue is not reasoning but distancing—making a gap, a space, between the subject or self and the object or other. Enormous energy is generated by that rending, that forcing of a gap between Man and World. So the continuous growth of technology and science fuels itself; the Industrial Revolution began with splitting the world-atom, and still by breaking the continuum into unequal parts we keep the imbalance from which our society draws the power that enables it to dominate every other culture, so that everywhere now everybody speaks the same language in laboratories and government buildings and headquarters and offices of business, and those who don’t know it or won’t speak it are silent, or silenced, or unheard.

[…]

Using the father tongue, I can speak of the mother tongue only, inevitably, to distance it—to exclude it. It is the other, inferior. It is primitive: inaccurate, unclear, coarse, limited, trivial, banal. It’s repetitive, the same over and over, like the work called women’s work; earthbound, housebound. It’s vulgar, the vulgar tongue, common, common speech, colloquial, low, ordinary, plebeian, like the work ordinary people do, the lives common people live. The mother tongue, spoken or written, expects an answer. It is conversation, a word the root of which means “turning together.” The mother tongue is language not as mere communication but as relation, relationship. It connects. It goes two ways, many ways, an exchange, a network. Its power is not in dividing but in binding, not in distancing but in uniting.

From Le Guin’s 1986 “Bryn Mawr College Commencement,“ included in Dancing At The Edge of the World: Thoughts on Words, Women, Places (New York: Harper & Row, 1989); also recently republished in Space Crone (London: Silver Press, 2023).

The power of male group solidarity must come from the control and channelling of male rivalry, the repression and concentration of the hormone-driven will to dominate that so often dominates men themselves. It is a remarkable reversal. The destructive, anarchic energy of individual rivalry and competitive ambition is diverted into loyalty to group and leader and directed to more or less constructive social enterprise.

[…]

Male solidarity appears to me to have been the prime shaper of most of the great ancient institutions of society—Government, Army, Priesthood, University, and the new one that may be devouring all the others, Corporation. The existence and dominance of these hierarchic, organized, coherent, durable institutions goes back so far and has been so nearly universal that it’s mostly just called “how things are,” “the world,” “the division of labour,” “history,” “God’s will,” etc.

As for female solidarity, without it human society, I think, would not exist. But it remains all but invisible to men, history, and God.

Female solidarity might better be called fluidity—a stream or river rather than a structure. The only institutions I am fairly sure it has played some part in shaping are the tribe and that very amorphous thing, the family. Wherever the male arrangement of society permits the fellowship of women on their own terms, it tends to be casual, unformulated, unhierarchical; to be ad hoc rather than fixed, flexible rather than rigid, and more collaborative than competitive.

From Le Guin’s 2010 blog post “A Band of Brothers, a Stream of Sisters,“ included in No Time to Spare: Thinking about What Matters (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019); also recently republished in Space Crone (London: Silver Press, 2023).

The essential gesture of the father tongue is not reasoning but distancing—making a gap, a space, between the subject or self and the object or other. [Thanks to Haraway’s Staying with the Trouble, I have a new take on this. That distancing gesture comes from a human exceptionalist position, where everything is made sense of in relation to the human self. Gap-making is comprehending the world through the lens of man-first and all else coming-after. (See pages 11-12 especially.)] I’m an expert at this. This is what I’ve been trained in through school and in jobs. This is a weird thing to brag about, but I feel confident and smart when I tell myself I have a total grasp on the logic of the world and can sell that to others in perfectly formed sentences. Why yes, I can make sense of everything and teach it to you too. Why yes, I was a teacher’s pet. [Humbling, really, to find myself so insufferable. I need to see this about myself. I need to be reminded to not act like or desire to be the smartest person or species or even the most intelligent thing in the room.]

Enormous energy is generated by that rending, that forcing of a gap between Man and World. It’s like the perfect supervillain’s superweapon—by convincing people the unnatural is natural, total world domination is possible. [World domination begins by convincing others that only one picture of the world is accurate, so that any other picture is difficult to imagine, to see as possible, and to bring about. This is how the bad guy wins, by not seeming like a bad guy at all, but a reasonable, visionary, credible figure. Insert list of charismatic despots here.] So the continuous growth of technology and science fuels itself; the Industrial Revolution began with splitting the world-atom, and still by breaking the continuum into unequal parts we keep the imbalance from which our society draws the power that enables it to dominate every other culture, so that everywhere now everybody speaks the same language in laboratories and government buildings and headquarters and offices of business, and those who don’t know it or won’t speak it are silent, or silenced, or unheard. I’m kind of defensive about this putdown; I like having mastery over this language, this way of speaking that I know is condescending and officious and fake, but it means not having to deal with the rage of being unheard, the indignity of being silenced, the depression of being silent. It’s intoxicating to be able to shut down complaints, get a raise, command a room, just by choosing your words in a certain way. [This is worrying. The type of person who says they’re a “girl boss” talks and writes this way, ick. It starts with not wanting to be silent, silenced, or unheard, then turns into forgetting there are other ways to speak and that language can shape thoughts and actions. Staying with the Trouble, on page 35 again, “It matters what thoughts think thoughts. It matters what knowledges know knowledges. It matters what relations relate relations. It matters what worlds world worlds. It matters what stories tell stories.”]

Using the father tongue, I can speak of the mother tongue only, inevitably, to distance it—to exclude it. It is the other, inferior. Everybody loves a tier list. Father tongue, S tier. [The instinct to rank is a father tongue exclusive. Ordering things from best to worst is deliciously fun, look at Letterboxd and Goodreads, but philosophically dangerous. Not so much for cultural artefacts, but the instinct to slot people, things, and relations into hierarchical structures.] It is primitive: inaccurate, unclear, coarse, limited, trivial, banal.

It’s repetitive, the same over and over, like the work called women’s work; earthbound, housebound. We’ve got to stop using “men,” “women,” “male,” “female,” “feminine,” and “masculine,” as descriptors of anything until we’re collectively able to see gender not as absolute unchanging categories. [Maybe we should be using these words in order to redefine them? What can we use instead? Is “queer” helpful as an adjective? Is “trans” helpful? Can they be used to shift the perception of gender from being static to being in flux? Okay, what if “gender” can be used like “age” as in “I am always aging,” “I am always gendering.”] It’s vulgar, the vulgar tongue, common, common speech, colloquial, low, ordinary, plebeian, like the work ordinary people do, the lives common people live.

The mother tongue, spoken or written, expects an answer. It is a conversation, a word the root of which means “turning together.” The father tongue expects an answer too, but answers that are contradictory and aggressive. It is calibrated to be impenetrable in expectation of an argument, another kind of “turning together” to face each other in confrontation. [Trump spoke in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, at the Saudi-US investment forum recently, and said, “The people of Gaza deserve a much better future, but that will or cannot occur as long as their leaders choose to kidnap, torture and target innocent men, women and children for political ends.” A sentence with built-in armour against attacks from all sides. The first clause crafted for the people in the Gulf, the second clause for Israel. The word “deserve” hinting at the power dynamic perceived by the speaker, that there are people who are worthy of something I could give, but won’t right now; actually, they haven’t done enough to merit salvation.] The mother tongue is language not as mere communication but as relation, relationship. It connects. Unfortunately, “connect” is co-opted by corporates: Facebook connects us, Apple connects us, Uber connects us. What does it mean anymore to be connected when everything is supposedly capable of forming connections. It goes two ways, many ways, an exchange, a network. Its power is not in dividing but in binding, not in distancing but in uniting. “Uniting” has a fascist flavour nowadays, a scent of mob mentality, but binding is pleasantly poetic. I think of eggs beaten into flour to make dough, tree roots holding the earth together, humming and holding the same note in a choir.

The power of male group solidarity must come from the control and channelling of male rivalry, the repression and concentration of the hormone-driven will to dominate that so often dominates men themselves. It is a remarkable reversal. The destructive anarchic energy of individual rivalry and competitive ambition is diverted into loyalty to group and leader and directed to more or less constructive social enterprise. This illuminates what’s going on in global politics and commerce—Elon Musk’s fanboys, Zuckerberg’s and Bezos’ tech bros, Netanyahu and the IDF. “Constructive” in this case not at all meaning productive and useful, but constructive like an invasive species. [There’s always a speech being made on a stage somewhere at another conference/summit/forum/symposium/convention where male group solidarity is highly visible as it’s channelled towards projects like an AI startup, going to the moon, a new massive data centre, a “sustained presence” in Gaza. All of these are invasions.] The diversion of individual rivalry and competitive ambition doesn’t make it disappear, though. There’s still in-fighting and the tension that any moment one of the gang could eat their littermates. [It’s ‘Survivor’! People talking behind each other’s backs, making alliances, acting like snakes and rats (Sue Hawk, final tribal council of Survivor 1). Loyalty, ultimately, is only to win yourself that million dollars.]

Male solidarity appears to me to have been the prime shaper of most of the great ancient institutions of society—Government, Army, Priesthood, University, and the new one that may be devouring all the others, Corporation. The existence and dominance of these hierarchic, organized, coherent, durable institutions goes back so far and has been so nearly universal that it’s mostly just called “how things are,” “the world,” “the division of labour,” “history,” “God’s will,” etc. Yeah, I’ve had these exact conversations. Ones where I’m the one pointing out how the core organizing structure of every institution stems from, as hooks put it, the “imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” and ones where I’m ready to give up on trying and giving the response, “hey, that’s how things are and it’s never going to be different.” Does explaining the patriarchy get us closer to dismantling it? [I have been trying to not yell, “Capitalism!” and “Neoliberalism!” as a response every time someone brings up a problem in the world, even though it’s true. I’m working on being more specific and detailed, because slapping a label on the issue doesn’t move us towards a better future and actually tips us towards despair.]

As for female solidarity, without it human society, I think, would not exist. But it remains all but invisible to men, history, and God. And it shifts in and out of visibility for me. [I have a friend in a group chat with women who were all bridesmaids at one person’s wedding and the group chat continues to be used to plan her birthday parties and baby showers. That might be female friendship but it’s not quite female solidarity.]

Female solidarity might better be called fluidity—a stream or river rather than a structure. [A river, scientifically and not symbolically, is a stream of fresh water gathered from rain, runoff, melting snow, or seepage, that flows downhill towards another body of water. They shape the landscape, spread nutrients to soil, sustain ecosystems of organisms, and provide resources to humans. A river doesn’t construct, but is reconstructive with others.] The only institutions I am fairly sure it has played some part in shaping are the tribe and that very amorphous thing, the family. That’s not a strong recommendation for female solidarity, when so many people’s experience of family is fraught. Family is itself an institution in need of reconsideration. Perhaps female solidarity’s power is in its lack of legacy. It doesn’t shape any enduring solid form. [No, that’s not completely right. Female solidarity can make an enduring form, but that form is capable of shapeshifting. It’s flexible and endlessly multiple. People’s roles, contributions, and relationships change. The organising principles intend for that to happen.]

Wherever the male arrangement of society permits the fellowship of women on their own terms, it tends to be casual, unformulated, unhierarchical; to be ad hoc rather than fixed, flexible rather than rigid, and more collaborative than competitive. I don’t know what the fellowship of women on their own terms looks like or feels like and what it produces. Is that just me? I don’t think this means any gathering of women, but a gathering of people who agree to intentionally organize with flexibility and a collaborative spirit. What comes to mind are all the times I saw women cause conflict because of competition; a colleague saying, “you need to understand how I’ll be appraised,” before claiming an unjust workload allocation. How can I respond with stream-like solidarity?

Charis Poon is an artist and educator who makes zines, audio pieces, draws comics, and writes. She teaches Social Design at the Hong Kong PolyU School of Design where she experiments with how teaching and learning happen. 

Banner image courtesy of Charis Poon.