Culture Case

Culture

It's all around us and is what we know as the norm. Culture is in our everyday activities and represents our way of life. We pass it on to children with or without knowing it and they do the same. Our culture can be represented from tasks like the use of a toilet, the concept of time, the housing styles, and the traditions practiced. On earth there are many different cultures within the basic human culture. People in poverty living in Africa, for example, have a much different lifestyle and culture than Americans. Even groups in a given country have their own subcultures, for instance football fans.

Ursula Le Guin created differences between the planets earth and Gethen in addition to differences in the people living there. These differences are the main cause of the culture differences. She put Genly Ai on a mission outside of the comfort of his home to a planet light years away where he had to communicate with aliens living with different lifestyles. Kemmer was one of the major culture differences that had Genly Ai confused at first. People misjudged him as a pervert because he was always a man and never went into kemmer. In addition to kemmer, the climate difference and lack of technology on Gethen created cultural differences with earth. Gethan was called Winter by the Ekumen because it was nearing an ice age. The weather was not suitable for birds to live in, so the Gethenians had no ambition to fly. Therefore, they didn't have technology to find life outside of their own planet, or travel their own planet quickly.

Gethen's culture differences with earth stuck out to me. It got me thinking, what if life on other planets exists, and if so how advanced are they. There are many other solar systems out there where the experience of life could be much different. Laws of nature and the planets conditions may be just slightly different and have a huge impact on how we evolved. These differences would affect the cultures on these planets, causing many not to produce life, as in the novel.

Culture is affected by and plays a big role in gender, government, and human development, all of which are main themes of the novel. Religion is another theme which is a big part of almost all cultures here on earth. Religion even separates many countries such as Israel. The gender theme is resembled by the king being pregnant. This would never be the news headline on earth. Here on earth a male is a male and a female is a female and they each play their own roles in the American culture. On Gethen, because everyone can develop as a male or female in kemmer, one person can be both a father to some and a mother to others. Kemmer eliminated gender roles and the male dominance we have on earth. Men generally have higher job positions and our language is more commonly masculinely. Culture and the novels themes go hand in hand.