Category: Discussion

Jamie’s Top Reads for 2015:
  1. robinson_auroraThe Shepherd’s Crown – Terry Pratchett
    A beautifully tearful and satisfying end to the stories from the Discworld from one of the greatest writers of our time.
  2. Aurora – Kim Stanley Robinson
    The chillingly harsh depiction of the struggles of the space ship Aurora as she travels through the empty void of space in search of a new planet to call home.
  3. Luna: New Moon – Ian McDonald
    When every breath you take costs you money, and every step could cost you your life, sometimes it seems that the moon wants to kill you. There are a million ways to die on the moon; just working to stay alive is only the first of your challenges.
  4. A Crucible of Souls – Mitchell Hogan
    A world of fantasy and intrigue with plenty of incredible surprises in store. With more books to come in this series, it’s is only going to get better and better.
  5. The Girl Thing Who Went Out For Sushi – Pat Cadigan
    Defying outdated social constructs such as gender roles and identity, this short story is perfect in its succinctness and form, leaving the reader questioning what/who they are and where they fit in this universe.

Joan_of_Arc_by_RossettiApologies for the downtime in November; I was on a month’s holiday in North America. My intentions of keeping up regular posts proved more difficult than I expected. Anyway, I’ll be popping back next week with my 2015 reflections, but in the mean time, just wanted to say thank you to those who read this blog and support my writers and myself in our craft. You have my gratitude and much applause.

If you’re looking for a quick fiction hit, I’ve got some free flash fiction up on the Barnes and Noble blog. It’s a totally new story, new characters and setting. I’ll be interested to see what you think.

Also, I’m having a week of celebrating my PhD confirmation (topic: Future Feminism in science fiction) at the University of Queensland before I dive back in to study. But I just wanted to put out a call to ask if you know anyone who has some expertise in early 1400’s France (Joan of Arc). I’d appreciate it if you would spread this message across the waves for me in the hope it might reach the right person.

Talk soon everyone!

 

you-re-next-poster04Home invasion movies are an old and popular genre in horror, and it is possibly the only horror genre that is targeted more towards women. This may be because in the real world, women are taught to fear strangers and the dangers they represent on a greater scale than men. The home has also historically been portrayed as a woman’s place, one of the few in which a woman was expected to take charge. In a society where men are viewed as the physical protectors of the home, having a solitary woman pursued and under attack by an ill-intentioned invader is a popular narrative tool used to inspire terror.

The problem this presents is that it implies women without men are more vulnerable and less able to defend themselves. It also often places men in a predatory role. This involves a certain amount of sexism in both directions, indicating a woman’s weakness and a man’s supposedly aggressive nature. These movies tend to show women as terrified and helpless, being stalked by the big bad wolf in the form of an unknown assailant. Both an outdated stereotype and a harmful one, this sub-genre of horror can have real world negative effects as it reinforces insulting ideas about women’s strength. Even when the woman escapes, the implication remains that they survived against the odds rather than as a matter of course.

panic-room-posterFor example, in Panic Room (2002) the female protagonist feared danger so greatly that she literally hides in a panic room with her sick child (not a feature that most homes contain), though ironically a working cell phone was not something she thought to store there.

Her eventual bid to escape is not due to inherent bravery, but in order to get treatment for her daughter. In Funny Games (1997), both a husband and wife are attacked, but the implication exists that it is the man’s job to fend off the attackers while the women, his wife, is only expected to escape at best. Instead, they both die. In The Strangers (2008), a more modern film, a similar setup occurs through one of the three assailants is actually a woman. The female half of the attacked duo in this case survives, satisfying the “final girl” trope popular in all genres of horror.

Though this final girl trope of having one surviving woman at the end of a horror film tends to play out more often in scenarios where there are groups under attack, such as slasher films, there are examples found in the home invasion category as well. The film You’re Next (2013) is another such example, where Erin is the last woman standing after killing four attackers and then, accidentally, one police officer. She survives but is on the hook for the deaths even though they were in self-defense or accidental. This movie is a bit of an exception in the genre in general anyway, due to Erin’s ability to physically fight back.

 In fact, often women in these movies use their wits rather than their strength to fend off attackers. Wait Until Dark (1967) stars Audrey Hepburn as a woman being terrorized by three men searching for drugs in her home. To emphasize her vulnerability even further she is blind in the film, but there the convention is turned on its head. Hepburn’s character uses her blindness as an advantage, plunging the robbers into the dark and setting traps they cannot see to avoid. She likely would have had an easier time had this movie been set more recently, as a security system would have done her job for her.

single-white-female-movie-poster-1992-1020233026Women are sometimes the attackers as well. 1992’s Single White Female is a perfect example. Hedy is the murderous assailant – though that is not apparent at first – and she manages to kill two men and severely injure a third in her pursuit of Ally, the “victim.” In the end, Ally is able to outwit her, once again relying on the positive brains over brawn narrative. Though the women here are not portrayed as weak in the same way as other movies in this genre, there are nevertheless negative stereotypes at play. One is of women as constantly being in competition with and jealous of each other. After all, there is no better way of portraying jealousy than literally trying to take over someone’s life. Another is of the crazy or unstable woman, an extremely damaging stereotype of its own. Those same stereotypes are at play in 2007’s Inside, where a woman stalks and eventually kills a mother-to-be in order to claim her child as her own.

In all these films, the sanctity of the home – an historically female sphere – is disturbed and a woman is shown as the main or ultimate victim. Most show women being forced to rely on their cleverness to protect them rather than a direct physical defense. The home becomes a trap that must be escaped, in fact an apt allegory for repressive sexism in general.

 However, there are differences as well, and signs of change in more recent movies. This genre sometimes has a woman as the attacker as well as the victim. There is even the occasional physical battle in which the woman triumphs. This is a sign of progress both in fiction and hopefully in how women are viewed in real life. Though the genre has historically relied on incorrect and offensive stereotypes of the weak and frightened female victims, if it continues to show women in the stronger role of successful defender and even sometimes attacker, the genre may be able to successfully evolve with the times.

 

Awards

davitt-award  aurealis-award   logo-curtin-university

Peacemaker - Aurealis Award
Best Science Fiction Novel 2014

Curtin University Distinguished Alumni Award 2014

Transformation Space - Aurealis Award
 Best Science Fiction Novel 2010

Sharp Shooter - Davitt Award
Best Crime Novel 2009 (Sisters in Crime Australia) 

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