#imperialradch — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #imperialradch, aggregated by home.social.
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Justice of Toren over Shis'urna
#PixelArt #Pixelorama #ImperialRadch -
Buckle up, you're in Radch space!
#ImperialRadch #Inkscape #Poster #PosterDesign -
The wise little kitten says you should.
#ImperialRadch #scifi #books #PixelArt #Pixelorama -
Love "When I was a ship," a fan song for Ann Leckie's ANCILLARY JUSTICE, sung from the POV of the ship Justice of Toren, reduced to the single-bodied person Breq. #FanArt #ImperialRadch #AncillaryJustice
"When I was a ship, when I was a weapon, when I wasn't configured to ask any questions ... when I was a sword, when I was reliable, when I was the hand, when I was pliable..."
So, so good.
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Oh so we’re all Radchaai now
#SciFi #AncillaryJustice #Trump #USPol #ImperialRadch #AnnLeckie #ExecutiveOrder
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I #AmReading Provenance by Ann Leckie.
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An ambitious young woman has just one chance to secure her future and reclaim her family’s priceless lost artifacts in this stand-alone novel set in the world of Ann Leckie’s groundbreaking, NYT bestselling Imperial Radch trilogy, which won the Hugo and Nebula awards.https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/28eb662d-3175-4f64-bbf6-82868a17a2a9
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TIL #AnneLeckie wrote a short standalone story set in the #ImperialRadch universe and then made it available for free on her website:
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Sort of random thought: Hild is also a bit like Breq, isn't she? Has enhanced modes of perception, which can feel like foresight, badass fighting skills, is good with children even though it seems unlikely, and acquires devoted fighters and dependents she cares very much about.
A difference: She's more self-aware, aware of her emotions, and goals, than Breq ist, and far less concerned with ethics.
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@quidcumque
Well then, you may wish to read some of Ann Leckie's other writing in that setting: short story She Commands Me And I Obey, novels Provenance and Translation State.But also: the Romanovan culture is only a couple centuries distant from Gender, and still lives cheek by jowl with cultures that practice it. The Radch is millennia removed from acknowledging any distinction in practice other than Radchaai and non-Radchaai.
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They aren't gender-neutral then, they just want to be and are lying to themselves if they believe they've already done it, and they do take steps towards changing that system in the end.
And while a lot has got to change in the Radch, I do hope they keep their system while acknowledging other cultures do things differently and loaning pronouns from other languages to accommodate them.
(4/n, n=4)
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It's interesting to compare with the Alliance from @adapalmer's "Terra Ignota" series here. They also are a nominally gender-neutral society using only one third-person pronoun ("they") and eschewing gendered names and clothes.
But there, it's a thing the society implemented but still chafes against: people do use gendered names and appearances, do gendered sexual play, and can be pushed towards a dominance of male leaders with not much effort.
(3/n)
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And that doesn't feel like propaganda: the Radchaai also pride themselves on their aptitudes-based meritocracy, and it's made very clear that they're lying to themselves in this case and the system isn't just based on merit at all. But gender doesn't play a role as status, diction, and ethnicity do.
As a person who doesn't really get gender, I do like that.
(I also like tea a lot. Those are the Radchaai redeeming qualities!)
(2/n)
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Still thinking about pronouns and gender in the Imperial Radch books, thanks @ergative for the really stimulating essay and discussion!
What I enjoy about the Radch is that while they're being imperialist and dismissive in ignoring other cultures' genders and pronouns, they do seem to be genuinely gender-neutral themselves. They don't behave like people "not seeing race", who are still racist; they really don't seem to care among themselves.
(1/n)
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I remember discussions about the "she" when "Ancillary Justice" came out; people going "I imagine them all as female" and others trying hard to puzzle out the "real" gender of Radchaai characters from clues I suspect aren't really there. There sure seemed to be a wish to know these things that's being subverted here.
For me, an agender person, they were just people, I didn't imagine them as any gender, just with some distinctive characteristics as described.
(5/n, n=5)
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The Radchaai standard "she" pronoun and "not seeing/doing gender" reception is also a really interesting point of the essay. I agree that ignoring other pronouns if they turn up in conversation is a standard dismissive move, "those primitives with their pesky speech". Other than that, it does genuinely feel like a cultural quirk they just happen to have: everyone does gender differently, they've seemed to have noped out, and it really seems to make no difference to them.
(4/n)
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Maybe these characters don't struggle with their gender identity, but they struggle with their identity, period, and how they want to be addressed is a part of that from the beginning. So I'd argue that a core trans issue, self-determination of identity, is at the heart of these books from the beginning as a central theme.
(That doesn't make them "about" trans issues, mind, it just resonates a lot with them.)
(3/n)
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And for some of these characters, that question of identity is tied up with the pronouns they choose to use. Breq isn't all that comfortable with the generic Radchaai "she" - ships, after all, are "it", and Breq still identifies as such, although it's technically no longer true, and the arising conflicts drive much of "Ancillary Mercy".
Even more so, Qven's assertion to use "e" instead of the generic translator "they", is a huge point and speech in "Translation State".
(2/n)
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This great essay* by @ergative is making me think about gender, pronouns, and other themes in @ann_leckie's Imperial Radch novels.
I agree that they aren't /about/ gender per se, but that identity is a big theme in both the trilogy and in "Translation State", and these two aren't disconnected. Breq struggles with losing most of what made up "Justice of Toren". All three main characters in "Translation State" are trying to find out who they are.
(1/n)
*http://www.nerds-feather.com/2023/09/lindsay-leckie-and-leguin-century-of.html
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My hold on Ann Leckie's Translation State audiobook came in from the library this morning. I've really been looking forward to this one.
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Having now finished the first three books of the #ImperialRadch series, I have to say that I really enjoyed it. Really awesome premise, cool universe, and amazing narration. Definitely recommend it for fans of #scifi . With that said, the end of Ancillary Mercy felt a little anti-climactic. It feels like it's building up to a particular kind of ending, and then it shifts to something else entirely - though it is something that was hinted at earlier in the book.
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I #AmReading Ancillary Mercy by Ann Leckie, book 3 of the #ImperialRadch series.
For a moment, things seem to be under control for the soldier known as Breq. Then a search of Atheok Station's slums turns up someone who shouldn't exist--someone who might be an ancillary from a ship that's been hiding beyond the empire's reach for three thousand years.
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/2427fa3c-1260-47b1-aeba-bf17a565e20e
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I #AmReading Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie, book 2 of the #ImperialRadch series.
Breq is a soldier who used to be a warship. Once a weapon of conquest controlling thousands of minds, now she has only a single body and serves the emperor.With a new ship and a troublesome crew, Breq is ordered to go to the only place in the galaxy she would agree to go: Athoek Station, where she's to protect the family of a lieutenant she once knew--a lieutenant she murdered in cold blood.
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/d40f48b6-caf1-47a0-8e41-71fcdb80e559 -
Two-year-old K2 insists on playing a board game labeled suitable for kids "five years and older" and I think something like the result was the inspiration for the game Translator Zeiat and Sphene play in @ann_leckie's "Ancillary Mercy"...
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Saw a poster about an exhibition about gloves from
the German Leather Museum......and thought "wow, Radchaai cultural exchange!" immediately.
😅