Ori Dona

Prof. Mathew Gold

Eng 2400-D552

Response Of District 9

District 9 had a very strong human and alien relationship theme. This movie takes place in Johannesburg South Africa which has a very long history of apartheid. Wikus van de Merwe is displayed as a weak man with a careless attitude toward the prawns. He is displayed as a caring man when it comes to his wife only. However later on after his fate changes and he begins to undergo his physical transformation, he also begins to change his perspective toward the prawns all leading up to the moment where he was willing to sacrifice his life to save father prawn and get them to the ship. This film is not like the traditional alien films because the prawns are not coming to invade, they actually are stuck and are the victims of human cruelty showing a correlation to the racial tensions in South African history. These prawns are clustered together in horrible conditions and are forced to fend for themselves while being isolated from the world. Wikus begins to see the error of his ways after he begins to taste the cruelty of the humans he was a part of. This movie is shown through Wikus’s perspective and shows his mental and physical transformation.in which he displays heroic qualities toward the last couple of scenes showing his ability to change.

After reading the novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep” by Philip K. Dick. I think that sometimes robot/machine are more moral and ethical than human beings. In the story where all the humans dream to have a real animal not just because they loves animal but to show their kindness and wealthiness. Robot sometimes have a cleaner mind than human beings, and for many times human do things for greedy reasons, so i disagree that robot are coldblooded.

“You don’t understand us as well as you think you do.” (Lilith)

“And you don’t understand us at all, you never will really …” (creature)

            This is a great part from the end of Part Two because it just gets down to the truth of the matter.  Lilith is a “fish out of water”.  The Oankali have been studying the humans for hundreds of years by this point and have gained enough knowledge to have the upper hand at this point.  They already have the upper hand with Lilith, as she is a captive.  For Lilith to insinuate that they know nothing about humans after all this time is a direct result of why the creature essentially demeans Lilith and states an even bigger fact that she knows nothing.  She has been out for hundreds of years and has no knowledge to what may or may not be going on, on Earth; let alone the ship that they are on.  The Oankali rules Lilith and have plans for the future.  A future that she may or may not be a part of depending on how she takes to the Oankali and their way of life.  The creature lowers her down a level and puts her in her place as the captive she truly is.

Ori Dona

Science Fiction

Prof. Gold

4-1-14

In Octavia Butlers “Dawn”, there is a deep sense of loss. When Lilith is awoken from her 250 years of sleep, she is oblivious to reality. Humans are almost extinct and they are now under the supervision of the Oankali. Lilith is forced to start over with her life in another time , Jdahya realizes Lilith’s loss and even offers to kill her to end her suffering. Jdahya tell Lilith,

“touch me here now and you will die very quickly and without pain”. This shows that the Oankali are intelligent beings because they understand Lilith’s situation and how she must fell to offer something so drastic as death. Lilith also is isolated from the other humans and is forced to follow the path that the Oankali has set for her. The fact that the Oankali are genetic engineers is frightening because as Jdahya mentions, the Oankali no longer look like their original selves. Rather they have mutated and evolved based on dominant genetic codes that they picked up over their travels. To Lilith it must be a feeling of deep loss because even her captors do not look the way they were intended to, completely alien and grotesque to her.

“She thought there could be nothing more seductive than an ooloi speaking in that particular tone, making that particular suggestion. She realized she had stood up without meaning to and taken a step toward the bed.” … “She did not pretend outwardly or to herself that she would resist Nikanj’s invitation — or that she wanted to resist it.”

So this somewhat creepy passage shows a large shift in Lilith’s attitude toward the Oankali. An suggestion she once thought of as grotesque and deplorable, she now considers seductive. Not to mention, this is sort of rape-ey because Joseph is asleep and drugged. There was a big part of this book missing; at one point Nikanj is sleeping, Lilith by its side, and the next, Lilith is in a big room preparing to Awake humans, after having trained in their “forest” and lived with Oankali for another year. We don’t really know of every interaction or modification she underwent during that year, but this passage is hugely indicative of the attitude shift she has had. To me, she is less human than she thinks. It seems like these alien ideas are becoming addictive, or like a habit she can’t kick and doesn’t want to. And she even knows it’s vulgar! A few paragraphs later, “she tore off her jacket and seized the ugly, ugly elephant’s trunk of an organ, letting it coil around her…” The imagery in that sentence and the meaning behind it is goose-bump inducing. I’m not sure where this is all going but it seems like she has entirely accepted her fate, even though she still thinks to herself that they will learn to live, then escape on Earth. Weird stuff here.

“…This one might have been taught to parent a group himself, but when I showed the other ooloi the match, they agreed that the two of you should be together.”

“You…you chose him for me?”

“I offered you to one another.  The two of you did your own choosing.”

This part of the novel shows just how controlling the ooloi are.  After Lilith and Joseph’s experience through Nikanj, it reveals to her that she didn’t really have a choice with who she mated with.  It was already decided by the ooloi that they were a good match, and they were set up to pick each other.  This causes doubts in Lilith between what is real and what is a neural stimulation from the ooloi.  They know her wants and body better than she does and that takes control out of her hands.

“Sensory arms, we call them in English. They’re more than arms -much more- but the term is convenient.” It focused its attention on Lilith and spoke in Oankali.

“Do you think it would help if he saw a demonstration?”

“I’m afraid he would be repelled.” she said.

“He’s an unusual male. I think he might surprise you.”

“No.”

“You should trust me. I know a great deal about him.”

“No! Leave him to me.”

Reading this passage, made me think a lot about what Nikanj had to say about Joseph that he was hiding from Lilith at the time I read it. I wonder what more to Joseph’s back story there was to it. Perhaps she knew as well but she wanted to forget about what might have happened in the past and try to mold him into a better more suited person than what he was in that community with the others. She did get info on the guy, but how much necessary? The whole point is to gather the best kind of people in order to survive on earth, Not everyone liked Joseph and Lilith when the rest was awakened, that sometimes they got into fights and no one was trusted that easily. Perhaps the unusual part of Joseph is that even though he’s scared of the Oankali at first, he automatically accepts what’s needed to be done, and gets it done quick.

For me, this has been the most interesting book in class so far. I am excited to see how the plot pans out because I can’t even begin to guess at the Oankali’s true motives. There have been a few themes throughout the first 100 pages but I think one that is most prevalent is this idea of imprisonment. We know now that the humans have been captive for a long time while the alien race fixes earth to make it inhabitable again. Once Lilith is Awoken for good, she is given a false sense of freedom. She is made to feel like a part of the family, all the while she is just a pet. After learning (and often guessing) about the Oankali’s intentions she begins to feel like one of earth’s animals who, once endangered, was captivated, breed, modified and otherwise controlled entirely by another species. Their intentions to preserve a species seem good, and given how gently the Oankali treat humans, their intentions seem decent too. But despite this, she is still just a well-treated prisoner and we have yet to see what this “trade” is that they keep referring to. We shall see where this theme leads us. All I know is what I will be doing this summer… finishing this series!

Octavia Butler’s Dawn creates a very interesting future for humans. The alien race of the Okanli people have saved the human race from destruction and are now preparing them to be released one day back on earth. I believe it is very interesting that the humans will be released onto earth with no tools so they can start all over again. It makes you wonder if it was possible for humans to have had been reintroduced to earth before. One question i would have liked Lilith to have asked if the engineering of human genes and re-population of earth had happened before.

In Octavia Butler’s Dawn, it is interesting to see how the character of Lilith jumps back and forth with her perception of the creatures that hold her captive.  Overall she has a complete discomfort with the creature; just the sight alone is too much for her at times.  There is this one moment where she is figuring out whether it is a male or female, and then as soon as she figures that out she says at least she doesn’t have to deal with the discomfort of referring to the creature as “It” and could now call it “Him”.  Another interesting part is when she tries to figure out if one of her old cell mate is still alive.  The creature confirms that her old cell mate is still alive but right after Lilith questions why she should even believe anything the creature says.  This is very interesting because it is one of the truest statements.  Why should any person being held against their will believe a word there captive says?  Throughout their conversation the creature is notoriously shady and only shedding light on the parts of the conversation and history that they choice to reveal.  For Lilith, this is a very hard situation to take in.