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Southern Academic Review 



volume lxvii, number xiii 



spring, 2000 



Southern Academic Review is published every spring 
by students of Birmingham-Southern College. It is funded 
by the Student Government Association and operates 
under the supervision of the Student Publications Board. 
SAR seeks to publish material of scholarly interest to the 
students and faculty of Birmingham-Southern College, 
and the editorial scope encompasses all academic disci- 
plines. Fully annotated research papers and shorter essays 
receive equal consideration for publication. SAR accepts 
submissions from any currently enrolled student or alumnus of 
the College. No submission will be considered if it has been 
previously submitted for academic credit at an institution 
other than Birmingham-Southern. Although most of SAR's 
content consists of student work, submissions from B-SC 
faculty and guest lecturers will also be considered for 
publication. Manuscripts should be sent to: Editor, 
Southern Academic Review, BSC Box 549046, 
Birmingham, Alabama, 35254. 



LIBRARY 

OF 

BIRMINGHAM-SOUTHERN 

COLLEGE 



Copyright 2000 by Southern Academic Review 

and Birmingham-Southern College 
Printed by EBSCO, Birmingham, Alabama 



BIRMINGHAM-SOUTHERN COLLEGE 



5 0553 01173030 3 

Southern Academic Review 

a student journal of scholarship 



volume lxvii, number xiii 
spring, 2000 



Robyn E. Moore, Editor-in-Chief 
Mary Lou Butts, Associate Editor 
Yin Ho, Associate Editor 

Dr. Matthew Levey, Faculty Advisor 



Contents: 



The Invisible Majority: The Role of Black Women in the Civil Rights Movement 

Tracey T. Aldewereld 

3 

Martin Luther's Marriage Theology: Implications for the Role of Women in 

Society 

Brandy Dahlen 
10 

Rubik's Magic Cube: A Demonstration of Group Theory 

Amy Susan Hajari 
18 

The Ecological Age: A Revolution in Judeo-Christian Tradition 

Abhijit Khanna 

23 

Cautionary Tales: Ecocriticism and Science Fiction 

Elizabeth Madrie 

28 

"Hysteria of Production and the Reproduction of the Real," or 
The Changing Face of Commercial Television in Postmodern Society 

Kate McGann 

33 

From Beirut to Jerusalem: The Lebanese Civil War as Middle East Microcosm 

Catherine A. Parker 
36 

Appreciating the Aesthetic of Cheesy Horror 

Rumsey Taylor 
42 



The Invisible Majority: 

The Role of Black Women in the 

Civil Rights Movement 

Tracey T. Aldewereld 

Though African-American women were critical to the success of the Civil Rights Movement, history 
seems to have all but ignored their contributions. To gain clearer insights into the celebrated accomplishments 
of this social movement, this paper looks past the public personalities and into the individual and collective 
motivations and philosophies of its feminine leaders. Evidence suggests that the social location of Black women 
and their intimate ties to one another, their community, and the church were key factors in the grassroots support 
of this movement. The other significant component was related to the non-linear (i. e., organizing from the bottom 
up) way in which the Civil Rights Movement developed. This paper argues that it was Black women from all 
walks of life who were in large part responsible for initiating and sustaining this form of organizing which led to 
the movement 's broad base of acceptance and support. Some possible reasons for why Black women leaders have 
not been given more recognition are also discussed. 



It has been argued that the real power behind 
the Civil Rights Movement was generated by African- 
American women (Allen. 1995; Evans, 1980; Nance, 1996; 
Payne 1993; Robnett, 1996. 1997; West & Blumberg. 
1 990). Yet many scholars allege most writings and analy- 
ses of this momentous event have overlooked or at least 
minimized the salient contributions of these women 
(Allen, 1995; Evans, 1980; Nance. 1996; Payne 1993; 
Robnett, 1996, 1997; West & Blumberg. 1990). Accord- 
ing to some researchers, this phenomenon can in large 
part be attributed to a male domination of the press and 
other institutions involved in recording and studying 
the movement (Allen, 1995; Browning, 1996; Nance, 
1996; West & Blumberg. 1990), meaning they possessed 
the power to define what comprises knowledge or news 
"and what part of it gets transmitted from generation to 
generation" (West & Blumberg, 1990, p. 8). The general 
consensus is that this form of gender bias, whether in- 
tentional or not, is associated with "Euro-centric and 
patricentric notions" (Barnett, 1996, p. 282) of what con- 
stitutes effective leadership and. consequently, which 
events and activities become defined as significant. In 
short, this means it was automatically assumed that men 
as formal leaders performed all the important work of the 
movement (Allen, 1995;Robnett, 1997;West&Blumberg, 
1990), and even though the majority of participants in 
the campaign were women (Allen, 1995, Gyant, 1996; 
Nance, 1996; Payne, 1993;Robnett, 1997), their work was 
seldom recognized. 



Some have suggested that without the passion- 
ate dedication of these valiant "Trail blazers" (Crawford, 
Rouse & Woods, 1993. p. xvii) this historical crusade to 
raise America's consciousness and transform deeply en- 
trenched racist notions and customs could have resulted 
in a less auspicious outcome. Thus, if there is to be a 
clearer understanding of why this particular social move- 
ment was so successful, it seems one must look past the 
public personalities and deeper into the internal work- 
ings and personal motivations of these less known char- 
acters of the Civil Rights Movement. 

This paper will attempt to analyze the ways in 
which women's attitudes and activism contributed in 
significant measure to the growth and triumphant ac- 
complishments of the Civil Rights Movement. Two of 
the main variables that I found to be pertinent and be- 
lieve will offer evidence as to the validity of this concept 
will be (a) the social location of Black women within the 
larger culture and local communities and (b) the theory 
that social movements do not always take place in a 
linear fashion. Next, an example will be offered that dem- 
onstrates how these two factors coalesced to facilitate 
the grassroots nature of the Civil Rights Movement. I 
believe these are the major factors that should be ad- 
dressed if one is to gain a clearer perspective into the 
extraordinary achievements of this struggle for human 
rights. 



Black Women and Social Location 

The social location of women in general, and 
Black women in particular, within the hierarchy of Ameri- 
can culture, appear to have played a significant role in 
their willingness to question the authority of those in 
power whether it was local White officials or Black min- 
isters (Dugger, 1996; Payne, 1993; Robnett, 1996), the de 
facto leaders of the black community (Payne, 1993; 
Standley, 1993). Historically, whether rich or poor, white 
or black, women's social location has placed them within 
a social stratification subordinate to that of men (Blood, 
Turtle &Lakey, 1995;Palen, 1997; Rubin, 1994;Skolnick, 
1991). Women's archetypal place in society had (until 
fairly recently) been delineated to taking care of home 
and hearth. If they worked outside the home, it was 
usually in low-status/low-income positions that garnered 
little recognition or attention. Consequently, women's 
roles and activities were typically devalued, making them 
more or less "invisible" (Palen, 1997, p. 278) within the 
larger culture (Rubin, 1994; Skolnick, 1991). 

It could be hypothesized that this situation 
would have been even more of a reality for African- Ameri- 
can women since they fell into a social strata below that 
of Caucasian women. Theoretically, this suggests that 
women (more specifically Black women) could have met 
and networked without attracting as much attention to 
themselves as might have been the case with men. In- 
deed, it seems Black women were acutely aware of this 
situation and many times became active because they 
believed Black men were, in fact, more endangered by 
racism than were they (Gyant, 1996; Nance, 1996; 
Robnett, 1997; Standley, 1993). 

The Black church had traditionally played a 
pivotal role in most African- Americans' lives and be- 
came increasingly important during the Civil Rights 
Movement, as it was the only place Black people could 
come together (Barnett, 1996; Robnett, 1997; Standley, 
1993). Though prior to and during the civil rights era 
Black women were not allowed to be ministers or hold 
any other official position within the church, studies 
show that they have always been more active and at- 
tended in greater numbers than the men. (Barnett, 1996; 
Gyant, 1996; Nance, 1996; Robnett, 1997; Standley, 1993). 
Women's authority and activities were limited to such 
things as church socials and aid to the needy, and it was 
through these church and other affiliated groups thai 
African- American women worked as a kind of collective 
sisterhood to support one another and enrich the larger 
community (Allen, 1995, Crawford, 1993; Payne, 1993; 
Nance, 1996; Robnett, 1996, 1997; Standley, 1993). To- 
day as then, studies on Black women living in poverty 



suggest that the way they and their families survive and 
thrive is through an intricate, tight-knit social network of 
helping one another with child-rearing, advice, chores, 
and sharing of financial resources (Crawford, 1993; Gyant, 
1996; Nance, 1996; Palen, 1997; Payne, 1993). 

During the civil rights era, these close bonds 
were based in part on an unshakable, shared faith in God 
and the belief that Christianity condemned the philoso- 
phy that served to legitimate racist practices (Grant, 1 993 ; 
Hamlet, 1996; Locke, 1993; Payne, 1993). It was this 
same deep abiding "faith in the Lord that made it easier 
for them [Black women] to have faith in the possibility of 
social change" (Payne, 1993, p. 6). 

Another compelling influence and source of 
inspiration was the positive role-modeling and nurtur- 
ing guidance from older African-American women who 
encouraged younger women to challenge and speak out 
against oppression (Allen, 1996; Gyant, 1996; 
Nance, 1996). Sometimes called "mama[s]" (Allen, 1996, 
p. 91; Nance, 1996, p. 2), these women appear to have 
been gifted with an inherent strength, determination, and 
resiliency of spirit that would not allow them to give up 
(Allen, 1996; Gyant, 1996; Nance; 1996), traits probably 
developed over hundreds of years of learning to survive 
under the most austere and inhumane of environments. 
As quoted in the literature, the mama was, '"militant, 
outspoken, understanding and willing to catch hell, hav- 
ing already caught her share'" (Allen, 1996, p. 9 1 ; Nance, 
1996, p. 2). Nevertheless, the term "mama" also denoted 
unconditional love and support for all those she cared 
about (Allen, 1995; Gyant, 1996; Nance, 1996). Her shared 
feminine ideal of a creating a "beloved community" where 
all would be treated equally is suggested to be one of 
the guiding forces in the formation of the Student Non- 
violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and why so 
many women joined this organization (Allen, 1996; Evans, 
1980). 

Considered to be the brainchild of prominent 
activist Ella Baker (Allen, 1996; Evans, 1980; Mueller, 
1993; Payne, 1993) whose motto was "Tower to the 
People'" (Elliot, 1996 p. 595), SNCC has been described 
as "'the most dynamic and progressive organization in 
the history of the Civil Rights Movement because Black 
women were such an integral part'" (Allen, 1996, p. 81). 
Unlike the patriarchal structures of the National Asso- 
ciation for Colored People (NAACP) and the Southern 
Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), both of which 
thwarted attempts by Baker and other women to assume 
formal leadership positions (Allen, 1996; Elliot, 1996; 
Mueller, 1993; Payne, 1993; Robnett, 1997; Standley, 
1993), SNCC embraced the feminine concept of group- 



centered guidance and encouraged women to become 
formal leaders (Elliot, 1980; Evans, 1980;Robnett, 1997). 
Indeed, within SNCC, women's unique talents for orga- 
nizing and rallying were recognized and perceived as 
critical to furthering the civil rights cause. 

Though contemporary women find juggling the 
roles of wife, mother, and employee more than a little 
stressful, African-American women (as well as other 
women from poor and working class families) for the 
most part have always performed these multiple duties 
(Dill. 1995;Dugger, 1996; Rubin, 1994;Skolnick, 1991). 
Few had the luxury of agonizing whether it might be 
detrimental to their children if they worked outside the 
home. Prejudice and discrimination often functioned to 
ensure high rates of unemployment among Black men or 
restrict them to menial, low-paying jobs, making a two- 
income household necessary for the Black family to sur- 
vive (Dugger, 1996). Nevertheless Black women in the 
Civil Rights Movement managed to deal with the day- 
to-day responsibilities associated with having a family, 
home, and job while organizing and attending meetings, 
boycotting, living with threats on their own and their 
families' lives, as well as canvassing for new supporters. 

In contrast, the traditional stereotype of white 
women portrayed them as "too frail and delicate to un- 
dertake physical labor, [while] Black women were viewed 
as beasts of burden and subjected to the same demean- 
ing labor and hardships as Black men" (Dugger, 1994, 
p. 34). Angela Davis is credited with noting, "Slavery 
constructed for Black women an alternative definition of 
womanhood, one that included a tradition of "hard work, 
perseverance and self-reliance, a legacy of tenacity, re- 
sistance and an insistence on sexual equality'" (Dugger, 
1994, p. 34). 

Important to note is that there was no structure 
of hierarchy within this culture of strong women; no 
one's job or contribution was viewed as more important 
than another; the essential work ethic all operated under 
was to do whatever was necessary to get the job done 
(Crawford, 1993; Elliot, 1996; Gyant. 1996; Gyant & 
Atwater, 1996; Nance, 1996;Robnett, 1996, 1997). Asa 
result, these intimate social ties among women, young 
and old, expanded their opportunities and made them 
the perfect candidates for the crucial intermediate layer 
of leadership that fueled the movement. Because women 
typically define such "activities as an extension of their 
nurturing and caring in the home" (West & Blumberg, 
1990, p. 9), it was this kind of spirit of cooperation and 
organization that Black women brought to the Civil Rights 
Movement. 

Another theory suggests that the success of 



the Civil Rights Movement was due in large part to a 
universality of experience and, therefore, a unanimity of 
agreement among all African-Americans on how to end 
the oppressive conditions under which they were forced 
to live (Robnett, 1996; 1997). However, this does not 
always appear to have been the case (Robnett. 1996; 
1997). Racist conditions and practices in some parts of 
the country were more oppressive than others. Gener- 
ally, an individual (white or black) possessing an educa- 
tion and money found life somewhat easier than one 
having no resources upon which to draw. Consequently, 
one might speculate that more affluent Blacks may have 
been less enthusiastic about rocking the boat than their 
impoverished brothers and sisters. Nevertheless, some 
of the poorest and most oppressed African- Americans, 
living in rural communities, who might be surmised to 
have a greater motivation for taking a stand to end rac- 
ism, were frequently suspicious of and feared being as- 
sociated with civil rights workers (Allen, 1996; Robnett, 
1996). Even church leaders, who have traditionally been 
credited with the mobilizing of local citizens to join the 
movement, often refused to have anything to do with 
the civil rights workers or become involved in any way 
(Allen, 1996; Payne, 1993; Robnett, 1996). 

Of course, such reticence is understandable in 
light of white propaganda of the time declaring civil rights 
workers to be communists or, at the very least, outsiders 
bent on stirring up trouble (Robnett, 1996). There was 
also the very real threat that persons caught associating 
with the workers could lose every thing they held dear 
including their lives (Robnett, 1996). However, when the 
religious leaders of a community refused or were reluc- 
tant to get involved, women were not so hesitant. Many 
times it was the case that women either pressured the 
local deacons and ministers to allow them to use the 
churches for meetings, or they would have them at their 
homes, fully cognizant of the risks and dangers involved 
(Allen, 1996; Payne, 1993; Robnett, 1996). Additionally, 
though barely able to take care of their families on their 
meager resources. Black women would often take the 
workers in, allowing them to live in their homes and 
warmly treating them like members of the family (Gyant, 
1996). 

Consequently, there appears to be at least some 
merit in the argument that the efficacy with which the 
message of the Civil Rights Movement spread was to a 
significant degree due to the vigorous and faithful net- 
working among these amazing women as well as their 
unerring willingness to support, nurture, and come to 
the aid of one another (Allen, 1996; Barnett, 1996; 
Crawford, Rouse & Woods, 1993; Gyant, 19961; Nance, 



1996; Payne, 1993;Robnett. 1996, 1997). Furthermore, 
these traits, combined with the Black woman's amazing 
history of courage and survival, her location within the 
local and larger culture, her spiritual fortitude and par- 
ticipation in church and community affairs, made her the 
natural candidate to become what Robnett terms a "bridge 
leader" (1996, p. 1664). 

Organizing From the Bottom Up 

Robnett maintains that the most effective so- 
cial movements do not always form in a linear fashion, 
that is, where an impassioned leader organizes and strives 
to recruit individuals to a particular cause (1996, 1997). 
Many times it is the case that an idea forms, catches on, 
and spreads through informal means (Robnett, 1996; 
1997). This is what appears to have taken place with 
regard to the Civil Rights Movement. Word of a boycott 
here, a sit-in there, along with individual acts of resis- 
tance began to circulate, infusing other individuals with 
courage and motivating them to take a stand. Since 
women were so deeply invested in their communities, it 
should not be surprising that they were among the first 
the join the movement and begin organizing (Payne, 
1993). It probably would not be overstating things to 
suggest that the majority of these stories and support 
for such events were communicated via women's church 
and community groups. Payne suggests that the social 
bonds between women's networks were so enmeshed 
that if one person joined, many more were likely to fol- 
low (1993). Lending credence to this concept, Robnett 
states that "It was not the case that the potential formal 
leaders of the movement mobilized the masses. Rather, 
bridge leaders acted to mobilize the potential formal lead- 
ers" (1996, p. 1678). Later, after the movement began to 
get organized, some of these same women who were 
responsible for facilitating and sustaining the micro- 
mobilization of the movement (Payne, 1993; Robnett 1996, 
1997) would become what Robnett labeled bridge lead- 
ers ( 1 996, 1 997 ). Robnett suggests that the bridge lead- 
ers (most of them women) sought to "[establish] a sense 
of group identity, collective consciousness, and solidar- 
ity between rural and small town communities and the 
movement, and they did so by bridging the gap between 
the message of the formal movement organization and 
the day-to-day realities of the potential constituents" 
(1996, pp. 1682-1683). 

The idea that women would be experts in the 
art of social bridge-building should not be surprising. 
Throughout history, this was the role for which women 
have been enculturated, to act as the go-between or 
mediator between family and the community at large. 



Put another way, women have always been responsible 
for "maintaining family cohesion while successfully ne- 
gotiating its connections to the larger society" (Palen, 
1997, p. 276). Bridge leaders performed the same essen- 
tial functions but on a larger scale. In a similar fashion, 
the African-American woman sought to integrate her 
community into the movement by teaching its principles 
and goals in terms that could be absorbed, as well as 
how these precepts related to individuals' values and 
beliefs (Crawford, 1993; Crawford, Rouse & Woods, 1993; 
Gyant, 1996; Robnett. 1996,1997). Her innate gifts in the 
art of diplomacy enabled the Black woman to impart her 
message in a way that inspired trust and loyalty because 
her ideas of leadership were based on a philosophy of 
nurturing empowerment or a '"lift as we climb'" (Adler. 
1996, p. 28) ideal, as opposed to rigidly wielding power 
over others (Crawford, Rouse & Woods, 1993; Gyant, 
1996; McFadden, 1993; Nance, 1996; Robnett, 1996, 
1997). 

Since these women were so invested in their 
communities, they were perceived as less likely to capi- 
talize on the movement for personal aggrandizement or 
gain (Payne, 1993). In fact, the literature indicates that 
most of the women active in the movement visualized 
the movement spreading and facilitating the emancipa- 
tion and uplifting of all poor and exploited peoples no 
matter what their ethnicity (Elliot, 1996; Hamlet, 1996; 
Gyant & Atwater, 1996). They were not interested in 
obtaining fame or recognition; they supported one an- 
other and held powerful internal convictions as to the 
value of their work (Gyant. 1996; Nance, 1996; Robnett, 
1996). 

The inspirational and rhetorical wisdom of 
Fannie Lou Hamer seems to best sum the motivations 
and philosophy of many of the women of the Civil Rights 
Movement. Hamer, arguably one of the most admirable 
figures associated with this cause, stood on the premise 
that all of humanity is divinely connected and that our 
fates are inextricably interwoven (Grant, 1993; Hamlet, 
1996). This adult child of a Mississippi sharecropper, 
the youngest of twenty children (Grant, 1993; Hamlet, 
1996) warned, "'A house divided against itself cannot 
stand'" (Hamlet, 1996 p. 567) and went on to prophesy, 
"We shall either live together as human beings or we will 
die together as fools" (Grant. 1993. p. 43). Harrier's inher- 
ent pragmatism allowed her to perceive and describe 
things as they truly were, including the ability to see 
over the "racial wall" (Grant, 1993, p. 43). In doing so, 
Hamer observed that the poor and downtrodden, no 
matter what their race, shared many "commonalities" and 
rather than focusing on shades of skin color, people 



should join together to resist the economic and social 
tyranny that threatened to crush the individual and col- 
lective spirit of them all (Grant, 1993, pp. 43-44). 

Thus, it seems appropriate to describe women's 
vision of leading as more holistic than hierarchal. In 
fact, eminent female activists like Hamer, Septima Clark, 
Ella Baker and others warned against becoming depen- 
dant upon any particular leader (Gyant & Atwater; 1 996; 
Hamlet, 1996;McFadden, 1993; Mueller, 1993). They 
strove to convince followers that "they [should not] 
look for salvation anywhere but themselves" (Mueller, 
1993, p. 58), and they taught people how to develop 
local leaderships tailored to serve their particular needs 
(Mueller, 1993). It was upon this firm foundation that the 
Civil Rights Movement was constructed, and it is from 
this perspective that one is better able to appreciate the 
efficacy of the organizing from the bottom up concept. 

The Combined Effects of Social Location and Non-Lin- 
ear Organization 

A prime example of how women functioned to 
initiate and sustain the movement can be observed in 
studying the circumstances surrounding the Montgom- 
ery bus boycott. Rosa Parks's refusal to give up her seat 
to a white man has, in the past, been portrayed as a 
spontaneous act in that on that particular day she was 
just too tired to give up her seat. Furthermore, credit for 
the success of the boycott has frequently been attrib- 
uted to Martin Luther King and local church leaders. 
Both of these assertions tell only part of the story. 

Ms. Parks, characterized as the '"patron saint" 
of the Montgomery bus boycott" (Burks, 1993, p. 73), 
had experienced prior abuse at the hands of bus drivers, 
as well as witnessing and hearing about acts of cruelty 
and injustice against other Black passengers (Allen, 1 995; 
Gyant, 1996). Incidents such as a young man's being 
shot in the back by police for talking back to a bus driver 
and a woman's being arrested for defending herself when 
the bus driver started beating her were all too common 
(Allen, 1995). Parks, who for twelve years was youth 
advisor for the Montgomery NAACP and had spent part 
of the previous summer at the Highlander Folk School 
receiving instruction in "Interracial Training For Lead- 
ers of Non-Violent Resistance" (Allen; 1995, p. 58), had 
apparently been waiting for this moment (Allen, 1995; 
Elliot, 1996). Referring to the incident. Parks is quoted as 
saying she had '"a life history of being rebellious against 
being mistreated because of [her] skin color,'" (Allen, 
1995, p. 58) and essentially was fed up with the system 
that condoned such acts of inhumanity. 

Jo Ann Robinson, labeled the "Joan of Arc" of 



the Montgomery bus boycott (Burks, 1993, p. 76) along 
with the socially active group, Women's Political Coun- 
cil of Montgomery ( WPC), had also been waiting forjust 
the right event to take action (Allen, 1996; Burks; 1993; 
Robnett, 1996, 1997). Robinson was a professor at Ala- 
bama State University and chair of the WPC which had a 
membership of 300 women educators, social workers, 
nurses, etc. (Allen, 1995; Burks, 1993; Robnett, 1996, 
1997). For years, this group had been challenging Jim 
Crow laws and practices in Montgomery, as well as run- 
ning literacy schools that would enable Blacks to pass 
voter registration tests (Burks, 1993). When Robinson 
found out about the Parks incident, she and two stu- 
dents stayed up all night mimeographing 52,500 notices 
of a city-wide bus strike by Blacks to begin the following 
Monday (Allen, 1995; Robnett, 1996). When Black min- 
isters entered their churches Sunday morning and real- 
ized their congregants were already committed to the 
boycott, '"the ministers decided that it was time for them, 
the leaders, to catch up with the masses...'" (Nance, 
1996. p. 4) as the people had decided to take part with or 
without their support (Standley, 1993). 

Nevertheless, members of the WPC and other 
women involved in the movement understood that be- 
cause of their gender they could not wield the same 
power and status over the Black community that men 
could, especially the preachers (Robnett, 1997; Standley, 
1 993), who "virtually monopolized" the Black political 
structure (Standley, 1993, p. 184). To insure the long- 
term success of the boycott, the women realized they 
needed the full endorsement and formal leadership of 
the ministers (Robnett, 1997; Standley, 1993). 

In essence, the women of the WPC in conjunc- 
tion with other Montgomery women's groups created 
the grassroots movement and selected their formal lead- 
ers, rather than the other way around (Robnett, 1996; 
Standley, 1 993). Hence, it may be said that Black women 
were indeed the "trailblazers [one who is] a pioneer in a 
field of endeavor" while men functioned as the "torch- 
bearers ... one who follows the trailblazer, imparting 
tested knowledge or truth provided originally by the 
pioneer in its rudimentary form" (Burks, 1993, p. 71). The 
transcendent feature here would seem to be that it took 
both the trailblazers and torchbearers to bring the bus 
boycott to its successful conclusion. In Montgomery 
as in the rest of the South, the achievements of each 
were dependent upon the efficacy with which the other 
performed his or her appointed tasks. 

Conclusion 

There appears to be valid reasoning behind the 



idea that Black women leaders played a crucial part in 
achieving the advances gained by the Civil Rights Move- 
ment. The success of the movement has been attributed 
to the broad base of support it was able to garner. If one 
accepts this, then it may be concluded that due to their 
history, culture, and social location. Black women were 
the silent majority and strength behind the widespread 
grassroots support for which the Civil Rights Move- 
ment has become known. 

Discussion 

The purpose of this paper has not been to de- 
tract from the many shining accomplishments of male 
leaders and participants of the Civil Rights Movement; 
rather, it has been to explain the critical roles African- 
American women played and why their contributions 
have not been given more prominence. This seems nec- 
essary for at least two reasons: (a) to gain a more accu- 
rate and complete picture for understanding how micro- 
mobilization for a particular cause is transformed into 
macro-mobilization in initiating social change, and (b) to 
better understand the subjective nature of leadership by 
attempting to identify possible cultural or gender biases 
regarding what traits and actions can be identified as the 
critical components of effective leadership. 

When examined from this perspective, it would 
appear that there were four main factors that functioned 
to minimize recognition of Black women's achievements 
during the Civil Rights Movement. First and foremost, 
the idea that women could be strong leaders was too 
abstract a concept to be given serious consideration by 
men, white or black, prior to and during the 50's and 60's. 
There are numerous documented incidents of Black 
women being looked down upon and treated as inferior 
by the Black male leadership of the movement (Allen, 
1995; Elliot, 1996; Gyant & Atwater, 1996; McFadden, 
1993; Mueller, 1993; Nance, 1996;Robnett, 1996, 1997; 
Standley, 1993). As noted by Elliot, "the most 'glaring' 
and 'detrimental' failure of King and Malcolm X was the 
failure to critique sexism within and without the move- 
ment" (1996, p. 597). It was also suggested that male 
leaders' insensitivity to this issue contributed to the 
formation of the Women's Liberation Movement (Elliot, 
1996; Evans, 1980). 

Second, the impact of Black women's activities 
was seldom acknowledged because, as noted earlier, 
women's work in capitalist cultures has always been 
marginalized, making women and their avocations more 
or less invisible within society. Third, the egalitarian 
nature of group-centered guidance, where all jobs and 
persons are regarded as critical to the cause, also placed 



women at odds with traditional, masculine, hierarchal 
notions of leadership. Finally, as a result of these cir- 
cumstances and the androcentric bias (white and black) 
of the institutions responsible for deciding who and 
which activities and events were of historical signifi- 
cance, women's activities were simply overlooked or taken 
for granted. 

As Nance asserts, "traditional domination-ori- 
ented histories simply do not recognize the [collective 
or group centered] sort of leadership" (1996 p. 545) that 
is characteristic of women's activism. West and Blumberg 
write: 

Within a patriarchal context, men are assumed 
to be leaders and organizers in the public sphere, 
while women who enter it are viewed as their 
supporters. Furthermore, sexist language that 
uses generic terms such as "he, him, men, chair- 
men," and so forth continues to reinforce the 
impression that men, not women, are the politi- 
cal activists. Thus language, along with other 
patriarchal institutions, shapes as well as re- 
flects reality about women and social protest 
(1990, p. 7). 

Nevertheless, as Robnett observed, the very 
fact that so many capable women were prevented from 
becoming formal leaders and limited to the intermediate 
layer of activism actually functioned to "create a remark- 
ably capable tier of leadership that strengthened the 
mobilization of and recruitment to the movement" 
(Robnett, 1996, p. 1677), thus contributing immeasur- 
ably to the success of one of the most momentous events 
in American history. 

There is, however, an acute irony to be found 
in the fact that Black men, in particular, perceived women 
to be inferior in much the same way whites had tradition- 
ally viewed African-Americans. Again, this issue is 
brought to the fore, not to diminish the efforts of the 
male participants in the Civil Rights Movement, but to 
cast light on how various prejudices and discriminatory 
practices can be so insidious and pervasive that they 
can operate within groups with even the purist of mo- 
tives. 



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(pp. 3-40). New York: Oxford University Press. 



Martin Luther's Marriage Theology: 
Implications for the 
Role of Women in Society 

Brandy Dahlen 

Martin Luther's theological doctrines clearly had widespread influence in Western civilization. Yet 
what was this influence on society and particularly marriage? Although Luther's writings and biblical interpre- 
tations praised women for their roles in the family and society, they indirectly served to restrict women and 
contributed to an overall domestication of women due to the focus of the importance Luther places on the role of 
women. 



In Reformation studies, there has been great 
controversy as to the effect of Martin Luther's marriage 
theology on the social situation of women. Celebrated 
and well-written historians such as Steven Ozment, Rob- 
ert Bainton, and William Lazareth argue that, on the 
whole, Luther's writings worked to promote respect and 
value for women and brought more equality and mutual 
commitment into the marriages (Ozment, When Fathers 
54; Lazareth, Luther, 225; Bainton, In Germany and Italy 
10). Others, such as Lyndal Roper, John Hale, and Susan 
Johnson, argue instead that while Luther's doctrine did 
in fact have rhetoric seeming to elevate women, in reality 
it had the effect of encouraging the dependency and 
domestication of women into a subordinate role (Roper 
2-3; Hale 205; Johnson 276). Yet, as pointed out by Hale, 
Johnson, and Joan Mitchanis, actual practices in Refor- 
mation marriage and gender relations show much more 
continuity with the tradition of the Middle Ages rather 
than exemplifying a significant change due to Luther's 
theological revolution (Hale 270; Johnson 285; Mitchanis 
10). This articularizes that, while circumstances may not 
have been drastically affected in the short term by 
Luther's work, in the long term Martin Luther's marriage 
theology did imply a more restricted social situation for 
women, despite seemingly improved views on the fe- 
male sex. 

What was the traditional view of marriage when 
Luther first began to develop his theology in the six- 
teenth century? In the Middle Ages there was a sense 
of appreciation but also skepticism about women, as 
illustrated in the statement of a contemporary writer, 
"woman is a stinking rose, a pleasing wound, [ . . . ] a pleas- 
ant punishment [...]" (qtd. in Hillerbrand 194). On 



the whole, throughout the Middle Ages, negative views 
of marriage and family were well-established in secular 
and church thought and grounded in Biblical stories 
such as that of Eve, Samson, and David (Johnson 280; 
Ozment, Protestants 152); furthermore, feminine quali- 
ties and marriage were attacked in literature and canon 
laws (Johnson 280; Ozment, When Fathers 11). To the 
medieval mind, the sexual act transmitted sin, and the 
prevailing biological notion that women had stronger 
sex drives logically led to the implication that women 
were more promiscuous and thus sinful (Hillerbrand 194; 
Marshall 13). Therefore, childbearing was seen as an 
unclean act in its reproduction of sin, and the situation 
of permanent chastity in cloisters was idealized and re- 
vered (Hillerbrand 198). Females were thus thought of 
as divided in composition: physical aspects, which were 
denounced, and spiritual and intellectual aspects. By 
focusing on wifehood or motherhood, a woman was thus 
concentrating on her sinful side, an antithesis to her 
intended destiny (Hillerbrand 194). Problems arose in 
the contradiction inherent in such thought between the 
need for procreation and the context of a sexual relation- 
ship deemed sinful even in marriage, further threatening 
this institution and only furthering the misogynistic 
trends of the time (Mitchanis 28). 

Yet, by the eve of the Reformation, women were 
experiencing wider opportunities and were being de- 
fended as well. With the spread of humanism, educa- 
tional opportunities and social freedoms were being in- 
creasingly opened to noblewomen (Ozment, When Fa- 
thers 14). Also, the actual situation was not truly as 
disrespectful and subordinate for women as previously 
thought (Ozment, Protestants 213). Defense for the fe- 



male sex had arisen from Church fathers. Catholic re- 
formers, and humanists. Augustine even defended mar- 
riage as sacred in his writings (Mitchanis 30). Certain 
Catholic reformers as Albrecht and von Eyb praised 
marriage and rejected the idea that women were inferior, 
advocating the idea that women were a gift rather than a 
temptress (Johnson 277). Such descriptions illustrated 
the conflict between seeing a woman in only one of two 
roles. She could either be the holy, the virgin Mary- 
figure, or the evil, sinful Eve-figure. Such stereotypes 
would easily lead to the situation of high respect for 
those women who choose the life of the cloister. Fur- 
thermore, humanists pushed marriage as God-ordained 
and basic to civilization (Marshall 13). Thus, although 
marriage did not receive the highest popular support, it 
was not truly regarded in the worst manner and was, in 
fact, being defended by some. 

It was out of this community of thought that 
Luther began to interpret gender biblically and to formu- 
late his own doctrine concerning marriage. Luther's 
theological doctrines, including that of marriage, came 
of out his interpretations of particular scriptural pas- 
sages. In his conceptualization of gender roles, Luther 
uses the Genesis account of Eve and sin, as well as 
certain passages from Galatians and Corinthians, among 
others. First of all, Luther interprets such verses as Gen- 
esis 2: 1 8, 2:23-4, and 3:20 to support a belief that women 
were created with a specific purpose (Luther's Works: 
Genesis 15). These verses state, "The Lord God said, 'It 
is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper 
suitable for him'" (Genesis 2: 18); "The man said, 'This is 
bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be 
called 'woman,' for she was taken out of man. For this 
reason a man will leave his father and mother and be 
united to his wife, and they will become one flesh'" (Gen- 
esis 2:23-4); and "Adam named his wife Eve, because 
she would become the mother of all the living" (Genesis 
3:20). This role includes serving as a "mundane dwell- 
ing place to her husband" (Luther's Works: Genesis 136). 
Luther's high esteem for women comes from their func- 
tions as wives and mothers (Mitchanis 70). She should 
not only marry and serve as a helpmeet, but also in the 
"increasing] of the human race" (Luther's Works: Gen- 
esis 115; Mitchanis 70). Claiming that "the entire female 
body was created for the purpose of nurturing children" 
(Luther's Works: Genesis 202), Luther locks the female 
sex into a divinely destined position of domestication 
and procreation. 

Yet his biblical discussions are at the same time 
highly respectful for women, as compared to contempo- 
rary thought. While a prevailing notion at the time is 



that of Aristotle, who claimed women were merely 
"maimed men," or simply an imperfect man, public opin- 
ion of women was not too high (Luther's Works: Genesis 
70; Mitchanis 67). Luther, rather, works to counter such 
depictions, although still not liberating females from sub- 
ordination to men, a contradiction that rests on his inter- 
pretations of the fall of man. He says, "there are men 
who think it clever to find fault with the opposite sex and 
to have nothing to do with marriage [. . .] let us, therefore, 
obey the word of God and recognize our wives as a 
building of God [...] a nest and dwelling place [...]" 
(Luther's Works: Genesis 134). In the same statement, he 
elevates women, but also reduces them by placing their 
importance in their relation to the man's life. 

Another contradiction lies in his description of 
how Eve was chosen to be Adam's wife. In the discus- 
sion of Genesis 2:22, "then the Lord God made a woman 
out from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he 
brought her to the man," Luther describes Eve as a God- 
given gift to Adam, more equal in a sense (Luther 's Works: 
Genesis 134). Yet, in the discussion of 2:23, which states, 
"the man said, 'This is the bone of my bones and the 
flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 'woman' because 
she was taken out of man.'" Adam chooses her in the 
same sense in which he chose the other animals, estab- 
lishing a clear hierarchy (Luther's Works: Genesis 136). 
Furthermore, while Luther criticizes the church's empha- 
sis on celibacy as the cause of misogyny, he claims that 
men should instead praise the fact that God "preserved" 
women, for both "procreation and also as a medicine 
against the sin of fornication" (Luther's Works: Genesis 
118), in other words, because of their utility to men. 
Advocating honor and respect for women. Luther claims 
that doing otherwise contradicts God's natural law 
(Mitchanis 71). So, at the same time as he is calling for a 
increased respect and elevation of women, he is pre- 
senting them as useful for man's purposes, not neces- 
sarily valuable in their own right. 

Luther also uses the Genesis account to define 
differences between the sexes that will lead to implica- 
tions in his marriage theology. He used such differences 
to validate the subordination of women to men, as well 
as to celebrate women (Mitchanis 66). Luther points out 
that in Genesis 1 :27, there is a distinction between male 
and female evident in the wording (Luther's Works: Gen- 
esis 68). "So God created man in his own image, in the 
image of God he created him; male and female he created 
them" (Genesis 1 :27). He uses the presence of this sepa- 
ration to claim that Eve, despite many similarities with 
Adam and including the fact that she is also created in 
the image of God, "she was nevertheless a woman... the 



woman, although she was a most beautiful work of God, 
nevertheless was not the equal of man in glory and pres- 
tige" (Luther's Works: Genesis 69). In contradiction to 
this idea that there is an inherent inferiority of women, 
Luther later claims, "if the woman had not been deceived 
by the serpent and had not sinned, she would have been 
the equal of Adam in all respects" as "she was in no 
respect inferior to Adam" (Luther's Works: Genesis 115), 
thus blaming the distinction on sin, rather than on cre- 
ation as he expressed earlier. And again, later, Luther 
states that besides differences in sex, "the woman is 
altogether a man" (Genesis 137). Yet, returning to the 
idea of original subordination, in discussing Genesis 3:20, 
"Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become 
the mother of all living," Luther points out that Eve was 
given her name by Adam, as he had done to the other 
animals. Taken as a whole, Luther demonstrates an infe- 
riority of women whether from the beginning or only 
after sin. 

Another important commentary in understand- 
ing Luther's views of gender differences is his discus- 
sion of Galatians 3:28. This verse states, "There is nei- 
ther Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is 
neither male nor female" (Galatians 3:53). In explaining 
this seeming lack of distinctions, Luther defines the pas- 
sage as God's view only with regards to determining 
salvation. There are no distinctions to God in determin- 
ing who can be saved, yet to the world these distinc- 
tions are very present and even necessary (Luther's 
Works: Galatians 356; 355). Such differences, accord- 
ing to Luther, are needed in earthly situations to main- 
tain social order (Luther's Works: Galatians 356). To 
explain this thought Luther claims. 

Whatever a male does as a male, getting mar- 
ried, administering his household well, obey- 
ing the magistrate, maintaining honest and de- 
cent relations with others; or if a lady lives 
chastely, obeys her husband, takes good care 
of the house, and teaches her children well- 
these truly magnificent and outstanding gifts 
and works do not avail anything towards righ 
teousness in the sight of God (Luther's Works: 
Galatians 355). 
Such a statement illustrates both Luther's emphasis on 
justification by faith alone and his conceptions of sepa- 
rate spheres for each sex. Thus, although the verse 
seems to indicate a removal of gender distinctions, Luther 
places this removal in the area of spiritual relationships 
and is thus able to maintain the importance of female 
subordination in worldly affairs. 

Luther's ideas, then, work both to contradict 



traditional views and to support those views. He advo- 
cates a high respect for women in the fulfillment of their 
God-given role to reproduce. He emphasizes this re- 
spect as a reaction to the threat of the Middle Ages 
tradition of misogyny, but, at the same time, he elevates 
the more physical nature of the woman through the roles 
he assigns her. Still, both viewpoints subordinate women 
to men, with Luther providing a firm biblical grounding 
for such a position. 

For women, the most positive aspect of Luther's 
marriage theology, which arose from his biblical inter- 
pretation, is his inclusion of love in the marital relation- 
ship. Clearly, Luther includes the concept of love as 
valuable in the marriage relationship. He claims, "there 
is no bond on earth so sweet nor any separation so 
bitter as that which occurs in a good marriage" (qtd. in 
Ozment, Protestants 160). Such statements emphasize 
the bond between husband and wife, signified in the 
marriage ceremony by the ring being placed on the fourth 
finger of the left hand because the vein in this hand 
supposably led directly to the heart (Roper 133). Yet, 
Luther's emphasis was perhaps not as revolutionary as 
it first might seem. Even prior to the Reformation, there 
seems to have been a growing emphasis on love and 
trust in marital relationships, a glorified ideal of marriage 
(Hale 270). Also, although Luther's message is positive 
overall, the words sometimes seem negative for women. 
For example, although he alludes to an deep-rooted life- 
long relationship (Lazareth, Luther 199) in which there is 
love as a necessity for happiness in a marriage (Lazareth, 
Luther 226 ). Luther still makes the statement, "It's easy 
enough to get a wife, but to love her with constancy is 
difficult" (qtd. in Althaus 94). Luther points out that 
marriages cannot rest solely on sexual attraction; "ap- 
proach marriage earnestly and ask God to give you a 
good pious girl, with whom you can spend your life in 
mutual love. For sex [alone] establishes nothing in this 
regard [...]" (qtd. in Protestants 162). 

In discussing marriage. Luther moves from a 
concentration on the scriptural passage, "Be fruitful and 
multiply," (Genesis 1 :28) to "God saw it was not good for 
man to be alone" (Genesis 2:18). Yet, the love he dis- 
cusses is not romantic love in a modern sense, but more 
of a service to the other person (Lazareth, Luther 230). 
This form of love is important as an obedience to God 
and is, in effect, a re-enactment of Christ's works (Lenski 
1 20; Lazareth, Luther 231). He suggests, "love begins 
when we wish to serve others" (qtd. in Ozment, "Re- 
inventing" 24). Luther is not advocating an emotional 
marriage, but a marriage based on duty, respect, and 
trust (Ozment, When Fathers 59). At the same time, he 



would suggest choosing a spouse whom one could grow 
to love, thus marriages are not impersonal (Ozment. When 
Fathers 61 ). Marriages should not be begun out of ro- 
mance but out of conviction (Johnson 275). He claims, 
"all other kinds of love seek something other than the 
loved one..." and spousal love is the "greatest and 
purest of all loves (Luther 632; 631; Althaus 84). Thus, 
in their service to each other, the married partners would 
encourage each in their own faithfulness and works (Kerr 
195). This aspect of his theology is one of the more 
positive parts in terms of implications for women as it 
suggests companionship in the marriage relationship 
rather than a complete domination. Nonetheless. Luther 
still only considers those women who became wives, in 
effect celebrating their restrictions to the domestic sphere. 

Yet Luther's ideas also seemed to encourage a 
respect for women. He proclaims a spiritual equality for 
women in that God created them, and they could be saved 
through faith just as men. He does not, however, extend 
this equality into social relations, as seen in his interpre- 
tation of Galatians 3:28 ("There is neither Jew nor Greek, 
there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor 
female"). Women still have their inherent subordination 
as a result of Eve's punishment (Marshall 12). Attacking 
medieval literature, Luther speaks against the devalua- 
tion of marriage and of women, claiming that unfavor- 
able remarks about women contradict natural law 
(Mitchanis 71 ). As woman is God's creation, negative 
statements about women would constitute a personal 
attack on God (Mitchanis 71 ). This high regard of women 
originated in the importance Luther places on procre- 
ation and the raising of children, activities in which 
women played a vital role (Ozment, Protestants 159). 
Still, critics of Luther point out negative aspects of his 
apparent esteem for women. Hartmann Grisar, for ex- 
ample, argues that, in reality, the Catholic system offered 
more esteem for women than Luther, where virginity was 
as praised, as was motherhood (Grisar 514). Whether 
the two options in life, motherhood or virginity, were 
seen equally or not, this stance raises an important point 
that maybe motherhood should not be the only reason 
women are respected and praised, canceling all other 
choices. According to Steven Ozment, Luther did not 
show equal treatment to all women, only those who be- 
came wives and mothers (Protestants 153). In effect, 
although Luther did call for a respect of women, this 
respect was limited to those who were wives, leaving 
out any others in his praise. 

Other aspects of Luther's biblically based mar- 
riage theology seems to hold more restrictive implica- 
tions, despite seemingly exalting points for women. First 



of all, to Luther, marriage has a different nature than 
traditionally accepted. His new interpretation raises 
marriage above other institutions of the church, such as 
cloisters. While seeming to raise public opinions of 
women, this new emphasis, in effect, actually restricts 
women in their opportunities. Luther portrays marriage 
as a matter of individual choice in his work Concerning 
Married Life (Schwiebert 581). He proclaims that there 
is no higher estate than marriage except the Gospel, and 
marriage is a "pure, natural act of obedience by faith to 
the will of the Creator" (Kerr 194; qtd. in Lenski 1 16). 
Repeatedly he describes marriage as natural in order to 
emphasize its purpose in God's will (Johnson 274; Ozment, 
Protestants 159). Such rhetoric concerning marriage 
evolved from his perception of Eve's role in Genesis, 
that of a wife and mother, being God-ordained. While 
such statements do not appear radical, they differ greatly 
from the medieval view which raised celibacy above 
marriage as spiritually superior (Ozment, When Fathers 
9). Marriage was a sacrament in the medieval church 
(Lazareth, Luther 20). Yet in popular thought the institu- 
tion was demeaned to a second place behind the celi- 
bate life because of the sexual nature and sins inherent 
in a marriage, thought to make one impure, as well as the 
idea that chastity was a good work able to aid in the 
reception of grace (Ozment, Protestants 152). Such 
thought made achievement of purity impossible in mar- 
riage, and, in a church where the doctrine focuses on 
achieving grace, chastity would clearly be praised over 
marriage. 

Luther challenges these views by asserting that 
God created marriage and sexuality as the natural order 
of creation (Lenski 1 14). Basing his discussion on Gen- 
esis 1 :27 and 2:18, Luther designates sexuality as "God's 
good creation" (Luther's Works: The Christian in Soci- 
ety II 18). These verses state, "So God created man in 
his own image, in the image of God he created him; male 
and female he created them," and "The Lord God said, 'It 
is not good for man to be alone. I will make a helper 
suitable for him'" (Genesis 1:27; 2:18). In this sense, 
marriage should be celebrated as the institution most 
favored rather than celibacy, as it is through marriage 
that people are able to fulfill their divine calling (Luther's 
Works: I Corinthians 17). Therefore, marriage is not a 
sacrament as it operates in the realm of creation rather 
than redemption (Althaus 89; Lazareth, Luther 217). 
Luther's concept of justification by faith alone sepa- 
rates the idea of receiving salvation and the participa- 
tion in the sacraments. Marriage thus moved away from 
a way to achieve salvation and grace, to a way to fulfill 
God's purposes through one's own calling. Yet even 



though marriage according to Luther is "the greatest, 
holiest, worthiest, and noblest thing that has ever ex- 
isted or ever will exist," it does not operate without sin 
(633). The sinful side is forgiven by God because of the 
good that comes from it, namely children and Christian 
love (Lazareth, Luther 212). Thus, husbands should 
"behave properly" even within marriage to lessen its 
sinful qualities, not being pure (Luther Basic Theologi- 
cal Writings 633). Luther's new look at marriage in effect 
raises it above celibacy as fulfilling the true divine call- 
ing (Lazareth, Luther 22 1 ). 

As a result of this new outlook, Luther began 
to push for women to leave convents, a movement that 
had negative effects on many women. At this time, nun- 
neries had been seen as the ideal life for a woman and 
offered women an alternative to marriage with educa- 
tional and leadership opportunities (Mitchanis 80; 
Johnson 282). In these institutions there was a possibil- 
ity for a separate female identity and independence that 
was not the norm outside (Ozment, When Fathers 15). 
Yet, it was widely believed at this time that women were 
forced into these institutions against their will, a fact 
that will be proved somewhat true by some women im- 
mediately leaving convents as the Reformation ideol- 
ogy arrives (Ozment, When Fathers 15). Problems Luther 
saw with cloisters included spiritual and natural issues. 
In terms of the spiritual, forced chastity was not in God's 
plan for the masses, but was rather a gift to a select few 
(Schwiebert 581). Forcing someone into such a situa- 
tion was in violation of God's commandment to procre- 
ate (Ozment, When Fathers 7). Furthermore, in such a 
circumstance, the tendency to assume one's own ac- 
tions affected one's achievement of salvation was greater 
than in the situation of marriage, an idea which is con- 
trary to Luther's doctrine of justification (Ozment, When 
Fathers 22). Also, Luther believed it was not within the 
power of man to deny his sexual instincts (Schwiebert 
582; Grisar 510). Thus, contradicting biological urges 
with chastity vows would lead to sin of impurity (Brecht 
95; Collinson 65). Issues also arose concerning the per- 
ceived misogynistic nature of the cloisters (Ozment, 
When Fathers 1 ). Luther saw women as restricted and 
subject to male domination from monks, an observation 
which was true to come extent, and he sought to free 
them from these obligations. Yet he in turn placed them 
in patriarchal marriages (Ozment, When Fathers 15, 16). 

Convents were thus abolished throughout Prot- 
estant areas, and the results had many effects on women 
(Hale 440). Robert Bainton points out that the role women 
played in the convent was later replaced by charity work 
and nursing (In Germain and Italy 13); first, though. 



women were encouraged to marry quickly and placed 
securely within the domestic sphere under the command 
of the husband (Bainton, In England and France 7). 
Former nuns were seen as in "sexual danger" and thus 
pressure to marry was extremely high (Roper 232). Evi- 
dence of discontent was seen in movements, such as 
that by a nun, Conitas Pierkheimer, where women sought 
to preserve a life outside the home with the maintenance 
of a cloistered situation (Johnson 282). Steven Ozment 
describes the resulting situation: the closing of the con- 
vents "left in virtual ruins medieval woman's apparently 
one true sphere of freedom from domination, the cloister, 
while enticing her into the seeming prison of the patriar- 
chal home" (Protestants 3). In other words, by attempt- 
ing to free women from male dominated cloisters, Luther 
in effect transplanted this subordination into the family 
and succeeded in closing opportunities to women out- 
side of marriage. 

The next aspect of Luther's marriage theology 
is what he viewed the purpose of marriage to be. This 
outlook evolved in his development, growing more opti- 
mistic with each change, and overall can be explained as 
protection from sin, procreation, and companionship and 
aid (Johnson 283). In this first sense, as protection from 
sin, Luther does not seem to raise marriage to a respect- 
able level in its own account, and, in fact, this sense was 
highly in the tradition of Augustine who described mar- 
riage as a lesser good to celibacy in that it controlled 
lustful thoughts and activities (Mitchanis 29). Yet, Luther 
does elevate marriage over celibacy even in this early 
definition as he describes it as the "proper state of life" 
(qtd. in Mitchanis 76). Overall, Luther calls marriage the 
"necessity of our humanity," initially as a protection from 
sin (qtd. in Althaus 86; Lazareth, Luther208). Marriage 
is "a hospital for the sick. . .so that men will not fall into 
greater sin" in his Treatise on Marriage (qtd. in Lazareth, 
Luther 2 10). In his commentary on Corinthians, he calls 
marriage "a help and means against unchastity" (Luther's 
Works: 1 Corinthians 13). Still, marriage is not free from 
sin, yet this sin is forgiven because "God's work" is 
being completed through this institution (Althaus 86; 
Collinson 66). God can in this sense "channel" the sin 
for his own purposes in the controlled environment of 
sin and overlook the transgressions as they lead to a 
favorable end (Lazareth, Luther 211; Brecht 92). Impor- 
tant as a positive reflection of women, Luther attributes 
sexual desire and temptation to both sexes, unlike the 
traditional view that women had stronger sexual urges 
(Lazareth, Luther 213). 

Luther also discusses the purpose of marriage 
in terms of procreation. He claims, "marriage produces 



offspring, for that is the end and chief purpose of mar- 
riage" (Luther 635), and "the purpose of marriage is not 
pleasure and ease, but the procreation and education of 
children and support of a family [...]" (qtd. in Ozment, 
"Re-inventing" 24). This idea is carried to such an ex- 
tent that he places it over the value of life itself. Accord- 
ing to Luther, "if the woman is worn out, if she die in the 
childbed, well enough!" (qtd. in Lenski 117). Ozment 
points out that, although Luther places a importance on 
the home and the family, his families are patriarchal and 
the women are basically subjected to the production of 
children ( When Fathers 2). Yet, at the same time, there is 
the idea of a partnership in raising the children, in sense 
also subjecting the men to a domestication to some ex- 
tent (Bainton, In Germany and Italy 10; Johnson 276). 

This "divine calling" to procreation rests in the 
importance of raising children (Lazareth, Luther 220; 
Grisar 511). Luther calls "bring[ing] up children to serve 
God" the "shortest road to heaven" (Luther Basic Theo- 
logical Writings 635). The parents are thus able to fulfill 
God's purpose by witnessing to their children and rais- 
ing them to be faithful (Althaus 96). The high level of 
importance Luther placed on procreation can be seen in 
the marriage and divorce regulations he sponsored. For 
example, if an impotent person marries without disclos- 
ing his or her impotency to the spouse, this deception is 
punishable (Brecht 91). Furthermore, divorce should be 
granted to a person in the case of spousal impotence 
(Brecht 280). Such stresses seem to place the produc- 
tion of the marriage over the individual happiness of 
those involved, and particularly works to reduce women 
to only the role of producing children. 

Finally, Luther, although acknowledging the 
"discomforts" of married life, emphasizes the joy of mar- 
riage flowing from the knowledge that it is in God's will 
(Kerr 195; Althaus 88). Furthermore, extending this joy 
outside the immediate family, Luther sees marriage as an 
opportunity to serve one's neighbors in an "estate of 
faith." Through this "vocation," good deeds and faith 
can be exhibited and tested (Lazareth, Luther 2 1 7). In a 
sense, then, marriage stimulates good works and pro- 
tects faith (Grisar 509). He claims, "marriage offers the 
greatest sphere for good works" (qtd. in Bainton, In 
Germany and Italy 42). Finally, marriage serves a heav- 
enly function in its use of faith, by "intend[ing] to purify 
us and mature us for his kingdom" (qtd. in Althaus 93). 
He calls the institution a "school for character" because 
of the inherent difficulties involved (Johnson 276). Yet 
he attributes these difficulties many times to women; 
"having to live with the care for a woman produces prob- 
lems which reveal God's grace and strength" (qtd. in 



Johnson 276). Therefore, although exalting the benefits 
of marriage and raising it to a higher place in society, 
Luther at the same time, in his language, acts to cast a 
negative light on women, as well as presenting them as 
child producers and guardians against sin. 

Luther clearly advocates a certain separation 
of the sexes by role and by rule. He even claims, "the 
word or work of God is quite clear... that women were 
made to be either wives or prostitutes" (qtd. in Grisar 
54). He asserts that wives are to be subject to their 
husbands at times to the extent that their subjection 
interferes in individual self-determination (Grisar 511). 
Yet Luther has very specific reasons for seeing such a 
situation as necessary. First of all, he saw men's rule 
over their houses as necessary for societal order and 
stability, not as a religious necessity, as all are equal to 
God based on his interpretation of Galatians 3:28 
(Ozment, When Fathers 70; Johnson 273; Lazareth, Luther 
224). Also, in accordance with traditional thought, Luther 
subordinates women based on the order of creation in 
the Genesis account. As men were created first, they 
were thought to have rule over women (Mitchanis 70). 
This goes along with the other aspects of male domina- 
tion seen in his biblical interpretation. Other reasons 
include the need for women to be guided because of the 
"woman's greed," and the idea that the woman is, ac- 
cording to Luther, "a weak vessel and fragile" (Hale 271; 
Luther's Works: 1 Corinthians 51). 

Thus, Luther, not deviating from traditional in- 
terpretation, called both women to "wifely obedience" 
and husbands to make the wives obey (qtd. in Marshall 
14; Brecht 282). This obligation extended beyond the 
faith, in that Luther discusses the necessity of wives 
obeying their husbands even if their husbands were not 
of the same faith (Marshall 13). Such a belief places a 
woman's submission above her religious situation. Yet, 
at the same time, Luther called husband to not abuse 
their "mandate" with physical abuse (Ozment, When 
Fathers 51). The relative relations of husband to wife 
can be seen in the symbolic act of the marriage ceremony 
that Luther advocated. The gifts each gave each other 
emphasized their particular attributes and roles in the 
family, the man giving wealth, the woman giving some- 
thing representative of her household skills (Roper 1 34). 
Furthermore, throughout the courtship and ceremony, 
the bride is to remain passive (Roper 143). 

In all, the respective roles of the marriage part- 
ners are clearly defined and designated by Luther. In 
most respects, a woman's role is highly praised because 
she is serving, through marriage, her calling in God's will 
(Marshall 13). This view has been called beneficial to 



women in its positive outlook and designation of a 
"unique calling" for women, which places them in a more 
important position (Roper 1 ; Althaus 97 ). Luther stresses 
that men should recognize the importance of the woman's 
role, and even seems to place her responsibilities on an 
equal ground with those of the men (Mitchanis 73; 
Hillerbrand 196). He calls the women "a partner in the 
management" of the household, with "a common inter- 
est in the children and the property" (qtd. in Hillerbrand 
195). He also declares all domestic callings, men and 
women, equal before God (Lazareth, Luther 221). Yet, 
his praise is once again limited to those women who 
were wives and mothers, and such an emphasis on this 
role further serves to restrict women to a domestic role 
(Mitchanis 72). 

Luther's role for women has many aspects to it, 
but all involve some form of domestic activity (Lazareth, 
Luther 224). These duties include the running of the 
family life, supervision of servants, serving meals, and 
keeping the home orderly (Hale 270). Predominantly, 
women are to be mothers and helpmeets to their hus- 
bands. They are responsible for the spiritual guidance 
of the children, as well as the "noble deed" of childbirth 
(Mitchanis 87; Althaus 96). Luther proclaims, "let them 
bear children to death [...]" This statement, although 
seeming adamant on the purpose of a woman's life, also 
operates to give the woman comfort in having such an 
important role, yet, still, this function is put over her own 
well-being (qtd. in Mitchanis 6). Luther also describes a 
woman as given "to be a companionable helpmeet to the 
man in everything" (Luther 63 1 ), as a "co-worker" to her 
husband (Ozment, When Fathers 64). In support of this 
notion that a woman's place is in a domestic capacity, 
Luther observes that "women have narrow shoulders 
and wide hips," a physique which he assumes as a sign 
that they should operate in a home (qtd. in Ozment, Prot- 
estants 152). Thus, although Luther is giving women a 
highly respectable vocation, once again, the language 
removes true dignity from the situation, making women 
restricted to the home based on a generalized, biological 
difference. Yet he still makes a point to emphasize that 
the man also has a role which is to complement the 
woman's (Roper 134). 

Many results of this view of the relative roles 
within a marriage seemed to operate with more negative 
implications than positive. For example, although Luther 
advocated education, the fact that a woman was to re- 
main in the home led to an education more in line with 
"morality and decorum" rather than language and reli- 
gious instruction, it being more important for a woman 
to behave properly than to have a religious function 



(Davis 103; Marshall 15). One historian has argued that 
Luther was not endorsing a woman's religious life but 
her life in the household (Roper 2; 233). Furthermore, 
historians argue, because a woman's role was in the home, 
there resulted in a domestication and restriction of 
women. The advocacy of the domestic duties in effect 
made the women more economically dependent, and in 
fact they were increasingly restricted from guilds 
(Marshall 3; Hale 270). Luther considered it "inappropri- 
ate" for a woman to be involved in external social and 
political issues because it removed her from devotion to 
her primary duties in the home (Ozment, When Fathers 
68). These negative implications can be qualified with 
the fact that the home was seen as the basis of society, 
not as separate, and in this sense the woman was ex- 
tremely valuable in society (Ozment, When Fathers 9). 
Nonetheless they were still restricted to the domestic 
sphere. Although a woman did not operate with a large 
public role in the Middle Ages, such thought served to 
institutionalize the practice at a time when women were 
beginning to experience greater opportunities. 

Robert Bainton describes the effect of the Ref- 
ormation on marriage: "The individualizing of faith led to 
the personalizing of marriage," or marriage became more 
personal and individualistic (In England and France 
256). Yet although Luther did portray marriage as in 
need of reform, he himself shared in some of the anti- 
feminist language (Ozment, Protestants 151; Johnson 
280). Still, Luther did present procreation in a more fa- 
vorable light; no longer a necessary evil, now a reli- 
gious, honorable act (Mitchanis 82). Not only did Luther 
acknowledge the divine nature of the physical side of 
marriage, he also spoke in language which valued women 
and marriage as an institution, particularly in his Con- 
cerning Married Life. Nonetheless, although he did 
show some more positive aspects of a view of marriage 
in relation to traditional thought, many aspects of his 
theology had negative implications and grounding, lead- 
ing to more restrictions and domestication, but most 
seemed to have no real effect. People seemed to accept 
those ideas that did not conflict with established cus- 
toms, and misogynistic behaviors continued even after 
his writings (Mitchanis 92; Johnson 285). Therefore, the 
relative implications of Luther's marriage theology, de- 
veloped out of his biblical interpretations, described an 
increasingly restricted and domesticated life for women, 
much more negative than the positive aspects on the 
whole. 



Works Cited 

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Fortress Press, 1972. 

Bainton, Ronald. Women of the Reformation in England and 
France. Boston: Beacon Press, 1973. 

Bainton, Ronald H. Women of the Reformation in Germany 
and Italy. Minneapolis: Augsburg Publ. House, 
1971. 

Brecht. Martin. Martin Luther: Shaping and Defining the 
Reformation, 1521-1532. Minneapolis: Fortress 
Press, 1990. 

Clayton, Joseph. Luther and His Work. Milwaukee: Bruce 
Publ. Co., 1937. 

Collinson, Patrick. The Birthpangs of Protestant England. 
New York: St. Martin's Press, 1988. 

A Compend of Luther 's Theology. Ed. Hugh Thomson Kerr, Jr. 
Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1943. 

Grisar, Hartmann. Martin Luther: His Life and Work. St. 
Louis, MO: B. Herder Book Co.. 1930. 

Haigh, Christopher. English Reformations. Oxford: Claredon 
Press, 1993. 

Hale, John. The Civilization of Europe in the Renaissance. 
New York: Simon & Schuster, 1993. 

Hillerbrand, Hans J. The World of the Reformation. New 
York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1973. 

A History of Women in the West: Renaissance and Enlighten- 
ment Paradoxes. Eds. Natalie Zeman Davis and 
Arlette Farge. Cambridge: The Belknap Press, 1993. 

Interpreters of Luther. Ed. Jaroslav Pelikan. Philadelphia: 
Fortress Press, 1968. 

Johnson, Susan M. "Luther's Reformation and (un)holy Mat- 
rimony." Journal of Family Histoiy. 17.3 (1992): 
271-288. 

Lazareth, William. Luther on the Christian Home. Philadel- 
phia: Muhlenberg Press, 1960. 

— . "Luther, Sex, and Marriage." Frontiers. 10.8(May 1959): 
1-5. 

Lenski, Gerhard E. Marriage in the Lutheran Church. Colum- 
bus: The Lutheran Book Concern, 1936. 

Luther, Martin. Basic Theological Writings. Ed. Timothy F 
Lull. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989. 

Luther s Works: Commentaries on 1 Corinthians 7, 

/ Corinthians 15, Lectures on Timothy. Ed. Hilton 
C.Oswald. St. Louis: Concordia Publ. Hous, 1973. 

Luther's Works: Lectures on Galatians 1535 Chapters 1-4. 
Ed. Jaroslav Pelikon and Walter Hansen. St. Louis: 
Concordia Publ. House, 1963. 

Luther's Works: Lectures on Genesis Chapters 1-5. Ed. 

Jaroslav Pelikan. St. Louis: Concordia Publ. House, 
1958. 

Luther 's Works: The Christian in Society 11. Ed. Walter 1 . 
Brandt. Philadelphia: Mulhenberg Press, 1962. 

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ern England 1550-1720. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 
1998. 

Mitchanis, Joan. The Reformation and German Society: The 
Impact of Martin Luther's Theology on Women, 



Marriage, and the Family. Chicago: DePaul Univ., 

1992. 
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York: Image Books, 1991. 
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(1993): 22-26. 
— , When Fathers Ruled: Family Life in Reformation Europe. 

Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1983. 
Pascal, Roy. The Social Basis of the German Reformation. 

New York: Augustus M. Kelley, Publ., 1993. 
Roper, Lyndal. The Holy Household: Women and Morals in 

Reformation Augsburg. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 

1989. 
Schwiebert, E. G. Luther and His Times. Missouri: Concordia 

Publ. 1950. 
Smith, Glenn P. A Rhetorical Biography: An Analysis of 

Selected Sermons Preached by Martin Luther. Ann 

Arbor: Univ. Microfilms Inter., 1980. 
Women in Reformation and Counter-Reformation Europe. Ed. 

Shernn Marshall. Indianapolis: Indiana Univ. Press, 

1989. 



Rubik's Magic Cube: 

A Demonstration of Group Theory 

Amy Susan Hajari 

Rubik's Magic Cube, invented in 1974 by design professor Erno Rubik, is a useful tool for mathemati- 
cians as a tactile demonstration of algebraic group theory. The Rubik's group is simply defined as the set of all 
turns of the cube's faces. Using basic group theory principles, we can find that the cube can be scrambled 43 
quintillion different ways, examine some simple subgroups, and analyze algorithms used to solve the cube. With 
a working knowledge of group theory and some hands-on experience, one can "build a whole science " and learn 
to solve any scrambled cube. 



Erno Rubik, a professor at the Academy of 
Applied Arts and Design in Budapest, Hungary, in- 
vented Rubik's magic cube in 1974 as an exercise in shape 
and design. Rubik applied for a Hungarian patent on the 
toy in 1975, and it was first sold in Hungary in 1977. By 
the early 1980's, the cube had become immensely popu- 
lar in the rest of the world, with books written on solu- 
tions and even a world championship for the fastest 
solvers (Tierney 83-4). Mathematicians' fascination with 
the cube exceeds its attraction as a toy, however. The 
cube is an exhibit of group theory, and it is very useful as 
a tactile demonstration of group theory principles. 

In referring to the cube, the notation of David 
Singmaster will be adopted here. 

♦ cubies — small cube pieces which make up 
the whole cube 

♦ cubicles — spaces occupied by cubies 

♦ facelets — faces of a cubie 

♦ types of cubies: 

♦ corner cubie — has three facelets 

♦ edge cubie — has two facelets 

♦ center cube — has one facelet 

♦ cube face notation — Up, Down, Right, Left, 
Front, Back 

♦ cubicle notation — lower-case initials; for 
example, uf denotes the Up-Front edge 
cubicle 

♦ cubie notation — upper-case initials; for 
example, URF denotes the cubie whose 
home position is the Up-Right-Front cor- 
ner 

♦ flip — an edge is flipped if it is in its home 
position, but incorrectly oriented 



♦ twist — a corner is twisted if it is in its home 
position, but incorrectly oriented; twists 
can be either clockwise or counterclock- 
wise 

We will also refer to the restored cube as being in the 
START position (Frey and Singmaster 4). 

We first define our group, known as the Rubik's 
group, as the group of all processes that can be executed 
on a cube; the operation over which the group is defined 
is simply to follow one process by another. A process is 
defined as a combination of clockwise quarter-turns of 
any of the six faces of the cube, which Singmaster abbre- 
viates using the first letters of the names of the faces: 
Front, Back, Up, Down, Left, Right (Singmaster 3). The 
inverse of each of these six turns is a counterclockwise 
quarter-turn, or three consecutive clockwise quarter- 
turns, of the same face, and it is denoted as follows: F" 1 , 
B "', U ■', D "', L 1 , R" 1 , thus, every process in the group is 
invertible. The identity of the group is a process that 
leaves every cubie on the cube undisturbed. The cube 
group is nonabelian, meaning that not every element in 
the group commutes with every other element in the 
group. 

Adequate discussion of Rubik's cube makes 
necessary the introduction of group theory definitions. 

♦ order of a group — the number of elements 
in a group, G 

♦ order of an element — the number of ele- 
ments in the group generated by the given 
element 

♦ conjugate — the element bab~' is the conju- 



gate of a by b, where a and b are elements 
of the group (Gilbert and Gilbert 143) 

♦ commutator — the element aba 'b' 1 is a com- 
mutator, where a and b are elements of the 
group; if aba 'b' 1 equals the identity, then 
the elements commute with one another 
(Frey and Singmaster 84) 

♦ coset — if H is a subgroup of the group G, 
for any ae G, 

aH = { xe G I x = ah for some he H } 

is a left coset of H in G; similarly, Ha is a 

right coset of H in G (Gilbert and Gilbert 

157) 

Conjugates are useful in returning a cube to 
START, because they allow targeted cubies to be ma- 
nipulated and reoriented without disturbing previously 
restored cubies. Temporary destruction of earlier 
progress is almost always necessary, but another conju- 
gate process can be used to return displaced cubies to 
their home positions along with the cubies targeted for 
restoration (Frey and Singmaster 143). Commutators are 
involved in many known cube processes. Two commu- 
tators are used so often that they have been given names. 
The Z commutator is the process URU"'R"', which af- 
fects only the cubies on the up-front edge, the front- 
right edge, and the down-right edge. The Y commutator 
is the process UR'U'R, which affects only the cubies 
on the up-front edge, the up-right edge, and the front- 
right edge (Frey and Singmaster 85). These processes 
can be applied to all sides of the cube by simply rotating 
the entire cube in the desired direction. At times, it will 
be useful to write cube processes in cycle notation, as 
the product of permutations of edges and corners pro- 
duced by the given process. For example, 

F = (uf,rf,df,lf)(ufr,rfd,dfl,lfu) = 

(uf,rf)(uf,df)(ufJMufr,rfd)(ufr,dMi'frJfu) 

A "+" or "-" is used after a cycle to indicate that the last 
element goes to the first with a change of orientation. 
For example, 

(ubr) + = (ubr,bru,rub) and (ubr)_ = 
(ubr.rub.bru) (Frey and Singmaster 69). 

Repetition of any process, M, gives 
MM = M 2 , W = MM 2 , M 4 "= MM 3 
and so on, until at some point 
M 1+l = M, 

and M, M : , M 1 M 1 are all different, with M' being the 

identity, M M being the inverse of M, and f being the 



order of the subgroup generated by M and the order of 
the element M (Zassenhaus 632). Thus, any M gener- 
ates a cyclic subgroup of the Rubik's group. 

One of the simplest subgroups of the cube 
group is that generated by half-turns of the Up face and 
the Right face, denoted (U 2 , R 2 ) (Frey and Singmaster 
112). There are twelve elements in this subgroup, {I, U 2 , 
R 2 , U 2 R 2 , U 2 R 2 U 2 , (U 2 R 2 ) 2 . (U 2 R 2 ) 2 U 2 , (U 2 R 2 )-\ (U 2 R 2 )'U 2 . 
(U 2 R 2 ) 4 , (U 2 R 2 ) 4 U 2 , (U 2 R 2 ) 5 }. Notice that (U 2 ) 2 , (R 2 ) 2 , 
(U 2 R 2 ) 6 = I, that each element of the form (U 2 R 2 ) n U 2 with 
neZ, is its own inverse, and that the inverse of (U 2 R 2 )"is 
(U 2 R 2 ) h " with ne Z. This subgroup cannot be generated 
by a single element; this is shown by calculating the 
order of each of the elements: 

o(D =1 
o((U 2 R 2 ) 2 U 2 ) = 2 

o((U 2 R 2 ) 3 > = 2 

o((U 2 R 2 ) 3 U 2 )-2 

o((U 2 R 2 ) 4 > = 3 

o((U 2 R 2 ) 4 U 2 > = 2 



o(U 2 > = 2 
o(R 2 > = 2 
o(U 2 R 2 > = 6 
o(U 2 R 2 U 2 > = 2 
o<(U 2 R 2 ) 2 > = 3 



o<(U 2 R 2 ) 5 > = 6 

Since the order of the subgroup is twelve, but there is no 
element in the subgroup of order twelve, an element that 
will generate the entire subgroup does not exist, but the 
order of each element divides the order of the subgroup. 

The order of Rubik's group can be calculated 
by computing the number of different configurations 
that application of the group will produce. Examination 
of the cube reveals the following: 

♦ the eight corner cubies are only inter- 
changeable with other corner cubies; cor- 
ner cubies can be oriented three ways in 
each position 

♦ the twelve edge cubies are only inter- 
changeable with other edge cubies; edge 
cubies can be oriented two ways in each 
position 

♦ the six center cubies are fixed; processes 
rotate center cubies but do not reposition 
them. 

Thus, ignoring orientation, there are 8! pos- 
sible configurations for corner cubies and 12! possible 
configurations for edge cubies. When orientation is 



considered, this adds a factor of 3 s possibilities for cor- 
ner cubies and a factor of 2' : possibilities for edge cubies. 
However, if the orientations of seven corner cubies are 
set, then the last is fixed; similarly, if the orientations of 
eleven edge cubies are set, then the last is fixed. This 
decreases our possibilities by a factor of six. Also, if all 
but two cubies are placed, the positions of the last two 
are fixed; thus, our possibilities are decreased by half. 
The order of the Rubik's group is 
(EL12L3!3S = 43,252,003,274,489,856,000 

3-2-2 
or approximately 43 quintillion (Hofstadter 306). This 
number is one-twelfth of the possible cube configura- 
tions; the other states are inaccessible from a restored 
cube and can only be reached by taking the cube apart 
and reassembling with a twisted corner or flipped edge. 
The patterns produced by our group on a restored cube 
comprise one orbit, defined by Singmaster as "the set of 
all patterns reachable from a given pattern by applica- 
tion of our group" (12). There are 12 non-overlapping 
orbits that our group can produce (the cube group acts 
on twelve different starting cube states, each unreach- 
able from the others without disassembly, and produces 
twelve non-overlapping sets of 43 quintillion configura- 
tions). 

By definition, the Rubik's group is generated 
by combining quarter-turns of the six faces of the cube. 
We can prove that these elements are sufficient for pro- 
ducing the following seven basic processes which leave 
untargeted cubies undisturbed: 

1) arbitrary double swap of edge pairs 

2) arbitrary double swap of corner pairs 

3) arbitrary flip of two edges 

4) arbitrary clockwise corner rotation 

5) arbitrary counterclockwise corner rotation 

6) arbitrary 3-cycle of edges 

7) arbitrary 3-cycle of corners 

which make any scrambling of the cube within a given 
orbit possible (Hofstadter 316) (i.e. let G, be the group 
generated by quarter-turns of the six faces, let G, be the 
group generated by the elements listed above, and prove 
that G, c G r ) The idea of conjugates allows one ex- 
ample of each of the above processes to act on any 
desired cubie. Also, it can be shown that a 3-cycle of 
edges can be constructed from two double edge swaps, 
a 3-cycle of corners can be constructed from two double 
comer swaps, and any counterclockwise corner rotation 
is simply two clockwise rotations on the same corner. 
Thus, it suffices to find an example from each of the first 
four classes. This demonstrates that all 43 quintillion 



accessible cube configurations can be reached by some 

combination of quarter-turns of the six faces. However, 

Frank Barnes has found that the Rubik's group can be 

generated by two moves: 

a = L-BRD-'L- 1 

(if ru, rb, ub, Idjb, lu,bd,df,fl, rd)(fiir,ubr,ldb, Ibu.dlf.bdr.dfr) 

p = UFRUR'U'F 1 

(uf,ul) + (ur\(ubr,ufl)_(urf)^ 

(Singmaster 32). We can see that a 7 is an eleven-cycle of 

edges, 

a 7 
[(fiir,ubrMbJbu4lfMr,dfr)}\(rf,ni,rb,ubMlbduM4ffljd)\ 1 

= I [(rf,ru,rb,ub,ld,lb,lu,bd,dfJl,rd)V 
which leaves one edge, uf undisturbed, and that a" is a 
seven-cycle of corners, 

a" 
[(rf,ni,rb,ubMJbJuMdffl,nJ)] u [(fiirub>;ldbJbuJlfMr,dfr)] u 

= I [(furjibr,ldb,lbu,dlf,bdr,dfr)] n 
which leaves one corner, ufl, undisturbed. P permutes 
the /(/edge and ufl, flips a pair of edges and twists cor- 
ners. The group generated by these two elements can 
produce all cube configurations in one orbit, and so it 
must equal the Rubik's group. 

As mentioned previously, there are physical 
constraints that cause eleven orbits to be inaccessible 
from a pristine cube. Using cycle notation, we can see 
that every quarter-turn on the cube is the product of a 
four-cycle of edges and a four-cycle of corners, which 
are disjoint. This can be written as the product of six 
two-cycles, an even permutation. This implies that all 
cube processes, because they are made up of quarter- 
turns of faces, are also even. Let's assume now that it is 
possible to exchange a single pair of cubies. Any single 
pair exchange is one two-cycle of edges or corners, an 
odd permutation, which cannot be an element in the 
Rubik's group. Therefore, the exchange of a single pair 
of edges or a single pair of corners is impossible (Frey 
and Singmaster 128). This is what Singmaster calls the 
"pair-exchange parity." 

Singmaster also states that edge flips occur only 
in pairs, and corner twists occur in either pairs of oppo- 
site direction or triples of the same direction. To prove 
this, Anne Scott's technique, taken from Winning Ways, 
is used to analyze the cube group (Frey and Singmaster 
131). Using a restored cube with fixed Up and Right 
faces, define the Up face of each top-layer cubicle as its 
chief face, and define the Up facelet of each top-layer 
cubie as its chief facelet. Define the Down face of each 
bottom-layer cubicle as its chief face and the Down 



facelet of each bottom-layer cubie as its chief facelet. 
For the middle-layer, if a cubicle is on the Right face, 
then Right faces and facelets are chief, otherwise Left 
faces and facelets are chief. This makes necessary the 
following definitions: 

♦ sane: if a chief facelet is in the position of 
the chief face of the cubicle it occupies, 
then it is sane 

♦ flip: if an edge cubie's chief facelet does 
not occupy the chief face of the cubicle it 
occupies, then it is flipped 

♦ twist: if a comer cubie's chief facelet is not 
on the chief face of the cubicle it occupies, 
it is twisted (note that a twist can be clock- 
wise or counterclockwise) 

♦ total flip: the total number of flipped cubies 
(let each flip = +1) 

♦ total twist: the number of clockwise twists 
minus the number of counterclockwise 
twists (let each clockwise twist = +1 and 
let each counterclockwise twist = - 1 ) 

U, D, F, and B do not affect the total flip; R and L flip four 
edges. U and D do not affect the total twist; F, B. R, and 
L each twist two corners clockwise and two counter- 
clockwise. We can conclude that the total edge flip is 
always even and that the total corner twist is always a 
multiple of three. It follows that edge flips must occur in 
pairs, and corner twists are either in opposite pairs or in 
triplets in the same direction. This is what Singmaster 
calls the "flip-twist parity." 

With 43 quintillion configurations accessible 
from a restored cube, how far can a randomly scrambled 
cube be from this restored state? Frustrated cubists 
quickly find that a scrambling that required only a few 
turns to accomplish can take hundreds of turns to re- 
store, even using published algorithms. Morwen B. 
Thistlethwaite's algorithm holds the record as the short- 
est, with a maximum of fifty turns to restore the cube 
(Rubik, et al 70). It would take a minimum of seventeen 
turns to theoretically scramble a cube 43 quintillion dif- 
ferent ways, but some of these configurations would 
overlap, so more turns must be necessary. It has been 
hypothesized that the farthest any cube can be from 
START is 22 or 23 turns, but this has not been proven 
(Hofstadter 323). Knowing a scrambled cube's "distance 
from START" would be a very useful tool in finding the 
shortest solution that would restore it, but. unfortunately, 
a method for finding this doesn't yet exist. The para- 
mount solution to Rubik's Magic Cube has been dubbed 



"God's algorithm," since, currently, only God knows it 
(Hofstadter 323). "God's algorithm" would, theoretically, 
take the shortest path back to START from any of the 43 
quintillion possible configurations. 

It is certainly possible to solve the cube with- 
out any knowledge of group theory. However, most 
successful cubists have an intuitive notion of inverses, 
commutators, and conjugates even without a mathemati- 
cal understanding of why they are used. Most algo- 
rithms solve the cube in stages, for example, placing and 
orienting cubies of the top layer, then middle layer edges, 
bottom layer corner, and, finally, bottom layer edges. 
They use principles of group theory and can be ana- 
lyzed using cosets, indexes, and subgroups of the 
Rubik's group. As the solution progresses, each pla- 
teau state, or intermediate state where the progress of 
the solution is visible, can be described using the sub- 
group, G that contains the process used to reach it. 
Before solving, G is the entire cube group. Each subse- 
quent subgroup becomes more limited until, finally, the 
last subgroup contains only the identity. So, a solution 
that fixes the cube in stages can be characterized by a 
nested sequence of subgroups, where 
G = G =>G,3...=>G n = I 

and n is the number of plateau states used to return the 
scrambled cube to START (Frey and Singmaster 144). 
The index, m, is the number of disjoint cosets of a given 
subgroup, H, in a group, G, and it can be found by divid- 
ing the order of the group by the order of the subgroup. 
Each of these m cosets has a shortest element; the length 
of the longest of these "shortest" elements is the maxi- 
mum number of moves required to reduce any permuta- 
tion in G to a permutation in H (144). This is easier said 
than done; a computer is usually needed to search for 
the "shortest" elements in given cosets. Morwen B. 
Thistlethwaite's solution method, although not show- 
ing apparent progress at each step, uses a sequence of 
nested subgroups in four steps. The subgroups are as 
follows: 

H n = <L, R, F, B, U, D) = G 
H, = <L,R, F, B, IP, D 2 ) 
H, = <L, R, F : , B : , IF, D 2 ) 
h;=<l : t r 2 , F, B : , IF, D 2 ) 
H 4 = I 
The following are the maximum number of moves re- 
quired to reduce a group to the next nested subgroup: 
step 1 G = H ->H ] 

7 moves 



step 2 H, -> H, 

13 moves 
step 3 H,-^H 3 

15 moves 
step 4 H 3 ^H 4 =I 

15 moves 
for a total of fifty moves maximum. This algorithm re- 
quired comprehensive tables and a computer to com- 
pose (144-45). 

Unfortunately, it takes more than a knowledge 
of group theory to restore a scrambled cube to its pris- 
tine state. Solutions are developed only after much time 
and experimentation. Hofstadter quotes Bernie 
Greenberg, saying, "[The cube] is the only puzzle that 
requires its solver to build a whole science" (328). Even 
after solving, there are nearly endless variations of the 
cube that can be analyzed, ranging from cubes of differ- 
ent sizes to alternate colorings to other shapes. Still, in 
all these modifications, the basic concept of groups is 
the same. The discoveries and ongoing studies inspired 
by Rubik's creation are a continual source of fascination 
for those intrigued by the cube. 



Works Cited 

Bandelow, Christoph. Inside Rubik's Cube and Beyond. Trans. 

Jeanette Zehnder and Lucy Moser. Boston: Birkhauser, 
1982. 

Frey, Jr., Alexander H., and David Singmaster. Handbook of 
CubikMath. Hillside: Enslow Publishers, 1982. 

Gilbert, Jimmie, and Linda Gilbert. Elements of Modern Alge- 
bra. 4" 1 ed. Boston: PWS Publishing Company, 
1996. 

Hofstadter, Douglas R. Metamagical Themas: Questing for 
the Essence of Mind and Pattern. New York: Basic 
Books, 1985. 

Joyner, W.D. Mathematics of the Rubik's Cube, http:// 

iTialh.usna.navv.mil/--wdj/sm485 la.txt (18 Jan. 
2000). 

Nourse, James G. The Simple Solution to Rubik's Cube. 
Toronto: Bantam Books, 1981. 

Ponder, Carl. "Solving a Generalization of Rubik's Cube: Part 
I — A General Representation of Cubelike Puzzles, 
ItsCombinatorial Invariants, and Basic Operators 
for Solving It." Journal of Recreational Mathemat 
ics 28 (1996): 38-48. 

— . "Solving a Generalization of Rubik's Cube: Part II — 
Applying the Solution Operators." Journal of 
Recreational Mathematics 28 ( 1 997): 1 03- 1 1 2. 

Rubik, Erno, Tamas Varga, Gerzson Keri, Gyorgy Marx, and 
Tamas Vekerdy. Rubik's Cubik Compendium. Ed. 
David Singmaster. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1 987. 

Singmaster, David. Notes on Rubik's Magic Cube. Hillside: 
Enslow Publishers, 1981. 

Tierney, John. "The Perplexing Life of Erno Rubik." Dis- 
cover! (1986): 81-88. 



The Ecological Age: 
A Revolution in 
Judeo-Christian Tradition 



AbhijitKhanna 



This paper deals with the question of whether or not traditional Judeo-Christian ideals are responsible 
for the current state of environmental degradation. It examines interpretations of aspects of Judeo-Christian 
thought and the way they have been used to justify human abuse of nature. Some of the tenets examined include 
a sense of separation and superiority from Nature, and the separation of God from Nature, the long-standing view 
of the absolute value of each individual human life (creating many lives and prolonging these lives through 
science and technology). The paper also considers alternative interpretations of scripture that advocate envi- 
ronmental defense and preservation. Finally, the paper makes note of contemporary efforts to redefine Judeo- 
Christian spiritualit}' in a way that precludes environmental destruction. 



There is little doubt in the minds of people to- 
day that we are facing an ecological crisis of biblical 
proportions. As a result of human activity, the earth is 
facing environmental degradation, species extinction, 
global warming, air and water pollution, and potentially 
unsupportable population growth. The existence of these 
symptoms is not in question: Most of humanity is in 
agreement as to the effects of our irresponsible behav- 
ior. The issue that brings about the greatest debate, 
however, is the root of this catastrophe. Some would 
argue that the origins of our current ecological problems 
lie in the Lockean view of humankind's natural rights to 
property and the corresponding right to do whatever is 
desired with said property. Others, such as David Korten, 
claim that our precarious ecological position is due to 
the actions of a materialistic culture that is dominated by 
the interests of corporate libertarians (c.f. Korten, ch. 5). 
Both of these factions would agree that whatever the 
explanation, humans have acted without a sense of 'care' 
or responsibility towards the environment. A growing 
number of scholars, including historian Lynn White, Jr., 
have postulated the idea that people lack a sense of 
direct ethical responsibility to the natural world that stems 
from the Judeo-Christian religious tradition (Des Jardins 
93). Although members of the Judeo-Christian commu- 
nity are hesitant to validate this idea, there is a growing 
sense of acknowledgement of the contribution of Judeo- 
Christian ideals to the condition of the environment 
which has in turn resulted in a concurrent counterrevo- 
lution designed to correct any harm done. 



The culpability of the Judeo-Christian tradition 
may be traced back to the creation story as related in the 
Bible: 

Let us make man in our image and like- 
ness to rule the fish in the sea, the 
birds in the sky, the cattle, all the wild 
animals on earth, all the reptiles that 
crawl upon the earth. So God created 
them in his own image and blessed 
them and said to them "be fruitful and 
multiply, and fill the earth and subdue 
it; and have dominion over the fish of 
the sea and the over the birds of the 
air and over every living thing that 
moves upon the earth (Genesis 1:26- 
29). 
In this passage, some have found an excuse, if not a 
moral justification, for humankind's management of the 
environment. We take this view as free license to treat 
the environment as a means to our ends, valued only in 
the uses that we find for it. As Des Jardins explains, 
White does not claim that "this is the only or the most 
reasonable interpretation of Christian theology," but 
rather the interpretation that many Jews and Christians 
have given to the story. Loren Wilkinson points out this 
distinction: the fault lies in the difference between Chris- 
tianity and Christendom (the way that Christians have 
lived their lives) (Fowler 61). Some would alternately 
interpret the creation story as a command for humans to 
act as stewards of the earth. Nonetheless, the fact re- 



mains that the former view has been the predominant 
one throughout Western history. While Christianity may 
not directly cause environmental destruction, it is used 
to legitimate human use of nature in harmful ways. 

The sub-themes of this passage influence our 
behavior towards the environment. The meaning attrib- 
uted to the beginning of the passage is the idea that we 
are made in God's likeness, which leads to a feeling of 
superiority toward nature. Along with this, our species 
developed a sense of distance from nature, as if we were 
somehow separate or apart from the rest of creation. As 
philosopher and theologian John B. Cobb Jr. puts it, it is 
as if "humans are called to dominate the nonhuman 
world." He further illustrates the pervasiveness of this 
viewpoint by quoting White: "Man and nature are two 
things, and man is master" (Cobb 22). This idea endured 
throughout the different intellectual movements of hu- 
man history. Cobb reports, "even when biblical author- 
ity became questionable in the nineteenth century, the 
vision of human lordship over the nonhuman world was 
not doubted. Even the rise of evolutionary theory did 
little to give humans a sense of kinship with other ani- 
mals" (22). Despite new ideas of equality and relation, 
humans chose to continue to perceive themselves as 
above and apart from nature. 

Lloyd Geering, a professor of religious studies, 
also observes this strange duality wherein humankind is 
presented as "over against the world enjoying a state of 
dominion or lordship" (4). Geering further develops this 
idea by claiming that this sense of superiority is a prod- 
uct of another Christian ideal, the ascension to heaven. 
By this assertion he refers to the concept that salvation 
in Christian teaching has traditionally been understood 
as deliverance from the physical, material, bodily world. 
Geering relates that the "very first Christians expected 
the earth to be destroyed and replaced by a new earth. 
Later Christians believed their ultimate destiny to be far 
away from this planet" (3). He quotes Tim Cooper's 
writing, "Most Christians still envisage leaving the earth 
when they die and going 'up' to heaven" (screen 4). 
From this perspective, the condition and fate of the earth 
are of little consequence to a given individual after his/ 
her death. There is little incentive to preserve a 'tempo- 
rary' home. In addition, this train of thought helps to 
sever any sense of connection to the world around us. 

Not only has the Judeo-Christian tradition been 
characterized by a disjunction of man from nature, but it 
also features a separation of God from nature. The medi- 
eval conception of spirituality reflects this ideal. At that 
time, the word connotated the supernatural as distinct 
from the material. The people of this era believed that 



through one's spirituality one could "move away from 
the world toward unity with God, who is apart from the 
world" (McDaniel 30). Geering cites this idea of "God 
the Creator over against the created world" as a further 
duality of Christian orthodoxy (4). The logical idea de- 
veloping out of this view is that if God himself is sepa- 
rate from his creation, aren't we, who are created in his 
likeness, also somehow separate? Again, we are faced 
with the sense that nature has no worth on its own. 
Since nature is of little importance to God, by the same 
token it is of little relevance to humans. We alone are the 
divine's most treasured possession. This division is 
symptomatic of the attitudes that allowed for maltreat- 
ment of the earth for such a long period of time. 

The imperative to dominate the earth gains fur- 
ther strength from the phrase "be fruitful and multiply, 
and fill the earth and subdue it." This particular maxim 
has often been taken to mean that there is a divine im- 
perative and obligation to have a large family. Yet this 
idea runs counter to the recent calls for significant popu- 
lation policies to control population growth. Traditional 
Christianity and church doctrine have both held with 
the former view, resulting in further environmental dev- 
astation. Cobb maintains this idea when he assigns a 
sense of accountability to the Judeo-Christian ideal that 
every human individual is of absolute value. He ex- 
plains that this deeply implanted idea has resulted in 
efforts to direct the advancement of science and tech- 
nology in such ways as would cause the prolongation 
of human life. These efforts and their relative success 
are in turn a direct contribution to the burgeoning popu- 
lation of the earth (23). A growing population minimizes 
the distribution of the earth's resources and strains its 
ability to sustain life. This in turn results in environmen- 
tal harm. When individuals are trying to meet their living 
needs they have little time to contemplate environmen- 
tal concerns. In this way, the tenets of human separa- 
tion/superiority and the value of every individual hu- 
man life has served to engender an ecological crisis. 
Cobb points out that the combination of these Judeo- 
Christian ideals has served to further reduce the value of 
the world to humans. 

There are those who use the same scriptures to 
argue that the Judeo-Christian tradition itself supports a 
stance of environmental preservation. They put forth 
the idea that these ideals mandate that humankind act as 
stewards of the earth. According to Eric Katz, in re- 
sponse to the oft-cited Genesis passage, the Jewish tra- 
dition does not interpret this passage to mean that the 
earth belongs to the human race. He cites Norman 
Lamm's observation that the next line from this same 



Genesis passage limits humans to a vegetarian diet. 
According to Katz, in this way, "The Torah thus limits 
the human right to 'subdue' and use nature; this com- 
mand is not title to unbridled domination" (Tucker and 
Grim 57). Katz cites other passages from the Bible to 
support this concept of human stewardship. He points 
to Genesis 2:14, which reads "And ... God ... put him 
into the garden of Eden to till it and to keep it." Psalm 24 
also supports this notion: "The earth is the Lord's and 
the fulness thereof, the world and those who dwell 
therein." The central tenet of Katz's argument is that 
Judaism does not advocate the wanton destruction of 
the environment. Rather, he expresses the idea that Ju- 
daism does not promote either the domination-destruc- 
tion or the preservation of the natural environment but 
its conservation and wise developmental use (Tucker 
and Grim 57). 

To facilitate understanding of this concept, Katz 
examines the distinction between dominion and stew- 
ardship. The former entails an unrestricted ownership 
and total power over the subordinate entity, while the 
latter strictly limits power because it denies ownership 
(58). As Katz notes, "in Judaism, the world belongs to 
God" (58). The Judaic tradition never claims a transfer- 
ence of ownership from God to humans. It even goes so 
far as to say that humans do not even have total control 
over their own activities, much less the land. Katz tells 
of several commandments that give weight to this claim. 
These commandments include a provision for the ethi- 
cal treatment of animals and concern for their suffering 
(Deut. 22:6), the prohibition of a scorched earth policy in 
warfare (Deut. 22:19-20), and admonishment of the ex- 
tinction of species (Lev. 22: 1 8, Deut. 22:6) (Tucker and 
Grim 60-62). In this manner, individuals such as Katz 
have attempted to make the case that the Judaic tradi- 
tion is not responsible for the level of environmental 
degradation that the world is currently faced with. 

Regardless of the cause of the current state of the 
earth, it is virtually universally agreed that fundamental 
changes in attitudes and styles of living must be under- 
taken to ensure the survival of all elements of creation. 
Since the origin of our peril has been attributed to the 
Judeo-Christian tradition, some also look to this source 
for a solution. Elements of the ecumenical church are 
responding with enthusiasm. A variety of responses 
and new theologies have been developed. But the ques- 
tion arises, can a tradition that has for so long been used 
to wreak environmental havoc change enough to pro- 
vide a method for the salvation of the earth and its crea- 
tures? 

Based on the perspectives presented and the ideas 



proposed it would seem that a new Judeo-Christian tra- 
dition may indeed provide the means to preserve cre- 
ation as we know it. McDaniel reports that some of 
these changes may require radical shifts in the daily/ 
traditional Christian perception of God and creation. 
According to McDaniel, these shifts are necessary, if 
not long overdue. He proposes that Christianity should 
be a dynamic, evolving way of looking at the world and 
spirituality rather than a static set of archaic rules for 
living. The change in attitudes proposed by McDaniel 
require a reexamination of the ideals under which estab- 
lished Judeo-Christian philosophy has operated for two 
millennia. The new ecologically aware Judeo-Christian 
tradition calls upon followers to disregard the dualities 
of its predecessor. 

McDaniel begins by refuting the duality "of hu- 
mans over against the planet, as if we were temporary 
visitors who do not properly belong here but are des- 
tined for another world" (Geering 5). He argues for an 
expansion of the Judeo-Christian outlook wherein hu- 
mans realize their interconnectedness with nature. 
McDaniel says we must begin by thinking relationally 
and by "feel[ing] the presence of other living beings and 
the natural world as if they are a part of us" (McDaniel 
29). In this way, our concept of spirituality is redefined; 
he says, "in an ecological spirituality we feel intimately 
related to these living beings [other people, plants and 
animals, the earth and sky, objects of the imagination, 
and God], recognizing that their existence cannot be 
separated from our own" (McDaniel 30). The theologi- 
cal philosopher develops a new conception of creation 
and nature in which the two terms are synonymous. In 
this view, perceiving ourselves as part of nature serves 
two purposes. 

First, it is to say that we are united 
with our fellow creatures - including 
the land and its soil - in mutual de- 
pendence upon god. Second, it is to 
say that we are united as mutual sub- 
jects of God's love (McDaniel 98). 
Like the critics of contemporary Christian philosophy, 
McDaniel is able to derive support for his views from 
Scripture. He seeks to extend Matthew 19:19, "Love 
your neighbor as yourself in such a way that we con- 
ceive of our neighbor (with this term inclusive of all cre- 
ation ) as a part of ourselves. McDaniel and others argue 
for a God who is not of the Judeo-Christian tradition that 
includes tenets that only humans have souls. If this 
were true, then what basis would we have for respecting 
the lives of animals or plants? Without the presence of 
a soul, what capacity is there to feel joy or suffering? 



Surely God did not create plants and animals as soulless 
automatons whose only purpose is human enjoyment. 
Contrary to these antiquated notions, the evolving eco- 
logical spirituality recognizes God as a being who "loves 
each and every creature for its own sake" (Tucker and 
Grim 80). Even in Genesis it states that God perceives 
the nonhuman world is good. Given this, we can deter- 
mine that God does care for nonhuman elements of cre- 
ation. 

In addition, there is an emerging view that we must 
extend our sense of connectedness to the nonliving as 
well as the living. This view posits that there are ele- 
ments of all creation in all things, including the soil and 
the rocks and the mountains. It is a view that says that 
we are the earth in flesh. As Ecclesiastes 3:20 states, "all 
come from dust, and to dust all return." By this reason- 
ing we can recognize an intrinsic value of the land in 
addition to the instrumental value (McDaniel 93). The 
land does not only provide us with a method to grow 
crops for our sustenance. Rather, it, too, is an expres- 
sion of God's love and creativity, as we are. We need 
only to look around at our surroundings to find and 
experience God. When we adopt this viewpoint, we aban- 
don the old Judeo-Christian hierarchy that placed hu- 
mans separate from and above nature. 

Many ecologically-minded Christian thinkers extend 
this line of thought in an effort to dispel another of 
Christianity's major dualities: "the duality of a self-con- 
tained being separate from the universe which he/she 
has supposedly created" (Geering 5). In direct contra- 
diction to this precept of Christianity, a new perspective 
has developed in which "God is the psyche, the heart, of 
the universe, and the universe is God's body" (McDaniel 
104). This outlook is used to express the belief that God 
permeates all of existence. It goes on to convey the 
notion that "God 'feels the feelings' of living beings, 
suffering with the sufferings and enjoying with the joys, 
and in so doing God's own life is affected" (McDaniel 
29). In ridding ourselves of these dualities we can deter- 
mine a unity of creation. As Robert B. Fowler puts it, 
"People are part of nature and thus part of God or, to put 
it another way, part of God and thus part of nature" 
(119). By this logic, "humanity every where, irrespective 
of race, color, gender or tradition, has the capacity to 
enflesh and mediate the divine" (Geering 8). In addition, 
we humans can no longer see ourselves as apart from 
and over nature. Our sense of superiority must be rel- 
egated to the past along with other fundamentals of the 
Judeo-Christian tradition. Ecological Christianity de- 
mands that we experience God as "immersed in the uni- 
verse and in our inner being" (Bianchi par. 3). This sense 



of unity and the omnipresence of God is mirrored in simi- 
lar but separate strains of ecological spirituality. 

In what seems to be another radical divergence 
from traditional thought, the ecological Christian reform- 
ers call for a new look at the creation story. The advo- 
cates of change are willing to accept and even embrace 
theories of evolution. No longer do we see the long- 
standing rivalry/animosity between Christianity and sci- 
ence. The acceptance of this new story of origins places 
humans back among our proper standing with the many 
and diverse life forms on this planet (Geering 5). We are 
again united with nature and given no basis to claim 
superiority; Geering says, "we humans, by the very ge- 
netic code out of which we are formed, are cousins to all 
other forms of planetary life. We have no special rights 
of ownership and dominion over the other forms of life" 
(5). This acceptance of evolution has played an integral 
part in shaping the two main schools of thought in eco- 
theology. Fowler explains one of these deviations, cre- 
ation theology, in the following manner: 

Proponents of creation theology cel- 
ebrate what they see as a glorious and 
unending creation (or evolution) that 
they perceive to be the central reality 
in the universe. They laud holism and 
deny dualism on any level. Though 
they normally acknowledge Christ, the 
Christ in creation theology often meta- 
morphoses into the "cosmic" Christ, 
a figure who summons all life to divin- 
ity and represents the interrelatedness 
of every thing (101). 
To creation theologians, creation is an evolving, unend- 
ing process. In this school of thought, all members of 
creation are active partners in the ongoing process of 
creation. They choose to eliminate any distinction be- 
tween human beings and the rest of nature. According 
to Fowler, "the goal is both to humble the human and to 
exalt the rest of nature" ( 1 03). Only by doing this will we 
feel a sense of connection and responsibility to the rest 
of creation. 

The other type of eco-theology, process theology, 
takes on a similar perspective. Again, in Fowler's words: 
The basic idea of process theology is 
that the universe is always develop- 
ing and always in process, an always 
changing whole in which each part 
includes all others. In this concep- 
tion of reality, dualisms, hierarchies, 
and fixed truths make no sense. What 
matters is the development and flow 



that infuse all aspects of the universe 
(108). 
The distinction between the two theologies is that pro- 
cess theology tends to be more focused on the idea of 
continuing development in the universe, creation theol- 
ogy on the realin' of continuing creation in the universe 
(Fowler 108). Process theologians argue that the uni- 
verse and God together are involved in evolution and 
are moving toward a teleological fulfillment of the goal 
of ever greater understanding and connection with each 
other (Fowler 1 16). Thus we are given a sense of pur- 
pose that includes self-actualization which requires an 
understanding that we are all equally connected to God 
and all parts of reality. The more connected we become, 
the more the whole of creation benefits. Despite this 
holistic approach, process theologians refuse to assert 
that the whole is more important than any of its indi- 
vidual parts. The core of the process movement is that 
"each entity, small or large, creates itself, but God works 
as a 'lure' that pulls the universe's elements along. God 
lures each thing to realize itself, and the ultimate goal is 
the realization of all potential" (Fowler 1 12). In this man- 
ner, God is present within all of us and all of creation. 
Thereby every element of the universe develops intrin- 
sic value. 

It is in these ways that the new ecological spiritual- 
ity developing within Christian confines seeks to redeem 
humankind and its treatment of the environment. There 
are those who seek to remain within the traditional 
boundaries of Judeo-Christian thought by seeking eco- 
logical cures within the existing framework. They con- 
tinue to espouse the notion of stewardship and argue 
that we should preserve creation because it is a testa- 
ment to God's glory. However, as McDaniel notes, stew- 
ardship lends itself to attitudes of separation from the 
rest of creation (Tucker and Grim 74). Additionally, the 
idea of stewardship implies hierarchies and superiority 
(Fowler 1 19). Thusly, these efforts to hold on to tradi- 
tional strains of thought will not serve to advance the 
cause of preserving and restoring the environment. 
Christians and non-Christians alike must learn to em- 
brace the new ideals and attitudes advanced by the lead- 
ing thinkers of ecological Christianity. Cobb reports that 
this transition may be difficult. He expresses the senti- 
ment in the following passage: 

What Western humanists and Chris- 
tians do find difficult is to adopt 
Schweitzer's self-giving devotion to 
the service of human need and his vi- 
sion of all life as worthy of reverence. 
The former stands squarely in the tra- 



dition of Christian devotion. The lat- 
ter transcends or extends it (3 1 ). 
In this manner, Christians must seek to mold a new Chris- 
tianity, one that is more open to the insights of other 
religious paths as well as more secular efforts to pre- 
serve the environment. Only by embracing the sense of 
unity and oneness advocated in ecological spirituality 
can humans hope to preserve God's creation. 



Works Cited 

Bianchi, Eugene C. "Ecospirituality — Necessary for a Re 
sponse to Eco-Injustice?" Earthkeeping News. 9 
Dec. 1999. 
<http://www.nacce.org/1998/bianci.html> 

Cobb, John B., Jr. Is it Too Late? A Theology of 
Ecology. Denton, TX: Environmental 
Ethics Books, 1995. 

Des Jardins, Joseph R. Environmental Ethics: An 
Introduction to Environmental Philosophy. 
Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing 
Company, 1997. 

Fowler, Robert Booth. The Greening of Protestant 
Thought. Chapel Hill, NC: The Univer 
sity of North Carolina Press, 1995. 

Geering, Lloyd. "Economics, Ecology, Ethics: 

Making the Connections Theologically, or 
Christianity in the Ecological Age." Sea 
of Faith Conference, 1996. 9 Dec. 1999. 
http://www.sofn.org.uk/lg96conf.html 

McDaniel, Jay B. Earth, Sky, Gods, and Mortals: 
Developing an Ecological Spirituality. 
Mystic, CT: Twenty-Third Publications, 
1990. 

Tucker, Mary Evelyn, and John A. Grim, Eds. 

Worldviews and Ecology: Religion, Phil- 
osophy, and the Environment. Maryknoll, 
NY: Orbis Books, 1997. 



Cautionary Tales: 

Ecocriticism and Science Fiction 

Elizabeth Madrie 



Science fiction is a genre of literature that, despite its immense popularity, is often ignored by scholars. 
I sought to change that. This paper studies three well-known works of science fiction in terms of the environmen- 
tal messages — or warnings — that they convey. 



Ursula K. Le Guin once referred to science fic- 
tion as "a personal variation on reality" (Le Guin 17). 
Perhaps this could describe any fiction, but with science 
fiction, it seems especially appropriate. The science fic- 
tion author has the freedom to alter time, space, even 
reality as a whole, to suit her needs. She can invent 
things, races of people, and planets that never existed. 
The setting can be a distant planet or a distant time, or 
an Earth so similar to our own that it is haunting. This 
makes it easy to make parallels to our own situations. 
Much of science fiction is allegory, and it is often very 
thinly veiled allegory. Perhaps this is why it is often 
ignored critically as a genre. Alien races can easily be 
substitutes for different races of humans; hostile alien 
takeovers can be read as terrestrial political disputes. 
Tales of the future are often read as what can happen if 
continue our self-destructive ways. 

These "warning stories" often involve the en- 
vironment. Many stories have been written about what 
will happen if we continue our wasteful lifestyles or do 
not alter our exploitive mindset about our environment. 
Other planets provide an excellent canvas on which to 
paint a warning for our own world (Hovanec 84). 

Ursula K. Le Guin's novella The Word for World 
is Forest is one such warning. It addresses the very 
mindset that is destructive to the environment. This 
mindset is the usually American idea that nature and 
less technologically developed civilizations are ours for 
the exploiting. Le Guin states in the introduction, "The 
victory of the ethic of exploitation, in all societies, seemed 
as inevitable as it was disastrous" (qtd. in Hovanec 85). 
Le Guin attacks this "ethic of exploitation" in the no- 
vella. 



The novella is set in the future on the planet 
with the ironic name of New Tahiti. Humans have de- 
stroyed all nature on their own planet and turned it into 
a "desert of cement" (Le Guin 14). New Tahiti has been 
chosen as a source of wood and its native population, 
the Athsheans, has been enslaved. The slaves revolt, 
kill the humans, and the planet, now called "World 41," 
is put under League Ban, meaning it is no longer a candi- 
date for colonization. 

The first chapter is from the point of view of the 
very stereotypical misogynist military man. Captain Don 
Davidson. He considers himself a "world tamer," and 
New Tahiti is a new conquest. His race, men, is superior, 
and he threatens the planet in his thoughts: "You'll learn 
what that means pretty soon, you godforsaken damn 
planet" (Le Guin 11). He thinks that New Tahiti was 
"literally made for men," that is, after it is "cleaned up 
and cleaned out, the dark forests cut down for open 
fields of grain, the primeval murk and savagery and ig- 
norance wiped out" (12-13). 

In the novella, humans have not had much luck 
ecologically so far. Earth is covered in cement, devoid 
of wood, and hunters are forced to hunt "robodeer". 
The characters talk about a failed waste management 
facility called "Dump Island" that was destroyed by ero- 
sion. According to Davidson's theories, this failure is 
inconsequential because it is easy to start over on a new 
planet. 

Furthermore, the humans' "ethics of exploita- 
tion" are apparent in more than Captain Davidson's atti- 
tude toward the environment. On the day the story be- 
gins, a shipment of girls is arriving from Earth. Davidson 
is not interested in those coming as brides for the men; 



he concentrates on those twenty or thirty who are the 
"Recreation Staff." This method of treating women as 
playthings is directly connected to the way the humans 
exploit the environment of New Tahiti. 

Ironically, it is possible to break "Ecological 
Protocols" on New Tahiti. A character named Kees Van 
Sten admonishes Davidson for letting his men hunt a 
rare native species of deer. Of course, Davidson sees 
nothing wrong with a little "extra-legal hunting" if it helps 
the men get through "this godforsaken life" (Le Guin 
13). How did the government decide that it would be 
illegal for people who are destroying a planet and an 
ecosystem by harvesting the trees in the name of Earth 
to hunt a certain species of deer? It seems very hypo- 
critical. 

The humans' exploitation is also evident in their 
treatment of the native population. The proper human 
name for the natives is Athsheans or hilfs, but Davidson 
calls them creechies. They are, of course, treated horri- 
bly by the humans. The natives toil in the humans' tree- 
harvesting operations, they are raped by the men, and 
their villages are burned in "recreational" raids. Davidson 
summarizes his feelings on the Athsheans as follows: 
"Primitive races always have to give way to civilised 
ones. Or be assimilated. But we sure as hell can't as- 
similate a lot of green monkeys" (qtd. in Hovanec 88). 
One of the other human characters, Captain Raj Lyubov 
(note the eastern name) has a very different perspective 
on the natives. He sees them as noble savages, and 
befriends his Athshean servant, Selver. He has an ideal- 
ized view of the natives and their planet. In fact, he 
believes them to be incapable of murder. This proves to 
be untrue. He eventually becomes an outcast of both 
societies and is killed in a raid (Hovanec 89). 

The Athsheans identify greatly with nature. 
Their clan names are tree names, and they consider trees 
as alive as any animal. When they see a tree cut down, 
the leaking sap looks like blood. T heir identification 
with nature makes the human destruction of their planet 
all the more painful. 

The relationship of the Athsheans and the hu- 
mans can easily be paralleled with any native Earth popu- 
lation and any conquering civilization. In fact. Captain 
Davidson refers to himself as one of the old European 
explorers, "The old Conquistador" (Le Guin 14). The 
way Davidson describes New Tahiti as paradise is simi- 
lar to the way the first explorers to North America de- 
scribed the New World. Columbus called America "mar- 
velous... most beautiful" with inhabitants who were 
"guileless and so generous." Michael Drayton praised 
Virginia as "Earth's only paradise. . . to whose the golden 



age / Still nature's laws doth give" (Hovanec 86). These 
comments are actually similar to both Davidson and 
Lyubov's views of the planet - Davidson's impression 
of the land and Lyubov's beliefs that the inhabitants 
could do no evil. However, both New Tahiti and the New 
World were not as good as they seemed. The Puritans 
did not feel the same as the explorers did. To them, the 
wilderness was evil. On New Tahiti, the idyllic situation 
with submissive natives was soon destroyed. This is 
where the similarities end, however, because the native 
population of North America has yet to fight back against 
their oppressors with any effects. 

In The Word for World is Forest, the nature on 
another planet is used and exploited to teach us Earth- 
lings a lesson. We must change our destructive mindset, 
or the oppressed peoples and perhaps the land itself will 
rise up and fight back. Le Guin shows us that we can not 
just have our way with nature; we can not just use it up 
and throw it away. Yet this is just one way nature is used 
in the genre of science fiction. The highly popular Dune 
series by Frank Herbert is deeply entwined with nature 
in a very different way. Dune and the three books Dune 
Messiah, Children of Dune, and God Emperor of Dune 
that follow it bring up important issues of conservation 
and the interrelatedness of things without being an ob- 
vious lesson to us on Earth. 

The setting of Dune is the planet Arrakis, also 
known simply as Dune. It is a harsh desert planet with a 
frightening lack of water. The young royal boy, Paul 
Atreides, must overcome the evil political power of the 
Harkonnen, who assinated the former ruler, Duke Leto. 
To fight the Harkonnen, Paul must ally himself with their 
hardy enemies, the Fremen. 

The Fremen have adapted to their environment 
through technology. They wear stillsuits, devices that 
recycle every ounce of water their body has. To go out 
into the Dune desert, one must wear a stillsuit. In a 
Fremen stillsuit, the average water loss in the desert is a 
thimbleful a day. This conservation is necessary to sur- 
vive in the harsh Arrakis desert. 

The Fremen understand the importance of the 
conservation of water. Their social and religious life is 
permeated with respect for the scarcity of water. Their 
dependence upon water can be seen in their burial cus- 
toms: a dead warrior's water is reclaimed in the "death 
still" (Scigaj 349). When Paul fights and kills a Fremen 
warrior, he is obligated to take the other body's water. 

Paul accepts the man's water, which is pre- 
sented to him in "watercounters," objects that symbol- 
ize that he owns the thirty liters of water distilled from 
the man. The water is kept in an underground reservoir. 



When Paul cries at the man's funeral, everyone is shocked 
and mutters, "He gives moisture to the dead" (Herbert 
314). They all touch his cheeks to feel the great sacrifice 
Paul has made. The Fremen dream of someday making 
Dune green with their reservoirs of water. 

As usually happens with the privileged upper 
class, the ruling class on Dune leads a much easier life 
than the Fremen. A row of palm trees is planted in front 
of the house in which the Duke and his family live. S 
hortly after coming to Arrakis, Jessica, Paul's mother, 
notices how the common people all stare at the trees. 
Another character, Yueh explains, "They look at those 
trees and think: 'There are one hundred of us' . . . Those 
are date palms. One date palm requires forty liters of 
water a day. A man requires but eight liters. A palm, 
then, equals five men. There are twenty palms out there 
- one hundred men" (Herbert 59). The wastefulness of 
the upper class is a sharp contrast to the harsh life of the 
Fremen. 

On Earth, our use of natural resources more 
resembles the wasteful upper class than the conserva- 
tion-minded Fremen. Our careless use of water and our 
"ethics of exploitation" would mean death on Arrakis. 
The harsh life of the Fremen teaches a subtle lesson 
about how we treat our natural resources on Earth. True, 
we have more than they do on Dune, but our resources 
are also limited. Eventually we will exhaust them all if we 
do not begin stricter conservation policies. 

Water is not the only precious natural resource 
on Dune. The chief export is spice, or melange, a highly 
addictive food additive and important dietary staple for 
natives of the planet. It is revealed late in the novel that 
the spice is produced by the sandworms, huge, danger- 
ous creatures that live deep in the desert. The Fremen 
understand the importance of spice (both as food and as 
an ingredient for many religious rituals), and understand 
the relationship between spice and the sandworms. 
While the other inhabitants of the planet are deathly 
afraid of the sandworms, it is a Fremen rite of passage to 
ride one. This symbolizes the interrelatedness of the 
Fremen, spice, and the sandworms. 

The Fremen's dreams of a green Dune begin to 
be realized in Children of Dune, when Leto II, Paul's 
son, is able to take control over the ecology of the planet. 
However, the sandworms cannot live in any biome but a 
desert, and begin to die out. This, of course, means that 
spice is becoming rare. This is ironic because it was 
profits from spice export that funded the environmental 
changes (Scigaj 343). 

The loss of the desert also means the death of 
the Fremen way of life. They lose their sense of commu- 



nity and their sense of ecological responsibility. As 
harsh as the Dune desert was, it was necessary for the 
production of spice and for the preservation of the Fremen 
culture. 

This demonstrates an important ideology of 
ecology. We should not tamper with the environment. 
We may think we are improving it, but there are creatures 
(and perhaps people) who depend on that environment 
just the way it is. Leto II kills himself — destroying the 
devices fueling the environmental change in the pro- 
cess - to reestablish the sandworm cycle and save Dune. 
On Earth, one can probably not commit honorable sui- 
cide and solve all of the planet's environmental prob- 
lems, but Leto IPs act does suggest small sacrifices we 
can make to help the Earth. 

The harsh climate of Dune and the strict con- 
servation policies of the Fremen show us a different kind 
of nature than we have on Earth. Their situation is some- 
what exaggerated, but is reminiscent of situations on 
our planet. We are wasteful, and we do have resources 
that may be exhausted soon. We can thus learn some- 
thing from the Fremen. Like The Word for World is For- 
est, Dune and the other books in the series show us a 
different environment and mirror our approaches to na- 
ture. In addition, Ray Bradbury's famous science fiction 
work, The Martian Chronicles, like The Word for World 
is Forest, is about the colonization of another planet. 
This time, it is our neighbor, Mars. 

Like New Tahiti, Mars is inhabited. The Mar- 
tians are etheral beings who communicate telepathically. 
The first human expeditions to Mars are killed by the 
Martians, or meet accidental deaths, but the Fourth Ex- 
pedition reaches a deserted Mars. They discover that 
the natives were killed by chicken pox. This is a direct 
reference to the smallpox that the Europeans brought to 
the unsuspecting Native Americans. The Europeans 
had built up immunity to the disease, but the Native 
Americans were unprepared. One character in The Mar- 
tian Chronicles, Spender, bemoans the fate of the noble 
Martians: 

A race builds itself for a million years, 
refines itself, erects cities like those 
out there, does everything it can to 
give itself to respect and beauty, and 
then it dies . . . Does . . . Mars die of a 
disease with a fine name or a terrify- 
ing name or a majestic name? No, in 
the name of all that's holy, it has to be 
chicken pox, a child's disease, a dis- 
ease that doesn't even kill children 
on Earth! It's not riaht and it's not fair 



(Bradbury 51). 
Smallpox is not a disease with a terrifying or majestic 
name, either. It is smallpox. Here, Spender admits that 
the race that they wiped out were not savages. They 
built beautiful cities and were very culturally advanced. 
It is not quite the theory of the "noble savage" because 
the Martians were not savages, but they were noble. 
The rest of the crew is unsympathetic to the plight of the 
Native Martians, but by including Spender's concern, 
Bradbury addresses one of the problems of coloniza- 
tion, that of destroying the culture of the native inhabit- 
ants. 

Two chapters that follow sum up the Earthlings' 
colonization of Mars. One. "December, 2001 : The Green 
Morning," has a directly environmental theme. It is the 
story of a Johnny Appleseed character, Benjamin Dnscoll. 
His dream is to cover Mars with trees. Mars has enough 
oxygen to support human life, but the air is thin, like at 
the top of a mountain. Benjamin's goal is to plant enough 
oxygen-producing trees to make the air easy to breathe. 
He travels the countryside on a motorcycle planting trees. 
One night it rains and trees spring up like magic, making 
the entire valley around him, lush and green. This is 
described as a good thing, but after thinking about what 
happened to Dune when humans meddled with the ecol- 
ogy of the planet, one realizes that there could be un- 
foreseen problems. The environment of Mars, however, 
seems to welcome the trees because they reproduce 
magically, instantly changing the landscape and the en- 
vironment. This may be beneficial to the humans, but 
seems to violate the very "Mars-ness" of Mars. 

Another chapter, "2004-2005: The Naming of 
Names," addresses an interesting step in the conquer- 
ing process, the renaming of land formations. The re- 
naming is described as follows: 

The old Martian names were names of 
water and air and hills. They were the 
names of snows that emptied south in 
stone canals to fill the empty seas... 
And the rockets struck at the names 
like hammers, breaking away the 
marble into shale, shattering the crock- 
ery milestones that named the old 
towns, in the rubble of which great 
pylon were plunged with new names: 
IRON TOWN. STEEL TOWN. ALU- 
MINUM CITY. ELECTRIC VILLAGE, 
CORN TOWN, GRAIN VILLA, DE- 
TROIT II. and the mechanical names 
and the metal names were from Earth 
(Bradbury 102, 103). 



The cities and landmarks are also named with the names 
of important humans. This renaming is a very important 
issue in the area of colonization. How often these days 
do we hear of a city or a mountain that will now be re- 
ferred to by its name given to it by the native population 
instead of the colonizing one? The act of reverting to 
the old name is seen as a tribute, or even a sort of apol- 
ogy to the native people. But in this chapter, we see the 
renaming of things and the destruction and discarding 
of the old Martian names. The old names are significant 
because they are natural names. The new names are 
mechanical, artificial names and names of Earth people. 
It seems to be an insult to the noble Martian landscape 
to tag it with these petty Earth names. It is an attack on 
the land itself. This act of renaming, like the planting of 
trees, seems to rob Mars of something only it can pos- 
sess. The inclusion of this chapter shows the author's 
sensitivity to the plight of native populations. 

Humans settle Mars in the years to follow, but 
the Martian colonies of settlers from Earth always seem 
lonely and sparsely populated. The inhabitants are 
acutely aware that it is not home. Finally, a war begins 
on Earth and almost everyone goes home to be with 
relatives during the war. Those that are left on Mars see 
Earth explode in a "tiny red flame in the sky" (Bradbury 
157). The destruction of Earth is told through the per- 
spective of one of the remaining families on Mars. The 
father tells his children that some people would escape 
Earth before it was destroyed, enough to continue life of 
Mars. However, they must think of themselves as Mar- 
tians, not Earthlings. The father considers the inhabit- 
ants of Earth evil, and wants to erase all ties to the now 
destroyed planet. He blows up the rocket that brought 
his family to Mars so they can never go back. He advo- 
cates a new, Martian way of life. He tells his children. 
Life on Earth never settled down to 
anything very good. Science ran too 
far ahead of us too quickly, and the 
people got lost in mechanical wilder- 
ness, like children making over pretty 
things, gadgets, helicopters, rockets; 
emphasizing the wrong items, empha- 
sizing machines instead of how to run 
the machines. Wars got bigger and 
bigger and finally killed Earth 
(Bradbury 179. 180). 
This is a direct criticism of the way we live on 
Earth. We depend too heavily on gadgets and machines. 
Perhaps we should concentrate on bettering ourselves 
instead of our technology. The Martians seemed to have 
a more balanced, environment-aware mindset. Also, they 



were judged to be inferior to Earthlings by very unfair 
standards - Earth standards. Perhaps the conquering 
Europeans were not more culturally advanced than the 
Native Americans were. Sometimes the worth of a cul- 
ture becomes apparent after that culture is almost oblit- 
erated. 

The final chapter of The Martian Chronicles 
seems to offer the new Martians a chance to start over. 
The final self-destruction of the "mother country" will 
force the new inhabitants of Mars to learn from mistakes 
made by Earth and adapt to their new land. The charac- 
ters at the end of The Martian Chronicles seem to be 
willing to work with the land at the end and willing to let 
it shape them instead of forcing themselves onto it. 

All three of these books show a different per- 
spective on nature, yet they all suggest that we need to 
show more respect for the land of whatever planet we 
live on. In The Word for World is Forest, it is the rebel- 
lious natives that teach this lesson. In Dune, the hardy 
Fremen show us that we need to conserve the natural 
resources that the land provides for us. The final de- 
struction of Earth by the its own inhabitants in The Mar- 
tian Chronicles shows us the folly of our selfish ways. 
Both The Word for World is Forest and The Martian 
Chronicles demonstrate the true nature of colonization 
and its effects on the native population and the land 
itself. These three works of science fiction have impor- 
tant lessons to teach us about nature and the nature of 
ourselves. 



Works Cited 

Bradbury, Ray. The Martian Chronicles, New York: 

Doubleday, 1950. 
Herbert, Frank. Dune. New York: Berkley, 1965. 
Hovanec, Carol P. "Visions of Nature in The Word for World 

is Forest." Extrapolation Spring, 1989: 84-92. 
Le Guin, Ursula K. The Word for World is Forest. London: 

Gollancz, 1977. 
Scigaj, Leonard M. "Prana and the Presbyterian Fixation: 

Ecology and Technology in Frank Herbert's Dune 

Tetralogy." Extrapolation Winter, 1983: 340-55. 



"Hysteria of Production and the 
Reproduction of the Real/' or 
The Changing Face of Commercial 
Television in Postmodern Society 

Kate McGann 



This paper is concerned with the state of advertising in today's society, a society that some refer to as 
"the postmodern condition. " It deals with the transformation of raw, high energy commercials to more sensitive, 
family centered ones. I hypothesize that this change is due to advertising s desire to assuage our feelings of fear 
and sense of loss in order to win our confidence in their products and their image. 



In recent postmodernist society where newness 
is imperative and speed is desired above all else, com- 
mercial television is strolling away from this modern idea 
and searching for a vehicle enabling advertising compa- 
nies to bring visions of peace, security, and family to a 
world of raw and oftentimes cutthroat individuals. While 
advertising is indeed a reflection and offspring of multi- 
national capitalism, it has recently taken on a new image 
attacking capitalist ideas of greed and power with themes 
of goodwill and hope. Companies, thus, are beginning 
to align themselves with a more humanist approach in- 
corporating the public's natural desire for comfort, safety, 
and security in their commercials — traits ironically con- 
trary to the paradigm of capitalistic practice, which both 
controls and creates these companies. 

Fredric Jameson notes this insurmountable con- 
nection between capitalism and society in saying: "Ev- 
ery position on postmodernism in culture — whether apo- 
logia or stigmatization — is also at one and the same time, 
and necessarily an implicitly or explicitly political stance 
on the nature of multinational capitalism today" (64). In 
abiding with this belief, commercial television is there- 
fore also taking a stance on the subject of postmodernist 
society. It seems as if the advertising gurus in America 
are beginning to sense a trend in the buying population. 
People are stressed out and looking for a way to unwind. 
Work is too long and too demanding, and moms are 
performing at an all time high level of energy and effi- 
ciency between the office and the station wagon. 



The world is spinning at a breakneck speed and people 
are buying new running shoes just to keep up. It should 
be no surprise that all of a sudden aromatherapy and 
yoga have come back into style, books on relaxation 
techniques are selling at an all time high, and everyone 
is re-learning how to breathe. It can be argued that this 
backlash of common people against the speed of mod- 
ern society has caused a giant paradigm shift in adver- 
tising today. 

Jameson writes in his essay, "Postmodernism, 
or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism": 
"Postmodernism[s]. . .own offensive features. . .no longer 
scandalize anyone and. . .have themselves become insti- 
tutionalized and are at one with the official culture of 
western society" (65). To many individuals, this thought 
is a frightening consideration. Could it be possible that 
we are so used to dishonesty, scandal, and pain that 
they no longer affect us, that we lack the humanity to be 
concerned with others as well as ourselves? Advertis- 
ing has smartened up to our insecurities and has un- 
leashed a whole slew of feel-good commercials, which 
attempt to clothe our grief and loss in cloaks of security 
and fulfillment. In this way, there has been a decrease in 
raucous commercials that emphasize being the best and 
conquering insurmountable obstacles; and in their place 
we have arrogant, yet quaintly subtle ads quietly admir- 
ing your obvious sense of direction and intelligence in 
choosing the crimson colored Hoover vacuum cleaner 
surrounded by antiques and Mozart over the Dust 



Buster's cute yet inherently mediocre sense of clean. 
Thus, there is a de-emphasis on loud, demanding adver- 
tising such as Coca Cola's Surge commercials, and a 
new emphasis on family, honesty, security and intelli- 
gence such as the countless ads for banking and insur- 
ance companies — "You're in good hands with All State," 
and AmSouth Bank, who claims unabashedly to be "The 
Relationship People." 

The period we arc currently living in is a time 
directly influenced by the centuries before; yet more 
than just influenced, it may be said that the 1990's is a 
time of confrontation concerning the paradigms and 
mores of the fifties, sixties and seventies. The 
postmodern tradition arguably began forming its present 
self in the 1950's with the newfound philosophy we call 
existentialism. One of the components to this belief was 
that for the first time in human history we held the power 
to annihilate ourselves in our own hands. We began to 
grasp the truth that our lives were precariously balanced 
on the whims of government leaders and shady busi- 
ness associates. This truth sent a giant culture shock 
wave through the traditional and secure minds of the 
fifties. With this fear came a time of chaos in the sixties 
where we began to profess love and not war and were 
really nothing more than terrified adolescents taunting 
the authority which surrounded us. This fake sense of 
freedom and community began to fade, however, upon 
entry into the eighties, and the public generally broke 
down. It was hard to profess sexual freedom when people 
began to die of AIDS, and hard to believe in anti confor- 
mity when the option was severe ostracization from the 
community. In truth, America was frightened. It seems 
America in 1999 is still frightened, if not more so. Adver- 
tising is clamping down on that fear and has made a slow 
transition to an emphasis on peace and on protecting 
oneself — as if the general public is readying itself for a 
blow. 

With TV Evangelists and half-baked 
astrologists proclaiming the end of the world, and the 
plague called AIDS and a disease known as cancer de- 
stroying a majority of our physical freedoms, people are 
beginning to buckle down. The world, in a sense, has 
become too big for us to handle. Jameson verifies this 
by saying: "The more powerful the vision of some in- 
creasingly total system or logic... the more powerless 
the reader comes to feel" (66). Every day we spend all of 
our time "reading" the world— advertising, work assign- 
ments, our children's and families actions— and it seems 
as if we have begun to realize that the world as we know 
it is running away without us, and there is no way of 
ever catching up. So, like hurt and defeated children, we 



return home for sustenance, security, and a sense of 
reality; only instead of mothers, the world of multina- 
tional advertising has become our bosomy embrace. 

Jameson notes a darkness subsumed in 
society's direct, whole-hearted, and arguably flawed but 
irreparable relationship with the capitalistic practice — 
he writes: "...This whole global, yet American, 
postmodern culture is the internal and superstructural 
expression of a whole new wave of American military 
and economic domination throughout the world in this 
sense... the underside of culture is blood, torture, death 
and horror" (65). 

This explicit idea is what humans innately sense 
and are terribly afraid of. This idea is the impetus behind 
our need for family, security, simplicity, and peace — and 
advertising has become the vehicle behind all of our 
needs and desires in this age. Jean Baudrillard insists 
that the ultimate slogan of power is "take your desires 
for reality," and advertising companies do this for us 
(199). They take our desire for the family that we never 
had, the security we cannot achieve, the freedom that is 
a nation of bunnies proverbial carrot, and makes it seem 
possible. Our idea of what is good, safe, and real is 
performed every fifteen minutes on the television screen, 
and we make it an integral and very real part of our lives. 
In giving our power of reason to advertising, we have 
given commercial television power to manipulate and 
create our lives. The interesting and frightening part lies 
in the fact that advertising both creates our lives by 
capitalistic practices and then attempts to give us a way 
out of these lives. It convinces us that speed is better, 
and in the same breath encourage us to slow down, 
breathe, converse, relate, sleep, and relax. Today there 
is even aromatherpay for infants, in Johnson and 
Johnson's soothing vapor bath, for you're never too 
young to wind down. 

Baudrillard notes, "In the absence of rules of 
the game, things become caught up in their own game; 
images become more real than real" (195). There are no 
efficient rules for our game because we have created 
them in error, and now there is nothing to fall back on. 
Who is to blame when teenage children kill other chil- 
dren for a pair of Nikes? Is it the company's fault with its 
appropriately advantageous motto "Just do it," or is it 
our fault for letting ourselves believe the right pair of 
shoes is really to die for? Once we have let the images 
and the falsehoods we are bombarded with daily con- 
sume what we know to be true, there is no turning back. 
Yet Baudrillard assumes we have already let this hap- 
pen; he believes, "It is now impossible to isolate the 
process of the real... images are more real than truth," 



but Sprite says, "Image is nothing, thirst is everything." 
If these two equations are set equal, we find either that 
nothing is more real than the truth, or thirst is more real 
than the truth, or perhaps everything is more real than 
the truth. This last idea seems to be the theme of most 
postmodern thought today, and I'm sure Coca-Cola ("the 
real thing") would agree (198). 

Baudrillard believes that this loss of realism 
causes us to desire a regression back to a time when we 
remember the truth, or it was believed the truth existed; 
he writes: "When the real is no longer what it used to be 
nostalgia assumes its real meaning" (197). For Ameri- 
cans nostalgia denotes a time when there was peace, 
when there was security, when the ideal family reigned. 
Companies have taken that theme of family and made it 
modern, emphasizing family in a number of interesting 
ways. One ad for Plymouth minivans has across the top 
in bold letters: "We listen to our mothers." The mothers, 
of course, are a panel of minivan driving experts, but the 
message is still there: We as consumers need someone 
to listen to, and family has always been the first place to 
go. This ad emphasizes advertising companies under- 
standing of our needs for familial ties, and we fall for it 
every time. 

Another genre of family-oriented commercials 
is the "meal in a hurry" advertisements that normally air 
on Lifetime, television for women, which allow women 
the opportunity to see a healthy and fast dinner for their 
children in Bagel Bites: "With pizza on a bagel, you can 
have pizza anytime." My personal favorite is a chaotic 
household with a mother in a perfect body and short 
skirt scrambling to find her briefcase, and below her is a 
pouty child attempting to display his newest art cre- 
ation. Finally she sees his little martyred face and de- 
cides for his trouble she will stop and make him a "real 
meal." The real meal turns out to be a can of Campbell's 
Chicken Noodle Soup. (If every college student I knew 
considered chicken noodle soup to be a "real meal," we 
would be a whole lot more satisfied on low budgets.) A 
fifties icon of motherly love transformed into a nineties 
woman with three jobs — a mother with three jobs is real- 
ity, Campbell's chicken noodle soup as a "real meal" is 
not. The connection the commercials make between a 
mother, her child, and a bowl of ready-made soup is not 
a connection with which we as humans intrinsically as- 
sociate. We do not consider opening a can of soup and 
dumping it into a pot to be any monumental or memo- 
rable act of love, but advertising has made it one — and 
the population has followed. 

There must be some shepherd for the popula- 
tion of America to follow, and corporations have ac- 



tively filled that role. At a crucial time, when we as a 
country realize that we cannot trust our government or 
our charismatic leader, advertising and corporations have 
become America's newest management. America, in re- 
ality, is not run by the government, but rather by giant 
corporations, and these corporations are working their 
hardest to make it seem like we don't have to. We live 
under the facade that it can really be that way. Corpora- 
tions keep busy thinking of new ways to help us relax, or 
to minimize our circle of concern — they spend their days 
attempting to make us believe they are taking care of us 
and our loved ones and providing us with peace and 
security, such as Visa, who assures us they are "every- 
where you want to be." We have not really stopped to 
decide if we want Visa to be everywhere, but we cannot 
escape the reality we have built for ourselves, because 
this reality is that we are effective, intelligent people and 
that we, our families, and our country "deserve more," to 
quote the most recent Alka Seltzer commercial. 

Finally, Baudrillard professes, "What society 
seeks through production and overproduction is the res- 
toration of the real which escapes it"; therefore, "the 
only weapon of power... is to reinject realness and 
referentiality everywhere" (198-99). Unfortunately, this 
is much easier said than done. Our world is a product of 
advertising, and it always will be; there is no escaping 
that reality. It is too late for us to "inject realness," 
because no one can remember what real ever meant. 
Real is what Saturn tells us, real is what Microsoft is 
creating, and "Coke... it's the real thing." They said it, 
not me. 



Works Cited 

Baudrillard, Jean. "The Evil Demon of Images and the Preces- 
sion of Simulacra." Postmodernism: A Reader. 
Ed. Thomas Docherty. New York: Columbia Uni- 
versity Press, 1993. 

Jameson, Frederic. "Postmodernisn, or the Cultural Logic of 
Late Capitalism." Postmodernism: A Reader. Ed. 
Thomas Docherty. New York: Columbia Univer- 
sity Press, 1993. 



35 



From Beirut to Jerusalem: 
The Lebanese Civil War as 
Middle East Microcosm 

Catherine A. Parker 



Providing a detailed explanation of the Lebanese Civil War, this paper attempts to portray the Lebanese 
Civil War as a microcosm of the Middle East as a region. The different factors that come into play in this war 
predominantly include religion, the involvement of outside forces, particularly the Palestinian Liberation Orga- 
nization, and a history and government of confessional politics. These factors too may be seen on a macro scale. 
The Middle East finds its path to peace guarded by those who do not wish to change the political, religious, or 
social climate of the region. The commonality of the problems between the micro- and macrocosm, therefore, 
makes Lebanon and the road from Beirut to Jerusalem an integral facet of stability in the Middle East. 



As Middle East peace talks rapidly approach 
the stated February, 2000, deadline, all eyes are focused 
on the two main players in the drama: the state of Israel 
and the Palestinians, represented by the Palestinian Lib- 
eration Organization. A mutually acceptable peace agree- 
ment between these two parties could possibly end the 
strife in this region, a strife brought to the forefront of 
world politics in 1947, when the United Nations issued 
Resolution 181, dividing British Palestine into one state 
for the Jews and one for the Palestinians. Though the 
legitimacy of the Jewish state is recognized by the rest 
of the world, the Arab nations have only recently real- 
ized that the Jewish state is not a figment of their imagi- 
nations, and they must, in order to ensure peace in the 
region, open diplomatic relations to solve the problems 
that have reigned for fifty years over these biblical lands. 
The most pervasive problem in this conflict stems from 
the wars raged against and by Israel in 1948, 1967, and 
1972: the Palestinian question. The Palestinian people 
lost their homes due to the occupation of Israeli troops 
in what was mandated Palestine (which has never ex- 
isted except on paper), fleeing to nearby Arab countries, 
most notably Lebanon and Jordan. The influx of Pales- 
tinian refugees further exacerbated the tensions between 
the established Arab nations and Israel. Not only was a 
Jewish state asserting its legitimacy in the predominantly 
Arab region of the world; but massive numbers of Pales- 
tinians fled into the Arab borders and established refu- 
gee camps, eventually becoming the launching pad for 
attacks on Israel, and thus actively involved the Arab 
nations in this tribal conflict. 



Lebanon, one such Arab nation that currently 
housing twelve Palestinian refugee camps within its bor- 
ders, suffers the same fate as the Middle East entire 
(Andrews par. 2). Inextricably linked with religion and 
host to its own set of conflicts (external, those with Is- 
rael, Iran and Syria, and internal, those between the 
Maronites, Sunnis, Shiites and Druse in addition to thir- 
teen other religious sects found there), Lebanon is a 
microcosm of the Middle East, sharing much of the his- 
tory and many of the issues that both bind and divide 
this region. 

The Roots of the Lebanese Civil War 

Lebanon, like Israel and Syria, was born from 
an attempt by Western powers to govern and partition 
areas of the world as a facet of the balance of power, a 
concern still remaining from the Age of Imperialism. 
Lebanon's birth, as the modern world knows it, occurred 
in 1916 when Great Britain, France and Russia drafted 
the Sykes-Picot agreement, giving France control over 
what is modern-day Lebanon and Syria. Shortly follow- 
ing the end of World War I, France decreed the forma- 
tion of Greater Lebanon which included the Maronite 
Christian and Druse Mount Lebanon, the Sunni Muslim 
cities of Beirut, Tripoli, Sidon and Tyre, and the Shiite 
Muslim areas in southern Lebanon, Akkar and the Bekaa 
Valley. The formation of Greater Lebanon is possibly the 
most significant event in early Lebanese history, for it 
brought into one nation-state four religious sects that 
before lived separately (Friedman 11-18). 

The Maronites are an Eastern Christian sect 



founded in Syria in the fifth century A. D. by a monk 
named Maron. Though acknowledging the supremacy 
of the Pope and the Catholic Church in Rome, the 
Maronites maintain a distinct liturgy, but they have used 
this tie to the West as well as their position on Mount 
Lebanon to survive the tumultuous political and reli- 
gious climates of the region. Mount Lebanon is inhab- 
ited, too, by the Druse, a splinter Islamic sect, that, like 
the Maronites, found Mount Lebanon's terrain protec- 
tive and conducive to their religious practices which are 
a communal secret. The other two major religious sects 
consist of the Islamic Sunni and Shiite groups who share 
a common history until the death of the prophet, and 
Islam's founder, Muhammad, in the seventh century 
A. D. Regarding the question of succession, the Sunnis, 
the majority, believed that the successor should be cho- 
sen by election and approval of a council of elders as 
was the tradition of the desert. (Surma in Arabic means 
tradition, hence the name Sunni.) The Shiites, on the 
other hand, believed that Muhammad's successor should 
be appointed from those in his family, specifically his 
son-in-law, Ali. Since this schism, the two sects have 
developed rather unique cultures and traditions sepa- 
rate from the other. Eventually prevailing, the Sunnis 
have come to represent the educated, well-off Muslims 
and the Shiites, the poor and degraded (Friedman 11-18). 

Based upon these religious lines, the Lebanese 
government from 1 943- 1 989, was crafted in the 1 943 'Na- 
tional Pact,' an attempt to provide a structure of govern- 
ment suitable to the French so to release the country 
from French control. The Lebanese president would al- 
ways be a Maronite Christian with the parliament main- 
taining a 6:5 Christian to Muslim ratio. A Sunni Muslim 
would always be appointed Prime Minister and the 
Speaker of the Parliament, a Shiite (Friedman 13). 
Confessionalism, as this form of government based on 
religious divisions is called, is quite intricate and rivals 
the more complicated electoral processes as those, for 
example, found in Germany. 

Beyond its own walls, Lebanon's Civil War may 
be traced, as aforementioned, to the formation of the 
Israeli state and the corresponding dispersal of Palestin- 
ians. In 1974, two years after the war for the Sinai Penin- 
sula, approximately 19 1,700 refugees were found in fif- 
teen camps spread throughout Lebanon. The presence 
of the Palestinians has left Lebanon a country continu- 
ally occupied or the home for outside groups when the 
first refugees fled there in 1948, six years after severing 
ties with France. After being forced from Amman, Jor- 
dan, by King Hussein, Yasir Arafat and the PLO moved 
to Beirut tojoin the majority of the Palestinians in 1970, 



a year after Arafat was elected chairman and six years 
after the establishment of the PLO by Arab heads of 
state. The people without a home were represented by 
an organization without a home. The Druse and the Leba- 
nese Muslims offered the PLO its country, for these 
groups were fighting the provisions of the National Pact, 
which ill-represented the population by this time. The 
Christians, who were the majority in 1943, no longer main- 
tained that status; thus the Muslims hoped that the PLO 
would put pressure on the Christians in order to gain 
greater representation in the government. Yasir Arafat 
saw an advantage in the close proximity of southern 
Lebanon to Israel— a location even more convenient than 
Jordan for launching attacks on the Jewish state. With 
the arrival of the PLO, Lebanon slowly drifted into civil 
war. The Lebanese army eventually disbanded due to 
PLO pressure, leaving South and West Beirut to the PLO 
and East Beirut and Mount Lebanon to the Christian 
militia called the Phalangist. 

The Lebanese Civil War 

"...I didn't know what was happening until yes- 
terday. But yesterday they brought in this expert on Arab 
affairs. He gave us a lecture on the present situation. ..It 
goes like this: The Christians hate the Druse, Shiites, 
Sunnis, and Palestinians. ..The Druse hate the Christians, 
Shiites, and the Syrians. The Shiites got screwed by 
them all for years, so they hate everyone. The Sunnis 
hate whomever their leader tells them to hate, and the 
Palestinians hate one another. Aside from that, they hate 
the others. Now, they all have a common denominator: 
they all hate us, the Israelis. They would like to blow us 
to pieces if they could, but they can't due to the Israeli 
army. Not all of the Israeli army-just the suckers, those 
who are in Lebanon" (Friedman 1 85-86). 

Erupting in 1 975, the Lebanese Civil War ended 
after fifteen years in 1990, with the Palestinians still in 
refugee camps; the Syrians in de facto control of the 
government; an emerging Iranian-backed once militia, 
now political party, the Hizbullah, bringing another out- 
side party into the arena; a short stint of American and 
international forces in Beirut during the early 1980's; 
and Southern Lebanon still occupied by Israel in a self- 
proclaimed 'Security Zone.' To Lebanon's credit, the 
country made an attempt to stifle the war through the 
National Dialogue Committee, meeting between Septem- 
ber 1975 and February 1976. The dialogue included the 
Muslim Lebanese National Movement in addition to the 
PLO and the Christian Lebanese Front. The crux of the 
discussions addressed the Palestinian armed presence 



in Beirut, a direct affront to the Christians who desper- 
ately struggled to maintain control of the country both 
politically and militarily (the Lebanese army largely con- 
sisted of Maronite Christians), and political reforms of 
the confessional division of power, an issue the Muslim 
Lebanese National Movement concerned itself with pri- 
marily due to the imbalances in the government. Medi- 
ated by the Syrians, the discussions terminated with an 
agreement, though never was it implemented (Deeb par. 
3). The Syrians, fully aware of the state of the Lebanese 
government and society, invaded in April, 1976, occu- 
pying the northern port of Tripoli and the Bekaa Valley 
near the Syrian-Lebanese border in the East (Friedman 
1 8). Though these discussions were not particularly fruit- 
ful and certainly did not curb the war raging in Lebanon, 
the National Dialogue committee illustrates three facets 
of the civil war that make it an exemplary microcosm of 
the Middle East: religion, common political traditions, 
and the Palestinian question. 

Religion in the Middle East holds a place in 
politics more eminent perhaps than the right of suffrage 
in the United States. The governments in the region are 
not necessarily theocracies like Iran; however, political 
parties are based almost solely on one's religion or sect 
and the interpretation of this religion. For example, in 
Israel, the Labor and Likud parties both maintain the 
basic tenants of Judaism, though the Likudniks repre- 
sent the more orthodox, practicing Jews who believe 
that the West Bank and Gaza are a necessary part of the 
modern-day Israel, based on biblical boundaries (Fried- 
man 267). In Lebanon, one religion does not prevail, nor 
one political party, and representation is determined by 
who elected for the seats available to a particular party. 
The Hizbullah, the Iranian-backed, Islamic fundamental- 
ist group, for example, has in recent years gained more 
support within the Muslim ranks, increasing the compe- 
tition for Muslim seats in parliament; however, due to 
Hizbullah's conservative nature, the Sunni and Shiite 
candidates still maintain the majority (Norton par. 1 16). 

Lebanon, through the Dialogue, also represents 
the political traditions of the Middle East, which are, 
according to Thomas Friedman, tribe-like politics and 
the modern nation-state. Adherence to primordial or kin- 
groups is the first priority in forming allegiances (87-98); 
all other allies are subject to change. The issues adopted 
by the Christian Lebanese Front and the Muslim Leba- 
nese National Movement coincided with what was in 
the best interest of the religious groups involved; the 
Muslims supported the PLO in order to gain leverage 
with the Christians, and the Christians fought for the 
maintenance of the status quo in the government. Israel 



would find out soon enough, as well, that these alle- 
giances are temporary and a matter of convenience. 

The modern nation-state is a tradition but only 
as far back as the early 1 900's, when the Western powers 
slowly relinquished their imperialistic holdings and es- 
tablished nation-states to replace provisional govern- 
ments. In essence, one might argue that these nation- 
states, which replaced actual tribal governments or au- 
thoritarian powers, are the root of the problem. France in 
1 920, created Greater Lebanon out of four primary reli- 
gious groups not known for living peacefully with the 
other. Israel was created in 1947 when Britain refused to 
continue mediating as a third party in the conflicts there, 
and the United Nations drafted a plan of partition, pro- 
posed by the pro-Israeli United States (known as Reso- 
lution 181). Thus, conflict, if not previously inherent in 
the region, was legitimized by the creation of states by 
non-Middle Eastern powers who understood neither the 
traditions of the region or the consequences of their 
actions. 

Lastly, the Dialogue addressed the armed pres- 
ence of the Palestinians, which would not have existed 
at all if the Palestinians had a state of their own. When 
the Israeli state was declared on May 14, 1948, the Pales- 
tinians with aid from Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, 
Saudi Arabia, and Iraq initiated the war which would 
deprive them of Resolution 1 8 l's Palestinian state. Jor- 
dan annexed the West Bank of the Jordan River, Egypt, 
the Gaza strip, and Israel, the rest of what was supposed 
to be Palestine. Not even its Arab neighbors allowed the 
Palestinians to form a state; thus 700,000 West Bankers 
and refugees found themselves apart of Jordan. With 
several hundred thousand refugees inside its borders, 
the Lebanese suddenly became party to the Palestinian 
question. Initially, the Arab nations wanted to help the 
refugees for they saw them as their Arab brothers and as 
a means to indirectly attack Israel; however, as the PLO 
developed into a terrorist organization the costs became 
too high. Therefore, no one country has truly taken in 
the refugees nor aided them in their quest for statehood, 
though Lebanon has certainly paid the price for housing 
them. 

June 13,1 982, may be marked as the day Leba- 
non felt the full weight of its responsibility. The Israeli 
army marched up to the gates of Beirut having invaded 
from the South. Yasir Arafat and the PLO may certainly 
be the cause of the invasion, for Arafat had concen- 
trated a considerable amount of firepower in the south 
of Lebanon and used the refugee camps, most notably 
Shatila and Sabra, as places of recruitment for his army 
of guerrillas and terrorists. In so doing, Arafat had Israel 



shelled one too many times for Menachem Begin, the 
Israeli President, and Ariel Sharon, Defense Minister and 
general in charge of the Beirut campaign. The invasion 
resulted in an alliance between Israel and the Christian 
Phalangist militia in the summer of 1 982, a natural ally in 
the fight against the PLO. Through these channels, Is- 
rael arranged for the election of Bashir Gemayel, a presi- 
dent who would put an end to the PLO's presence in 
Beirut and favor Israel in future negotiations. In Beirut, 
however, things are not quite as simple as they may 
have seemed, especially when another power as large as 
Syria was interested in the same territory. Hafez Assad, 
president of Syria, feeling his back to the wall and with 
control in Lebanon at stake, changed the rules on the 
relatively naive Israelis. An apartment house where 
Gemayel met with members of the Phalangist party was 
leveled (a matter of weeks after Gemayel ascended to the 
presidency) with Gemayel found buried in the rubble 
(Friedman 157-58). 

Though the PLO withdrew in August from 
Beirut, moving the homeless organization to Tunis, the 
Israelis were not going to win this war so easily if Assad 
had anything to do with it. In response, the Israelis par- 
ticipated in perhaps the most bloody, unjustified mur- 
ders of the entire war. Allied with the Phalangists, the 
Israeli army, under control of Sharon, surrounded the 
refugee camps to protect them and prevent anyone from 
coming in or going out-except the Phalangists. Under 
Israeli cover the Phalangists entered Sabra and Shatila 
refugee camps, indiscriminately killing 800-1,000 Pales- 
tinians (Friedman 161-63). The Israelis, a year after this 
massacre, withdrew from Beirut, finally realizing that they 
no more belonged in Lebanon than did those who fol- 
lowed—the Americans. In May of 1983, Israel and Amin 
Gemayel, brother of the assassinated Bashir, brokered a 
peace agreement providing for the protection of Israel's 
northern border. None of the provisions were ever hon- 
ored, and Israel pulled out of Lebanon save the 'Secu- 
rity Zone' in the very south of the country. 

With the retreat of one army came the presence 
of another. Perhaps even more naive than the Israelis, 
the American Marines arrived with an eight hundred 
man contingent in August, 1982, "with the mission of 
enabling the Lebanese government to restore full sover- 
eignty over its capital..." Following in September were 
the French and Italians, numbering 1 ,500. Eager to help 
in any way they could, the Marines agreed to train and 
equip the Lebanese army, basically another militia group 
for the Maronites under the control of Amin Gemayel. 
Not acquainted with the rules of the Beirut game, the 
Americans enthusiastically sent Special Forces advisors 



to the Ministry of Defense and gave the Lebanese army 
uniforms practically identical to their own, as well as 
trained and armed them (Friedman 193-94). The Ameri- 
cans assumed that Lebanon was an extension of America, 
championing democracy and searching for a peace ben- 
eficial to all parties involved. Despite the intentions, the 
Marines' presence slowly came to be associated with 
the Christians in East Beirut. A suicide bomber, attrib- 
uted to the Iranian backed Hizbullah, drove a Chevrolet 
truck into the front door of the American Embassy in 
April of 1983, giving the Marines a personal sample of 
the Lebanese Civil War and its consequences when one 
understands not what one is involved in (Friedman 198). 
A similar incident involving a yellow Mercedes truck 
carrying 12,000 pounds of dynamite occurred in Octo- 
ber, 1983, when the driver drove into the Marine com- 
pound, bringing the toll to 241 Americans dead in Beirut 
(Friedman 201 ). Though never fully understanding the 
rules of the game or how they broke them, the Marines 
were ordered by President Reagan to withdraw in Febru- 
ary, 1984. 

Normality for Lebanon and the Continual Occupation 

Once the Americans left in 1984, the Lebanese 
Civil War quietly raged on, often times sporadically. For 
Beirut, this war was the norm, and life minus the car 
bombings, the Israeli shells in the front yard and the 
Green Line would not be normal. An entire generation 
had grown up amidst the dangers of the war. Peace in 
Lebanon would not be easy to come by, especially with 
seventeen religious groups, each, in tribe-like politics, 
trying to secure all the benefits for one's own. None of 
Lebanon's occupiers understood the rules of the war 
better than Syria, the sole foreign power still in Lebanon 
save the Israelis in the South. In 1989, a conference at 
Ta'if convened to discuss the two essential questions 
presented in the National Dialogue Committee in 1975- 
76: 1 ) political reforms, and 2) the Palestinian Question. 
Saudi Arabia, Algeria, and Morocco mediated this con- 
ference which came together due to the attempts by Gen- 
eral Aoun of the Lebanese Army to turn the civil war 
into a war of liberation from Syria (Deeb pars. 21-25). No 
matter how true his cause seemed, the General faced a 
Syrian government striving to attain and maintain power 
in Lebanon and a coalition of Arab countries willing to 
see an end to the civil war. Expanding the parliament 
from 99 to 108 members, granting equal representation 
to Christians and Muslims, removing a majority of the 
power from the president and giving executive power to 
the prime minister, and extending the Speaker of the 
Parliament's term from one year to four, the Ta'if Confer- 



ence managed to get these long awaited reforms on pa- 
per. Disbandment of all Lebanese and non-Lebanese 
militias and the surrender of weapons to the state, too, 
was agreed upon with Syria's pledge to help "impose its 
authority over all Lebanese territory" (Deebpars. 21-25). 
Syria forced the end to Aoun's presidency in 1990, end- 
ing the fifteen-year Lebanese Civil War (Deebpars. 21- 
25). 

Despite such initiatives like Horizon 2000, a pro- 
gram that aspires to build and improve telecommunica- 
tions, an international airport and the port facilities of 
Lebanon, problems with the present Lebanese situation 
will prevent Lebanon from becoming its own country 
and fully achieving internal harmony (Norton pars. 1-3). 
The first of these problems is the government's rigging 
of ballots and voter lists. Without truly democratic elec- 
tions by the people of Lebanon instead of the manipula- 
tion of the government by the Syrians, the Lebanese will 
not have a country of their own to flourish and prosper 
in. Closely connected to the voting process are the deep- 
seeded confessional divisions within the country. The 
confessional system further entrenches the differences 
between the religious and tribal groups present in Leba- 
non. Though tradition holds these groups in place, the 
continuation of such does not necessarily connote sta- 
bility or internal harmony, for Lebanon for the longer the 
religious groups fight each other, the more power Syria 
will wield in Lebanese politics. The Treaty of Brother- 
hood , Cooperation, and Coordination, and the Pact on 
Defense and Security, signed between Lebanon and Syria 
in 1991, virtually ensures that big brother Syria will 
'guide' Lebanese politics for security interests for an 
indefinite amount of time. These treaties, coupled with 
the 1993 agricultural, social, and economic agreements, 
practically seal Lebanon's fate as a puppet nation in the 
hands of a skilled politician (Norton par. 23). 

Lebanon also is not completely free of Israel in 
its southern border, with the Israeli 'Security Zone' en- 
compassing 10% of all Lebanese territory. United Na- 
tions Resolution 425 requires the removal of Israeli troops 
from southern Lebanon; however in light of the recent 
Lebanese-Syrian agreements, the Syrians will be the sole 
negotiators with Israel, leaving the fate of Lebanon to its 
eastern neighbor. Due to Syria's place in potential nego- 
tiations, the withdrawal of troops from Lebanon will be 
coupled with any agreement made on the Golan Heights, 
which Syria now occupies (Norton pars. 23, 26). The 
Israelis demand the disarming of the Hizbullah before 
any troops are removed; however, Syria supports the 
militia. (Its arming is an obvious violation of the Ta'if 
Conference.) A settlement, then, is not likely to surface 



unless the two countries are willing to move past these 
differences (Norton par. 27). 

The Importance to the United States 

With the exception of the Marines' two year 
stay in Beirut, the United States has had little involve- 
ment with Lebanon, especially since the troop withdrawal 
in 1984. In fact, Americans have been banned from trav- 
eling to Lebanon on U. S. visas, further alienating a coun- 
try that might benefit from Western support, but instead 
finds its only friend in Syria. Lebanon, since its estab- 
lishment in 1 920, has never been, nor will be in the near 
future, its own country. The recently established ties 
with Syria have forged a bond that grows stronger with 
the continued isolation of Lebanon on the world stage. 
This in and of itself is unfortunate; however, Lebanon is 
also an integral part of the Middle East peace process. 
As previously noted. Israel maintains a 'Security Zone' 
in southern Lebanon that is not likely to be removed 
until an agreement with the PLO and the Palestinians in 
the West Bank and Gaza is reached. In 1975, twelve 
refugee camps with 400,000 Palestinians spread amongst 
them were counted and, with the dynamics of the Arab 
population in recent years, are growing at rate faster 
than that of the Israeli population. The population of 
Palestinians outside of the Occupied Territories will not 
be easily ignored, especially since Yasir Arafat and the 
PLO have many supporters in these camps. Lebanon is 
also key to Israeli-Syrian agreements, as previously men- 
tioned, with the fate of the Israeli troops in the Security 
Zone tied to the Golan Heights and the Hizbullah militia. 

The foreign policy of the United States, espe- 
cially its presence in the Middle East peace talks, is di- 
rectly related to the situation in Lebanon, for the stabil- 
ity of Lebanon is essential in maintaining order in the 
region. Though Lebanon is not politically strong inde- 
pendently, instability in Lebanon could trigger a domino 
effect with the repercussions resounding through the 
refugee camps, Israel, and Syria, not to mention Leba- 
non itself. Another Lebanese Civil War risks the possi- 
bility of setting the peace process backwards another 
fifteen years and losing hundreds of lives to the confu- 
sion and chaos of Beirut. In addition, the United States 
has been painfully pro-Israeli in recent years, neglecting 
to pressure Israel into abiding by Resolution 425. The 
role of mediator is important, for the last time the United 
Stated involved itself with Lebanese politics it unwit- 
tingly chose to support the Christians, and the cost was 
241 lives. Here, the costs may not be as personal, but the 
gravity of the situation just as great. 

From Beirut to Jerusalem the importance of the 



Lebanese Civil War reverberated, leaving Israel and Leba- 
non war torn and bitter with much rebuilding to do, both 
physically and mentally. From the United States to Israel 
to Syria all parties who ever set foot in Lebanon were 
betrayed and lost amongst the bazaar of militias, politi- 
cians and rhetoric. No one was left untouched, nor vic- 
tory truly claimed. Yet the Lebanese Civil War provides 
an excellent case study of the region-a microcosm of all 
that encompasses the politics of the Middle East. From 
religion to tribal affiliations to the Palestinian Question, 
the Lebanese Civil War and post-war Lebanon exhibit 
the nuances and complications involved in analyzing 
even one war, in one country, spanning fifteen years in 
the Middle East. The lessons of this war must be utilized 
to make peace, for from Beirut to Jerusalem lies the road 
peace must be made upon. 



Works Cited 

Andrews, John. "A Question of Faith." The Economist 24 

Feb. 1996: 338. Academic Search Elite. Online. 

EbscoHost. 29 Nov. 1999. 
Andrews, John. "A War With Many Losers." The Economist 

24 Feb. 1996: 338. Academic Search Elite. Online. 

EbscoHost. 29 Nov. 1999. 
Deeb, M. and M. K. Deeb, "Regional Conflict and Regional 

Solutions: Lebanon." Annals of the American 

Academy of Political and Social Science Nov. 1 99 1 : 

518. Academic Search Elite. Online. EbscoHost. 29 

Nov. 1999. 
Friedman, Thomas. From Beirut to Jerusalem. New York: 

Doubleday, 1995. 
Norton, Augustus R. "Lebanon's Conundrum." Arab Studies 

Quarterly Winter 1 999: 2 1 . Academic Search Elite. 

Online. EbscoHost. 29 Nov. 1999. 



Appreciating the Aesthetic 
of Cheesy Horror 

Rumsey Taylor 

Since the invention of the motion picture, critical praise has been severely limited to films that embrace 
critically popular genres such as drama. Those that draw negative responses are typically vacuous, commer- 
cially viable star vehicles aimed at mere entertainment. Seldom does a single film contain the aspects of a 
technically masterful film, all the while functioning as entertainment. This paper defends a cheesy horror film. 
Evil Dead 2, as a prime example of a film with exceptional camera technique. This is apparent only to those who 
remain undistracted by the plot, which involves a climactic battle between a man and his possessed hand. 



Upon its release in 1987, Sam Raimi's Evil Dead 
2 was garnered with mixed criticism. It was both a sequel 
and remake of its 1 98 1 predecessor, The Evil Dead , and it 
contained the needed criterion for any cheesy horror 
movie. Many lauded it for its unique humor; many more 
hated it for its over-the-top gore. The following re- 
sponses summarize the film's initial reception: 

". . .everything is so Out There, so comedically 
exaggerated, that there's no way to take [it] se- 
riously. [Evil Dead 2] is the postmidnight meld 
of Roadrunner cartoons and Three Stooges 
films" (Harrington, Washington Post ). 

"Evil Dead 2 is a comedy disguised as a blood- 
soaked shock-a-rama. It looks superficially lake 
a routine horror movie, a vomitorium designed 
to separate callow teenagers from their lunch" 
(Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times ). 

These reactions hold in reference to the film's theme, 
characterization, and dialogue, but the technical aspects 
of the film elevate it from the artistically devoid trap- 
pings of the comic-horror genre. 

Granted, it is difficult to appreciate the aesthetic 
of a film about a man being chased by unseen evil spirits 
in the woods, especially with the film's comic facade. In 
one scene, the film's hero, Ash (Bruce Campbell) locks 
the possessed, decapitated head of his former girlfriend 
in a vice. She hisses at him, he glares back at her, mum- 
bling nervously "You're goin' down!" (Raimi, 1987). Yet 
beneath the zombie puppets and the overabundant gore 
lies a technically masterful film. Some of the camerawork 
in Evil Dead 2 is so wonderfully executed, to merely dis- 
miss the film as comic schlock would be a critical short 



coming. What many critics who disowned the film at its 
initial release fail to realize is that all the blood, gore, and 
violence are a backdrop for what is truly an inspired 
exercise in camera technique. 

Cinematography is the art of the moving pic- 
ture. Seldom does it rely on a particular frozen image for 
artistic merit, but rather a collection of images. When 
shown in order, the images move, take life, and become 
alarmingly real. 

Since the invention of the motion picture, cer- 
tain film techniques have been recycled frequently, to 
the point that a particular and common form of cinema- 
tography has been established. In recent years, com- 
mon cinematographic techniques have been combined, 
and, consequently, give off a new feel to conventional 
film. One shot in particular involves three olden film 
tricks. When used in succession, they create a visual 
metaphor. They are as follows: 

establishing shot - A shot, usually a long shot, that 
orients the audience in a film narrative by providing vi- 
sual information (such as location) for the scene that 
follows (Cook, 1996, p. 964). 

This is probably the most frequent and simple 
of any camera shots, as it is used in most sitcoms, news 
broadcasts, and films. The purpose of the establishing 
shot is to introduce or set up a scene. For example, it is 
typical for news stations, in their introductions, to have 
at least a glimpse of their city's horizon before introduc- 
ing the anchors. The news is about events related in 
some way to the city and its occupants, and a shot of the 
city's horizon is a simple, fitting method of introducing 
the news. 

One of the more famous establishing shots in 



film comes from Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho ( 1 969). The 
film opens with a full view of Phoenix. The camera slowly 
pans right and slows to frame a single building, then, 
with a couple of edits, the scene moves into a room 
where Marion Crane (Vivian Leigh) is talking to her boy- 
friend. 

tracking shot - A single continuous shot made on the 
ground with a moving camera; also known as a traveling 
shot (Cook, 1996, p. 975). 

The tracking shot displays the versatility of 
camera movement. Typically, tracking shots follow char- 
acters down sidewalks or through hallways. In the more 
elaborate form of this technique, the camera assumes 
the point-of-view of, say, a monster, and will typically 
proceed to chase a character into darkness. 

When the tracking shot incorporates more spo- 
radic movement, a stabilizing mechanism such as the 
handicam must be used. Such a mechanism allows the 
camera to be carried while minimalizing vibration and 
shake. This is most often used in film to create a long, 
uninterrupted shot called mise-en-scene. Martin 
Scorsese's GoodFellas ( 1990) utilizes this technique fa- 
mously. The following is an excerpt from Roger Ebert's 
review of the film. 

"[T]here is an astonishing camera movement in 
which the point of view follows Henry and 
Karen on one of their first dates, to the 
Copacabana nightclub. There are people wait- 
ing in line at the door, but Henry takes her in 
through the service entrance, past the security 
guards and the off-duty waiters, down a corri- 
dor, through the kitchen, through the service 
area and out into the front of the club, where a 
table is literally lifted into the air and placed in 
front of all the others so that the young couple 
can be in the first row for the floor show. This is 
power" (1990, par. 8). 

close-up - In its precise meaning, a shot of a human 
subject's face or other object alone (Cook, 1996, p. 962). 

The close-up is another familiar, used cinemato- 
graphic technique. Arguably as old as film itself, the 
close-up has earned a particular meaning over time. 
Close-ups are used to evoke emotion. Facial expres- 
sions say things no words can, and close-ups are uti- 
lized to capture this unwritten language. 

Francois Truffaut's 1959 masterpiece The 400 
Blows contains one of the most famous close-ups in the 



history of film. At the film's end, a boy (Jean-Pierre 
Leaud) runs down a wet, sandy beach, symbolically ap- 
proaching his destiny. Slowly, he turns back, and the 
picture freezes, zooming onto his frozen countenance. 
His arresting expression is of purity and innocence as he 
seems to reconcile life-changing events in his past. 

Most images presented in film provide a sub- 
consciously recognized stimulus with the viewer — the 
camera will allow us whom to root for, whom to lust after, 
and whom to despise. In film, villains, heroes, strangers, 
thieves, prostitutes, children, whoever, may all be por- 
trayed differently by subtle differences in camera use. 
The camera is as discerning and judgmental as the hu- 
man eye; after all, the eye is what the camera is designed 
after. 

The three aforementioned camera techniques 
all utilize this universal film language. Each one reveals 
particular things about a character or scene, and, when 
used in succession, these techniques create a striking 
visual metaphor. Typically, a scene incorporating the 
three techniques would play like this: 

The camera pans across a landscape, and 
moves towards a lone individual in the center 
of the frame. As the camera moves closer, the 
objects that once clouded the frame instead 
rush past it. Establishment is lost, and the 
camera moves closer, onto a vivid, frozen fa- 
cial expression. 

This one, uninterrupted shot is metaphorically used to 
forward an immediate theme in a film. When used effec- 
tively, scene establishment gives way to character build, 
and this shot marks a turning point in a scene, as the film 
begins to rely on visuals instead of spoken words. In 
each of the following cases, this shot temporarily de- 
taches a film from the distracting constraint of entertain- 
ment. When employed, this shot heightens the drama, 
and the film becomes more reliant on visuals. By incor- 
porating this shot, these films are momentarily promoted 
to art status. 

With his breakthrough film Jaws ( 1 975), Steven 
Spielberg invented the rules for what has been called 
"the event film," i.e., one that is solely aimed at commer- 
cial success. By relocating the focus of cinema on films 
with a higher propensity for financial success, Spielberg's 
success questionably marked the end of 1970's film — a 
decade known for procuring some of the more artisti- 
cally driven films in history. 

Spielberg has since gained in his commercial 



viability the respect and trust of Hollywood producers, 
which has ultimately enabled him to direct more classi- 
cally associated features such as Schindler's List ( 1993). 
Yet Spielberg has long since cracked his creative whip, 
though it may not be apparent in many of his films laden 
with stilted dialogue and bad casting. Take, for example, 
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). It is in every 
aspect a commercially driven film, dutifully embracing 
the cliches familiar to the action-adventure genre. Nev- 
ertheless, the film contains redeeming moments of art 
cinema. Though they are both sparse and far between, 
certain moments mark Spielberg's title as a talented di- 
rector. 

Halfway through the film, Indy (Harrison Ford) 
and his father (Sean Connery) steal a fragile plane and 
attempt to put-put their way to safety. Before the plot is 
given enough time to run thin, two menacing Germans, 
in sleek WWI fighter planes no less, aim to thwart the 
Jones' plan to escape. At first, Indy only sees the two 
planes firing wastefully in the distance. As the planes 
come closer, Indy's nemesis is revealed. The plane is 
comfortably weighted in the center of the frame, in front 
of a scenic landscape (establishment). Quickly, the cam- 
era moves towards the pilot (tracking), and the shot cul- 
minates by driving towards the pilots determined gri- 
mace (close-up). This shot, when used in this film, makes 
Indy's enemy more human. This is not a battle between 
who has the better plane; this is a battle between Indi- 
ana and an anonymous German (Spielberg, 1 989). 

Another example involves a filmmaking team of 
two brothers from Minnesota, the Coen brothers, who 
co-write, co-direct, and co-produce each of their films, 
most of which include one or more botched crimes and 
dark humor. (Their recent filmography includes Fargo 
[19961 and The Big Lebowski 119981.) The Coen broth- 
ers have long since been regarded as a technically effi- 
cient directing team with a cornucopia of critically ac- 
claimed films under their belts. Their first feature, Blood 
Simple (1984), put their star on the map with startling 
notice. Internet critic Ben Stephens stated the following 
in his review of the film: 

"The Coen Brothers' films are to other people's 
films what Mozart is to Boyzone. The taciturn 
pair of long-haired, bespectacled geeks have 
consistently managed to make their love of cin- 
ema shine through every frame of their work, 
not in a derivative, Tarantino-esque way, but in 
a respectful, artistic way" (1996, par. 1). 
In a decade when film was becoming even more profit- 
driven, underground hits like Blood Simple were a wel- 
come surprise for critics and a taught wire in Hollywood's 



arrogant stride. (Ironically, it was released in the same 
year as Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom .) 

With the help of cinematographer Barry 
Sonnenfeld, the Coen's weave their knotted tale with 
surprisingly innovative camerawork, especially for a film 
with a tiny budget. Sonnenfeld's camera has the fervor 
of a hummingbird, furiously darting into some scenes 
and cautiously waning out of others, heightening the 
suspenseful mood of the film. 

Early on in the film, Abby (Frances 
McDormand) is hiding out at her boyfriend Ray's (John 
Getz) house. She is being pursued by her husband Julian 
(Dan Hedaya). Early one morning, Julian comes into 
Ray's house when the couple is asleep. Startled, Abby 
awakes and goes to get her purse. She has a gun. Be- 
fore she can procure it, Julian grabs her, forcefully cup- 
ping his hand over her mouth. She reaches for the purse, 
and he drags her outside (Coen, 1984). 

Clutching her awkwardly, Julian looks around, 
realizing this was not apart of his plan. Tension mounts 
(this is illustrated by the film's effective score), and the 
two are framed at a distance, from the end of the front 
yard (establishment). Without warning, the camera rushes 
forward (tracking) to Abby's face (close-up). She bites 
her husband's thumb, escapes his grasp, and places a 
swift kick in his groin. Drooling and limping, he leaves 
(Coen, 1984). 

This camera shot is particularly effective in 
Blood Simple , as it seamlessly mirrors the film's ever- 
present theme of potential menace. The Coens' next 
feature, Raising Arizona (1987), is a completely different 
film from Blood Simple , but it does incorporate the same 
manic cinematography. 

H.I. (Nicholas Cage), an ex-con, is married to Ed 
(Holly Hunter), a cop. The couple discovers early in 
their marriage that Ed is not capable of bearing children. 
Heartbroken, the couple's hope is soon restored with 
the knowledge that a local furniture salesman Nathan 
Arizona (Trey Wilson) is the proud father of quintu- 
plets. H.I. resurrects his con-man skills and steals one of 
the babies. "I think I got the best one," he cheerfully 
exclaims (Coen, 1987). 

Late one night H.I. has a dream. He sees the 
dark vision of a leather-clad biker flying down a desert 
road, investigating the Arizonas' missing child report. 
In his sleep, H.I. tosses in a thick coat of sweat. He sees 
the Arizonas' house (establishment), and his perspec- 
tive quickly moves closer (tracking). He moves up his 
escape ladder, and into the babies' room. The shocked, 
screaming expression of Florence Arizona (Lynne Kitei) 
now fills his head (close-up). H.I. juts awake, and his 



startled countenance fills the screen (Coen, 1987). 

However, this same camera shot is used in Evil 
Dead 2 more effectively than any of the previously men- 
tioned films. The film is comfortably grounded in cheesy 
horror, and, for some, that prevents it from being re- 
garded as a work of art. In theme, the film is equivalent 
to the strife of a worried hiker. In visuals, the film dis- 
plays the rare power of film to connect with the viewer. 

Throughout the film, the perspective of a howl- 
ing, evil force is represented by the camera. In numer- 
ous uninterrupted shots (similar to the one mentioned 
above), this evil force chases Ash through a deserted 
cabin and through the dark woods. At one point, it 
grabs hold of him, and Ash is seized in front of the cam- 
era as he is thrust forcefully into a tree. Ash's face 
expresses simultaneously fear, pain, and endurance. As 
he is being thrown through the woods, he grits his teeth 
and bravely glares in the face of evil. His piercing stare 
and the dark woods rushing past him momentarily strike 
a chord in the attentive viewer, undistracted by the film's 
comic nature. This the most vivid image in the film, as it 
displays the protagonist's sheer determination (Raimi, 
1987). 

For a moment, the film transcends the loose 
expectations of its misnomered genre and manifests it- 
self alongside other classics. Briefly, Ash becomes some 
sort of tragic hero. His quest, tedious as it may be, 
becomes inspired. 

Yet surprisingly enough, Evil Dead 2 won no 
awards. The unusual, comic nature of the film has since 
gained it cult status, insuring it short-lived stays on the 
shelves of many video rental stores. Sam Raimi ended 
his stride as the director of intentionally cheesy horror 
films in 1993 with Army of Darkness , the third install- 
ment of the Evil Dead trilogy. He now oversees more 
family-oriented fare, including his last film. For Love of 
the Game , starring Kevin Costner as a sympathetic, ag- 
ing baseball player. Bruce Campbell (Ash) is now recog- 
nized by his loving fans as being the inspiration for Jim 
Carrey's frenetic approach to each role he plays, and he 
now directs episodes of Hercules: The Legendary Jour- 
neys and Xena: Warrior Princess . His autobiography, 
Confessions of a B-Movie Actor comes out in the fall of 
2000. 

Furthermore, in the 1988 Academy Awards, the 
winner for Best Cinematography was The Last Emporer 
(1987)— a drama. 



Works Cited 
Blood Simple . Dir. Joel Coen. Perf. John Getz, 

Frances McDormand, and M. Emmet Walsh. River Road, 
1987. 

Cook, David A. A History of Narrative Film . 3rd 
ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1996. 962, 
964, 975. 

Ehert, Roger. Chicago Sun-Times . 10 April 1987 
<http://www.suntimes.com/ebert/ebert_reviews/1987/04/ 
227094.html>. 

Ebert, Roger. Chicago Sun-Times . 2 September 
1990 <http://www.suntimes.com/ebert/ebert_reviews/ 1990/09/ 
565099. html>. 

Evil Dead . Dir. Sam Raimi. Perf. Bruce Campbell. 
Ellen Sandweiss, and Hal Delrich. Renaissance Pictures, 1982. 

Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn . Dir. Sam Raimi. Perf. 
Bruce Campbell, Sarah Berry, and Dan Hicks. Renaissance 
Pictures, 1987. 

400 Blows. The . Dir. Francois Truffaut. Perf. Jean- 
Pierre Leaud. Les Films du Carrosse, 1959. 

GoodFellas . Dir. Martin Scorsese. Perf. Ray Liotta, 
Robert De Niro, and Joe Pesci. Warner Brothers, 1990. 

Harrington, Richard. Washington Post . 30 April 
1987 <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/ 
longterm/mo vies/ videos /evildead2 

deadbydawnnrharrington_a0aa40.htm>. 

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade . Dir. Steven 
Spielberg. Perf. Harrison Ford, Sean Connery, and Denholm 
Elliott. Paramount Pictures, 1989. 

Internet Movie Database. Ltd.. The . <http:// 
www.imdb.com>. 

Psycho . Dir. Alfred Hitchcock. Perf. Janet Leigh, 
and Anthony Perkins. Shamley Productions, 1960. 

Raising Arizona . Dir. Joel Coen. Perf. Nicolas Cage, 
Holly Hunter, and Trey Wilson. Circle Films, Inc., 1987. 

Stephens, Ben. Edinburgh University Film Society . 
1996- 1997 <http://www.eusa.ed.ac.uk/societies/filmsoc/films/ 
blood_simple.html>. 



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