TITLE: Native Tongue (Native Tongue Trilogy, Book 01)
AUTHOR: Suzette Haden Elgin
GENRE: Science Fiction
PUBLISHED: 07/07/1984
RATING: ★★★★★
PURCHASE LINKS: Amazon
MOBILISM LINK: Mobilism
Review: At some point in our lives, most women realise that we live in a patriarchal world, and summarily realise just what that means. We've all had our arguments or protests dismissed on the basis of our gender; we’ve all been called ‘too emotional’ or ‘too sensitive’, or accused of having no sense of humour. We've had our skills and abilities under-estimated, where they've been believed in at all, and I think it’s safe to claim that most of us have been chided for doing something, or forbidden from doing something, on the basis of it not being ‘lady-like’.
And of course, there are many millions of women who suffer far worse than this maddening deluge of condescension and ignorant prejudice. We live in a world where, even in the countries we Caucasians like to think of as ‘civilised’, rape in particular and male-on-female violence in general is so common as to be hardly noteworthy. I live in Finland, a country that has 108 times less rape than the USA (so speaks NationMaster, for those who will demand a source), and still I know more women who have suffered some kind of sexual violence than those who haven’t.
This isn't meant as mere rhetoric. Elgin’s Native Tongue, the first in a trilogy I am very excited to continue (the publisher of the most current edition, Feminist Press, assures me that the next two books will be available as e-books within the next six months, although so far only the first is so available) is set some two hundred years in the future, in a United States that has repealed the nineteenth amendment (that’d be the one allowing women the right to vote, my dears) and declared all women to be legally minors, subject entirely to their male guardians. In this world (I hoped it might be a localised madness, but various passages suggest that Europe and Africa, at least, have both adopted this madness too) women have no say in their marriages or careers, or even what they wear. They can't spend any money without written permission from their husbands or fathers—but that’s not such a big deal, since they can hardly work, anyway, being forbidden nearly all jobs.
The one job women can't be excluded from is that of translation. Specifically, the translation of alien languages. It’s not clear how the world came to be this way, but sometime in the last 200 years Earth not only came into contact with other sentient (or should that be self-aware?) aliens, but now base their entire economy around trade with aliens. Should they suddenly lose the ability to communicate with said aliens, they would be in a hell of a lot of trouble, let’s put it that way.
But! Turns out, learning alien languages is pretty much impossible. (You would have thought so, right?) In fact, only the men (and women) of the thirteen linguist ‘Lines’—families—are capable of doing so, due to being exposed to these alien tongues via very expensive Interface machines practically at birth. (Although in fact, any baby could be put into an Interface and learn at least one alien language… But I'll get to that in a minute). These linguists, then, are in constant demand as translators and negotiators between human governments and alien representatives, to the point where children as young as six years old are performing official functions. Even though linguist women regularly have upwards of six children—seven or nine seems a lot more common—there just aren't enough linguists to go around. Reading about the schedules of the linguist children was genuinely horrifying; between practising their languages (at least one alien language, and upwards of ten human ones, as well as American Sign Language), school classes, mandatory exercise, and official functions, these children have maybe fifteen minutes of free time all day.
All. Day. And don’t forget, these poor creatures are up at five or six a.m. Just for that extra kick in the teeth.
Below, the schedule for a 14 month baby of a linguist family...
5: 00 – 6: 00 AM Wakeup, followed by calisthenics or swimming, and then breakfast.
6: 00 – 9: 00 AM Interface session, with one or two Aliens-in-Residence.
9: 00 – 10: 00 AM Outdoor play with other children. During this play hour the adults supervising use only American Sign Language for communication.
11: 30 – 12: 00 Lunch.
12: 00 – 2: 30 PM Nap.
2: 30 – 3: 00 PM Calisthenics or swimming.
3: 00 – 5: 00 PM “Play” time; spent with an older child who speaks yet another Alien language to James.
5: 00 – 6: 00 PM Supper, followed by bath.
6: 00 – 7: 00 PM “Family” time; spent with parents if available, or with an older relative.
7: 00 PM To sleep.
That’s a BABY. And later on we get governments demanding to know why linguist babies can’t spend six hours in the Interface instead of three, so they could learn faster. Of course, then, linguist women, despite being only women, have to be allowed to translate. There simply aren't enough linguists for anyone to be able to ignore full half of the linguist population.
The relationship between the public and the linguists was absolutely fascinating, although a little hard to swallow—given that most of the PoV characters are linguists, the reader knows full well that the misconceptions the public has about the ‘lingoes’ are completely false. In fact, from the very first chapter, when we see the woman Nazareth denied the (very cheap, in this future world) procedure to regrow her breasts after a total mastectomy, we see how heavily the public’s disapproval (if not outright hatred) influences the daily life of the linguists. Despite having literal fortunes at their fingertips, the linguists live in very bare, monkish conditions out of fear that the public will (inevitably) discover them spending ‘outrageous’ sums of money and riot again, as seems to have happened at some point prior to the beginning of the story. (I think at least a century before, but it’s a bit difficult to keep track.) The public, on the other hand, despises the linguists utterly, envying them their fortunes and always blaming them for not doing more. In particular, everyone, from the highest reaches of the government to the lowest citizen, believes that the linguists are capable of learning the ‘non-humanoid’ alien languages, and merely choose not to do so. For reasons no one examines too closely.
Simultaneously, the linguists are hated for how they abuse their children. But, as the head of the Families points out when this accusation is brought to him…
“Well, then, Smith,” Thomas asked gently, “would you explain something to me? Would you explain to me why it is that the government has not moved to take the children of the linguists away from them? If, as you imply, we treat them coldly and callously, and exploit them—”
“You do, dammit! You violate the child labor laws before the poor kids are even out of the cradle!”
“Ah. . . . a forceful phrase. . . . And why is that allowed to go on, Smith? If you took your own child and put it to work in a cornfield from dawn to dark, as we linguists put our children to work in government affairs, the authorities would step in and take that child away from you for its own good, wouldn’t they?”
Smith had seen what was coming, suddenly, too late, and he squirmed, and swallowed bile, and chewed on his lips.
“But nobody moves to protect our children from abuse, Smith . . . why is that?”
“Look—”
…He did not want to think about it. He would not, would not, think about it. He had never considered that question, why it was that the U.S. government , that would have stepped in instantly if any other child, let alone whole generations of children, had been mistreated as the linguist children were said to be mistreated, not only did not interfere but paid enormous sums to cooperate in that abuse. It was not a thought that he was willing to let get the least tendril of purchase in his mind.
Of course, the reason no one has taken the linguist children away is because the government depends upon them—demands more of them, in fact, than the linguist families will allow. And that this incredible… I don’t know what else to call it; that this fact exists—that any other child would be rescued, and these are not, that the government not only allows it but demands this abuse—and the public don't see the contradiction, or the problem with the logic of their hatred… It would be unbelievable if we hadn't all seen similar things in our real-world media. There is of course the other contradiction—if the linguists are so evil and terrible, why not replace them? Why not volunteer your own children to enter the Interface—which, performed properly, is perfectly safe—and become linguists?
Oh, of course. You wouldn't subject your own children to that lifetime of abuse and degradation and all the rest of it. You'll only demand it of other people’s children…while simultaneously calling them monsters for doing it.
I've now written almost three pages of review, and have yet to share what I think about the plot. Oops. Let’s see if I can rectify that.
There are a number of interwoven plots within this book. The government is trying to get an infant to survive Interfacing with a non-humanoid alien (so far, all have died horribly); Thomas Chornyak, head of the Families and of Chornyak line in particular, has to manage the incident of a linguist baby being kidnapped, as well as managing the various Lines; and Michaela, a non-linguist woman, is out to murder as many linguists as she can manage. There is Nazareth’s arc, which we glimpse first on the day of her surgery, only to backtrack to her life as a teenager and her horrifically early marriage to an even more horrific man.
None of these, however, are the true story. All are important, and all keep the pages turning, but the real—albeit quiet—focus of Native Tongue is the idea, and creation, of a women’s language. Something which is being done secretly, and slowly, in the Barren Houses of the Lines—the houses where the women past menopause, or otherwise made infertile, reside.
Elgin was an incredible linguist, the preface tells us, a professor of languages. It would probably be quite easy to write this same story and make it completely incomprehensible to anyone without a professional grasp of how languages work—which, having failed to learn all 8 of the foreign languages I've studied, I can assure you I do not have! And yet, Elgin does not overwhelm us, careful only to skirt the practical aspects of creating a language, focusing more on the importance of what the Barren House women are working on.
It is an importance which is inextricably interwoven with the rage-inducing misogynism of this world. The women of Elgin’s world—and perhaps our own, too—need a language that is all their own, both so they can communicate with each other in secret, and so as to express themselves more perfectly than any currently-extant human language allows them to do. I will freely confess that I didn't entirely understand why it was so important for most of the novel—what difference could it make to the appalling situation these women lived in? But Elgin very skillfully guides the reader to the appreciation of the full ramifications of a private language, one that belongs to women alone.
I’ve seen The Handmaid’s Tale hailed as a work of feminist science fiction. I've never really understood why—to me it’s more of a highlighting of how terrible patriarchy is, a kind of smack in the face for people (of all genders) who don't recognize the dehumanization of women that is painfully rampant in our society, and how plausibly easily we could lose all the progress we've made so painstakingly over the last century or so. Native Tongue, though—this is a feminist novel. This is a story of women, in unabashed honesty—women who are horrible and those who fight for a better world, women working together and women working alone. It’s about the strength and powers of women in a world where women are supposed to have no strengths at all. It’s an examination of the inherent madness of misogynism, the total lack of logic, and the quiet, subtle ways to undermine it. Nor does Elgin fall into the lazy trap of painting all her men as unabashed villains—although I personally loathed them all without exception, it cannot be said that any of her characters, male or female, are simplistic in any way. Every character has complex motivations and realistic personalities—and for those of you who want to argue that no man could ever be as awful as any of Elgin’s male cast (not now, in 2015!), who will scoff and claim that they are caricatures, I will just say: I've met worse. This crap not only still exists, it’s even still socially acceptable in far too many settings. So don't even go there.
I loved this book. It made me furious, and it made me cry, and frankly it made me overjoyed to be a woman—despite all that Elgin’s female characters go through, despite the misogyny in our, real, world.
It also made me incredibly grateful to be living in our world, and not Elgin’s.
Even if you have no interest in languages or politics, I would recommend this book. It’s wonderfully built, every word carefully selected, every bit of world building perfectly thought out. Elgin always provides the exact amount of detail necessary, no more and no less. It’s a superbly crafted novel, and I'm dying to get my hands on book two. After that ending, you will be too!