Something I've been mulling over, but find it hard to put into words—Tolkien's dwarves, as well as Pratchett's, are portrayed as without gender, but the effective gender they portray is exclusvely what humans think of as masculine. I think Pratchett handles it fairly well with the progression of, for example, Cheery/Cherry Littlebottom, etc.
In translation, the male pronoun is exclusively used, but Dwarves don't think of themselves as male-that effectively means that the 12 Dwarves in the Hobbit could be of either sex, we wouldn't know, no secondary sexual characteristics.
In SF, the Sontarans, for example, are an agender clone race, but again are interpreted and basically portrayed as male.
Is that a fault in our interpretation, in the writing, or of human society in general?
And are there any other races in SF or fantasy that are effectively agender but aren't written in those explicit terms?
no subject
In translation, the male pronoun is exclusively used, but Dwarves don't think of themselves as male-that effectively means that the 12 Dwarves in the Hobbit could be of either sex, we wouldn't know, no secondary sexual characteristics.
In SF, the Sontarans, for example, are an agender clone race, but again are interpreted and basically portrayed as male.
Is that a fault in our interpretation, in the writing, or of human society in general?
And are there any other races in SF or fantasy that are effectively agender but aren't written in those explicit terms?