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How does Le Guin’s The Word For World Is Forest use alien contact to explore themes of imperialism, violence, and war? How does it work as a kind...

This novella is definitely my favorite piece of work by Ursula LeGuin. The themes regarding war, imperialism and violence are connected to alien contact because of the complex setting LeGuin has constructed. The story is less "science fiction" than speculative fiction, despite its use of science-based tropes to explain how things function.


Because the setting posits a planet that has to be colonized due to Earth's being made uninhabitable, the worldview of the Terrans (the ones seeking to colonize Athshe) is that they have dominion over the solar system. The Terrans' ability to navigate space travel as a way of colonizing other planets suggests complex intelligence and impressive achievement; but the price has been the ruination of their home planet. The technological sophistication needed for space travel and alien contact seems to be at odds with the rather savage behavior of the Terrans towards the denizens of Athshe.


Also, with these technological achievements comes great arrogance and a sort of oblivious disregard for their own recklessness. These attitudes inform the Terrans' approach to war, colonization and violence. They engage in brutal treatment of the inhabitants of Athshe, enslaving them, raping them and essentially treating them like animals. They refer to them as "creechies" and assume that their nocturnal ways and appearance (they've covered in fur) must somehow make them inferior to the Terrans. They are considered Other, and therefore alien; this is another interpretation of "alien contact" that can be explored. 


This metaphorical racism is at the heart of humanity's colonizing and imperialism throughout world history, and LeGuin suggests that our distant future will be no different if we do not learn from our past. The use of alien contact as a form of political communication is part of a depiction of the future that seems to value ideas over emotions, and institutions and commerce over human lives.

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