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Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand explores the idea of someone having to restart their life in a completely different culture. In Delany’s novel, Rat Korga is the character that moves to a different planet after his gets destroyed. In class on Thursday, we discussed what questions and technology assistance we would provide an individual whose planet (or previous living) was destroyed.

I had similar questions as the ones we discussed in class. I would ask how they are feeling, learn about their culture, and try to the best of my ability to comfort them. I would want to learn about and document their culture and society. I feel that with only one survivor from a different world, it would be very beneficial and educational to record what life in the planet was like. I would be interested to know what the social structure and government was like and how it compares and contrasts to what we know in the US and on Earth. Discussing the relationship between individuals on their previous planet would also be interesting. If they were comfortable talking about their personal story of living on a planet that got destroyed and their feelings towards everything that happened, I would ask them.

Another theme in Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand is gender. In the book, the concept of gender binary is opened up and explored. For example, Delany uses the pronoun “she” for beings of any gender.

Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand although hard to read and sometimes understand, it offers a different literature perspective to sexuality, sexual drive, and accepting of different sexualities. Today we live in a world that is very sensitive about sexuality gender and sexual orientation. We must be careful about pronoun use, and our society is now challenged to be more accepting of those who don’t “follow” societal norms. Reading this book makes me think more deeply about this pressing issue in society. It is interesting to me that in RAT Korgas country Rhyonon where sexuality was not as widely accepted was destroyed. However, Rat Korga is sent to Velm. Velm however is more open with sexuality and allows men to be with men, and men to be with Evelmy. Marq and Rat Korga are able to develop a relationship in a country where they could, in a country that is surviving. In the North, the Evelmy and the humans do not get along and are in war which threatens the counties livelihood. However, the south thrives because they accept one another. What if our would was more like South Velm. Is there a message that Delaney is trying to tell us? While the book is science fiction, there is many truths behind the story line that exist in today’s society. There is conflict between people of different sexual orientations, we do have societal norms, and we do have restrictions on what our world sees as acceptable. Delaney makes me question what lessons can be drawn that we can learn from and implement in our society before our country self-destructs due to rising conflict.

In class we discussed the topics of General information and privacy and how the two realms are interconnected in the Stars in my Pocket. However, I was intrigued by the notions of general knowledge and how our current society’s ability is limited based on the constraints of privacy that we are entitled to.  Privacy to whatever extent allows us to be uninhibited in our actions and make progress without the perceptions of others.

The ability to act without the consciousness of others views or opinions allows oneself the ability to explore investigate and learn about what may not be socially accepted or allowed. In doing so, people are able to generate more knowledge and understanding. With the imposition of being monitored, one forfeits the ability to act whimsically on ones personal desires because of the possibility of going against social norms. When a society is collectibly able to explore and learn freely, that society will in turn develop into a more knowledgable and accepting space as a result of the general information and knowledge that it had developed.

For example, countries that experience large amounts of government control fall being on progressive fronts that enable greater acception and personal understanding. China, because of the governments censorship, is drastically behind in social and general rational because of the lack of freedom given to its citizens. In comparison to the United States, where privacy and freedom is much more abundant, our society as whole is leagues ahead of China’s. As a result, the idea of developing general information is born from the privacy that a society has.

I found reading Stars in my Pocket like Grains of Sand a very challenging book for me to understand. While I understood the main scenery and concepts of the different planets interacting together, it was hard for me to grasp the interactions of the people and the different things living on the planets. It is clear to me that Samuel R. Delany wanted to challenge our typical cultural views of sexuality and gender. In Rhyonon where Rat Korga is from, you are allowed to have sex with another “male” when you are over the age of twenty seven. In another planet called Velm where Marq Dyeth is from, you are allowed to have sexual relations with any gender. In the United States, gay marriage was just legalized. While the gay couples are allowed to get married, acceptance of these couples is only slowly getting adapted. I think after reading Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand, I have come to realize that the different in acceptance in different sexuality between the book and present day is our present day reliance on gender norms.

In the book, the difference between male and female is ambiguous. Everyone is referred to as a “she” and you only refer to someone as a “he” if you want to have sex with someone. In fact, sometimes I could not tell if characters in the book were male or female because Marq did not specify. Because gender in this universe is standardized between males and females, it evens the playing field in terms of gender identities. Therefore, homosexuality is accepted and deemed normal because it is not within in the gender norm to have to be attracted to someone of the opposite sex. Furthermore, the difference in gender norms in Velm has changed the dynamic of their home life. Two males can be the parents, or two females, or a mix between humans and other creatures. If you are a parent, then they use the term “mother” regardless of sex. Our gender norms in today’s world would never be able to accept a male as a “mother” figure because in many cultures, the mother and father have different roles in the home. Thinking about it now, our strict following of gender norms can sometimes limit us as people, or parents. Sometimes a father might not want to cry in front of his kids because he is supposed to be the strong family member who everyone else is supposed to lean on. I believe that understanding the characters and their interaction with each other was so hard for me to understand because of the engrained gender norms in the culture that I have grown up in. Reading this book made me wish our gender norms would not be as powerful, because it would mean wider acceptance of sexuality for homosexuals. When Delany wrote this book, gay marriage was not legal and was not accepted by many. I think it is very interesting that Delany wrote this book involving the sexual desire between two “males” because of the criticism he would have received. It makes me believe that Delany understood that one day, the barriers of our gender norms would be challenged to release the tensions of our gender and sexuality and form a more accepting world.

The concept of general information systems has been explored throughout class this week. On Thursday, we discussed the capabilities of perfect and complete knowledge. The human capabilities with access to perfect knowledge could be endless. the subject here that particularly interests me is the idea of perfect knowledge and its impacts on prejudice and ability to promote acceptance in society. As we discussed in class, Stars in my Pocket touches on the idea of foreign and familiar and the dichotomy between them. in Particular, things that are foreign to some people, can often lead to judgements and prejudices due to their lack of knowledge of the subject.

An instance of this would be one person holding prejudices of the Islam tradition regarding sacrifice and Jihad. these prejudices may very well be due to a lack of knowledge of the religion and the related traditions/beliefs. With access to perfect knowledge, perhaps there would be a greater understanding of tradition and culture. This greater understanding takes the Islam tradition from a foreign/unfamiliar subject and turns it into a more familiar one. With familiarity comes understanding/appreciation. As certain things are better appreciated, prejudices could be suppressed.

“Stars,” in my opinion, is a peep into this concept. The book presents readers with circumstances they may be unfamiliar with (homosexuality, lack of gender, oddly configured characters, etc). With increased exposure to these unfamiliar aspects of the book, the reader is able to better understand/ accept the circumstances for how they are. In other words, throughout the book, the discomfort or unfamiliarity of the book evolves into a more familiar feeling. The knowledge that the book provides, just as a perfect knowledge system would, provides an opportunity for once unfamiliarity to become custom.