Author: Ivan West

Throughout this course, my thinking has shifted in different ways. Coming into this course, I was not sure what to expect. I originally thought it was going to be like any other English course, doing regular reading and writing. When we wrote the “Lithosphere Essay”, I thought we would be focusing more on the trilogy and the issues that emerged throughout reading each book. As we progressed through the course, I realized that it was more about our personal development and understanding not only what we think, but also understanding why we think the way we do. Reading through The Broken Earth Trilogy not only made it easier for me to grasp issues like racialization and problems in social structures that people experience every day, but it also allowed me to put myself in the shoes of some of the characters from the book and almost be able to share the emotions of what they were feeling. This course has also enabled me to achieve a deeper understanding of how every individual thinks differently in their own way about whatever the topic or issue may be.

Reading the first book of the trilogy, The Fifth Season, I was exposed to the “use-caste” system as it is referred to in the Stillness. The Stillness is a supercontinent much like what we assume Pangea to be like. The population living on the Stillness keeps their order within this hierarchical caste system where a part of the population; individuals called Orogenes are at the very bottom. Although Orogenes are the most powerful group of individuals on the Stillness; having the ability to control seismic energy and cause catastrophic seismic events all around the world, they have the least amount of freedom, being treated as non-human. From birth, Orogenes are mistreated, being physically and emotionally abused, even by their own families. Several characters in this trilogy experience life-changing events that cause deep personal changes in ways that change how they think and act toward others and even themselves. Most of these events stem from the racialization and manipulation of these Orogenes to use their powers in bad faith. One character in particular named Essun; who is also one of the main characters of this trilogy, experiences several life-altering events. At a very young age, her parents discover she is an Orogene. This causes them to banish her from the family, making her live in a barn isolated from everyone until she is assigned a Guardian named Shaffa and taken away. In the first book, Shaffa says to Essun (who is named Damaya at the time) ” sometimes…the parents of an orogene will try to hide the child. To keep her, untrained and without a Guardian. That always goes badly.” (The Fifth Season, Chapter 2). This quote gives a great example of how Orogenes and non-Orogenes were manipulated into believing that Orogenes have a power that is not safe to the rest of the world and needs to be restricted and controlled by others to keep everyone else safe. This part of the book made me think about how certain groups of individuals experience similar oppression in the real world, where things like social media and news can manipulate people into believing something that isn’t true, causing things like stereotypes and polarization that create a label for certain groups causing issues similar to what takes place throughout the trilogy. Furthermore, one thing I think that has changed about my thinking is that in the book, I understand now that this may have been originally done in good faith to protect the population and the land from a fifth season, but it was taken to extreme levels and not executed properly, creating a stereotype of Orogenes as being dangerous, causing other individuals not to trust or accept them as humans; putting them at the very bottom of their hierarchical social structure, which can be related to events that have happened to oppressed groups throughout history. In the second book of the trilogy, The Obelisk Gate, Nassun who is the daughter of Essun is taken by her father after he kills his son Uche when he discovers that is he an Orogene. While traveling through the Antarctics, Nassums father says to her “They can cure you Nassun. That’s what the stories say.” (The Obelisk Gate, Chapter 7). I believe that this quote shows how everyone including Orogenes like Nassun has been manipulated so much into believing that there is something wrong with them and that they are not able to be normal unless they are “cured”. This quote shows how oppression and racialization can have a massive impact on different groups of people where they truly believe that they are different from what is “normal”. This causes several issues that we experience in the real world where individuals can be once again manipulated into believing things about themselves and others that are not always true.

A character that I can relate to my personal growth and how my thinking has changed is Essun. She went through several different challenges in the trilogy, from being banished from her family and home at a very young age to having her son murdered by her husband. These hard times and challenges are what ultimately shaped her into the individual she was at the end of the trilogy, being more grounded and patient, compared to how she was at the beginning of the trilogy; being fiery and wanting to get things done without caring as much for the repercussions of her actions. I can relate this to my personal experiences. At the beginning of this semester, I was expecting to be able to stay focused on what I needed to do to complete all of my classes and improve on how well I did in the previous semester. I soon realized that it wasn’t going to be as easy as I thought it would be, taking classes that were more challenging than I expected. It took me a little time before I understood that I needed to change my approach to get the results that I intended. Just as Essun was faced with hard and seemingly impossible challenges when she was young, I feel as if the beginning of this semester was similar for me. I did not expect my workload to be as intense as it was and I became very stressed, while also experiencing personal issues on top of having a difficult semester. At first, I felt almost hopeless and that nothing that could help me. Throughout this course, I began to notice that I just needed to focus on what was the task at hand and not manipulate myself into thinking that I wouldn’t be able to do what I needed to. Nearing the end of this semester, I feel that even though I still have a heavy workload, I have been able to stay patient and manage my time much better, allowing myself to do better in all my courses.

This course has helped my personal development, giving me a deeper understanding of all things around me. Once I realized that we were developing ourselves in class and not just reading books, writing, and doing assignments on them, I realized the importance of our thinking and how much of a role it plays in our daily lives, and how it can also have an impact on others around us.

Work Cited

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1od_oEtoq2TRPiGlFduDLLKOAtSfYKcB4QyduwdXqvuY/edit

“The Fifth Season” by N.K. Jemisin

“The Obelisk Gate” by N.K. Jemisin“The Stone Sky” by N.K. Jemisin

In the first book of the “Broken Earth” Trilogy, “The Fifth Season” by N.K. Jemisin, we are met with the manipulation of myth and science in both, good faith and bad faith ways that racialize orogenes. Orogenes are individuals that have the ability to feel the seismic activity, which gives them the power to control such things as earthquakes and volcanoes. Orogenes are feared by the rest of the population because of this power that they hold. In order for the non-orogene individuals to be able to feel safe from the orogenes, they are kept under close watch by Guardians. Guardians have a power that negates that of the orogenes, causing their seismic power to have little to no effect. Throughout this novel, we learn and understand that the orogenes are treated extremely unfairly because of their ability, and face oppression in emotional and physical ways. Our course epigraph explains how the term “race” is not used to describe how an individual appears or looks but rather a ranking in society based on essentializing a specific group of people, or race. These social rankings, are recognized as essential in the function of our society and is why there has always been a pronounced power dynamic, throughout history. Throughout “The Fifth Season” we are met with several examples of racialization, which can also be tied to real-world events and scenarios.

In “The Fifth Season” there is a caste system that has been established, keeping the orogenes at the very bottom. It is seen that orogenes are mistreated in several ways by other individuals of higher power. At the beginning of the book, Damaya is a young girl who is found to be an orogene by her parents. After finding out that Damaya was an orogene, she was forced to sleep in a barn outside of her family’s home. Even though Damaya had a family that loved her, orogenes are so frowned upon that the people closest and dearest to her pushed her away for the simple fact that she was an orogene. In chapter 2, Schaffa says to Damaya “Not all parents do the right thing … by the time a Guardian arrives a mob has carried the child off and beaten her to death. Don’t think unkindly of your parents, Dama. You’re alive and well, and that is no small thing” (The Fifth Season, Chapter 2). This excerpt exemplifies the fact that the orogenes were extremely oppressed, and families would even abandon or kill their children after hearing that they were orogene. Another quote that backs up this point is when Essun says to herself  “House empty, too quiet, tiny little boy all bloody and bruised on the den floor” (The Fifth Season, Chapter 1). Essun who is the oldest version of Damaya, is looking at one of her two children dead in her own home because her husband Jija found out that their son Uche was an orogene. Physically and emotionally, orogens experienced the absolute worst treatment by other individuals of different castes. They were beaten and tortured, and if not killed, they were given the worst possible living conditions. Later in the book, we learn that all orogens have different levels of strength when it comes to their power, a 10-ringer being the strongest. Stronger orogens have more important jobs but are still treated poorly, and do not get any special treatments for having these more important tasks. Later in the book, Damaya changes her name to Syanite, which is done to detach her from her past life as Damaya, and now as someone who works and does jobs for the Fulcrum. During one of her adventures, she comes across something called a node. The book states “It’s the sort of thing they give to orogenes who’ll never make it to the fourth ring—the ones who have lots of raw power and little control. At least they can save lives, even if they’re doomed to spend their own lives in relative isolation and obscurity” (The Fifth Season, Chapter 8). Although the purpose of using nodes was done mostly in good faith, to protect the Stillness and keep it safe from detrimental seismic activity, orogenes are kept in these nodes, stuck underground for the rest of their lives controlling seismic activity in the location that they are stationed in. These orogenes experience extremely inhumane treatment by the individuals who put them there, with no choice but to serve the Stillness as a tool instead of as an individual and a living working being. As we can see from these examples, orogenes were not treated with respect or fairness by anyone, not even by other orogenes. If there was no oppression from guardians or other caste members, it was by other orogenes who were constantly in competition with one another. This helps keep the hierarchy where it is by turning people against one another because it makes it hard to trust one another. This can be seen in the real world throughout history and still today in the present time.

As media becomes a larger and larger part of our daily lives, more and more information is at the end of our fingertips. People are becoming more and more polarized from one another, creating tension between individuals, or groups of people. This polarization and inequity creates beliefs that form systems and laws that allow some groups to be treated differently; better or worse than others. In our course epigraph this is explained when it is said “My understanding, thus, is that race is a structural relationship for the articulation and management of human differences, rather than a substantive content” (Passage from page 27 of Geraldine Heng’s The Invention of Race in the European Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018.) Race has been used as a factor in creating and maintaining a social hierarchy throughout history and even still today. As you can see in a majority of major cities, there are very distinct lines of segregation between different racial groups, with those who are part of a lower class in the system, living in the worst-kept parts of the cities. (A City Divided) This holds the individuals living in these areas to stay at their “spot” in the social hierarchy. Furthermore, it prevents these individuals from having the same opportunities that other individuals have in the nicer, safer, and more up-kept parts of the city because of where they live and the conditions they are almost forced to live in. This gives a perfect example of why we live in a hierarchical system, providing benefits in numerous ways to those who were chosen to be at the top of this system. While those individuals who are not as fortunate at the bottom of the system, are faced with more daily challenges than those who have reaped the benefits throughout history and their daily lives.

Throughout the first novel of the “Broken Earth Trilogy”, we are introduced to several examples of racialization. “The Fifth Season” gives us a unique perspective on how the social hierarchy is truly a long-enduring issue in the real world. Not only does it paint a picture in our head of what the extreme scenarios of racialization and a set-in-stone caste system could lead to, it also allows us as individuals to be more aware of the hierarchical social issues we are currently enduring, and the same issues that have been ongoing for several generations.

Work Cited

“The Fifth Season” by N.K. Jemisin

Mini-Collaboration 1

A City Divided: https://ppgbuffalo.org/files/documents/data-demographics-history/a_city_divided__a_brief_history_of_segregation_in_the_city_of_buffalo.pdf