Fragile Spaces: Situated Knowledges in Orion’s Academia

Abstract

Through the element of estrangement often present in science fiction, Australian author Marianne de Pierres presents a world, which, while very different from our world, highlights issues very relevant to it. Close reading and literary analysis of <i>The Sentients of Orion</i> reveal an impoverished planetary world where most characters are stripped of, or crippled in terms of displaying and accepting love, affection and emotional intimacy. With reference to the recently published dialogue between Rosi Braidotti and Nina Lykke ‘The Long March Through the Patriarchal Institutions’ (2021), this paper will demonstrate how the negative experiences of love and intimacy of female academics and scientists in <i>The Sentients of Orion</i> are contributed to by the academic system in which they are situated. The analysis will show how patriarchal academic institutions alienate female characters, thus impacting negatively on their choices in terms of sexuality and gender performance. While gender performance and the results of the presence or absence of intimacy in the novels are situated and bound by specificity, the paper aims to show how the lack of tolerance for individuality allowed by the patriarchal systems of knowledge making on Orion impacts negatively on female agency.