Week 12: Bloodchild, by Octavia Butler (points: 2)

 My reaction to this story is that it is somehow familiar. Not in the way that Butler stole from someone else her idea, or that this story has been rewritten ad nauseum. I mean it in that Gan's story is something that is very familiar to the average consumer of period romance, and maybe even at some level, the female-hindbrain. This is an arranged marriage between Gan and T'Gatoi, something that was practiced for a majority of human history, across culture and era. T'Gatoi being a literal alien isn't even that strange in this context - humans use that word to describe 'foreigners' after all, and cross culture marriage for the consolidation of power and resources was an extremely prevalent reason for arranged marriages. 

Gan's equivocation over accepting T'Gatoi before ultimately accepting is interesting to me. He doesn't care as much as he thinks he does about becoming T'Gatoi's 'bride,' but he is afraid of hosting her young. He's actually kind of possessive of his role with her, more so than he is afraid, and that is what spurs him on to make the choice he does. But there is also a way that none of this conflict could have happened, and Gan even says is - humans need to be shown successful harvesting and not just the ones that end up with someone dying. They know it's possible, Gan's own father did it several times without hating the Talic, but T'Gatoi's response of humans needing to be 'protected' from seeing the harvesting enforces the image we have of human's dubious consent to all this, by removing an opportunity for the humans to make informed decisions. Ignorance is a tool in subjugation as much as any weapon, but you still need some level of knowledge for understanding and cooperating, of you end up with Qui, who only knows enough to be afraid. The whole dynamic of the family was really compelling to me, because this is how a family would react to these circumstances of one of theirs essentially getting married.

If I had to adapt this into another medium, I would say comic or graphic novel. There is a flourishing market there for Sci-Fi, and as part of an anthology series it would get some great reach. I don't think much would need to change between to two mediums outside of offering some visual intensity and allowing for visual nuance, which is good, because that ensures the preservation of Butler's work at it's core.

An element of afro-futurism would be the adaptability of the humans while in a diaspora. They don't quite secure their independence, but their agency is pretty good for the circumstances. At this point in the story too, the worst of the cohabitation period has worn off, and Gan's choice is both an acceptance of culpability and of changing the status quo to more favor human and Talic equally.