Dwarves

I have feels about this. Good lordy, I have feels.

One, is that we need, need, need to avoid stereotypical, "barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen" attitudes among our men and dwarves. That is not to say that they need to be gender equal, just that it needs to be handled in a more nuanced way. I'm thinking, especially with the dwarves, that any unhealthy social norms be of the "benevolent sexism" sort. And if you're not familiar with that term no, it's not a good thing.

A lot of Hobbit fanfic is terrible (but of what genre is that not true), but one thing the good ones tend to be really good at is considering the consequences of a "male-dominated but female-dependent society". That is -- dwarf women are one in three, and Tolkien says many choose not to marry. So you will always have more males than females, especially more unmarried males, and what does that mean for your culture? Tolkien's Word of God indicates that dwarf females at least have the right, first to choose whether or not they wish to marry, and second whom. Beyond that, I think it's in keeping with canon to depict females as sheltered: either by being kept at home or being presented as males to outsiders.

The major struggle a female dwarf is likely to feel isn't that she's considered weak/silly/incapable -- I see no reason we can't depict them as well-educated, trained craftsmen just like their brothers -- but that they're too precious. The dwarfling girl who wants to be a warrior won't be told female's aren't strong enough to fight, but that the society can't risk it. Dwarf women can't be forced to wed, but do many of them, especially perhaps in noble families, feel a pressure to do so in order for family/blood lines to continue?

If women are so few, and "breeders" (to be blunt) are fewer, than a lot of archaic human attitudes we're familiar with won't apply. A dalliance before marriage, for example, probably won't ruin a girl's prospects -- it's not as if her suitors have a plethora of other options, after all. A female -- any female -- might have to fight tooth and nail not to be stuck on a pedestal, worshiped and adored from afar.

All this is to (for me, briefly?) say that dwarf gender issues are there, but they're going to be very different from our average experience.


There is something to the idea of Dwarf females being "too important" to waste in combat. There is pretty good precedent to that in human cultures. Obviously there are the considerations of the average physical attributes involved, but early human civilizations would realize quite quickly that males are quite expendable in comparison to females. It may have actually given rise to polygamy, as males would have a far lower life expectancy.

The "male-dominated but female-dependent society" has a lot of precedent. Think about cultures that have a "bride price" vs. a "dowery". Of course, there sexist implications of both, but it is an interesting distinction nonetheless.
 
There is something to the idea of Dwarf females being "too important" to waste in combat. There is pretty good precedent to that in human cultures. Obviously there are the considerations of the average physical attributes involved, but early human civilizations would realize quite quickly that males are quite expendable in comparison to females. It may have actually given rise to polygamy, as males would have a far lower life expectancy.

The "male-dominated but female-dependent society" has a lot of precedent. Think about cultures that have a "bride price" vs. a "dowery". Of course, there sexist implications of both, but it is an interesting distinction nonetheless.
Exactly. Which is why I mentioned benevolent sexism. Obviously, a bride-price isn't necessary an example of that, but we have a lot more to think and work through than knee-jerk redneck stereotypes.

In all societies there are a given set of assumptions, values, and beliefs. Even negative things about cultures: sexism or racism, unhealthy views of honor or glory; come from that set of common attitudes. A given assumption that females are supremely precious will have a lot of consequences, not all immediately obvious. If we're going to the gender thing, and I think we must at least think through it here, we need to do it thoughtfully and with plenty of nuance.
 
Interestingly, "redneck" stereotypes are more likely to involve the "dowery" side of things, coming from cultures in northwestern Europe where a woman was expected to come into a marriage with a "fortune" or "dowery" to cover the cost of "supporting" her.

The bride price is much more common in places like Africa, where in many tribes, the women do almost all of the physical labor, while the tasks of men revolve entirely around hunting and warfare. This makes women extremely valuable in that society.
 
The #1 thing to try to do, and it's REALLY hard, is to step back as objectively as possible from the RL human experience and try to get in the heads of these imaginary NOT HUMAN people and try to work out how they think and what would fall out both from their biology and from what we are told of the outward manifestations of culture. (I think it's actually harder for Dwarves than for Elves.)

"Females are rare" as a cultural basis for gender roles is much different from "females are weak". Just typing that made me think - pregnancy and childbirth should probably be MUCH easier procedures for Dwarves than for Men (har har it's the name of the race).
 
The #1 thing to try to do, and it's REALLY hard, is to step back as objectively as possible from the RL human experience and try to get in the heads of these imaginary NOT HUMAN people and try to work out how they think and what would fall out both from their biology and from what we are told of the outward manifestations of culture. (I think it's actually harder for Dwarves than for Elves.)

"Females are rare" as a cultural basis for gender roles is much different from "females are weak". Just typing that made me think - pregnancy and childbirth should probably be MUCH easier procedures for Dwarves than for Men (har har it's the name of the race).
One, I'd agree and go further: it's much harder for dwarves than for elves. With elves, at least, we have a bunch of stories and a good chunk of a language to glean insights from. Dwarves? We have a children's story version of one of their Tales (possibly a Great Tale, at least in the Fourth Age), one dwarf amongst the Company, a handful of words, and... the elven version of their creation story. There's a bit more here and there, but not much.

One thing we do know about dwarves, though, is that they tend to be greedy and horde gold. Could they have at least the temptation to be possessive of their females, too? Overprotective, to the point of paternalistic, of sisters, wives, or daughters? Is a wife a status symbol among dwarves? Not younger/beautiful, perhaps, as is sometimes present in the more squicky parts of human society, but being seen as "good enough" to win a female? Especially an intellegent/shrewd/talented one?
 
I'm having a difficult time with it right now, actually.

Reconciling the seemingly inevitable "protected and treasured because precious as gold" with my desired "strong independent equal". I just can't get from A to B easily, without if feeling like I'm forcing my preference into an inappropriate setting.
 
I'm having a difficult time with it right now, actually.

Reconciling the seemingly inevitable "protected and treasured because precious as gold" with my desired "strong independent equal". I just can't get from A to B easily, without if feeling like I'm forcing my preference into an inappropriate setting.
One thing we can play with is making the protectiveness a temptation, not necessarily seen as a good thing, even by them. Thorin's goldsickness, after all, wasn't exonerated by his being a dwarf, even if the other dwarves instinctively understood his desired better than Bilbo did.

I don't think the text supports making dwarven culture a modern social utopia. We can play with serial monogamy, as you suggested above, or same-sex relationships, if we like, but I think the evidence we have points to a clear distinction between males and females in this society. I'm sure we can find a way to maintain that, and still have strong female characters without going all Mulan on the dwarves.*

I do suspect, however, that we can have strong females even if they are highly protected and sheltered. It's a misconception, I think, that a "strong" female character has to be a tough-gal, "beats the boys and makes them cry" while drinking and smoking and overall acting like the guys. If, for example, we make Telchar a female, than she should be the head of her guild, and the master of apprentices, respected/revered by her contemporaries and mythologized by later generations. And her being female would have nothing to do with it, would barely even be worth mentioning to the dwarves, because so what? What does her gender have to do with it? Whereas a tale of a fight for survival so fierce that "even the dams took up arms" would have a very different feel when being retold.




*Don't get me wrong, love that movie, but maybe not here.
 
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Prior to the 12th century, Europe had a bride price, not a dowry. The shift between the two almost always has to do with demographics - are there more marriageable males or females in the population? If men are rare (because of wars wiping them all out), then dowries make sense as women's families bribe men to take their daughters off their hands. If women are rare (because of disease or famine decimating the population), then the bride price makes economic sense. Which is why it will be interesting to see how long India holds onto the dowry tradition in light of their shifting demographics heavily favoring male children (sex selective abortion and female infanticide are a thing there, specifically because of how expensive dowries are).


Of course, you can have both bride price and dowry, or neither. It depends on the culture how this played out, and was also a function of whether or not women could own or inherit property in their own right. The purpose of a dowry was meant to be to provide for the bride in the event that she became a widow.

http://www.womenintheancientworld.com/dowry and bride price.htm

The main (obvious) issue with the concept of bride price is that most young men would be unable to afford marriage. Several cultures have developed work arounds so that either the bride price is small/symbolic, or paid out over time rather than before the wedding.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bride_price


Beren's insult to Thingol (about how cheaply the elves sell their daughters, if all he wants in return is some rock) suggests that bride price is not practiced among the Men of Bëor. I'm not sure that we should assume it is common among the Sindar, but if it is, Celeborn will have to offer something to Galadriel's brothers, and I can just see that going over well! We honestly don't know anything about the dwarves' wedding customs, so we are free to develop these how we like...but we should create them with an eye to the misunderstandings of outsiders.

I would imagine that the dwarves would have some custom in place in their culture that reflects the scarcity of women and dwarvish tendency to assign everything a value. If they were to practice some form of bride price and the elves did not, then that would just increase the likelihood of the elves seeing them in a poor light (they buy and sell their women!), but show the audience that it is rather a matter of esteem, and to ask for marriage without offering something valuable in return is considered...cheap (or something). The audience will understand engagement rings, so I think it would be easy to portray this in a more positive light (if necessary).
 
I'm having a difficult time with it right now, actually.

Reconciling the seemingly inevitable "protected and treasured because precious as gold" with my desired "strong independent equal". I just can't get from A to B easily, without if feeling like I'm forcing my preference into an inappropriate setting.



Ok, so I feel like I have to kind of address a phenomenon of "modern perspective".

Today, we reject the ideas of gender stereotypes. We look for strong female role models who can do everything that men can.

Two things about this: One, cultures in the past did not feel this way. For better or for worse, the norm was male-dominated societies. Can we judge those societies by modern standards? I think we can, to a point. To say that the ethics of past societies are valueless because they are dissonant with ours is to condemn the lessons learned by humankind throughout history to irrelevance. On the other hand, "whitewashing" past cultures to fit our modern sensibilities is actually worse, because it ignores our struggles thus far.

Of course, the dwarves are not a real, historic culture, but I think that they give us a unique opportunity. If anyone can be shown to have wrong attitudes while not being wholly unsympathetic, it is the dwarves.


Two, there is a modern trend, and I think quite a sexist one, that elevates traditionally masculine roles and traits as being superior to feminine ones.

In order for a woman to be "equal" to the men in her environment, she must take on a traditionally masculine role. She must exhibit the same attitudes, skills, and approaches as men.

I utterly reject this as a necessity. Having women bucking gender roles is great. The character of Haleth exemplifies this.

One reading of Eowyn's character is that she bucks the gender stereotype, then decides she would rather retreat to female life.

I would prefer to think that she realizes that she does not have to BE a man to be EQUAL to a man. Faramir certainly does not treat her as an inferior.

I caution against using the "warrior woman" as short-hand for equality.
 
Beren's insult to Thingol (about how cheaply the elves sell their daughters, if all he wants in return is some rock) suggests that bride price is not practiced among the Men of Bëor. I'm not sure that we should assume it is common among the Sindar, but if it is, Celeborn will have to offer something to Galadriel's brothers, and I can just see that going over well! We honestly don't know anything about the dwarves' wedding customs, so we are free to develop these how we like...but we should create them with an eye to the misunderstandings of outsiders.

I would imagine that the dwarves would have some custom in place in their culture that reflects the scarcity of women and dwarvish tendency to assign everything a value. If they were to practice some form of bride price and the elves did not, then that would just increase the likelihood of the elves seeing them in a poor light (they buy and sell their women!), but show the audience that it is rather a matter of esteem, and to ask for marriage without offering something valuable in return is considered...cheap (or something). The audience will understand engagement rings, so I think it would be easy to portray this in a more positive light (if necessary).
Actually, I think I'd prefer it if the Sindar don't have anything like a bride-price or dowry, so that Thingol's demand is doubly transgressive.

I do like the idea of playing with the bride-price inside and outside the dwarrow mindset. For them, it could be part of proving yourself "worthy", i.e. financially secure, of a wife, as well as a mark of esteem, or even a gift like an engagement ring: perhaps the groom supplies the metals and gems that is crafted into her wedding jewelry? And then that can be interpreted by men and elves as "purchasing" a wife, as you said.
 
I would rather explore what we think the dwarvish culture would be, rather than decide in advance what we want it to look like and force it into that shape for no reason. The dwarves are (nearly) a blank slate, it's true, and there is plenty of room for different interpretations. But I'd rather start with a beginning point that is 'dwarvish' and then work through the issue, than start with a 'modern' viewpoint and then try to force the dwarves to get there.

The dwarves have been compared to the Jews (by Tolkien himself, actually), so we could probably do worse than to use some sort of ketubah for the Dwarves:

http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/the-ketubah-or-marriage-contract/

It would make sense for the dwarves to put the terms of their marriages into a written contract, wouldn't it?
 
But I'd rather start with a beginning point that is 'dwarvish' and then work through the issue, than start with a 'modern' viewpoint and then try to force the dwarves to get there.
Very well said!

If it seems like I'm jumping the gun, well, maybe I am a little. But I've already thought a lot (and I do mean a lot) about dwarves and dwarrow culture. My thinking has been influenced, I admit, by the behind-the-scenes materials of the Hobbit extended editions, but they're largely silent about dams and that sort of thing.


It would make sense for the dwarves to put the terms of their marriages into a written contract, wouldn't it?
I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, yes. But on the other.... Bilbo is the one who wants everything laid out neat and clear, in the Hobbit; Thorin thinks his song is sufficient. And unlike the movies, in the book Bilbo's "contract" is a short, sarcastic note. And given that Gimli has to pause at the Mirrormere, I tend to think of dwarves as highly ritualized, relying on certain oaths, words, songs, and gestures, more than on the written text. But I'm not sure.
 
Well, in the Hobbit, we are getting modern (well, Victorian) British culture being brought face-to-face with the Northern tradition of much older cultures. So, yes, the idea of written contracts and legalities versus the emphasis being on someone's given word reflects oral tradition of the ancient Norse vs the prevalent literacy of 19th century England. But literacy is very much associated with the Jewish culture as well, and we know the dwarves from the Hobbit were quite literate themselves.

We don't have to use that parallel as a jumping off point; it was merely an example. I thought the contractual nature of marriage would be very important to dwarves.
 
Like I said, mixed feelings about that particular example. I fully support our dwarves being highly literate, but perhaps they save Khuzdul, created for them by Mahal, for more significant or sacred things than business transactions or hiring help? That could be an argument for wedding contracts, as a wife or husband is a helpmate of much more spiritual worth and importance than a burglar.
 
As much as I like the Dwarves in The Hobbit, I would like our Dwarves to be more mysterious, odd, weird, perhaps even alien. They behave in ways Elves and Men don't quite understand, and they have their own special relationship to magic; they have deep knowledge about matter and we should sense their closeness to Aulë, even if he doesn't visit them anymore. We should sooner get the feeling that they are almost earth elementals than 19th century lawyers. I want us to be inspired by the Norse Myths Tolkien loved, whose Dwarves were dark and powerful.
 
As much as I like the Dwarves in The Hobbit, I would like our Dwarves to be more mysterious, odd, weird, perhaps even alien. They behave in ways Elves and Men don't quite understand, and they have their own special relationship to magic; they have deep knowledge about matter and we should sense their closeness to Aulë, even if he doesn't visit them anymore. We should sooner get the feeling that they are almost earth elementals than 19th century lawyers. I want us to be inspired by the Norse Myths Tolkien loved, whose Dwarves were dark and powerful.


My question on this is whether or not the dwarves that Tolkien actually describes in detail could be described as "dark and powerful".
 
My question on this is whether or not the dwarves that Tolkien actually describes in detail could be described as "dark and powerful".
Maybe not, but they are Other. Dwarves are unique in Tolkien, to my memory, as bad guys who turned (largely) good, and some parts of them remain... suspicious? Mysterious, at least. We do get repeated hints about dwarrow magic, and I suspect it is magic, not enchantment (or rather, a mix of both) as Tolkien defined the terms in "On Faerie Stories". They tend to live their lives underground, away from others, are secretive, literally not even speaking the same language as those around them. And yet they keep time by the Sun and Moon, as men and elves do (after the Trees). They are not complete incomprehensible, but the other races never quite understand them.* "Dark" I would quibble with, but there is something there, I think, even in the Hobbit, that is not quite safe about them.

*I know one race never completely "gets" the other, but Aragorn does have a pretty good grasp of elven nature, and Elrond of mannish. Neither, I think, fully gets dwarves.
 
not all of it... merp did invent some neo-khuzdul too before the pj movies and lotto came up with more neok-khuzdul.
 
Maybe not, but they are Other. Dwarves are unique in Tolkien, to my memory, as bad guys who turned (largely) good, and some parts of them remain... suspicious? Mysterious, at least. We do get repeated hints about dwarrow magic, and I suspect it is magic, not enchantment (or rather, a mix of both) as Tolkien defined the terms in "On Faerie Stories". They tend to live their lives underground, away from others, are secretive, literally not even speaking the same language as those around them. And yet they keep time by the Sun and Moon, as men and elves do (after the Trees). They are not complete incomprehensible, but the other races never quite understand them.* "Dark" I would quibble with, but there is something there, I think, even in the Hobbit, that is not quite safe about them.

*I know one race never completely "gets" the other, but Aragorn does have a pretty good grasp of elven nature, and Elrond of mannish. Neither, I think, fully gets dwarves.

Yes, I was painting an extreme picture to get my point across. It doesn't have to be totally that way, but that's the direction I'd like us to take. Exactly like you say Marielle, they are Other.

I'm thinking also of the way their strangeness makes Eöl a more mysterious person. He's the one who gets them best, almost.
 
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