Official Philip Nel Question #9: House Elves (includes some fanfic theory)

[gwendolyngrace]

No: HPFGUIDX 39154

Hello, again!

As promised, now that a few others are discussion the house-elf 
question, I'm free to add my own opinions.

> 2. A related point: Hermione says that the house 
> elves have been brainwashed into accepting their jobs.  Should we 
> agree with her?  Do we see the means through which the elves are 
> brainwashed? 
> 

Since as yet, we haven't seen the means through which they may be 
brainwashed, I believe they are not--not exactly, anyway. Let me 
explain.

Hm. Well, first of all, specious assignations of identity aside 
(sorry, Amy!), I lay down my position pretty well in 26785.

My belief is that we are meant to take house-elves literally for what 
they are, but metaphorically as a statement that not all problems 
require the same tool. Banging on a washing machine with a hammer is 
unlikely to do it much good, if it needs a new belt.

Hermione, IMO, is like a hammer to the subtle problem of house-elves. 
I do not believe that their "enslavement" is the issue, so much as it 
is their entrenchment in a system that exploits their other rights. 
Dobby clearly can tell what is right vs. what is easy, and he chooses 
the right path, even though he must injure himself to take it. If the 
captivity of house-elves were not so absolute, if their minds and 
hearts were not assumed to be given wholly to the service of their 
masters, more house-elves would be able to shake off their masters' 
plans when they do not serve the light. But how do we know they 
don't? We haven't seen them en masse in an evil household yet—-unless 
one believes that Dumbledore is ever-so-evil.

It's my prediction that the success of Dobby will lead some of the 
elves in other DE households to subtly work behind their masters' 
backs to bring about ruination. OTOH, the elves must weigh the risk 
and the danger to themselves, especially since it's my opinion that a 
house-elf's magic is tied to his service. A house-elf who is not "in 
fealty," as it were, or at least giving himself selflessly in the 
service of others, is in danger of draining his powers away. So house-
elves need families to serve if they are to survive—-unless a 
fundamental change in their situation and/or their natures is also 
brought about by the act of a number of them shaking off their yoke.

Let me use my fic to illustrate. I had an idea about house-elves in 
that fic—-well, actually, several. One idea was whether there was any 
kind of difference in JKR's world between the house-elves we've seen 
and any other kind of elf. If there is, what is that difference? I 
decided they were related, but several things happened along the way 
to change them. First, I really wanted to use the link from service 
to power, so I speculated that a house-elf amasses greater powers by 
serving his masters well and faithfully. Second, I wanted to provide 
some explanation for the whole clothes = freedom thing, so I came up 
with a hazy sort of backstory for the house-elves' enslavement, which 
blurs the line drawn between an elf like Dobby and one like Winky. 
Third, I wanted to provide some explanation as to why they hadn't all 
up and revolted before now, so I gave them a semi-Messianic myth, 
that one day, there will come a deliverer of some kind. (No self-
respecting house-elf would believe it's Dobby, though. :^)) And last, 
I believe there are other, less tangible consequences to 
disobedience, besides physical punishment, so I showed that through 
the means of a geas or weird that lies on house-elves, paralleling 
the events that led to their enslavement in the first place, so that 
they have incentive against breaking their bonds.

The result is a house-elf mythos that reconciles Winky, Dobby, and 
the elves in between, allows for the existence of some other species 
of elf we haven't yet met, and explains both why they are enslaved 
and why they continue to be enslaved.

I deliberately didn't develop it fully, nor indeed go anywhere past 
the fuzzy outlines of these ideas. But consider it this way:

1. The house-elves are creatures of magic. Their magic is regenerated 
through acts of service. Therefore, they *must* serve or their powers 
fade gradually, and if they fade too far, they will die. However, 
house-elves also have some mortality, and regardless of whether or 
not they serve, they do still age, and eventually will die of old age 
despite long service.

2. While the service given by a house-elf must be selfless, that is, 
done freely and willingly, the house-elves did enter a compact with 
humans eons ago in order to ensure that they would always have 
masters to serve. Over time, that relationship has become more 
entrenched and some masters have come to scorn their servants rather 
than appreciate them.

3. Presenting clothing to a house-elf breaks the contract, but it is 
also tantamount to outlawing that elf, or else murdering him. An elf 
without an assured source of service is an elf who is consigned to 
working in secret. This is how I believe Dobby survived for the two 
years before he came to Hogwarts: by "helping" families without their 
knowledge, and without pay, simply in order to maintain his level of 
power and energy.

4. Although the house-elf compact with humans has developed into 
discrete relationships with specific families, the house-elf still 
exercises some free will as to the manner of service. There is a 
professional pride, of course, to seeing that the chores are done 
well, regardless of whom one serves. In addition, there is the threat 
of punishment from some masters if their orders are not obeyed. But 
within the letter of that law, house-elves often have leeway. I am 
thinking here of the tendency of the Little Folk in Irish and British 
mythology to find the loophole in any situation (much as Dobby does 
with his sock). They can, like Dobby, choose to serve a "greater 
good" than their earthly masters, without impact on their abilities 
or their magical stores.

5. However, doing so bears a hidden price. By willfully ignoring what 
the wishes of their masters would be, in order to serve a higher 
purpose, the house-elves compound their situation with regard to the 
magical contract they entered with humans. They can either accept 
punishment as their due, or they pass on their term of service to 
another generation of elves. In other words, Dobby hit himself with 
the lamp or banged his fingers in the oven door to incur his 
punishment solely on himself, rather than passing an obligation to 
serve onto his progeny or another branch of his family.

6. Just for fun, I also set another limitation on house-elves: they 
cannot use their powers against someone of their own kin, and that 
limitation is "extended" onto their masters for the duration of their 
service. Doing so incurs the same type of price as working against 
their masters' purposes, only to a much greater extent. So that has 
the effect of rendering house-elves pretty much harmless against 
their own masters, and backs up Fred's statement to the effect that 
they can't use their magic without permission.

In terms of Dobby and Winky, here's how it looks:

1. Dobby has the misfortune of being born into a family of elves 
serving dark wizards. They are stuck, because of the compact, or 
perhaps because previous generations of elves serving the Malfoys 
tried to work against them and wound up having to serve for another 
period of time. So he tries as much as possible to keep his head down 
and do what he's told.

2. Harry Potter defeats Voldemort. Death Eaters have to pretend to be 
nice wizards again, and to some extent that reflects on their 
treatment of house-elves. Dobby's situation isn't great, still, but 
it's a lot better. Somewhere along the way, Dobby develops an 
unusually progressive idea about monetary compensation, though 
perhaps this is more of a status indicator than anything else, or 
maybe he really is ahead of his time.

3. Dobby learns of the plot to use the diary, and decides that 
protecting HP is more important than his geas to serve. In his mind, 
he transfers his service to Harry Potter, but he can't completely 
give up serving the Malfoys because he hasn't been freed from the 
contract with them (clothes). 

4. In order to help HP without consigning his family to another 
generation worth (or more) of service to "bad dark wizards," Dobby 
punishes himself physically. He justifies his actions by deciding 
that helping HP is a greater good than serving the Malfoys without 
question.

5. When he sees a loophole in the system, he jumps through it. Thus 
he is freed, but now he has the problem that he must serve in order 
to stay alive.

6. Dobby wanders through the country looking for work. If his 
strength begins to flag, he may perform a random act of kindness just 
in order to replenish his reserves. Finally, he thinks of Hogwarts, 
but having pledged his loyalty, in effect, to HP in CoS, he still 
considers himself in service to Harry. Of course, at Hogwarts, it's 
much easier to serve Harry, because Dumbledore doesn't restrict the 
elves nearly as much as the Malfoys.

Winky, by contrast, is I think just as much an aberration as Dobby. I 
agree with Dave that the clothing is a binding gesture--she must 
accept it even if it had been an accident. I think that the 
identification with her family, though, is perhaps a little more 
obsessive than most house-elves tend to behave. Having been sacked, 
she does not adjust at all. She is not serving any purpose in the 
Hogwarts kitchen, and I believe that her powers and her will to live 
are both diminishing because she is not working. 

Amanda (gosh, I hope it was Amanda) mentioned that she thinks house-
elves really are connected to a place, and only come to serve the 
family as an extension of their ownership of that place, based on the 
twins' comment that they come with large houses and mansions and 
castles. However, Dobby says in GoF: "Winky forgets she is not bound 
to Mr. Crouch anymore," which could as easily be an indication that 
they are, in fact, tied to a family and barring some other breach of 
contract, go where the family go.


On a slightly different note, some folks pointed out the similarity 
between house-elf speech and the slave dialect used in 19th century 
period pieces. I find that really interesting, because I never even 
considered that was a possible parallel. I did think it was a sort of 
pidgin, as if they didn't really speak English as a first language, 
but I never equated it to the usual "yas, massa" kind of accent 
represented in stories like "Gone with the Wind" or other Civil War 
era tales. 

Just because it made me curious, I looked up some of the speech in 
one of my favourite series of books. I have a few sentences of 
dialect from that book, "Yankee Stranger," by Elswyth Thane. It's the 
second in a fabulous series of books about several families who grow 
up in Williamsburg, Virginia. Yankee Stranger was published in 1944, 
but the dialect used is typical of the type others referred to, IMO. 
Contrast them with some of the house-elf speech.

"Done tol' me a lie," Micah ruminated. "Didn' look right, neither. 
Peak-ed, kinda. Marse Sedgwick have a fit." He pondered the last idea 
unhappily. "Yassuh, Marse Sedgwick sho' nuff gimme the debbil effen 
he knowed I let her ride off by herself like dat." He sighed 
philosophically, "Well, reckon I got to go tell him." (Yankee 
Stranger, 18th printing, page 100-1)

Here's another passage:

"Miss Felicity, ma'am, Miss Louise sont me to tell you all de wounded 
has begun to come in an' dey's a-sortin' of `em out down at de 
College, an' could use mo' help—"

"Is there anyone—-has she heard from—?"

"Oh, Lawdy, ma'am, none o' our folks is hurt, leastways far's we know 
now—-Marse Lafe, he rid off wid Gin'ral Johnston, not a scratch on 
him, praise de Lawd, an'-—"

"Sedgwick?"

"Marse Sedgwick ain' showed up yit, ma'am—-but ain' no call to git 
skeered `bout dat, `cause Gin'ral Stuart hisself ain' come by yit-—
an' you know yo'self de Gin'ral ain' gwine to let nothin' happen to 
dat boy, ma'am-—" (Yankee Stranger, 18th printing, p. 138)

And just to use the classic example, here's a passage from "Gone with 
the Wind:" 

"`Runned away?' answered Big sam. `No'm, us ain' runned away. Dey 
done sont an' tuck us, kase us wuz de fo' bigges' an' stronges' han's 
at Tara.' His white teeth showed proudly. `Dey specially sont fer me, 
kase Ah could sing so good. Yas'm, Mist' Frank Kennedy, he come by 
an' tuck us
. Cose, Mis' Gerald might' nigh had a fit w'en dey tuck 
me, an' he say he kain run de place widout me. But Miss Ellen she 
say: "Tek him, Nist' Kennedy. De Confedrutsy need Big Sam mo' dan us 
do." An' she gib me a dollar an' tell me ter do jes' whut de w'ite 
gempmums tell me. So hyah us is.'" (Gone with the Wind, Mitchell, 
1936. Avon books first printing, 1973, p. 301)

That's one of many, many, many examples of dialect in GWtW. 

Compared to house-elf speak:

"`And then Dobby had the idea, Harry Potter, sir! "Why doesn't Dobby 
and Winky find work together?" Dobby says.  "Where is there enough 
work for two house-elves?" says Winky. And Dobby thinks, and it comes 
to him, sir! Hogwarts! So Dobby and Winky came to see Professor 
Dumbledore, sir, and Professor Dumbledore took us on!'" (GoF, ch. 21, 
British ed.)

I can see that the house-elves have a dialect of their own, but I 
guess I'm missing something when it comes to a side-by-side 
comparison of Black American speech as represented in novels about 
the 19th Century, specifically the Civil War period. I never thought 
of it as a pidgin, per se, but simply as an attempt to make the house-
elves seem childlike, to go along with their diminutive appearance.

Incidentally, did anyone notice that Winky actually does refer to 
herself in the first person a few times, whereas Dobby never does? Do 
you think this indicates a difference between the two of them, either 
in education or treatment or some other status difference, or is it a 
Flint?

Gwen