But in a fictional world where different races have various magical powers and vastly different anatomies, a character's race (or rather species) rather does define a lot about them from the reader's perspective.
I mean do episodes of Star Trek go 'this is Bob, the sentient space nebula - he has two kids and likes to drink with his friends at the weekend' ?
LoTR no doubt does have some collectivist/nationalist/whaterverist trappings, but I find it completely unfair the way people call Tolkien racist by juxtaposing some modern and inanalagous ethnicity debate onto his fictional world.
I think you can fairly call Tolkien racist without bringing an external debate into it -- the fact is that as an author he spent an inordinate number of pages establishing racial heritage, and his characters are deeply straitjacketed by their race.
I mean do episodes of Star Trek go 'this is Bob, the sentient space nebula - he has two kids and likes to drink with his friends at the weekend' ?
LoTR no doubt does have some collectivist/nationalist/whaterverist trappings, but I find it completely unfair the way people call Tolkien racist by juxtaposing some modern and inanalagous ethnicity debate onto his fictional world.