Writing and race

[bubosquared]

I've been thinking lately about if/how to write about a minority I'm not part of. Specifically, about me, as a white girl, writing about non-white characters. This could apply both to fanfic and non-fanfic, but I'm mostly thinking about the latter, because in fanfic, if the canon glosses over certain aspects of racial differences, for example, it's easy enough to follow its lead and not bring that up in fanfic.

But when I'm creating my own canon, that's a decision I actually have to make, and it's one that keeps making me wibble like there's no tomorrow. On the one hand, I don't want to write "colourblind", but on the other hand, I also don't want to fuck up if I do write about the more touchy subjects.

(And that's not even mentioning the "How the fuck do you show-not-tell race?" issue, which is something else I wrestle with, and augh.)

So, yeah. Thoughts? Opinions? Pointers? Swats upside the head? Anything? Like I said, this is mostly a non-fanfic thing, but opinions pertaining to fanfic arealso welcome, as I do write non-white characters in fanfic as well. *vague handwave at Lee and Mickey* (This is not a crossover bunny!)

Comments

[bibliotech.livejournal.com]

You have Common Sense, or I would beg you not to bother. But really, just avoid the "by the way, I am black, have I mentioned that I am black? Because, you know, I'm black" as a means of--well--letting the reader know the character is black.

Also, this might just be me, but lately I've been seeing this a lot in published fiction: when the minority character first appears, the author goes out of their way to describe the colour of their skin. "She was tall, and the colour of coffee with two creams. Her light brown skin hinted at something more than just African ancestry" (that's almost a direct quote from...I can't remember what, but as the story goes on, her race has absolutely nothing to do with it. And no one ever describes how pale the white people are.) For some reason, that mildly irritates me, especially when at least a paragraph is devoted to it, and it has no bearing on the story.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

Heh, yeah, I think this is one of those situations where I think drawing parallels to queer characters helps, because it irritates the fuck out of me when they do that with gays and lesbians (Marvel, I am looking at you!), so that's something I'm definitely avoiding. (And that paragraph you quoted is just ... ugh. I mean, apart from everything else, it's just gag-worthy writing.)

Though then you do run into the other side of that coin, the "white until proven otherwise" syndrome, and considering that there were people who didn't realise that Cho Chang was Asian, ands the Patil sisters were Indian, I don't know that I can really count on surnames to give people a clue, even in a contemporary setting.

I think I just need to do some research into Vietnamese culture formy contemporary novel, and see if I can weave some more cultural details into the novel, without getting all "OMG look at me, I did my research, SEE?" about it.

[bibliotech.livejournal.com]

Oh! Damn it, I saw that somewhere last week, and I couldn't remember...I was reading something, and someone new walked into the room and the main character said, "She had long blonde hair [blah blah blah about how blonde it was], she was a lesbian and her big green eyes sparkled like [blah blah blah]" and I stopped and went "...what?" And then you never hear anyone mention anything about her in relation to her sexuality ever again. So...why just randomly slip it in there like that, between "hair" and "eyes"? People do this so badly.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

... What? I mean, what? Do we have "LESBIAN!" stamped on our foreheads now and no one told me? o_O

But yes, and even if they manage to mention it the first time gracefully, characters are often then reduced to "I'm gay! Did I mention I'm gay? SO GAY! Because I like guys! Not that I'm ever actually going to kiss one but, GAY!" And now I'm wondering what the race equivalent of Will-and-Grace-syndrome is, if there is one. Hm.

[bibliotech.livejournal.com]

Now I want to go through popular books and look for that--any time someone mentions "she was tall and BLACK AND GAY and had brown eyes and was BLACK AND GAY AND A PAGAN and wore red boots and OH BY THE WAY SHE'S STILL BLACK AND GAY AND PAGAN TOO and had on red lipstick." It's like the author's going, "I want to show diversity, but the scene doesn't really call for it...I know! I'll introduce a very minor character and mention that they're a minority! That'll do it! Now back to the plot!"

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

*encourages* Hey, it'd give me some good examples of What Not To Do. :D

[bibliotech.livejournal.com]

I think the most depressing part is that it's become so common that it would be easier to find examples where they don't do this. I'm working on a story now where one of the main characters is black, and no one's mentioned it yet because it just doesn't apply to anything. I keep wondering should I work that in there, but unless someone new shows up and goes, "Hey, you're black! Look, that guy's Jewish!", there's no tactful way that I can find. Maybe it'll come up in a random conversation, that's all I can think of. This "writing" stuff is hard.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

God, yes! I lucked out a little with my contemporary novel, because the major non-white character is Vietnamese, so I can probably count on her name tipping the readers off, but a) not a guarantee, see also Cho Chang and the Patil sisters, and b) her given name (Jesse) isn't especially Vietnamese, and I don't think her surname's going to show until like a third into the book. And with my fantasy novel, I realised as I was re-reading to editing that the only reference to one of the characters being/looking Arabic/Middle-Eastern is a mention of "olive skin," which is going out in the rewrite because it's just a leetle bit too close to that coffee-with-milk example you mentioned. (Not to mention, in context it's kinda skating the purple prose line, ick.)

This "writing" stuff is hard.

Tell me about it. They need to work on this whole cybernetics thing, so I can just syphon images into people's brain directly instead of having to go through that whole "words" thing.

Also ...

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

You have Common Sense

Somewhere in Belgium, my mother is laughing hysterically, and she doesn't know why. :D