I've been wondering whether we should talk about "harmful representation" more than "cultural appropriation" because the latter seems to hard for some people to wrap their heads around.
But...I'm not sure it matters. When it comes down to it, it appears there are a lot of white people who simply don't give a shit about PoC and how we feel. In fact, not only do they not give a shit, but they take pride in this. They don't want to listen to us, and they want to make these discussions all about them. After some of the crap I've seen in the romance community lately, there are some authors whose books I will never be buying...
You know, I think you're right: "harmful representation" seems to be more apt. But I agree, a lot of white writers don't care about PoCs and our feelings, and pride themselves on that.
However, I believe saying "a lot of white writers" doesn't really account for the type of writer we're talking about whose type is quite prevalent in all cultures. Perhaps a better way would be to say "a lot of dominant-culture writers"? I'm just thinking of moving away from using colours as labels. Or is that naive -- and insulting -- of me to try to remove these labels in the context of this thread?
Am asking because it actually makes me uncomfortable to say "white writers" when I'm aware that this isn't always the case.
Doesn't this kind of then extend to everything?
One could extend this to everything. However, I was talking about
my reluctance and refusal to tell the story of a minority / marginalised culture for the personal reasons I listed.
I don't think snitchcat was suggesting defining person of X culture as *just* that. Race is one defining trait of many. I would actually define myself first and foremost as female (and a hippo), and then by my race, and then I guess by my age, and then by education, and then...hrummm economic stability or otherwise, and then...oh as a mom, and then...a wannabe writer, oh, and a wife, and...I dunno, whatever other defining factors there are. I would define you not just as a cereal flake, but also a good query writer, a thoughtful poster, my victim , a snarky critter, and so on and so forth... It would be problematic if we were all only defined by ONE trait.
As to the whether or not this extends to everything, I don't know. There's another thread about the same subject in the Activism forum, and someone wisely pointed out that turning to extremes ("ignore all the noise! Write whatever you want!" Or "you can't write any char outside of your own demographic!") is easier to understand. It's when you strive for a middle ground that things get murky, and we find that the lines are blurred and people from the same group sometimws disagree about where they are in the first place, because like you pointed out, individual experience plays a factor too.
Heh, no, I was not suggesting that a person define themselves in this way. One defines oneself as one does. A cop out response? No. I believe that if one is comfortable with how one defines oneself using one's preferred criteria, then that is how it is; I will accept and respect that.
"Murky". That's a good way of looking at this topic.
No, sorry, I don't think Snitch was saying that people should be defined as just culture or race/ethnicity, but someone saying they feel they can't write about people from different cultures, and that people misunderstood someone's lack of apology as it was cultural
Yes, this.
-- though I don't see a particular reason to presume it wasn't just rude, or a product of the moment and not culture -- seems to me to kind of be looking at things from that type of lens, primarily cultural. Which, obviously, some people do define primarily, or feel their experiences are primarily defined, but... yeah.
I saw it that way because I heard three languages and saw two different cultures from opposite sides of the world in the video. Then I saw a third culture in the responses. Hence, I found the reactions all quite a bit more cultural than actually saying the lack of gratitude was a product of the moment.
Someone later in the thread pointed out that the gentleman was the maternal grandfather. Thank you for clearing that up; spoken Mandarin Chinese is not my forte.
It also then just brings up the rest to me, because I don't see the difference so much -- though I see the issues in ingrained societal prejudice that are different -- between a cultural or racial difference and a mental illness, a disorder, being short, being divorced, practicing a particular profession, etc.
I understand how ingrained societal prejudices inform one's viewpoint. On the other hand, I'm sensitive to many cultural differences due to my background.
This is where sensitivity readers come in. You have someone with the background you're trying to portray who can go through and tell you where you've missed it or misspoken.
Small example. In one of my books, there's an infection that turns the afflicted's blood jet black. There were lines in that book with a character who had been exposed bemoaning how they couldn't go home with "black blood." That phrase, to me, was a literal representation of the condition. Someone else pointed out that the same phrase, in other contexts, is used to denigrate people with African American heritage (the "one drop" rule). It was easy to rephrase the character's dialogue and not lose an ounce of meaning, but I wouldn't have thought to do it without hearing from someone who had different experiences. And the point is that it needed to be done. It's not about vision or authorial authenticity. Yes, it's my story, but it's written for an audience that hopefully includes a large number of diverse readers, some of whom might have had very negative run-ins with that phrase in a hurtful context. Me declaring my intent isn't as important as the potential damage done to a kid who associates my words with someone who hurt them. It's a breech of trust.
Wow. That term is something I would never have considered in such context.
I wasn't suggesting I was on the 'write whatever and fuck 'em if they're offended' page. I'd be careful about things and wary, but I don't know that tilting entirely to people maybe shouldn't write anything outside of their own experiences, is a good idea either. I'm not sure where people are suggesting those lines are.
There are a lot of things to consider in this thread. It's a complicated topic and mental gymnastics (as well as the occasional accidental conflation) are quite the norm here, IMO.
On the other, you've got your traditional Avatar / Ferngully / Pocahontas / Dances with Wolves / etc. "white savior" trope, where the guy is put there as the audience's insert character to "translate" between them and [insert non-white culture of choice]. It's condescending and ignorant, but in a different way from old Hollywood's "just put darker make-up on them" method of casting.
Irksome. Very irksome. I've seen those and... sigh. While I loved the concepts, saw what was behind the surface telling, I couldn't help thinking: what happened to not being condescending, to just presenting the stories as-is, without the translation? What happened to letting those cultures tell their own stories?
The one that really infuriated me, and put me off Disney forever, was Mulan. But I'll wax lyrical on that somewhere else at some point.
I can't comment on the disabilities part because I'm not sure how I want to phrase anything that's running through my head. But I get it.
The real "line" is a series of puppet strings, all held in the hands of the writer. The writer gets in trouble when they try to force those strings into trite, stereotypical motions rather than letting the puppet dance in the way more authentic to its story.
The line comes down to Don't be a Jerk and Don't write crap.
The language around cultural appropriation is "new" (c. 20 years or so, I forget), but the problem is not new, nor are the excuses around avoiding being courteous and accurate.
No one who knows anything is saying "You can write this" unless "you're that"; but people are saying get it right.
When we take cultural practices, whether religious or social or literary/mythological out of their context, we can't help but change them. [snip]
It's . . . complicated. Cultural interaction, explanation and annotation change things.
QFT.
Yes, when taken out of context (and I'd venture to say, even in context), we all have a tendency to change something, no matter how minor, because our filters, our views, colour everything we see. So, IMO, we can't be truly objective, despite our best efforts.
One example of this is how Chinese and Japanese cultures were/are conflated. This was especially evident when aspects of these cultures first started going mainstream within Western societies. It was incredibly infuriating. And the exploitation of elements of both was... Let's just say I avoided them whenever possible. (And I still do.)
Btw, obvious side note: "Fortune cookies" are
not Chinese; they're an American invention. In the same way, "General Tso's Chicken" is
not Chinese; this historical general was too busy fighting to cook. Definitely an America-invented dish.
Someone else's stories should be approached with at least the humble understanding that we might inadvertently, unconsciously alter them. Diligent research combined with openness to no-holds-barred critique are the best tools we have...but we have to have the courage to use them (versus the arrogance to insist they are unnecessary in my work).
Maybe our research reveals too many holes in a story idea best abandoned. Maybe a gracious critique means a completed manuscript has to be entirely rewritten. These things happen, and there's no point being precious about our feelings. Do better next time.
Agreed.
This led me to wonder: if science is a good thing overall, a tool that improves the quality of life and the standards of living for people, and if questioning everything has led some who are oppressed to question the status quo and has even led some of us in the currently dominant culture to question our own beliefs and our "right" to push everyone else around (after centuries of using their scientific accomplishments as a justification for dominating, of course), then aren't cultures that encourage inquisitiveness and questioning better off overall and more likely to survive, even if they evolve and change and eventually forget much of their old ways?
[snip]
There's a difference between a culture abandoning some things that were once dear to them but don't work for them anymore on their own and being forced to by another culture that wants their stuff or gets an ego trip out of making everyone more like them.
You know, I think this may need its own thread. IMO, this is another huge topic that needs to be examined in-depth without derailing this one.
If you are X, feel free to include characters who are Y, but do NOT write from the experience of being Y, because that's not your story to tell. Do the research, be accurate, be respectful, seek out opinions from Y beta readers, but try not to step into "This is how it feels to be Y" because no amount of research can actually put you into their shoes.
There are exceptions to this, obviously, as there are to pretty much every "rule" about writing, but I like this as a benchmark for "Am I going too far out of my own experience with this?"
QFT.
In re: cornflake's point about writing outside one's experiences that don't have to do with race/ethnicity/culture:
* If you write about, say, a profession, if you get things wrong it's not nearly as harmful or insulting as getting culture wrong.
* Culture influences our ways of thinking in really unexpected ways. It wasn't until I lived overseas that I realized a lot of my assumptions about ways of thinking I thought of as "human" -- or didn't think about at all, but would have assumed were universal -- are actually cultural.
* But for some reason, when we ask people to research other cultures, there's pushback.
In other words: I don't think anyone's saying writers shouldn't research other topics they write about. But most other topics lack the issues attached to cultural appropriation.
SL's post makes me wonder how much the source of contention hinges on not having a definition/understanding of culture. It's hard to talk about cultural appropriation if you don't fundamentally understand what culture is and what it does for us. The research on identity and culture in the social sciences all tends to agree that especially white middle class Americans don't tend to view themselves as having a culture. So just to extrapolate a little bit, I think if you're from the dominant culture in any given moment/place/time, it's very hard to see what your culture is and thus understand what other people's cultures mean to them. And in that way, I think it's really easy sometimes for writers to do all of the other research except the research on culture. It's easy to have cultural blinders on if you're not in a situation where your cultural isn't the dominant one.
This definitely makes sense.
There are so many elements that comprise culture. And I think everyone has a different viewpoint of that composition, but perhaps, because the majority agree on several common factors, therein lies the concept of culture. For example, one might say that because everyone practices a certain routine at a certain time, it is culture.
Several instances spring to mind: The celebration of the seasons and certain times within those seasons. From West to East, there are myriad variations, multiple ways of celebrating those events. The Spring Festival, May Day, Eid, the Autumn Festival / Harvest, Hanukah, Winter Solstice, New Year's. And so on. How many of the traditional pagan festivals were stolen by the Catholic church and assimilated into its practices, and over time, became new traditions and culture?
On the other hand, I think many of us are in a unique position: we are from both the dominant culture and the marginalised one.
For instance: I'm simultaneously part of the dominant UK culture and the marginalised Chinese culture (oh, and derail here: This is so telling of one of the reasons I left the country I am/was a citizen of: 56% of Brits view ethnic minorities as a threat to British culture, a new study finds. Sources:
https://www.defendevropa.org/2017/britain/britons-reject-diversity-new-research-finds/ and
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...nk-minorities-threaten-uk-culture-report-says). I'm also similarly, part of the dominant HK culture and the minority British culture in HK. Then again, part of the minority HK culture when I'm in Mainland China.
AAAHHHH. This is *exactly* how I feel whenever I go to my parents' place and my mom's watching her usual Chinese or Korean dramas. I'm like, "Jaysus, that is one unhealthy-as-fuck relationship" and she's like, "Look how filial that child is to his mother. He knows that she has self-sacrificed for years for his benefit. *sniff* *looks at me with disappointment*".
Exactly this.
