On Appropriation vs. Representation

This past weekend I was asked to be on a podcast that’s a little outside my usual scene.

I go to an art club called Drink and Draw every month, and many of the people there are more “serious” artists than I am (or at least more talented). Anyway, my friend Eric is the club’s host, and he usually picks me up on his way there so we talk about stuff. This time, we ended up talking about the comic book The Nameless City by Faith Erin Hicks, which I hadn’t read.

It turned out that Eric had seen a Twitter discussion about whether The Nameless City was appropriative, because it has a cast and setting clearly based on ancient China, but it’s written by a white woman. An Asian artist on Twitter was saying books like this and television shows like Avatar: The Last Airbender (which clearly influenced Hicks) are disappointing in a way because it feels like mainstream culture is capitalizing on “diversity” while still not making way for people to make art about themselves.

This is a good point, and Eric and I had a spirited discussion about it. He invited me to come on his podcast the next day to talk about the same thing with his friend Robbie (who I also know but he’s mainly just an acquaintance of mine–we hang out with the same people and he’s been in my house but we don’t really talk much). Of course, first I had to read the book. So I read it at Drink and Draw before doing my art. 😉

The podcast episode I was on is here: Handsome Boys #142.

A review I did of the book is here: The Nameless City by Faith Erin Hicks (review).

Here’s the thing: We all know we would like more diversity of all kinds in fiction, and we all know the only way it can happen is if people make it on purpose. The problems are many, though, and one of the most insidious is that mainstream audiences often think a piece of media is not “for them” if it primarily contains people who are not like them. When we “mark” a piece of media, usually the people who are described by that mark will flock to read it, but it will remain less circulated, undervalued, probably written off as niche, and rarely reaching the broader world. But if the mainstream media actively solicits media featuring characters, settings, and messages less commonly featured, will that help?

Some say it’s really not going to help that much if the creators filtering the message into the mainstream are not telling their own stories. If they’re telling underrepresented populations’ stories through their own lenses, does it really serve the purpose of bringing those stories to light, or is it just people from the mainstream culture wanting to pat themselves on the back for being so inclusive now that diversity is a buzzword?

So what do the underrepresented populations in question have to say about this? Well, as usual, it’s a mixed bag. Some want to know why mainstream authors with plenty of connections want to hijack their narratives and give them to the outside world so they can gawk. Some want to know why they’re not being solicited to contribute work if it’s their perspective that’s supposedly so valuable. And some believe one of the things that actually does help pave the road for that to happen is getting mainstream audiences to understand that work about “the other” can be for them.

Avatar: The Last Airbender managed to get a cartoon onto mainstream television that did not contain a single solitary white person, and it’s definitely got a large cast, too. The names and concepts definitely have Asian inspiration of various sorts, but it is still Fantasy Asia, so the creators get a bit of a pass if something isn’t “accurate.” And its creators are two white guys. They have a ton of Asian consultants and people working on the show, but it’s still a mainstream Nickelodeon show by Mike and Bryan. Perhaps this sends a message to big media companies that audiences can and do accept and enjoy these stories. Will this prompt them to actively solicit shows with actual Asian creators at the helm? Too early to tell.

But it’s clear from most of the dialogue that underrepresented people do not want to build a fence and say “you should not write about us.” There’s a very good reason why those folks are wary of mainstream creators (why do they want to do it? what are they going to screw up?), and they also have good reason to expect well-meaning mainstream creators to do their research extensively. That research can include bringing in test audiences from the population they’re trying to portray, including creators from that background as co-creators or permanent contributors, and consuming media and commentary by those populations.

I want men to be able to write about women, for instance–and I want men who are making creative works about women to help combat the notion that works about us are marked for only our consumption, irrelevant to people who aren’t women–but I’m not going to appreciate it if the way the male creator makes his woman character feel “authentic” is to graft in his assumptions about what women think about. I have seen a male author praised extensively for wow it’s so hard to believe a man wrote this book about a woman, it feels so feminine but I was shocked that the supposed authenticity was literally her worrying about being fat and being obsessed with shoes. I also once read a very popular male author’s book that was from a teenage girl’s point of view and I cringed every time he tried to make her say/do something that reminded us of her gender (“ugh why do boys make us watch their movies? we’re not interested lol because ladies!”). I would ask these men to read books that are by women, to try to understand why we write what we write, and then don’t appoint yourself to tell a Feminine Story About Being Female. You don’t need to tell that story, but yes, please, put female characters in your book.

From a practical standpoint, I think it’s very important for mainstream audiences to start seeing people who are different from them in their everyday media. Without having to deliberately seek it out. Because people who aren’t like you are part of your world. Most media does not currently reflect that. We also need both “issue books” and “incidentally representative books.” The Nameless City was not about what it is to be any of the Asian populations it included, though it gave its own culture to the fantasy world (as it should). So it’s a nice thing if people from all backgrounds can go into a bookstore and see this and think “hmm that looks interesting” rather than thinking “welp, Asians on the front, must be some kind of niche media.”

I remember working at a bookstore and having a woman pestering me to make recommendations for “good books” and rejecting all the suggestions before I could even finish a sentence, and one of those attempts was me saying “You might like Life of Pi. It’s about a boy from India–” “NO.” She immediately wasn’t interested as soon as I said “India.” We also had an “African-American Fiction” section when I first started at the store. Many black readers would come in asking for the section, and other readers were scandalized by its existence–I heard black readers say it was gross to segregate it from the “regular” fiction, and I also heard non-black readers snot about it wanting to know where the white fiction was. (Clue phone: Pretty much the entire rest of the store.) Later it was integrated (along with several other categories) into one big mega-fiction section. Some people said that was the right choice. Some people were frustrated that they could no longer easily browse a section that was for them, and interpreted it as an attempt to take the entire thing away. Both sides are kind of right, but I think I’m personally more invested in my background and other people’s backgrounds all being presented as “for” anyone to be exposed to.

And here’s something interesting.

Wait, what’s that? Is it a children’s book with a same-sex couple on the front? Yeah it is.

This book is coming out later this year. It’s explicitly described in the book summary as a love story–depicted in the comfortable fairy-tale style children are used to seeing in all their other storybooks. There is no sticker on it proclaiming “LOOK, IT’S LESBIANS!!” or anything, but even though some people might interpret the red character as a boy because of how she’s dressed, a basic glance at the information will make it clear that their names are both feminine-coded names (Sapphire and Ruby) and they both use “she” pronouns. They’re in a clear casually intimate pose on the front cover. This is not being designated as a Special Interest book. It’s just going to be released as a storybook. For the regular storybooks section.

Recently in an interview, creator Rebecca Sugar said this about children’s media:

I think if you wait to tell kids, to tell queer youth that it matters how they feel or that they are even a person, then it’s going to be too late!

You have to talk about it–you have to let it be what it gets to be for everyone. I mean, like, I think about, a lot of times I think about sort of fairy tales and Disney movies and the way that love is something that is ALWAYS discussed with children. And I think also there’s this idea that’s like, oh, we should represent, you know, queer characters that are adults, because there are adults that are queer, and you should know that’s something that is happening in the adult world, but that’s not how those films or those stories are told to children. You’re told that YOU should dream about love, about this fulfilling love that YOU’RE going to have. […]

The Prince and Snow White are not like someone’s PARENTS. They’re something you want to be, that you are sort of dreaming of a future where you will find happiness. Why shouldn’t everyone have that? It’s really absurd to think that everyone shouldn’t get to have that!

Based on Rebecca Sugar’s history, it’s clear that she is very invested in portraying same-sex couples as natural, as an everyday part of life, as not worth batting an eyelash at in protest. She tends not to make her works “issue” works, and on her television show she’s included a large cast of non-white characters (as well as coding some of her aliens as having features typically associated with people of color), and she just presents that and lets it be without pointing at it and saying “look what I did.”

Rebecca’s romantic partner (and major contributor to her show) is Ian Jones-Quartey, who is a black man, and most of the voice cast and many of the writers are also people of color. But this is not written as a niche show. Rebecca Sugar hasn’t publicly identified as any stripe of queer as of this writing, and she’s partnered with a man, though I know better than to say that means we know anything–and ethnicity-wise she looks white, but she has demonstrated over and over that she believes racial diversity and queer representation belong in mainstream media, even for–ESPECIALLY for–children. Because, as she said above in the quote, we should all grow up knowing we can have that. That we’re people. That we don’t have to wait until our minds have formed around us being “other” before we’re gently coaxed “back” into society. In the interview, she also said some vague things about how she never watched Disney movies thinking that could be her, though I don’t know in what ways she was unable to relate. But I can certainly say I would have grown up feeling more like the world wasn’t someone else’s place I was just trying to live in if the media I consumed in my youth had hinted that people like me were real.

Now I’ve heard tell that Seanan McGuire has written a book with an asexual protagonist. (The book also contains a trans man who is, I believe, a romantic interest.) The author is bisexual (and as far as I know not asexual-spectrum), and this is one of the only novels out there that has not just an asexual character tucked in someone’s pocket somewhere but an asexual protagonist. This is also not a book about the character realizing she’s asexual, nor have I heard that it heavily features that revelation. It just is. As it should be. The question is, did she do it right?

I’ll have to see, by reading it. And even though I’m an asexual woman, obviously I’m not the decision-maker on whether Seanan McGuire has written an asexual character “wrong.” I would certainly be able to read it and say “I wish that hadn’t been there” or “I wish that had been phrased differently” or “just once I’d like to see an asexual character who isn’t also XYZ.” (I withhold judgment until I read it, obviously.) But I must admit that as an asexual woman knowing a bisexual author has included a character of my incredibly underrepresented background, my first thought was “ohhhhh jeez I hope it isn’t terrible.” I feel bad that this was my first thought, because though I’m passably familiar with Seanan McGuire, I’ve never read any of her long fiction. I have no reason not to trust her, and I trust her more than I’d trust a straight person to write aces. And yet that was my knee-jerk reaction. Because I’m used to mainstream fiction taking people I can relate to and framing them as broken, as cold or confused, as villainous, or as needing to learn more about being human. And it isn’t just hurtful to see yourself represented poorly in a story. It’s hurtful to know this is a mainstream presentation and other people are going to be even more likely to think about me that way. I’ve been taught to expect this when non-asexual people try to show the world who I am.

Right now we don’t have enough characters like us in the media to risk getting a large percentage of them wrong. Just like a straight white male character being an utter douchebag in a movie will not make people think differently about straight white men, there does need to be room for non-majority characters to not be perfect people, but since people are establishing lasting impressions of us based on how media portrays us, we need to ask creators to be sensitive to this when they plan their presentation. If you have no exposure to a group but you see them on TV, you generalize–even if someone else has chosen how that group is portrayed without being part of it. We cannot realistically arrange global exposure to every marginalized group, but we can be responsible with how that exposure comes through our media.

Video: Choices in Publishing

This month’s video deals with choices we as writers have to make in publishing—specifically with regards to publishing paths. We receive many messages about what you “have to” do if you want to be published, but many of them are elements of mainstream publishing, which isn’t the only option for today’s writers. Here is a video discussing my thoughts on what to take into consideration when picking a publishing path.

Article reprinted in anthology: Drunk Monkeys Volume 3

My short piece “Asexual, Aromantic, Partnerless, Childless – and Happy” which was originally published in Drunk Monkeys and run a second time in Everyday Feminism (as “Asexual, Aromantic, Partnerless, Child-Free… And (Yes!) Happy” is now available in the Drunk Monkeys anthology Drunk Monkeys Anthology Volume 3!

drunkmonkeys

It was put together by the publication’s editor and is sold through Amazon here if you’d like a copy.

 

Ace of Arts Update: Chapter 7

I got my characters talking.

I wrote Chapter 7 earlier this week, sometime over the weekend.

Chapter 7 came to 2,380 words (bringing the book’s total to 16,548 words), and most of what happened in it is dialogue.

I’m not sure how happy I am with it. I wasn’t feeling very good about it when I wrote it, and then when I read it back I was a lot happier with it. (Maybe I was feeling awkward during the drafting because it was a pretty awkward conversation.) I’m trying to build a rapport here but my character is resisting it, and I kinda need her to stop doing that if I am going to get anywhere, but that’s what she wants to do so I can’t really write her out of character.

She kinda makes a good point during this whole thing, too: she’s actually not a very nice person, but she’s not actively mean either. It’s just that when you don’t really want to engage, speak bluntly and sparingly, and aren’t empathetic–and (this is key) you’re female–this behavior is interpreted as rude. Women and girls not going out of their way to coddle and comfort others–especially if they’re boys or men who want their attention–are perceived as bitchy. I’m kind of fighting that feeling with Megan, because she’s honestly not “a bitch.” She just lives in a world that expects things of ladies that she is not interested in providing, and she refuses to apologize for it, but she’s not making a big platform out of how proud she is to not apologize for it either.

But anyway, I got my characters talking, I got Brady and Megan to reach an understanding (even if she was kind of sour about it), and I got him to buy her a cookie, so there’s that.

Let’s see where they take it from here.

Ace of Arts: Update on (the rest of) Chapter 6

Well I finished Chapter 6, and had aspirations of writing another one, but I just didn’t get around to it, because slacker.

I mentioned a few weeks back that I started writing Chapter 6, and that I got an imaginary cityscape scene and a family interaction scene out. I went ahead and completed a school scene too, which included something big for Megan’s classmate Brady. And, as usual, my jaded protagonist is sulking about it.

Chapter 6 is 2,031 words, bringing the book’s total to 14,161 so far.

Here’s a thing: I’ve been using the f-word.

It hasn’t been thrown around aggressively; it’s only popped up a few times, and I didn’t save it for powerful scenes. I just remember what high school was like, and we said some raunchy stuff. (And that didn’t really change in adulthood, but I’m saying. The f-word is common in many high schools. I remember hearing it all the time even in middle school.) This is contemporary YA and the school setting is probably pretty typical. I think it makes sense that the characters would occasionally throw out curse words, even the f-bomb. But she uses it casually, not as a shortcut to showing she’s the “angry youth” type, you know? Megan doesn’t talk much, so she tends to make sure the words she does say have an impact. And one of the ways she gets an impact is using strong language.

I wonder how I’m going to handle the next few chapters. I don’t want her to suddenly become chatty, but I do need her to have some conversations with Brady. I will probably handle it with a mixture of three techniques: Having her open up unexpectedly sometimes, having her say little but add onto her comments with attached thoughts, and having Brady sort of lampshade her tight-lipped nature by bothering her to say more (which she will either refuse to do or claim she’ll tell him when she wants to). It’s a battle to get words out of Megan when you’re talking to her, but she speaks just enough that it’s not like it’s shocking if she talks (like, you know, a Silent Bob type). I don’t want it to seem like she has some kind of silence vow going on. She just doesn’t really want to talk to you. It’s not awkwardness (well, not exactly), it’s not abject rudeness, it’s not shyness; she just . . . legit doesn’t have a lot to say to you and doesn’t want your attention, so why should she?

I’ve never written a character quite like this before and I’m enjoying the departure.

Video: Why Editing Is So Important

Just a quick unprofessional video telling you why it’s important to be professional when you submit your work to agents or publishers!

This video explains the philosophy behind why authors should not assume the message or the story is going to be so fantastic that it will eclipse the need for basic language skills. Good stories can be and will be rejected sometimes because their execution is messy.

The message: If you are not so great at this, please get a proofreader, and NEVER assume you’re going to be the exception.

Ace of Arts Update: Some of Chapter 6

I forget how much stuff I got written this week, but it did what I wanted it to do.

So I’m gonna talk about cityscape scenes.

My character does this thing–so far only on Page 1 of every even chapter–where she views an imaginary city, and it later becomes one of her drawings. She interacts with these cityscape scenes in a very peculiar way: mostly she’s just an observer, but she does act upon the environment without it being clear that “she” is actually there, and these scenes are written in present tense with a detached narrator. (There’s never any “I” in them.) My character has opinions about these city environments and her thoughts translate into drawings later, but what’s also interesting is that she’ll incorporate things she wants to be there into her drawings and if she goes back to those imaginary cities those things are there. It’s like the imaginary cities can contribute to her real life, and her real life can contribute to her cities.

It’s really, really interesting to write. It’s a little bit like Finding Mulligan, which is my book about a girl who lives one life when she’s awake and a different one when she’s asleep (but she believes she is two different people in those different places).

In the latest chapter opening, I gave her a weird clean slate (after two other chapters established what she usually looks at in imaginary cityscapes). I’m going to spend the next few even-chapter openings cluttering this place up while she’s experimenting with her art. (This is kind of spawned by her teacher telling her she needs more than one kind of piece in her portfolio if she’s going to apply to art school, so she’s kind of in panic mode looking for a way to translate her usual art-making techniques into different products. It’s going to end in mixed results.)

This week’s partial chapter included a page of that stuff and then some more family dynamics featuring Megan hanging out with Dyane and Dyane’s boyfriend Corey. I’m not done with the chapter though. I want to do another school scene with Brady. It’s Chapter 6 already. This important relationship needs to get rolling.

Eh so that’s it for now.

Not Me

My character is Not Me. She’s more divergent from being Me than most of my characters–not just in life circumstances (because all my characters have very different life circumstances from me), but in the way she speaks and thinks and IS. And because of that, I actually have to work really hard to stop my own inclinations from elbowing their way in when the flow clatters a little bit and I’m trying to keep going.

I have this wordiness problem, as y’all well know, and though it’s gotten a LOT better in recent years, I still have a tendency to wordify things. That includes feelings and thoughts and reactions and attempts to include other people. And I’m kinda used to having introspective, self-aware characters who revel in those words, composing significant dialogue and having a fair amount of running commentary in their heads.

That’s not what Megan is like. It’s kinda frustrating.

Nearly every time I write a full sentence for her I feel like it’s too much. She doesn’t talk a lot, and when she does talk, it’s usually pretty guarded. She doesn’t take extra steps to invite people to understand her; she doesn’t explain her thoughts; she doesn’t even fixate on what she’s thinking enough for me to nail it down in the text. I’m not used to a character like her who mostly speaks because others speak to her or because she can’t avoid it or to get them to STOP talking to her. (And I think this is going to make the times Megan DOES speak for other reasons far more significant, which will make my job easier down the line.)

It’s turning out to be pretty hard working with someone whose communication style is so different from mine. And I don’t want to just write it how I would write it and then edit it to be more like her because that will fundamentally change how I think about her. I’ll only really nail her voice if I practice with it as it’s developing in the story.

It’s pretty funny that I’m finally writing an asexual character and she’s the least like me of any character I’ve had. (We do seem to share an opinion when it comes to kissing, though.) I wonder how many of my readers are going to relate to her?