I am a white male. Like it or not, both those things — white and male — say volumes about me. Of course, some people make them say more than they should. Which is the downside of living in our hypersensitive, politically correct age. But I am also a novelist. Those two things — white male + novelist — can, if not careful, become a tightrope. Especially as they relate to the opposite gender and other ethnicities.
So what happens when a white male novelist chooses to write about a white female protagonist? Even more to the point, what happens when a white male novelist chooses to write about a black female protagonist? Wow! Talk about a minefield. Even riskier than writing in the opposite sex, is writing in another ethnicity.
Back in 2005, when I was writing The Resurrection, I posed this question to my then-critique group:
In my WIP, there’s a cross-section of different ethnic characters: a Hispanic priest, an Asian servant, a Nigerian doctor, etc. Question: Must I articulate these characters’ ethnicity or can I leave it up to the reader’s discovery? For instance, instead of describing one character as “a black man,” I am tempted to not even mention his skin color, just background info like: he’s Nigerian, he has an accent, he wears unique clothes, and let the reader fill in the blanks.
Ideally, it would be cool to not have to attribute race to every character. She is Hispanic. He is Middle-Eastern. They are Chinese. However, I’m discovering what C.S. Lewis suggested, If readers are given the chance to misunderstand, they will. Which is what happened recently with one reviewer.
Katherine Coble, who visits this blog (and graciously permitted me to cite her), recently reviewed The Resurrection on Goodreads and had trouble with the book because of what she perceived as a racist undercurrent. She wrote:
My main objection to the book is that I felt it flirted a bit too much with racism. I actually said “Oh no!” out loud when the Magical Negro made his first appearance. Then, as he monologues his villainous intent and it becomes clear that he is a Black Magical Negro I was fairly upset. It seems that a lot of the negativity in the book is (accidentally, I trust) The Fault Of Ignorant Coloured People. I may be reading too much into that, but it does trouble me.
Well, after I read this, I was the one who was troubled. Who was the Magical Negro in my story that Katherine was referring to? And am I unconsciously a racist? This is not an inference to take lightly. Which I didn’t. That night, I tossed and turned, trying to get a handle on Katherine’s observations. Then, about 1 AM, it dawned on me:
Katherine mistakenly thought my antagonist was black.
This was partly my fault. Why? Because I didn’t say he wasn’t. In fact, I never specified his ethnicity. I did however say he had an afro. And apparently this is what misled Katherine. It resulted in an interesting exchange between us, which you can find in the body and comments section of THIS POST. But the whole incident has caused me to ponder the issue of handling race in our fiction. These are some of the questions I’ve been asking myself lately.
Have readers become hyper-sensitive to the portrayal of race, especially when that portrayal is done by writers of a different race? In other words, have we developed a knee-jerk suspicion of white men writing about black men (much less black women)? Are we overly-cautious against racial stereotypes (like the Magical Negro)? And could this be due entirely to a monocultural publishing industry (like the CBA)?
Secondly, what ways do authors unintentionally employ racial stereotypes? Katherine’s observations made me think about the ways I employed characters of color in my story. Perhaps I had subconsciously made my antags Ignorant Coloured People. In the aforementioned comments thread, it led to a rather uncomfortable defense of sympathetic characters of color in my novel. Frankly, I don’t put this type of latent or subconscious stereotyping past myself or anyone. So, even if I denied the “charge,” it is definitely worthwhile thinking about.
Thirdly, is it safe to assume that when an author does not specify a character’s ethnicity, that character is the author’s ethnicity? In other words, when an Asian author writes characters, the default race of her characters is always Asian. When a black author writes characters, the default race is always black. Etcetera, etcetera. One of the reasons I resisted attributing race to every person of color in my story was a feeling of pandering to multiculturalism, as if I was populating my story in order to meet some demographic quota. Either way, it seemed to have come back to bite me. So is it safe to assume that when an author does not specify a character’s ethnicity, that character is the author’s ethnicity? In my case, the answer was “no.”
Anyway, the whole affair has been instructive and caused me to reflect deeply on this issue. I’m interested in your thoughts. Do you think we must attribute race to all characters not of our own race? Do you think we pander to a multicultural mindset and are overly-sensitive to the portrayal of ethnic groups in fiction? Or do you think this sensitivity is important for an author to develop and nurture?
Hmmm, I don’t think we can be overly sensitive about how people are portrayed. We live in a racist society and a lot of us have internalized racism we don’t even realize we have. (same with misogyny, homophobia, etc.) Art actually provides an excellent chance for us to unpack some of those ideas in our reactions to it and open up discussions about the issues.
From what you are saying, I as a middle aged white male born, bred and living south of the Mason-Dixon line have no chance of someone not assuming one of my characters is either racist or stereotypical. Truthfully Mike, when I read descriptions of Keen I pictured a guy who plays in the praise band in our church. He is not dark skinned, drives a Ford F250 and probably listens to Lynrd Skynrd on old cassettes from back in the day. But I swear I see Keen every time I talk to him at church. Haven’t told him yet because he is reading The Resurrection right now.
Of course we are all prone to inner prejudices we don’t want to see. That goes for the reader as well as the writer. Personally, I have learned no real improvement in race relations happens until we all get over our sensitivities and deal honestly with each other as individuals.
Tim, I have a file of images I use when I construct a novel. It provides me a visual reference for characters. The picture I have in that file for Benjamin Keen is THIS.
Yep, that’s good old Jerry plucking away on the bass. Same body type, same glasses, same hair and about the same age. Uncanny.
Oddly enough after hearing Yancy speak in college he’s now the first person I think of when I hear the word “fro”
Seriously.
Re: reading fiction – characters often look different in my mind than they are described at times even when haircolor etc are specified so who knows what I’ll assume about any given character…
this is an interesting thought.
i wonder if i’m sometimes so afraid of being offensive that i overcompensate.
i do find that different races and ethnicities and even location-cultures (such as the difference btw a white person from new york and a white person from alabama) define a person, so to develop the whole of the character, their race, color, ethnicity, background, would definitely play into who they are. i have a dear friend who is puerto-rican and grew up in new york! she’s amazing! yet her culture and ethnicity definitely define her in many ways – i cannot separate the two anymore than she can separate that i’ve lived in texas for most of my life.
interesting … i have an asian friend who calls herself a “banana” … “yellow on the outside and white on the inside.” those thoughts never occured to me … to me she’s simply my friend, but to her, her culture and ethnicity *and* her environment and travel and life-choices define her a bit differently. so my perceptions of her and her perceptions of her are different.
my husband lived in new orleans for several years before i knew him. he has referred to the cajuns living down there as “coon a$$.” i was offended and took it as derogatory … then a couple months ago we were in a cajun restaurant, and a man there started telling us that, although he married a woman from oklahoma and has lived outside of that area for many years and has lost his accent, he is a “coon a$$.” i was shocked to hear him refer to himself with that term and wondered if it was not, indeed, derogatory. this man’s history and family and environment and ethnicity defined him.
Actually, my Cajun friends I grew up with in south Louisiana would have proudly told you there were 24K Coon Ass. Black people from the area take no exception to the term because they know it is a term Cajuns adopted with pride because of derisive things said about them by outsiders. (Has to do with their typically black hair among other things).
wow … that’s interesting. when that man said that in the restaurant, you coulda knocked me over w/a feather … but he was so fun, i willed myself to stay in my seat and continue the conversation 🙂
If it makes you feel better, I’d have been up all night too. I think it’s something to be aware of, but not something to be paralyzed from fear of.
Admittedly, I prefer male protagonists to female most of the time and tend to think of skin tone and ethnicity separately. One thing fantasy really forces you to do is describe a character without the labels. Most of my characters are shades of brown: anywhere from golden brown to very black. I remember in middle school trying to explain how a black character in a story wasn’t African or African-American.
Friend: She’s African-American.
Me: No, she’s black. There’s no Africa, and there’s no America.
Friend: But that’s how people will view her.
Me: But it’s incorrect.
Then there’s trying to describe a pagoda without using the word…
As far as writing the opposite gender goes, I think it just takes observation and practice. And feedback. Sometimes I take “guy polls” of my friends to get their insight on how a guy would react in a situation or if he was being too aggressive or feminine (not to be confused with effeminate).
Personally, I see any real cultural differences as cultural, not racial (say, Mexican v. American culture). And all subcultural (inner city v. rural Midwest, South v. New England) fall the same way. At least in my head. Cultures vary, but people are people.
And yes, I know cross and counter culture gets messy.
Have readers become hyper-sensitive to the portrayal of race, especially when that portrayal is done by writers of a different race?
I hadn’t thought about it. I do know I hated “Bringing Down the House,” Native Son” (okay, I thought most of my reading list from my survey of ethnic literature course was racist in nature), and “Heart of Darkness” for the same reasons: racist undertones. I think it’s an old wound that only time and intentional effort is going to heal.
Secondly, what ways do authors unintentionally employ racial stereotypes?
I think it depends on the author. I think, too, sometimes a writer won’t use a character of another ethnicity out of fear of sending the wrong signal–but I think that’s an unfounded fear as the remedy is, well, do your research. Ask. Observe. Take the risk and do what’s in your power to do it right. If you’ve done your homework, any perceived racism is more than likely just that.
Thirdly, is it safe to assume that when an author does not specify a character’s ethnicity, that character is the author’s ethnicity?
I don’t think so. Usually they just look the way they will in my head. Some characters I know are supposed to be blond, but in my head they’re brunette. But random story: I got most of the way through a novel before getting a text clue that told me a primary character was black. It was the first mention of any real description. I felt kinda bad for not catching on, but I also wish the author had given me more description earlier on. It was a small thing, but still. Don’t ask me the book; I don’t remember.
One of the reasons I resisted attributing race to every person of color in my story was a feeling of pandering to multiculturalism, as if I was populating my story in order to meet some demographic quota.
There’s that too.
On the other hand, there’s a show I watch that actually sort of bothers me that the only two black people that’ve been in it have been a rather passive guy and a girl with whom they seemed to be deliberately playing the race card.
Do you think we must attribute race to all characters not of our own race?
I know I don’t, but I can’t say for everyone. Moreover, many of the characters I read tend to specify.
Amy – We live in a racist society and a lot of us have internalized racism we don’t even realize we have.
I’d like to hear more on that.
Art actually provides an excellent chance for us to unpack some of those ideas in our reactions to it and open up discussions about the issues.
Oddly, I was telling a fellow Christian writer the other day that, as far as homosexuality goes, Christians better dang be ready to unpack and handle the subject in a healthy manner (other things, too, but this was a specific conversation).
I agree with you. Culture is the breeding ground for ignorance. It delineates essential prejudices that reek of dragon-breath. I hate culture! It wants and craves and slurps and sucks, divides and organizes itself as the power monger that it is. It is the vial legitimizer of the mob to exercise. impose its will and spew out of its mouth who do not succumb.
The opposite to this ignorance is not consciousness but love and it without awareness. When it becomes aware of itself it does so to answer not to itself, but to injustice in which it does not rejoice.
Culture is the beast that rises from the sea to devour and destroy.
Culture is the breeding ground for ignorance. It delineates essential prejudices that reek of dragon-breath. I hate culture! It wants and craves and slurps and sucks, divides and organizes itself as the power monger that it is.
That’s not quite what I meant. Culture is constructed by humans and happens when a particular group of people develops You can hate specific cultures or specific aspects of them, but what you’ll find is that what’s truly hate-worthy is the evil side of our own human natures. If culture is blind to those things, it’s because the people themselves are blind to it. You change people, not cultures.
Addendum: When I said I distinguish culture from ethnicity, I meant just that. The truth is, there are dark-skinned people in Russia and white people in Africa. I know a black guy from Honduras who told me the nice thing about going home was that people didn’t think it was weird he spoke Spanish and had a Spanish accent. I had a friend in college who was black, has family immigrated from Wales, still has the Welsh spelling of his surname, and has extended family in Jamaica (I think) and Central America (I don’t think he said which country, just that he had Spanish-speaking family).
Moreover, most of the world has dominant genes: dark hair, dark eyes, medium skin tone. It just is.
You cannot look at a person’s skin color and presume to know exactly where their origins are–that’s all I meant.
Just to tack on: Every geographical point on the planet is full of color, and even where it appears everyone’s the same “color,” history will tell you that they weren’t the same people groups at all: a wide variety of language, culture, and religion.
I don’t think you can appreciate diversity, truly, while trying to pretend we’re all alike. We’re not, and that’s the beauty of it.
I wrestled with this same issue in my upcoming book, “The 13th Demon” out in October. One of my main characters is an African American female scientist who is probably the most sane, best educated, and most stable character in the book. But, I had to decided on how to designate her. If I had chosen “black”, I’m sure I would have heard many protestations from my editor and certainly from my prospective readers.
The real problem is my second book. A character I am introducing who will become part of my book series is an African American male drug addict who is trying to clean up his act and get his life right with God. I based him on one of my best friends, a man who used to work at the hospital and subsequently underwent a heart transplant. I am a doctor. He was a “transport technician”, someone who carried patients from their rooms to radiology. He is like a brother to me now and, in fact, in two weeks I will be his best man at his wedding. I will probably be the only “caucasian” present!
So, the best I know to do is to try and emphasize, as someone said above, the “cultural” background. What else can we do? We have to create believable, realistic characters. Unfortunately, racial bias is real — whether intended or perceived.
By the way, I never pictured Keen as “black”. But, I didn’t get that he was Caucasian either. He seemed to be of mixed ethnicity to me, someone with a varied racial background that transcended racial stereotyping. But, I am a middle age, white male! I am doomed!
I ignore about 99% of every accusation of racism. It’s overplayed and politicized. Honestly, you should ignore it, too.
That’s it.
Jay, just to be clear, Katherine’s tone was NOT accusatory, which caused me to consider her observation even more.
It really wasn’t accusatory at all. It was more of a “this is what I came away with, and admittedly I brought my own issues to the story” type of thing.
One of the more unfortunate angles to this whole scenario is that poor sleepless Mike had no idea that I am a chronic nightowl and if he’d sent me an email instead of tossing and turning he’d have gotten a nigh-instant response. 😉
I was always more approaching this as a bundle of
–these are issues I bring to the table with Christian fiction given my limited recent experience with The Shack and a couple of unpublished manuscripts I’ve read recently.
–How do various methods of character description help or hurt a writer?
–How do writers’ groups help or hurt a writer? *I know several WGs that have bullied (my perception) writers into changing their initial approach to characterisation for a lot of reasons, racial bias being the first and foremost.
–How do different genres’ approach to the question reflect upon the genre?
My main read of choice lately is SF-Fantasy, but I read across all genres, excepting Erotica. And race is somewhat of a non-issue in the Fantasy I’ve been reading because you’ve got globe-spanning types of things from George RR Martin and Peter V. Brett or niche things like Patrick Rothfuss. But, bar none, that genre thrives on detailed character descriptions. I’m honestly surprised as I’ve stepped back into Christian fiction with how little the authors choose to dole out about their characters’ physical attributes. Reading the other comments here I see some readers prefer it, while I find it distracting. Matter of individual preference, I guess.
I wasn’t necessarily saying she was accusing, really. I meant to say that I have no interest in most discussions of race (accusatory or not) or racial stereotypes. I’ve been through it too many times to really get anything out of it. The line between race, culture, ethnicity is too ill-defined for me to have a meaningful discussion about it. I don’t know…maybe I’ve just been through it too many times.
Carry on, then.
I was raised and always believed racism was wrong. So much so, I really don’t look at people in such categories. Sure, I notice skin color, other factors of what a person looks like, but I feel strongly we treat each person as an individual, they prove themselves by their own words and actions, not predefined by a group stereotype.
But I also think what some people say is racism is more cultural prejudice. Everyone has that. And some so easily want to apply the racist label when the cultural prejudice is about a darker-skinned friend.
So in my stories, I rarely even mention a character’s race. I leave that to the imagination of the reader. Only exception so far is the current series I’m writing, a space opera, and I intentionally had a more multicultural cast. And I identified them as such. Will I step on some land mines because I’m simply ignorant of what some people will take offense to? Probably, but I don’t see how I can avoid doing that. I can’t write worried about how someone might take something. Sure, I know enough to avoid things like the N-word. But most any term you can come up with someone will take offense at. It used to be black was the preferred word, and colored was negative. Now it seems to be reversed? I don’t know, I can’t keep up with the current trend.
Now, the blacks, coloreds, however you want to “label” them, is a family in the group: husband, wife, and young boy. I have an advantage in that this is far into the future, so one would expect certain things, like slang, to no longer exist. They would have their own. But I’ll probably get hit on something, I’m sure, just purely from the expectations of various people and so many are so hypersensative that they take the most innocent things as being racist. I can’t help that. I’ll do what I can, follow what I know. But I can’t control other people’s reactions to things.
But in my opinion, the very presence of hypersensitivity on this subject, and that it even matters to some, shows just how far we are from Martin Luther King’s dream that no one is judged by the color of their skin. It seems in many people, that’s all we judge people on, including whether it is a white guy writing about a black girl. It simply shouldn’t matter. But apparently some people will not be able to.
Now, I was in high school during the 70s. We studied racism in the 60s in history class. For me, that whole thing was history, and felt like a long time ago, even though I was alive as a kid during all the racial strife and such. My idea was only older folks might be racist. So I was completely shocked when a minor acquaintance of mine talked with me a bit in the library (my normal hang out spot during lunch hour after finishing the meal) and made the statement something along the lines that black people were an inferior race.
I think I just stared at him in disbelief. I didn’t think anyone my age believed that. I was naive to say the least. But that was seeing real racism up close and personal.
I think we need to be careful we don’t attribute that type of belief to someone simply because they are culturally ignorant or exhibit some cultural prejudice, but don’t believe that another race is inferior to one’s own.
And certainly we should avoid stereotypes, as we should in all our characters, no matter the race.
I don’t like to over describe character’s appearances (so I guess that would include race), because like others have said here, I tend to imagine fictional characters the way I want to. If an author gives me a detailed description, including their family tree and ethnic heritage, it’s likely to stress me out. There should be some trust between the author and the reader and vice versa…as reader’s, we don’t need to know every last detail…and if the author provides every last detail (to me) it can come across as “you’re imagination isn’t good enough, here let me stuff my brain into yours…”
That said, your picture of Keen is pretty much how I imagined him. Somehow you managed to convey it too me, but unobtrusively. Here’s the thing I just realized though, perhaps because he’s a professor, I assumed he was white. There’s a stereotype for you. I come from an area of the country, where white gray-haired male is the norm for that profession, so…
I suppose if you’d have made Keen asian, that would have really thrown people off.
Hm, I’m finding it interesting (and not at all surprising) that the comments on this post are veering toward discussing personal views on race and such, and how it should be portrayed by the author. But what I’m wondering is–shouldn’t it have less to do with the author and more to do with the pov character? I mean, it seems like how much focus is given to race should be determined by the attitude of the character whose head we’re in.
For example–an author gave a lecture at a writers’ meeting where she was talking about description. She told us about this writer who had written a scene where a white man walked into an all-black diner back in the–well, not sure the exact year, but obviously when segregation was still around. He described the room in exquisite detail. The lecturing author said she’d told him that if a white man had walked into a black diner he wouldn’t have noticed the napkins–he’d have seen nothing but a sea of dark-skinned faces, all looking at him.
So, I guess my point is this–does it matter to your character? And how relevant is it to their place in the setting and story? That should be the determining factor for how much you include about race.
Good question, Kat. But I still think the author walks a tightrope in portraying race… even if it is from a POV character’s perspective. A while back, in a post, I asked the question Am I Responsible for What My Characters Say? Several commenters said, Of course! Who else is responsible for what your characters say? If this is true (or at least some readers interpret it as such), our characters are never really autonomous. Even a POV racist can be traced back to the author’s own psyche.
Define racist. That’s the issue I’m having here. Racism is not recognizing that there are differences in skin color and culture. It’s seeing another person as subhuman because of those things. I grew up in an area where racism was rampant. Hick town full of bigoted rednecks. (Oh, yep, I just said that. Fortunately it’s gotten better over the years.) I had a friend–half black, half white–whose family, on more than one occasion, came home to find crosses burning in their yard.
Guess what, the friend had no problem recognizing differences in race, nor did his parents. We knew we were culturally different. We liked each other anyway. These days I have a culturally diverse extended family–with cousins/aunts/uncles who are black, Japanese, Chinese. We are family, and yet we recognize the cultural differences. There’s nothing wrong with seeing differences. It’s only judging a person as “less” because of those differences that is a problem.
Conversely, sometimes the bad guy IS black. What is wrong with that? I had a Sociology prof in college who once said, “You stop being prejudiced when you realize jerks come in all colors.” I always thought that statement was profound. True, you can’t assume someone is bad because of their skin–but if you walk on eggshells, acting as if, oh, gosh, I better not think he’s a jerk because he’s black, then how is that not racist as well? It’s still attributing personality traits to skin color.
Nothing about you has ever struck me as racist. And your example in your other post–where you quote Stephen King–says so much. People write to Stephen King calling him a bigot because he’s got characters who are. I think that’s ridiculous. The characters he writes about who are bigoted come across as complete jackasses most of the time, so to me he’s saying that bigotry is for the stupid and narrow-minded. But readers misread that. Readers misread things all the time.
Define racist. That’s the issue I’m having here. Racism is not recognizing that there are differences in skin color and culture. It’s seeing another person as subhuman because of those things.
I write up this long post, and then you go ahead and say in a couple sentences what I was thinking. 0=)
I also think there is a subtle side of the Race issue that Id more consider a question of priveledge instead of a question of dislike.
How aware is a writer that the experiences of different sociocultural groups with, say, police and hospitals for instance, vary wildly? That the expectations different sociocultural groups bring to interactions will affect a character’s behavior?
I am still a bit sideways with the idea, as I said to Mike in an email or on GR or somewhere (this turned into a conversation that lasted quite awhile), that authors are reluctant to describe a character.
This person is coming to me from YOUR head. You have an idea of what they look like, as much as you have an idea about what they are going to do and why. So why would you NOT describe the person? There are a gajillion non-rascist, non-anthropologically charged ways to introduce a character that still let the reader know whom youve conjured for them.
“So little had changed about Dr. Jasperson since Dave last saw him . Five years of living with the Olithe tribe had weathered his once-sallow complexion as the hot sun of the equator burnished his skin to a rich leather. But still the special glint of knowledge–ignorance conquered, facts collected and neatly filed away–lit his eyes with joy. Dave had seen those eyes countless times before, their blue irises peering into the class room to scooe out a challenger. Challenging Jasperson, Davr had learned,
Could end no other way but badly.”
Won’t lie, as a biracial man (dad is black/mom is white), I’m offended when people get easily offended by stuff like this. Even if the guy had been black, so what? If the story was not just a story, and was true, isn’t it plausible that the man behind it all could be black? Maybe he’s even black and talks with a southern slur and occasionally calls people “massa.” (truthfully, if someone pulled that off right, I bet it’d be hilarious)
I sometimes wonder — and I mean no offense– if it is the absense of experiencing true racism that drives the majority of people to be so easily offended by this sort of thing. Racism is not the use of a “magical negro.” It is not the occasional stereotype (some people fit stereotypes, actually). Racism is when a car drives by full of drunks who yell “ni**er” at you as you’re taking an afternoon stroll, or the girl who thinks it’s an abomination for two different races to fall in love, or the chubby bully who calls your dad/you a “ni**er” to your face just to see your reaction. (All true stories)
When you’ve experienced racism first hand, you find yourself rolling your eyes A LOT at the extreme PC attitude of society today.
I realize this is a bit off topic. . .but I just wanted to make the comment. If you’re not a racist, don’t worry about what (how) you write (something). All readers bring their own baggage to the table, and some get rubbed the wrong way as a result. Not your fault. Nothing you can do about it. Set the record straight if need be, then move on. My thoughts, anyway.
(To clarify: This isn’t necessarily directed at Katherine — I’m talking about an idea, a habit of society, not an individual)
Tony, I appreciate your comments. If my antagonist had been black, as Katherine assumed, I think her concerns would have carried some validity. Perhaps it is due to an “extreme PC attitude,” like you say. Personally, as a white male novelist, I think being sensitive to that issue is safer than not.
(BTW, did you know you won the subscription to Apex? I emailed you and announced it on that post. Please let me know if that’s the addy to send the subscription to.)
Wow. That’s a switch. I’ve never won anything. O_O
. . .maybe this is a sign I should start playing the lottery?
Tony, I just noticed your comment as I finished posting my own, above. Seems we are coming from the same place here. What you said about it being an absence of experience with real racism that is the problem. I haven’t had to deal with racism directed at me personally (white girl), but have through people I love. Real racism. Being called a “ni**er lover” because of my choice of friends and boyfriends. Listening to my other “friends” make jokes about the “half-breed.” Burning crosses showing up in my friend’s front yard. Yes, it kinda makes you roll your eyes over “shall we call them black or African American.”
Anyway, I don’t want to repeat myself (much) but the other point I made above is that it’s just as much racism if you worry too much about making sure you always portray someone of another race as the good guy. In real life, bad guys come in all races.
Yep. I agree 100%.
Mike,
I’ve been pondering issues of race a little myself, of late. I was listening to a son by the rock group Switchfoot recently that referenced a civil rights leader named John Perkins. I had never heard of him.
The following week, I happened upon a PBS documentary on the Freedom Riders. Again, I was largely ignorant of the history.
Does my lack of knowledge about issues important to African Americans betray racism … even if it is subtle? Maybe. But to be honest, I think that charges of racism can be leveled too quickly. If a minority is evil, you’re accused of stereotyping. Make a black male a positive character, and you’re guilty of creating a Magical Negro? Quite a minefield.
This may be way off base Mike, but what part do minorities play in your everyday life? Do you have any African Americans over to your house for dinner? Does your social circle include any Asians or Hispanics? If your life doesn’t include much color, your writing may include more stereotypes than you think, just because your personal experience is deep.
Dave
Stranger days.
The questions that we ask are intrinsically false in my view. They are phenotype bound questions. If they were cultural questions they would have to be much more specific. Besides being the father of our 38 year old white male son, I am the father of our two adopted teenage girls. One is Asian looking, since she was born to a Himalaya tribal group called the Tamang, and the younger is a chocolate NW-India born.
Lol, if you were to know them and have them in your home or they were your daughters’ friends at school, you would have to look long and hard to find any differences culturally. The only difference might be that they would honestly question American Christendom with respect to its claim on true representation of Christ on earth.
So, how is a question of phenotype going to lead us to the proper answering to our questions, when all along it is and will always be a cultural one?
Matt, I don’t think I’m asking “phenotype bound” questions. Even so, I’m not sure we can separate the two. Of course, race and culture ARE two different things. I am “culturally” worlds apart from some others of my “race.” Nevertheless, unlike your adopted kids, skin color is often bound up with culture. My daughter and son-in-law are currently a host family for a Chinese high school student. His name is Victor. Victor is different from us on many levels, physical ones included. My questions here have to do with properly and respectfully portraying someone of another race, and the potential pitfalls of attempting this. I appreciate your comments!
Yes indeed!
Skin color is the first “affront” we “suffer”:( However, the socio-political and cultural distinctions in their distinct historicity and individual interpretations are the true bars that isolate us from each other. E pluribus unum is the ideal that we invented to answer our frustrations and yet, we fail at it. Why? Because our essential understanding of unity predisposes this failure. The worship of the ideal in the absence of the real must lead to such failure to which only one can answer correctly, one who is indeed capable of appreciating the WHOLE as in “greater than the sum of its parts. The true appreciation of individuality lies in the recognition not just of its uniqueness, but in loving the whole to which this uniqueness belongs, exclaiming, begging: I can not be the same without you!
This renders dismissal of culture bound group ethics upping the anti to a level of what is so uncomfortably notion-ed among Christians “the body of Christ”. If “we are all of divine origin” then “all” are appreciated and the “real” of this must determine the movement toward a whole where all uniqueness lives in celebration of its contributions. That, and only that, allow the “Greater”.
As long as our characters are ever disposable, we follow a narrative that cuts off its nose despite its face. Therein lies partly an answer to the dilemma. As long as all in our character development serves the “greater” of our story, there is no judgement that can stand against it, unless of course the “greater” disposes of the reader.
I ran into a similar situation for my book. A character in my cast, Isabella, had a mother who left her when she was a baby–and it just so happens the mother was Hispanic. One reviewer took that to mean I was labeling the ENTIRE HISPANIC COMMUNITY as unfit or runaway parents. I was totally blown away. Especially given the fact that Isabella is, by logic, of Hispanic descent and is one of the guiding forces for good and the one with the rock solid faith in the book.
It’s a tricky situation. As white, male authors, perhaps we are doomed to only being able to write in our racial sphere as a means of staying “safe” from being labeled a racist–but then THAT’S labeled as racism or, at least, culturally ignorant. I think readers DO assume that a character is the same ethnicity of the author, so if you designate that someone is a different color, the reader wants to know “Why?” “What sets that character apart? Why did you make THEM Asian, African American, Hispanic, etc etc?” And they start assigning deeper meanings to your choice than you had ever considered. I don’t think it’s fair, but if I had a henchmen and decided, “Hey, let’s make him Chinese American, just because we got way too many white folks running around” then the Sensitive Reader’s going to make an assumption based on that: “Oh, why is the THUG Chinese American? What are you trying to say?” I’m not saying anything–just wanted variety. But it automatically gets taken as racism from people.
People are so sensitive and I think things become retro-actively racist, just because people MAKE it racist-intending, despite the original context.
It is easy to forget how parts of my life that are still so fresh in memory seem ancient history to other here. In my lifetime I have seen Martin Luther King from my grandfather’s barber shop window in Jackson, MS – and heard my grandfather’s unreasonable (to me as 8 year old) intolerance toward those of other races – and watched my father embrace fellow black pastors in Louisiana when it cost him favor among his peers – a lived through violent integration in middle school – and grown to love and be loved by my black brothers and sisters – and worked on a steering committee for Mission Mississippi with John Perkins and Dolphus Weery – and seen my oldest son marry a beautiful Philippino women with a mixed race daughter from a former marriage … and I could go on but would bore all of you.
BUT – when we fall to prey to gestalt guilt in which the collective political correctness of our culture takes on a life of its own, racism is the last thing that is really dealt with. Know you heart Mike and quit losing sleep over the perceptions of others.
Are you familiar with Nisi Shawl’s Writing the Other? You might find it helpful.
I LOVED that. One of my favourite writing books, as it addresses more than the usual “write every day and dont use adverbs” stuff.
I’ve noticed that I’m prone to all-caucasian casts in my own works, and I realized: my characters’ origins often mean that they must be caucasian. The cultures I know best are also caucasian.
But it does make me sit back and consider: Where are the other skin types?
In my fantasy novel I’m serializing, there aren’t any “blacks”, but there is racism—based something other than skin color. Other stories in the world will feature different locations and therefore different phenotypes.
Will somebody probably pitch a fit and call me anti-[insert their pet sensitivity here]? Yes. I even have one novel in revisions that I could see folks protesting as anti-Christian, because the narrator encounters some bad churches and knowingly breaks the 10 commandments.
But someone will always misinterpret your words out of hypersensitivity. It’s something we all have to live with.
Carradee, I tend to populate my stories with a multicultural cast, probably because I live and work among a multicultural cast. But I must confess, thus far, all my protags are white. Is this wrong? Call it false guilt, but it makes me wonder.
You’re most intimately familiar with white cultures, though, correct? Craeting a protagonist of a different ethnicity that was true to a different culture and background would be inherently easier to mess up, because it’s a closer perspective. You’ll be likely to miss pertinent details.
For example, I fit easily into my car, so it doesn’t strike me as small—but my younger brother, who’s taller and bigger than me, can barely fit in it to drive it. That difference in perspective makes it far easier for me to realistically write short people. When I write a tall protagonist, I often find myself having to read the story through again carefully to make sure that height has effects, like a character having to watch where a doorjamb is.
And character height is a far simpler concept than character culture and ethnicity.
Where I feel it can get upside down is if all the protags are of one sociocultural strata, whereas the antags are of another.
And my main concern here has never been with “are you, Mike, a racist?” but with “what do these common narrative elements across several authors’ works say about institutional racism & bias of priviledge within the CBA and the Evangelical church?”
I don’t think Mike Duran is a racist.
But I DO think there is a great deal of institutional priviledge bias within the cultural structure of the modern evangelical church.
Talking about racial elements in story isnt about “are whites good and non-whites bad?”
For instance, i became tangentially involved in a very long thread over at spec fic discussing the nature of anti-semitism within Christianity as it appears in several popular Christian works.
Ive realised of late that I read Christian fiction as much to get a bead on the current climate of our larger community. What we choose to elevate in our art becomes a dominant expression of who we are. As I see it, thats part of the danger of writing as a Christian for a Christian publisher. Like it or not, you participate in creating the artistic commentary we display to the world.
“Where I feel it can get upside down is if all the protags are of one sociocultural strata, whereas the antags are of another.”
I agree with you, Katherine. Which is why, if you perceived my antag as black, I could see how it might be a red flag. That doesn’t mean white authors can’t portray some antags as being non-white, but that we should be aware of our own potential biases. I agree.
You might also be interested in this, Katherine. There is one character in The Resurrection who I thought had a minor racist streak. She can be found in Chapter 19 recalling how the church refused to “waffle ’round while some foreigners took over.” That character is white. Thanks for being a part of this discussion, Katherine!
This is an interesting conversation. It made me ponder my WIP, as it is mostly set in Thailand. I try to use just a few dialogue cues to show an accent or somesuch, to not make it overwhelming for the reader. One Thai character is very fluent in English, so I don’t change anything for her, but her friend isn’t as fluent, so I have her English come out a little choppy. Now I’m wondering if I’m being insensitive 😉 (or I learned a new emoticon today O|O)
Actually, I’m not worried about it. The character is a better bi-lingual person than me, and it is true to how people spoke English when I was there. Someone may find issue with it, but in this case I have some experience.
I agree with the others – you know your heart, and you can’t control how others will respond.
(Now I will never look at Philip Yancey without a sliver of suspicion though, whether he’s a pre-Keen…)
Sometimes it says more about the reader who assigns negative meaning to your writing than it does you as a writer for writing in the first place. Just sayin’.
And I believe I have been very upfront about that, in all the venues where this conversation occurs.
There is no possible way you can anticipate every misconception readers are going to have. But I also agree that some quick physical descriptions would alleviate some of this argument. I like physical descriptions. I’m not terribly fond of books that allow each reader to imagine the protags/antags according to personal fantasies. Not to mention, you can’t make everybody happy.
I tend to write from what I know. Whether that’s a good or a bad thing is up to the reader. I once wrote a short memoir about MY OWN family, which is ethnically mixed, and had two people in a critique workshop accuse me of racism and tell me I shouldn’t write about ethnic groups other than my own (you know, white trash hillbilly). Go figure. I can’t even write about my own family w/o offending somebody.
Ultimately, people are people. Cultural differences exist, but people are similar enough at the core of their beings to make a lot of this nonsense. Write truthfully. Write sympathetically. And forget about pleasing everybody.
“Either way, it seemed to have come back to bite me.”
For me, that’s the most telling statement in your post (that, and the quote by C.S. Lewis).
I know I’ve said this at least twice before in your comments; sorry if I’m a one-trick pony specializing in the obvious: Writers *will* be criticised…by someone…for every possible choice.
If you stick to your own “people group” to avoid controversy and “write what you know”, you’ll be criticized for being one-dimensional (Amy Tan, Charles Dickens, and many others have taken this hit.) If you branch out beyond the bounds of your own skin/gender, a different set of critics will step up to the plate, and tell you you got it wrong. In milder cases, this takes the form of “No way would a real _________ (man, woman, Asian, hobbitt, etc) do that.” In the more serious versions, you’re accused of “making a derogatory statement” concening that group, when you thought you were building a living, breathing character.
My own upcoming novel features a young woman of Italian-American descent, and her older male, African-American, homeless friend (the good guys)…both penned by a white, middle-class male. I chose to address the differences directly, and, to the best of my ability, accurately.
We’ll see….
I read an article in (I think) Writer’s Digest in the last few months that touched on this topic written by a black woman, and she took the opposite stance as you.
I happen to agree with the statement that if you give the reader a chance to misinterpret something, they will. I’ve done it before. For me, I’d like to have a clear racial identification otherwise if I learn someone is different than how I pictured them, it takes me out of the story while I readjust my brain.
As a writer, one of my current projects has several different ethnicities. My MC is white, as is her boyfriend, but her best friend is black, but atypical. Most of the rest of the people in the story are a mix: black, Asian, Hispanic. I try to be clear, either by name choice, physical description, or how they speak, what race they are since I don’t want confusion for my readers.
Of course, my project has yet to see the eyes of an agent or editor, so who knows what they’ll come up with on that front. That could change before it’s in print!
Why do we find it so hard to celebrate cultural differences rather than pretend they don’t exist?
What relief action is to Kharma, the individuums’ uniqueness anchored celebration of the “greater” is to culture.
Culture is island mentality driven and strengthens its members unto themselves. The recognition of the individual’s uniqueness is in its celebration “wholeness” driven for the “Greater” good. I think it speaks to this in the model of the Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 12. An organic model of a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts as it lives in celebration of all uniquely contributing parts.
Mike, I just finished reading your book and as a black man…I didn’t find anything unusual or unsettling (as far as race is concerned) with the character of Mr. Keen.
(BTW….I enjoyed reading your novel. I thought you gave a good portrayal of a pastor who had a wandering spiritual quest. I could identify with him somewhat. Even though, I must admit I thought he was a little too wimpy in the beginning of the book. LOL!)
I do believe we have become hyper-sensitive in our “culturally-correct” age. I don’t like the word “politically-correct”….because it has nothing to do with politics but how a society perceives what is correct to say and do or not.
I currently have a WIP where the main character is black, his girlfriend is Hispanic, and his best friend is white. That’s a reflection of what’s in my family and how I’ve interacted with people over the years as an adult.
The key for a novelist is to be authentic to the character and your story. Each ethnicity has stereotypes and as a writer it’s easy to put those in your story because it’s part of the context on how we live and interact amongst one other.
The idea that someone is racist because he wrote a black (or Hispanic or Asian) character as a bad guy is asinine. We all have the problem of sin and there are bad people in every color and not to honestly portray it in a work of art is committing fictional suicide.
I’m currently reading Lost Mission by Athol Dickson ( I will write review about it on my blog once I’m finished.) and the setting is in Southern California in late 1700s.. And should we call him racist…if he portrays a Hispanic negatively in the story? What if he’s a legitimate bad guy or has a character flaw that reveals their full personality?
We can go down a dangerous slippery slope if we let hypersensitivity and cultural-correctness totally take over art.
Mike, I would tell you to keep pushing for authentic characters in your story (regardless of their ethnicity) and most people (even Black People)can tell if you’re writing to a stereotype or honestly portraying a human being who is flawed and sinful like the rest of humanity.
God Bless,
Marion
kammbia1.wordpress.com
The things I find most amazing:
1) How gracious Mike was when facing a deeply paining accusation
2) How civil this discussion is
3) That no one noted that in schools, mentor RACE is a much smaller consideration than personal CONNECTION. Studies show that if a student has a connection with ONE adult (race isn’t important, gender isn’t important, socioeconomic status isn’t important), their chances of doing well in school dramatically increases and risk of committing suicide dramatically decreases.
My message: race is important, connection more so…in writing, we can focus on CONNECTIONS.