Welcome to Fantasy Friday, dear readers. It’s once again time to Blog For A Beer! (Rules, as always, are here.) This week is International Blog Against Racism Week, an annual event where bloggers talk about their experience with racism, eliminating racism, and promote education and activism. It seemed appropriate to devote this week’s Blog For A Beer to IBARW and the discussion of racism within SF/F publishing. To that end, we posted a very thoughtful essay by J. T. Glover, which you can read in full here. He ends the piece by asking:
…for those who would prefer a different SF: what do you want, and how are you going to get it? My frustration with Mr. Banker’s post was exceeded only by my curiosity. What sustainable alternative exists, now or in future, and how will it come about? Can it be created without alienating most of SF, and if not, does that matter? Even as the writer in me is most concerned with writing well and getting published, the reader in me wants both literary challenges and comfort food. The librarian in me believes that we must make room for everyone, whoever they are and whatever they believe, else we abandon the promise of speculative fiction.
Let’s discuss these questions and the other issues raised by the essay in the comments below. As always, the participant who engages, interests, or entertains us the most gets the prize.
One important thing to note: This week’s comments will be moderated more than usual due to the nature of the discussion. All opinions are welcome, disagreement is welcome, ad hominem attacks, bigoted language, and flamewars are not welcome. If you’re unsure how to participate in a discussion of this nature, this guide is very handy in illustrating what not to do.
“it’s usually unhelpful to direct her to Samuel Delany,”
Says who? Sure, you don’t want to send them to Hogg or Dahlgren, but what about Nova? Or Babel-17/Empire Star? Or Jewels of Aptor? All are complex but subtle, and easy for non-literary readers to get into, but could also be a sort of gateway to other things.
That’s not say I agree with Ashtok- I don’t. Oddly enough he posted just recently on my website, in a completely unrelated post, making the same American bashing comments. It’s strange because what he said on my blog had nothing to do with my original post. I’m wondering if he’s going to spam other writer’s blogs in the same attempt.
I think he’s just trying to get a rise out of people and create a sort of infamous personality online, in order to gather readers for his own works (which I’ve heard sold poorly in America…)
I realize that “Says who” might come off as aggressive- it wasn’t meant to be. It’s hard to get tone across online- that was meant to be jocular
On the topic of change- I think it’s happening now. Slowly, slowly. Evolution of genre itself, remixing, creating something new. The main way to do it is to bring in more readers who enjoy this sort of thing. This is happening now. The current generation is paving the way, has had the way paved. Ten years from now, twenty, who knows what genre will look like?
I bet it will be multicultural and more gender neutral. But it will be a long, hard struggle with the old guard of writers, and the generation who supposedly supports them, and want to keep it white male and colonial. Their numbers are shrinking, and they know it.
While I would personally recommend Delany to a Farland reader, as a librarian I would want to know more about the patron and his/her taste before doing so. Some patrons are hardy and regularly do jump all over the place, but others are skittish, or are new/tentative readers, or etc. Some of ‘em we gotta reel in carefully…
Well, I’m not sure- I’ve never read Farland. But then again, I do think Nova is infinitely accessible, and would suggest to a Heinlein reader, or a Star Wars fan, or whatever
While publishers can take measured risks on new voices and non-mainstream authors, and should do so for the vitality of SF, they are money-making entities providing product to a market, not democratically elected groups with an obligation to a constituency.
So?
The mistake, and it is a doozy based on paying, well, ZERO attention to what is going on in publishing, is to conclude that any set of SF lists at point n are a meaningful reflection of what the readers want.
Publishers generally have no idea what the readers want. It’s a set of guesses and hunches based on primitive sources of information such as prior sales of this or that book.
Or, more to the point, walking into a bookstore in 1998 you would not see two of the largest sections that exist in 2008:
“urban” fiction
manga
It took the publishing industry YEARS to get behind urban fiction, even after dozens of authors self-published their books and sold tens of thousands of copies out of car trunks and through networks of black bookstores, street vendors, and book clubs. Now publishers cannot start urban lines and pump out material fast enough.
Manga was much the same; publishing ignored the obvious interest in magna — what were once start-up firms now dominate the trade and only lately are both “mainstream” publishers and comic book publishers getting in on the action.
Not so incidentally for a post concerning race, both urban fiction and manga are heavily race-signified. (For an example of yet another genre that is powerful today thanks to actions taking place outside the mainstream of the publishing industry, check out the rise of “romantica” in both its fantastic and more realistic iterations).
It’s just foolish to think that publishers know what readers want. If they did, for one thing, the margins on the business would be much higher.
Nearly twenty years ago, my writing partner and I published a space opera called Exordium, which was the fictional version of a TV show we came close to selling back in 1980–just before the big strike hit. This is not a plug for the books, which went right out of print and are almost impossible to find, so much as a context. Our supposition was that in the far future, the races would have mixed together so much that everyone would be more or less brown. White skin wouldn’t be prized by the those at the top of the social heap–if anything it would be regarded as atavistic, with its tendency to burn in UV, and the ugliness of veins visible, etc. (This also went for gender diversity.)
Some readers liked this aspect to our worldbuilding, but others slammed us for not showing respect for ethnic distinction. In other words, we should have been depicting ethnic custom, speech patterns, etc, as they exist now, implying that they would be cherished through the centuries as important and valuable, without ever diluting with the predominant culture. This left us with the sense that nothing is going to please all readers, especially when you come to a hot topic in contemporary society. Supposing anyone actually unearths a copy of Exordium in 100 years–200 years–will our supposition be invisible, or will we be written off as hopelessly quaint and bigoted for our lack of acknowledgment of ethnic distinction?
I was born in the fifties, during the time when we were earnestly told that we were “all Americans equally” and the USA was a giant melting pot, but in actuality, bigoted jokes and remarks, “back of the bus” social expectations were all around one, certainly on TV. When one had friends from those minority groups, it became painful to see the impact of this stuff in their eyes, even when (especially when) they said nothing. What could they do when all the adults seemed to feel the same? It’s been good to see that change, albeit slowly, good to see ethnic explorations in entertainment without implication of hierarchy–and it’s been really good, at least to me, to see ethnic mixing, with due appreciation for both cultures.
What I like to see in my reading is a celebration of human diversity. Others will probably feel differently.
Never having worked in publishing, I can’t claim that I know everything about what’s popular, what isn’t, what The Readers want, etc. Sure, the success of new genres/sections reflects publishers’ success at tapping into markets of which they weren’t previously aware. Likewise with phenomenon authors — nobody in 1985 could have predicted (?) Harry Potter, but quite clearly there was an unmet demand.
At the same time, I also don’t know how many people out there do want a new SF. I mean that literally — aside from the relatively small segment of SF I follow online, I don’t know what percentage of readers are satisfied vs. those who aren’t. It’d be great to hear some editors or publishers chime in about what they hear from readers.
Nick, what did you hear from readers when you were at Clarkesworld? What about at your new position (if I can ask)? Do you think there’s a huge audience out there for more diverse literary SF? Does it dwarf the audience for the current overall makeup of SF?
I know those crazy kids are all about the manga these days, as reflected at ALA conferences. Can’t swing a dead cat without hitting a manga panel. Still, do you think the fans of manga would be willing to associate themselves with a field best known for thick-thewed white guys who conquer dark people? I’ve seen occasional comments among readers of color to the effect that there is some bias against SF (not “black enough,” e.g.).
My question when this comes up, is to what degree the fan is responsible for his tastes. A lot of people want to read stories in which the handsome, intelligent Marty Stu defeats the aliens and gets the girl. And the publishing industry wants to meet that demand. Leave aside for now the question of whether they overestimate the demand for this kind of story, or if they underestimate the demand for other kinds (though I suspect that both of those things are true). Are the fans that want these wish-fulfillment stories to be morally censured? Do they have an obligation to eat their peas and read more stories starring people who aren’t white or aren’t male?
I have a hard time saying that they do. I think it would be good for them to read more broadly, but people have every right to read for comfort and familiarity, if that’s what they want to do.
Conversely, I tentatively suggest that authors have a right to write comfortable, familiar stories to meet that demand. But I need to think on that some more… in the meantime I’m curious what others have to say.
JS Bangs-
I doubt it. I bet, if you took good old Marty Stu and made him a different color, people would still buy it and read it and devour it and go for more. People reading Marty Stu books read them for the same people read romances- it’s the repetition, the same story repeated with minor changes.
But are these big movers and shakers in the world of publishing? I dunno. But if you look at the Locus top 10 books each month or so, there is more diversification than you would expect.
And everyone is ignoring Neil Gaiman. Did Anansi Boys flop? No. Top seller. bridged gaps between those who like genre and those who won’t read it. And let’s see- what skin color where the characters?
I think the fallacy in Glover’s article is that it assumes the commercial non-viability of “inclusive SF” (for lack of a better term) from jump — he implies that it simply isn’t possible for SF to become inclusive and still make a buck.
But as Nick has intimated, there’s a huge potential audience out there right now which I believe has actively avoided SF for decades, precisely because it is seen to be so non-diverse. Nick mentions two examples; I’ll toss in another, which is currently making bucketloads of money: blends of romance with SF, with the conscious intention of targeting female and romance readers. “Paranormal romance” is part of this, but not the be-all and end-all; just tossing romantic tropes into traditional SF seems to have a positive impact as well. (I’m thinking of Sandra MacDonald’s THE OUTBACK STARS as an example — space opera by a new author, two parameters that are usually the kiss of death or at least midlist sales, but which was a Locus top 10 bestseller this year, I believe because it prominently features a female protagonist involved in a realistic romance. It’s also really good beyond that, but I’ll admit I wouldn’t've touched it if I hadn’t known it had that kind of content, because I’ve grown to view the space opera genre as one of the worst perpetrators of the “white guy Manifest Destiny” ideology.) The popular (white and male) conception before a few years ago was that women didn’t read SF, but now we see that SF targeting women is making money. This suggests that (duh) the popular (white and male) conception was dead wrong. So why not apply that same logic to PoC, non-Western cultures, etc.?
Frankly, simple demographics should suggest that a change in strategy is necessary: white men are a minority, even in the US, and their percentage of the population is only projected to dwindle in the future. It’s mind-gratingly stupid for people in the industry to speak and act as if commercial success lies in targeting a single demographic niche — a shrinking demographic niche — rather than changing with the times. Forget democracy; we’re talking about simple business sense here. If your market is dying, find new markets. Duh. Why is this so hard?
(I’m not calling Mr. Glover stupid, note. But I do think the myopia that he’s displaying here is common in SF, and I continually do not get how anyone could think this way. It simply doesn’t make sense.)
So to get back to Mr. Glover’s question: here’s what I want and here’s how I plan to get it. I want an SF written by authors who derive from the whole human race, which focuses on issues that concern the whole human race, and/or which features characters who are representative of the whole human race. I plan to get this “inclusive SF” by a) writing some of it myself, and trying to do so well enough to sell it; b) buying books that display the inclusive SF characteristics noted above, and recommending them to everyone I know; c) anti-recommending books that don’t do it, or do it badly, and telling everyone why I think they suck; d) joining organizations which seem to understand that the “non-inclusive SF” strategy is stupid, and are working to change it; e) shunning organizations which adhere to the “non-inclusive SF” strategy, because they’re doomed; and f) continuing to do this over and over until I die.
Oh, and encouraging everyone else who wants inclusive SF to do the same.
Hmm… I liked the article very much and am surprised by some of the comments. J. T. Glover’s perceptions certainly jive with what I’ve experienced, as a woman on the street. I don’t see him as being defeatist.
I love seeing new stuff–new formats, new styles of publishing, new content–and I certainly prefer to read works that don’t denigrate or demean whole groups of people. I’d prefer to avoid Children’s Television Special-style diversity, where the band of protagonists include two white people, two people of color, at least one woman, and someone in a wheelchair, and the plot covers a social issue du jour, because the earnestness tends to make the story rough going–BUT! A cool story drawing on the history of the Mahapajit kingdom of Java–I’m there. Or a story from inside the head of someone with autism–awesome. These expand our world and enrich our imagination, and I’d love more.
Wow. Seriously? Criticism of Tolkien as being racist?
They are really reaching on that one, given that Tolkien’s expressed intention of his work was to invent a mythology for ancient England.
And there are complaints about Tolkien’s elves being Aryan?
Hello! The elf mythology is Germanic! Of course Tolkien made them Aryan. Just as his dwarves are based on Norse mythology, and thus were white as well.
Now, if he were inventing a mythology for ancient Persia, then instead of elves he may have used jinns, and they may well have been Arabic. But then, Persia has plenty of mythology and history as is.
Having said that, yes, absolutely, most SF and Fantasy has a majority (if not entirely) white cast. But I think it is important to clarify that where racism does exist, it is mostly passive, not intentional.
The majority of traditional fantasy, for example, continues to be based heavily on European and Scandinavian mythology and cultures, particularly medieval western Europe. To most people, that means white folk in shiny armor. Part of this is, as Glover suggests, a building on what has come before. We read and love Tolkien, and are inspired to write Fantasy. And what we’ve read that we can define as “fantasy” is medieval western Europe, with magic.
This is not to say people of color should not be included in the story. But if you were to do so, particularly in a culture traditionally viewed as white, shouldn’t it be for a reason?
For example, how much would be added to the Arthurian legend by making Lancelot black? Well, if your purpose was to tell the Arthurian legend, then not much would be added, really, and the decision comes off as arbitrary.
But if you wanted to devote a portion of your story (or the entire story) to the ways in which Lancelot’s differing race or ethnicity affected his relationship and status with the other knights, and with Guenevere, and how it complicated his rise to his position as Arthur’s best knight, then it might make sense, and can reflect the issues of race in our own society.
So while the racism in traditional fantasy is passive, it will require conscious effort and awareness to eliminate. Just as passive racism in real life requires self-examination, societal examination, and effort to eliminate.
Sherwood,
(This also went for gender diversity.)
I’m curious as to what you mean by this. Do you mean that men and women had melded into a single hermaphroditic gender? Thus far I’ve only seen a handful of SF works apply the “melting pot” theory to gender.
I’d be very interested to see these books if so, and will hunt them down on ABE or elsewhere. =)
Changing a character’s skin color just to make your fantasy world racially balanced doesn’t really add much to the story in and of itself, and it is the story that people buy the book for.
But by changing the color of a character’s skin, you suddenly have to ask a lot of questions, questions that can make your world more believable, and make that story deeper, richer, and more interesting without being overtly political or polemic.
What is the character’s race?
Where is this race from, and how did members of this race arrive in your story location? Brought as slaves? Traders? Invaders? Refugees? What’s the history of integration?
Is this race capable of the special abilities (i.e. magic, telepathy, etc.) you allow in your world, and if so, how are members of this race who have the abilities treated differently than those of other races? How are they treated differently than mundane members of their own race?
What religions does this race practice? Does that create conflicts or open up opportunities for them with other races?
What stereotypes are associated with this race?
Are there specific jobs traditionally associated to this race?
Is there a clear economic stratification between the races? Why?
Is this race especially prone (or resistant) to any diseases? How does that affect their place in society or their habits?
Are there special laws that apply only to this race?
What are the societal views on interracial relationships? How are interracial offspring treated?
How has this race influenced the music, art, technology, etcetera of the area?
Etcetera and so forth.
By asking these kinds of questions and including them in your world building, and by making one or more key characters be of this race, you open up all kinds of new opportunities for character conflict and growth.
And by engaging the reader emotionally in the story and allowing the reader to experience the character’s struggles, you will do more to raise racial awareness and identification in the reader than a hundred essays on racism.
Or you could just base your world on a non-European culture
Also, fantasy and sci-fi does frequently explore issues of racism, disability, addiction, etcetera, but through analogies, metaphors or substitutes. A story about a half-elf who feels as though she’s not fully accepted by either humans or elves can convey similar feelings as a literary novel about a pale-skinned mulatto struggling with being accepted by black or white cultures in the 1950′s, etcetera.
Not saying this excuses the lack of racial diversity in fantasy, but rather that it is an additional tool that can be used to further the awareness of racial issues.
Randy,
Wow. Seriously? Criticism of Tolkien as being racist?
Yes, especially in the lit-crit realm. The critics point out, among other things, that Tolkien depicted thinly-veiled Africans and Asians as the “Southrons and Easterlings” — human races who collaborated with the evil Sauron, and therefore weren’t included in the “races of men” who were fighting on the side of goodness and right. It’s worth noting that while Tolkien was published and lived most of his life in England, he was born in Apartheid South Africa and may have been inculcated with the values of white South Africans by his parents. This makes his depictions of various things — such as his implication that pure-blooded and/or “fair” (Noldorin) elves are better than dark-complected and/or mixed-race (Sindarin) elves — suspect, when viewed in the context of racism. Ditto his insistence that mixed-race elves must choose one or the other heritage (human or elven), and can’t just exist as mixed.
There’s been a lot of discussion about this in various spheres, especially since the movies came out. Just Google “Tolkien” and “racism” sometime.
This is not to say people of color should not be included in the story. But if you were to do so, particularly in a culture traditionally viewed as white, shouldn’t it be for a reason?
I agree. And one reason should probably include the fact that medieval Western Europe was nowhere near as all-white as “traditional” fantasy would have it seem. The Moors ruled huge swaths of Europe for centuries, even integrating with several European royal families (e.g., the Medicis); the Chinese silk road brought traders back and forth between Europe and Asian countries; and so on. The failure to depict the actual diversity that existed in medieval Europe, and fantasies based on medieval Europe, is one of the great flaws of fantasy, which — despite its supposedly medieval European mythological roots — is still framed by modern/post-colonial and largely American perceptions of race.
So here’s the “reason” people of color should be included in fantasy: because they have been excluded up to now. It may not have been intentional, but really, intention is irrelevant. The exclusion has occurred.
And I won’t even get into the question of why so much modern fantasy ignores the fact that all people, not just medieval Europeans, have mythology worth exploring.
Oh. More Randy:
Also, fantasy and sci-fi does frequently explore issues of racism, disability, addiction, etcetera, but through analogies, metaphors or substitutes. A story about a half-elf who feels as though she’s not fully accepted by either humans or elves can convey similar feelings as a literary novel about a pale-skinned mulatto struggling with being accepted by black or white cultures in the 1950’s, etcetera.
No, it can’t.
Not saying this excuses the lack of racial diversity in fantasy, but rather that it is an additional tool that can be used to further the awareness of racial issues.
No, it isn’t. At least, it hasn’t been so far.
Accusations of racism in Tolkien are such an old hat by now that I’m surprised that anyone is surprised by them.
Anyway, I think that the criticism of Tolkien is overdone. If you read the conflicts between elves and dwarves as conflicts between races (which I think is correct), then the racial messages become much more complicated and much more conciliatory. Additionally, the gripes against Tolkien’s “Aryan Elves” miss Tolkien’s own criticisms of the Elves, which aren’t far beneath the surface in LOTR.
@Nora: care to support your assertions?
I would argue that a lot of mono-racial sff, even old-timey rockets and ray guns sff, does address issues of otherness. It just does it with sf-nal kinds of alienation (like actual aliens).
Allegory is great and has opened up a lot of minds, no doubt. But there comes a point when allegory is not enough, that these issues must be addressed in terms closer to their real-world counterparts. and that time is right now. why? because allegory did some of the work for us back in the day and we’ve moved past it, somewhat. Now it’s no longer dangerous for a TV to tackle real racial issues in an SF setting — well, dangerous in the sense that it might get someone killed or, for a less extreme example, not have stations in the South refusing to show your program.
The thing is, once you get to the point where allegory isn’t necessary to get people to think about these issues AT ALL, it then becomes an enabler of not thinking about the issues at all. It allows people to avoid doing the real work of exploring racism by saying “well, this story is about elves and dwarfs and I expect people to apply any two groups that don’t get along to elves and dwarfs.” Allegory can become a cop-out. Allegory is used to prop up McEurope, too. Because no two groups have strife between them for the exact same reasons. The strife comes not just from differences in skin color, but differences in culture, religion, custom, or imbalance of power.
Sure, not every story or novel is going to deal with these things. not all should. But Allegory is not an excuse for not including some non-white people and non-American or non-McEurope cultures in your work.
@KTB: Good point, and well-stated. I completely agree. (And I hate McEurope in all of its forms.)
This is very much a British-perspective comment.
I’d like to say a word for Phillip Pullman, because he has a very largely sympathetic portrayal of Gypsies. Racism is very often understood to mean ‘about Black people’, which makes anti-Gypsy (Roma/Sinti/Pavee/etc) racism very hard to acknowledge, much less work against.
In the UK, anti-Traveller racism remains acceptable among people who would be horrified if you suggested they were racist. Indeed, in answer to the question ‘how not to alienate’, I’d say ‘but who would be alienated by works that challenge the well-known racisms?’.
And in many indices, from educational attainment to health out comes, the effects are demonstrated: the graphs showing difference are pretty disturbing … until you add in Gypsies, and the result is that attainment/outcomes among other ethnic groups look like pretty much a level line. And don’t get me started about what’s happening in Italy …
My guess is that 99% of non-European readers are unaware of this context. So perhaps this is one way to create non-alienating SF? Get the statistics on educational achievement of Gypsies put into the back of Pullman’s books.
The ‘fantasy’ appearance of ethnic groups is a difficult topic, partly because the ‘fantasy’ nature of the group is not readily apparent – Tolkien’s racism is a nice demonstration of this – I have been convinced by arguments that he was talking about one, very specific, ethnic group (the Huns, a traditional enemy – hence the widespread use of ‘Hun’ to mean German). This is not to say This is OK Then, but to say, it’s all a lot more Difficult and Deserving of Thought, than simply talking about ‘racism’ as if we all understood what one another were talking about might suggest.
eeek! I should have said, I don’t drink beer! Only cider!
JT Bangs,
@Nora: care to support your assertions?
Sure. Which ones?
I would argue that a lot of mono-racial sff, even old-timey rockets and ray guns sff, does address issues of otherness.
I don’t disagree with this. But what Randy said was that this addresses racial issues, and racial issues go far beyond issues of otherness.
K. Tempest @21:
Darn you for being so articulate! What you said. =)
Actually, I think SF, even space opera, is far more diverse than fantasy. I have just read Elizabeth Moon’s ‘Vatta’ series and saw the main character as black, because I registered clues such as that the place she comes from is like the Caribbean – I don’t know what an African American or Black British woman would have seen, though.
Vatta’s skin colour is not the most important thing about the books, though, because like any space opera it’s about the action and the spaceships. I don’t think it’s a bad thing that the culture of the books is typical space opera – but I wish there was more SF published which used a different culture than 21st Century America as its baseline. There ought to be a wide, wide variety so that non-white characters and non-WASP cultures are common.
There are very, very few fantasy books that have non-white characters. There are still too few that have believable women, too, though things are far better than when I first read fantasy in the late 60s. But why is almost everyone white? And not just white but Northern European white. Where are the black Elves? (‘Elfquest’ had dark-skinned Elves decades ago!) Apart from anything else, these white characters and cod-mediaeval settings are boring!
Nora,
I feel as though you are taking a hard line on the issue, and that we are in violent agreement rather than truly at odds on this topic.
I did not say that using substitutes such as Elven integration issues to represent African American integration issues is a perfect and exact parallel, but rather that it can be used to convey similar feelings and experiences.
For example, I can write an essay on the disparities between powder cocaine laws and crack cocaine laws, and the conviction rates and prison terms for African American males versus white males for drug crimes in America. I could even write a story about an African American family that struggles to make ends meet after the father/husband in imprisoned for years on a lame drug charge. But what if I wanted to transfer this issue to my fantasy novel, a novel I hope to be read by the legions of readers who are looking for their next epic fantasy fix after burning through Tolkien, Jordan, etcetera?
I could create a parallel African race and history of slavery, integration, and social prejudice, and tell my tale. That could be a great book, and one worth writing. However, as an epic fantasy writer, my target audience did not buy my book looking for commentary on modern racial issues. They bought it looking for the comfortable and familiar tropes of epic fantasy. So perhaps I can instead tell the tale of how the elves in my world were enslaved, then integrated, and have a higher-than-normal addicted to rum. Even though the elves are supposedly now considered “equal” members of society and laws singling out elves are supposedly things of the past, there are laws against the use and sale of rum, and drunken or disorderly behavior while drunk on rum, that are harsh and far in excess of any laws against other forms of alcohol, etc. And one of the main characters of my story has been shaped by such prejudiced laws and attitudes, etcetera. (Okay, pretty lame, but I’m working off the top of my head here).
Anyway, point is, while this does not directly demonstrate prejudice against an African American character, it does demonstrate how a society’s laws and legal system can be inherently prejudiced towards a particular group, etcetera. It lays the framework in the reader’s mind that will allow them to better recognize and understand such prejudices and disparities in the real world.
Racism, especially passive racism, is not something that is switched on or off in the brain. It is the accumulation of generations of assumptions, stereotypes, social customs and laws, the influence of family and friends and media, etcetera. It is subtle, and much of it is unconscious. So everything that can create a countervailing influence can’t be bad. It all adds up, it all helps.
As for the racial diversity of Europe, I am aware of it. But ask the general person to imagine a Medieval France or England, and again, they see white men in shiny armor, or white men with bows, or grubby white men and women living in daub-and-wattle huts. Is that entirely accurate? No. Is it fair? Nope. But again, writers of fantasy often build on what has come before, and also work with their readers expectations and assumptions. For one, it requires less exposition, less world building and explanation, and you can focus more on the story arc and action. So I imagine that unless promoting racial equality and issue awareness is an agenda of the author, the extra work to do so seems unnecessary. The readers who enjoyed the last epic fantasy with mostly white characters, elves and dwarves won’t blink an eye if the next epic fantasy series they read has mostly white characters, elves and dwarves. They are not reading it for racial diversity education. They are reading it to see knights cut down monsters and mages cast cool spells. I’m not saying I approve, just that I can see the reasons. But I agree it would be great if more authors took the time and effort to break free of these traditions, expectations and habits and created more diverse worlds.
And yes, while Tolkien’s “bad guys” were non-white, I suspect, again, he was pulling more from historical invasions by Moors, Persians, etcetera than by any conscious, overt attempt to display all white men as good and all colored races as evil. This is not to say he wasn’t shaped by the attitudes and beliefs common to his society at the time, but again, he was writing a mythological history of his western European country, not Mein Kampf, and I think this explains away most perceived imbalances. However, discussions like this are valuable in raising awareness of issues such as people of color being too-often cast as the bad guys, and thus in preventing arguably unintentional imbalances such as those found in Tolkien’s work from being absorbed and added unchallenged to the collective perception and attitudes of the readers.
And stuff.
And again, I agree wholeheartedly that it would be awesome to see more works based on non-Western mythologies.
@Nora, I was referring to comment 19. But I think that K. Tempest covered you pretty well.
Pat Reynolds:
The UK non-whites I’ve spoken with have pretty much said that their experience of racism isn’t that different from mine in the US. The historical roots are slightly different (e.g., colonialist exploitation vs. slavery — still pretty sucky either way), but the current manifestation is pretty much the same. Most of them understand quite clearly that “racism” refers to more than black people, for example; I suspect that anyone who’s experienced racism understands that, though admittedly it’s natural for people to focus on themselves and thine.
And I can’t speak for other non-European readers, but I’m very aware of how the Roma have been, and still are being, treated in Europe. The latest incidents have been discussed on several “PoC interest” blogs and mailing lists I’m on.
I’m not sure that putting real-world statistics into the back of a fantasy novel would work. As Francesca named it (so perfectly!), I think this would have the feel of Children’s Television Workshop-style diversity — heavy-handed, simplistic, and probably offputting to anyone over the age of five. Just my opinion. =)
I think what might be more effective is what Pullman did, by your description (I haven’t read the books) — it sounds like he actually acknowledged the existence of the Roma and their unfair treatment. This seems to have had a positive impact on you and your perception of them, hasn’t it? =) Ditto Jacqueline Carey, who actually depicted Romalike people (and Jewishlike people, and other ethnicities traditionally excluded from fantasy) as real, well-rounded characters in her created world. Such depictions occur so rarely that they really stand out when they’re done well (or at least, they stand out to me). So really, I don’t think it takes that much to work in PoC.
K. Tempest @ 21
I agree. I’m not making an either/or argument. I’m making a “the more the better” argument.
We definitely need more racial diversity in all forms of fiction, from spec fic literature to comics to movies.
As I tried to express in post 15, I think such inclusions don’t have to be arbitrary, or detract from the traditional fantasy expectations, but rather can add quite a bit to the story, not only in terms of plot but also in terms of the world being believable and rich.
Heck, including racial diversity might even reduce writer’s block.
Re racism and Tolkien: the most serious criticism leveled against his work concerning this issue is anti-semitic depictions of the dwarves.
Alas, it is true, if you look prequel tales of his world, particularly in the more recently published The Children of Húrin. The description of the wicked dwarf, Mim. He’s the very stereotype of the money loving, miserly Jew.
It was an actual shock to my system to encounter his character in Hurí, the stereotyping was so blatant.
From Wiki (coz I don’t have time to write this in my own words):
Love, C.
Randy @ 28
Geez Randy. If you’re going to go through that much effort to analogize the African American experience with elves, why not just do it with humans of color?
Ummm… good point Randy. But mostly, I’d expect such info to be background info in an epic fantasy, not main plot points. And thus I’ve just created some good detail around my elven culture in this fantasy world.
But ideally, you’d consider such racial issues and influences when world building your fantasy races (to make them rich and believable) AND include non-white human races with well-thought-out histories and issues as well.
Randy,
I feel as though you are taking a hard line on the issue
A hard line? Asking that fantasy not focus on a single culture or demographic group to the exclusion of all others?
Anyway, point is, while this does not directly demonstrate prejudice against an African American character, it does demonstrate how a society’s laws and legal system can be inherently prejudiced towards a particular group, etcetera. It lays the framework in the reader’s mind that will allow them to better recognize and understand such prejudices and disparities in the real world.
I take your point. However, this very kind of allegory has been done for literal generations in American SF and F, and it hasn’t made much of a real difference. We’re still seeing aliens and elves used instead of actual brown human beings. We’re still seeing fantasy readers insist that you have to have a reason to include brown people in a fantastic world (while in the real world, brown people make up the vast majority of humankind!). The attitude seems to be that we can ditch the brown people, since we’ve got all these handy aliens and elves. (And can I just point out the inherent creepiness of allegorically depicting human beings as non-human?)
So my point is that when real people are still being hurt (yes, exclusion is hurt), and the allegory is what’s being used to hurt them (in part), then the allegory is doing more harm than good.
Racism, especially passive racism, is not something that is switched on or off in the brain. It is the accumulation of generations of assumptions, stereotypes, social customs and laws, the influence of family and friends and media, etcetera. It is subtle, and much of it is unconscious. So everything that can create a countervailing influence can’t be bad. It all adds up, it all helps.
It helps if it helps. But my argument is that subtle, allegorical depictions which do nothing to directly challenge those internalized, long-held prejudices are essentially useless. Worse than useless, really, because they allow people to feel good about being open-minded, without actually being open-minded.
Star Trek is an example — the original series was arguably the first of the early SF shows to use both allegory and tokenism to depict racial diversity. Most ST fans consider themselves non-racist and welcoming of diversity. Yet when the Voyager team decided to depict actual, real diversity — Tuvok the black Vulcan — it was the long-term fans of the show I heard howling loudest about it. Literal decades of allegory had done nothing to make them consider the fact that maybe Vulcans come in different colors too, and maybe it’s a good idea to give some of them speaking roles. In fact, seeing racial issues depicted in allegorical form made them resistant to seeing actual people of different races. How on earth is this a good thing?
As for the racial diversity of Europe, I am aware of it. But ask the general person to imagine a Medieval France or England, and again, they see white men in shiny armor, or white men with bows, or grubby white men and women living in daub-and-wattle huts. Is that entirely accurate? No. Is it fair? Nope. But again, writers of fantasy often build on what has come before, and also work with their readers expectations and assumptions.
You’re saying “work with their assumptions”. I’m reading “enable their racism.”
You’re pointing out the core problem here yourself: the average fantasy reader’s perception of medieval Europe has been completely and falsely skewed thanks to generations of racism. You acknowledge that this is a problem. Yet you seem to be suggesting that the solution to this problem is to continue this racist bias — consciously, deliberately — rather than challenge it.
Is that what you’re saying? Because if so, I have a serious problem with that.
And yes, while Tolkien’s “bad guys” were non-white, I suspect, again, he was pulling more from historical invasions by Moors, Persians, etcetera than by any conscious, overt attempt to display all white men as good and all colored races as evil.
Whether it was conscious and overt really doesn’t matter, though. I think the worst bigotry is that which is perpetuated unintentionally, through sheer laziness and/or the failure to question one’s assumptions and prejudices. Of course people who engage in unintentional racism aren’t evil or monsters; I understand that. But the fact that their bigotry is “passive” does little to change the fact that it does real, active harm.
@Nora
But I do think the myopia that he’s displaying here is common in SF, and I continually do not get how anyone could think this way. It simply doesn’t make sense.
First, I was glad to read what you had to say about what you want out of SF. Second, thanks for bringing in the romance blend — I was hoping someone would bring up paranormal romance, urban fantasy, or the like.
As a reader (as I said), I want all of what can be made available. I get tired of reading the stuff that’s supposedly marketed to me and enjoy variety. Believe me when I say that I want a variegated SF. I’m happy when publishers take risks and open the field to new voices.
The view from behind my “librarian goggles” is necessarily tailored to what patrons tell me they want. You (and Nick) are both very right about new genres popping up, and there’s all sorts of reasons why it can take a long time for publishers to get behind something new. We librarians try to keep up with what’s hot, as much as we can within budgetary constraints, but we have to look at what gets used when we make purchases. It’s good to take chances and try new things, see if they’ll interest patrons, but we do have a responsibility to buy what we know people like and want.
I can’t, without some sort of indication from my patrons, blow my budget on something completely different from what they’ve historically said they want. Sure, we push into new areas, get grants to start new collections (graphic novels, e.g., where there haven’t been any before), but this complements a steady diet of what patrons are going to use.
Nora,
Again, violent agreement
However, this very kind of allegory has been done for literal generations in American SF and F, and it hasn’t made much of a real difference. We’re still seeing aliens and elves used instead of actual brown human beings.
You argue that allegory and analogy hasn’t made a difference, evidenced by the continued racial homogony of SF literature. I would say those two things should be considered separately. Has it made a difference in the larger sense? I don’t think anybody can say. I’d hope it has. I’d like to think our genre has had a positive influence on the way people think, again, on a subtle, unconscious level at least, which may have added in some small way to the larger (if still inadequate) shifts in societal views and attitudes.
The reason why those shifts in view have not then fed back into the literature which may have helped generate them is, again, at least in part a matter of genre traditions, ala McEurope, etcetera.
But regardless, I am not saying Allegory and analogy are THE answer. I’m saying they can be part of the answer. Obviously, the bigger part of the answer would be including actual people of color.
Yet you seem to be suggesting that the solution to this problem is to continue this racist bias — consciously, deliberately — rather than challenge it.
Heck no. I neither approve nor encourage the lack of racial diversity in any forms of media. I was merely pointing out the reasons it has occurred to date, not justifying its continuation.
Again, we must acknowledge that we’re working against decades of reader, genre, agent and publisher expectation and assumptions, not to mention the not-to-be-underestimated power of laziness and convenience on the writer’s part, as well as well-documented psychological factors that makes us tend to surround ourselves with that which is familiar, as well as the writer’s own pool of characters that he/she will naturally draw from (friends, family, co-workers, and characters they’ve read), etcetera and so forth.
So let’s talk solutions.
The first and most obvious solution is to write best selling fantasy and sci-fi yourself that includes racial diversity. And not just racial diversity for the sake of a multi-racial book cover, but meaningful racial diversity, where the differing races and cultures actually add something to the story.
Failing that (or in addition to that), participate in genre convention panels and programs and push for forum topics such as How Racial Diversity Improves Fantasy and Sci-Fi, or McEurope: Chocolate, Strawberry AND Vanilla, Please. Spread awareness among readers, and among your current and future writers.
Post to blogs on the topic in cool places like Fantasy Magazine.
Go to the websites of authors and encourage them or dare them to include more humans of color, and not just say “do so” but give examples of how it would improve their work and their sales.
Write editorials and book reviews for newspapers, magazines, and online zines that discuss this issue.
And finally, a stealth tactic: If you are a person of color, befriend writers, share your stories, experiences, and views with them, and gift them books that feature persons of color. Again, writers write what they know. The characters they create are based on who they’ve met, who they’ve seen, and who they’ve read about. So give them some fresh material.
Oh yeah, and of course, purchase and spread the word on books that do include racial diversity, to demonstrate the monetary reasons to publish such works.
And to loop this all around, encourage your local library to carry such works
JT,
Thanks for your reply.
You’re right in pointing out that librarians, buyers for the big chain stores, publishers, etc., must be driven by commercial considerations. I agree. That’s why my suggestions were not aimed at the “gatekeeper” level, but instead at the consumer. This is not a change that can be driven from the top down, IMO. Frankly, top-down approaches are probably doomed to failure at this point because the top — power, money — is where racism comes from; any solutions proposed by the very same people who benefit from the system are likely to be regarded as suspect (at least by PoC). So the gatekeepers can do as you’ve done, and ask questions, and maybe raise awareness. But ultimately the only people who can create a more inclusive SF are the SF fans.
And they are changing. There are many, many more writers of color in the genre these days, myself included. This is because, IMO, the genre can now support a larger population of us. This is a good sign. I know there are many more PoC readers; I’ve watched participation in this genre by PoC grow by leaps and bounds over the course of my life (a measly 35 years). There are also a lot more white readers who are aware of these issues, and offended by the bias, and demanding change. I’ve seen an increasing amount of attention paid to the issue of inclusion in print and online venues, and to the issue of good inclusion versus harmful inclusion (e.g., via allegorical aliens/elves, tokenism, stereotypes, etc.). Movements like IBARW are, IMO, doing a great deal to change minds and send the message — from the consumer level up — that there are a lot of us out here who want variety.
But it will take time, and it will be hard. Which is why I said, in my “what I’m going to do about it” statement, that I would keep doing this over and over until I die. Persistence pays, whether in writing or in combatting racism. You simply have to push, and push, and keep pushing. And then push some more.
Nora:
We did not depict humanity having become unisex (I saw that done in the seventies, and wasn’t convinced it would work) but we did do genmods of all kinds, plus variations in relationships, etc.
For example, how much would be added to the Arthurian legend by making Lancelot black? Well, if your purpose was to tell the Arthurian legend, then not much would be added, really, and the decision comes off as arbitrary.
But if you wanted to devote a portion of your story (or the entire story) to the ways in which Lancelot’s differing race or ethnicity affected his relationship and status with the other knights, and with Guenevere, and how it complicated his rise to his position as Arthur’s best knight, then it might make sense, and can reflect the issues of race in our own society.
And if you resort to either technique, I’m going to throw your book against the wall. Hard.
And then I will shriek, “Doesn’t this twit realize that the US does not cover all of space and time?” Loudly.
If you want to talk about people of color, what on earth is wrong with the Saracens you can find in Arthurian romances and many other medieval romances? You might even be able to swing making some of them black.
Well, what is wrong besides the obvious problem that they didn’t suffer from racial discrimination. There were issues with religious differences. And sometimes there were class issues. But then, frequently the romances settled the first one with a baptism and didn’t allow the second to arise, and then you can see that there really were no racial issues.
Of course, that would not be a good allegory of US racial relations. On the other hand, it would demonstrate that the US does not cover all of space and time. I think the second lesson is rather more needed.
Changing a character’s skin color just to make your fantasy world racially balanced doesn’t really add much to the story in and of itself, and it is the story that people buy the book for.
Speaking of all of space and time. . . .
You don’t have to change their skin color. Change their hair color. Change their nose. Change their height. And then show that the characters use different racial distinctions than we do.
Bear in mind that judges in the US have in the past refused to naturalize Irish because the Irish do not qualify as white.
The failure to depict the actual diversity that existed in medieval Europe, and fantasies based on medieval Europe, is one of the great flaws of fantasy,
You know, I find it rather odd that no one has questioned the assumption that Europe is the proper setting of fantasy.
Why aren’t there more monolithically racial fantasies, set in Africa? Or the Americas? Or Asia?
wow. It’s funny how we all try to say the same thing, express the same feelings, yet get nitpicked for doing so. As with any example, I could have used a different one. I could have said what if Lancelot were Jewish. Rather than skin color I could have said different hair color.All true. Bit if I include every variation and possibility my posts would be even longer than they already are. And who would want that?
Sherwood,
We did not depict humanity having become unisex (I saw that done in the seventies, and wasn’t convinced it would work) but we did do genmods of all kinds, plus variations in relationships, etc.
Oh, that’s a shame. I loved Storm Constantine’s Wraeththu novels, which I think handled the hermaphroditism idea well; was hoping to see more of it.
Backing up (meant to address this earlier and forgot)… I’ve always been wary of the SFnal idea that all races will blend into a uniform beige in the future, mostly because the writers who do this so often perceive race itself or human variation as the cause of racism, rather than behavior or morality. So they wipe out the variation without addressing the behavior, and what is probably intended as a utopian ideal ends up sounding instead like a statement against diversity. The writers rarely intend for the “unirace” idea to be read this way, but given the historical context of racism, I’m not sure there’s any other way for it to be read.
But I don’t know. Maybe it’s possible to do the uniracial thing without simultaneously making it a statement against diversity. Maybe your books even did this. I’ve seen the unirace thing done before in a lot of SF, particularly SF of the Sixties and Seventies, and it never reads well to me. I’m open to the idea, though. (Maybe I’ll try it myself. Though it’s likely to be a very dark and unpleasant story, and I’m not sure I feel like writing that right now.)
Mary,
I’m not sure it scans that racial discrimination did not exist in Arthurian “times”. Given the human tendency to react badly to those who are “different” in whatever way, I think that if Lancelot were visibly of some different ethnicity — not necessarily a different color, but maybe from a culture that dressed differently, had different eating habits, a different language, whatever — then I think it would’ve made an impact on the story. (Maybe Arthur wouldn’t've been so quick to let this guy near his wife, for one thing =P)
But I agree with you; racial variations existed in those times, and can and should be depicted — though how those variations are treated would of course differ from modern color-centric racism.
As for fantasies set in non-European cultures — they do exist. I’ve seen quite a few of them reviewed and recommended in the articles right here at Fantasy. Not all of them are monoracial, though.
Apparently I did not express myself with sufficient vigor.
Any story idea that is intrinsically dependant on the notion that the US covers all of space and time is rotten to the core.
And making Lancelot Jewish is intrinsically dependant on that notion. Albeit for slightly different reasons that making him black.
To clarify: religiously Jewish.
Ethnically Jewish might work. Provided, of course, the writer considered it carefully in light of how the Arthurian legends treated Christian Saracens, and did not just assume that he can project his own time into them.
Excellent post. Most of the relevant comments have been made already so I’ll just briefly state my point: My intention in my article was not to revolutionize American SFF, it was to point that American SFF is already irrelevant. It’s quite evident that the genre has been superceded and abrogated by so-called ‘mainstream’ SFF which is indeed multicultural, or other-cultural, and international, and such books are outselling genre-labelled SFF in the USA. That’s where the future lies–for writers of colour to ignore genre and genre publishers and to simply write great fiction. In a sense, even publishers have started to realize this, as you can see with authors like Nalo Hopkinson, who herself proudly embraces the label of SF, being published as general fiction by her publishers. Or Neil Gaiman, Michael Chabon, Audrey Niffeneger, Margaret Atwood, Salman Rushdie…it’s a long list and growing daily.
SFF in America has always been ghettoized by the critics. It’s now being ghettoized by its own practitioners. To insist that SFF is the only genre label worth claiming is itself parochial and limiting. Readers are finding good fiction with speculative elements wherever they can, and there are many more such readers today with buying power than readers who want typical whitebread conquest-fantasy SF.
Thank you also for addressing my observations and article rather than attacking me personally. I’ve received some three dozen-odd attacks online in the wake of my article, all of them from people clearly attached to the SFF field in the USA. Almost all of them, with two exceptions, were content to dismiss me out of hand either because (a)I’m not American and therefore, must be ignorant of what’s happening in America; (b)I didn’t agree 100% with their own views, and that of course is a crime unforgivable in their eyes; (c)I’m not white, Christian, educated, etc.
The most endearing one simply called me “asshole” and “brown nigger” and I wear those badges proudly now. Five of those name-callers are in the commentators above this comment. All of them are either known bloggers or editors/authors in the field. All of them, without exception, were hugely angry with me for expressing my opinion. None of them even attempted to intelligently look at my concerns or consider the points I’d raised. Two of them apologized after the fact, but insisted that I had better not speak out on issues “not concerning” me. I think the “or else” was implied.
I think that’s a pretty fair example of bias, racism, and cultural insensitivity in SFF in America, and the reason why the genre is falling out of favour with mainstream media, readers, critics, booksellers, etc, around the world.
And for what it’s worth, I’m still a fan–of great SF. And will remain one forever.
Ashok
This is Ashok Banker here, and the comment above is also by me, “brown dog”.
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My point in mentioning these things is that the divisions in American SFF are not merely along lines of race and colour bias, or sexism, they’re also along cultural divides. Many SFF practioners, or wannabe practitioners in the USA, mistakenly believe that an US v/s Them attitude is the only way to go. Another SFF author insulted me on his blog when I commented, called me names, then apologized via email later, but deleted all my comments and refused to allow me to comment again.
I think I’m tending towards calling SFF in America fascist as well now, after these experiences. I’m actually surprised and pleased that this site at least encourages and permits open discussion. To shut me out simply because I’m not American or you don’t like my views is in itself an admission of bias, people! You prove my argument by indulging in such petty tactics. Be more mature than that, and look beyond the superficial differences to the real issues we’re discussing here.
Thanks again for allowing me to speak my piece. And for reading this far.
And I still think American SFF rocks!
Best regards,
Ashok Banker
It’s quite evident that the genre has been superceded and abrogated by so-called ‘mainstream’ SFF which is indeed multicultural, or other-cultural, and international, and such books are outselling genre-labelled SFF in the USA.
Please be more specific here.