-Summer Cherries-
(?)Community Member
- Posted: Tue, 18 Sep 2012 20:18:07 +0000
An issue I've taken note of recently is that unless a character's race is explicitly stated or described to the point where all ambiguity is eliminated, the prevailing assumption is that s/he is White. And even then, some folks forget to take down a memo. This matter becomes particularly salient when books with racial minorities hit the big screen:
The Hunger Games: Anyone remember the embarrassing mess that went down with the casting of Rue? Many were apparently not aware that she was a black girl, and an unfortunate number of readers threw fits (that were definitely NOT racist, omg how dare you suggest that, some of my best friends are black~).
The Mortal Instruments: A movie is currently in the works, and it seems that a pivotal character, Magnus Bane, is of Asian descent. An Asian actor (Godfrey Gao) was indeed cast, again to the surprise of several readers (many of whom had dreamcast Adam Lambert, who is definitely not Asian by any stretch of the imagination). If my information is correct, this is a character who was very clearly stated to be Asian.
So, this got me wondering: how do you approach a subject matter as sensitive as this when writing? I'd imagine that if you had a character that was of a particular racial background, you would want that detail to be conveyed to the reader in a manner that is clear and evident (yet not in a repetitive, hammer-to-the-head sort of way that detracts from the story). This is especially pertinent when describing POC characters in a fantasy setting, where we can't signify what a character's real world racial/ethnic equivalent is through preexisting terms (ex. We can't refer to a character who is an analogue of an Indian person as 'Indian' in the story, because India as we know it doesn't exist in fantasy worlds).
Feel free to discuss any of what is written above! C:
The Hunger Games: Anyone remember the embarrassing mess that went down with the casting of Rue? Many were apparently not aware that she was a black girl, and an unfortunate number of readers threw fits (that were definitely NOT racist, omg how dare you suggest that, some of my best friends are black~).
The Mortal Instruments: A movie is currently in the works, and it seems that a pivotal character, Magnus Bane, is of Asian descent. An Asian actor (Godfrey Gao) was indeed cast, again to the surprise of several readers (many of whom had dreamcast Adam Lambert, who is definitely not Asian by any stretch of the imagination). If my information is correct, this is a character who was very clearly stated to be Asian.
So, this got me wondering: how do you approach a subject matter as sensitive as this when writing? I'd imagine that if you had a character that was of a particular racial background, you would want that detail to be conveyed to the reader in a manner that is clear and evident (yet not in a repetitive, hammer-to-the-head sort of way that detracts from the story). This is especially pertinent when describing POC characters in a fantasy setting, where we can't signify what a character's real world racial/ethnic equivalent is through preexisting terms (ex. We can't refer to a character who is an analogue of an Indian person as 'Indian' in the story, because India as we know it doesn't exist in fantasy worlds).
Feel free to discuss any of what is written above! C: