Diversity in Fiction.

[misslj_author]

I've been thinking about this for a while but it came to a head today after a discussion with jerusalemorbust last night and a discussion between meredith_shayne and myself this morning. (Both of whom I hope will comment here. :D) The subject being multiculturalism and interracial relationships in novels and characters that are in some way disabled and characters that are over the age of 25. (Warning: this post does contain a bit of self-absorbed hyperbole alas.)



It's been on my mind so much, personally, because in writing my Archangels novel, I am very aware that choosing to have each of the ten Archangels be a particular race, I am putting myself out there to be potentially inflammatory and/or offensive. It's on my mind that I could be called a racist or accused of cultural appropriation. Not to mention the religion thing, but I'm choosing to ignore it for the simple reason that I ignore it in the book. They're Archangels, they have a job to do, there's no praying or reading of scripture or anything like that. They just happen to be made by God – and God means different things to different people – there's no pontificating about any religion because that's just not what I want to write about.

So, I have white, Maori, Indian (from India), Chinese, black, Russian, Columbian and Cambodian characters. I've asked a few people about describing these characters because I want it to be very clear that they are not the default of white, male, mid-twenties, because they can switch gender as they choose, they aren't all white, and, as Archangels, older than time itself, they really aren't in their mid-twenties. My main concern is stereotyping: I don't want to describe them too much but I don't want to scrimp on it, either.

They are, in their natural state, creatures of light and energy. They take human shapes so as to do their duties and interact with humanity and also, the pesky side effect of their natural state tends to blind and melt the brains of humans. So it's a protection for human eyes as well as a means towards interaction without too many problems. Of course, there are problems, because otherwise there would be no story, but that's not what I'm going to talk about here.

I don't want to do PoC a disservice or show disrespect in how I write these characters. They're all likable characters, they all have flaws. (She says with great modesty!) I don't want the colour of their skin or the race their chosen forms are to be a deciding factor in whether or not they're likable. In short, I am genuinely terrified of being disrespectful.



Then there's able bodied versus not so able bodied. I'm working on a sequel to City of Gold right now, and my two main characters are older men, one of them has less mobility than his partner. This is due to a war injury and because of it, his hip and knee play up. Now, that sounds all fine and probably, to someone who doesn't suffer this sort of pain and the debilitation that goes with it as it gets worse, nothing worth mentioning.

I want to say right here and now, that's bullshit. Chronic pain is, to be blunt, a bitch. I know; I live with it. Every. Single. Day. The pain and frustration my character suffers is familiar to me, because I deal with this myself. The atrophy of muscles, the irreparable damage to cartilage and nerves makes mobility difficult, makes joints sometimes unusable. This is hard for me to articulate here, actually – it's easier for me to do in fiction because I can separate myself from it, in a way.

The character doesn't talk about it unless asked directly and unless it's someone he knows very well, he'll just say it's a war wound and change the subject. (Setting is the Byzantine Empire, the year 1131AD.) Why doesn't he talk about it? Because he's ashamed.

I know what that feels like too. My own situation makes me ashamed to say the words, "I'm disabled." I hate that I feel shame when I say this, but the reaction to these two little words is either pity – and I don't want pity – or disgust. Neither reflect the reality of my life, but there we go. Now, I, like my character, don't want to go into the nitty gritty of it, but it wasn't a war wound for me. It is what it is, I live with it daily and I don't particularly like explaining it – even to medical professionals because there's always that lingering shame of it and that whatever I say will be met with pity and/or disgust.

And it is, each and every time. Even in, I'm afraid to say, some of my friends. I know they don't mean it, and I know it's not conscious. I know that the pity they exhibit is genuine compassion and they wish they could help or something, but... having this, living with this does not mean I need to be treated as any less a person. So yeah, it's a bugbear and I can completely understand why authors would feel concerned that they might give offence when writing a character with a disability that they themselves don't have or have direct experience with (i.e., caring for a relative, working in support for that disability, etc.).

Which brings me to my point, in a long winded way – how do we, as writers, approach these topics that we, personally, may not have experience with, without giving offence to readers who do ?


People are people and love is love. Age, race, religion, disability, sex – none of this should matter. Unfortunately, because of societal conditioning, it does. And that's terrible.

Comments

[jerusalemorbust.livejournal.com]

I think I'm more intimidated to write injured or disabled characters than I am to write different nationalities, creeds, or cultures. At least those are mostly consistent, or I can research them to a point and they stay somewhat uniform. Injuries, on the other hand, are hard and no one heals the same. I can go to three different doctors and get three different opinions, so I can try my best and still be so off base about an injury that it probably deserves mocking on the net.

I still attempt to write characters like that, but there's more fear that I got something wrong.

[meredith-shayne.livejournal.com]

living with this does not mean I need to be treated as any less a person

This is the crux of it for me, because the simple fact is that our society sees people with a disability as lesser, and this bleeds into any portrayal we see in the media. I don't think the writers of these characters are even aware they're doing it for the most part, because the attitude is so ingrained. I have yet to see anything with a disabled character where it's not implied that they need to be fixed in some way. And of course you get the stereotypes: the poor, brave disabled person who overcomes such terrible obstacles and yet can still manage to smile, such a sweet girl (excuse me while I vomit), and the bitter and twisted disabled person who hates the world and everyone in it. My other issue is one of emphasis, although this can vary depending on a person's situation, since I acknowledge the fact that a person who becomes disabled later in life will be in a different mental position than someone who is born with a disability; generally, I feel that there is too much emphasis placed on the disability, with whatever it is consuming the person's whole life and their every waking thought, which of course it doesn't. But I think that an able-bodied person just can't imagine that it wouldn't consume your every waking moment, and so these are the pictures with which we get presented. It's very annoying.

But yes. In sum: my issues, let me show you them. :)

As for how we do it without offending people, first of all I think you have to accept that there will always be someone who doesn't like what you've done, and you need to be prepared to listen to that person if they tell you why they don't like it. Apart from that I think to write about these topics takes a huge amount of sensitivity, awareness (of self as well as in general), tact and openness.

[angharad-gam.livejournal.com]

I think you seem to have a firm grasp on the main idea - that everyone is human whatever else is going on. And I suspect if you write your characters that way you will get little complaint. I think it's the stereotypes that cause most offence - you know, the noble savage, the well-hung black man, and so on.

I would only note that there's more variation in Indians (from India) than most people think, and that Russians probably count as Europeans, unless you're thinking of Siberians, or people from the Central Asian republics like Kazakhs etc. If you want to be truly representative you might swap the Russian for someone from Central Asia or the Middle East. And there's probably one remaining major human 'racial' group you're missing and that's Melanesians (eg people from PNG).

As for the disability thing, same goes. There are those who say 'write what you know' but that doesn't help much in speculative or historic fiction :-). So we can only try to educate ourselves and avoid the stereotypes.

Have you read much by Lois McMaster Bujold? She has major characters with disabilities and with late life romances, and speaking as a relatively able and youthful person there were no major dissonances to me.

[xakara.livejournal.com]

I know this is two weeks old but as I stumbled on it today I wanted to add to it.

As a PoC, I think the first and last thing in your mind when you write a character of a different culture, ethnicity, religion, gender or ableness, is the question "but why". Every time you have a character whose experience you don't understand first hand do somethin, ask yourself why? If the answer is it's what you would do, or what your beta reader said was realistic, or what you gather from direct observation, then go with it and put it in front of as many betas as you can before you send it out into the world. If your answer is "well because that's what those people do", then stop, assess your own bias and start again.

There are some things that are always going to be "wrong" when it comes to writing another tribe of people. Cultural differences don't require a skin color and it's really the success or failure of capturing a culture that will garner praise or cause offense. In my Therian World and my Angelic Prophecies series that kicks off next year, my shifter and angels cover the spectrum of coloring and ethnicity, but their cultures are Therian and Celestial respectively. Each are knowledgeable in the human equivalent culture but their motivations and behaviors are of their preternatural culture and they act accordingly.

Your Archangels should be no different. The color of their skin, the texture of their hair and the shape of their eyes has nothing to do with the Angelic culture they descend from and that shapes their motivations. It's not cultural appropriation if the culture in question is an inclusive one of your own making. The point where you start making them act differently based in the human facade they wear, that's when you'll have crossed into dangerous, perhaps outright offensive territory.

Thanks for the friend add! :)

~Xakara

[xakara.livejournal.com]

I keep trying to get into twitter but I honestly forget that it's there. I've even placed it on my tool bar next to my facebook icon so that I can remember but it slips my mind all the time. I'll add you to my list of twitter addicts that might be able to drag me into it if I bug them enough. *smile*

Facebook is my homepage so it's the social media I'm addicted to. Between updates, notes, groups, chat and games, it's the most inclusive site for my time. That said, I know twitter is important on the promotion front among other things and I'll definitely work on it.

I need to get back here to LJ regularly again. I do the weekly Thursday Thirteen and have built that habit up, now I need to voyage into a second day a week until I'm producing at least three blogs a week. Hopefully that'll lead into becoming active in the LJ communities again as well.

I'm originally from Wisconsin in the midwest, right in the Great Lakes region. Now, I'm in the American southwest in New Mexico. It has beautiful mountains and desert landscape, but I'm hoping to move soon to Colorado or Washington State. I love the mountains but I miss the water and being surrounded by green, and Colorado and Washington have both. We're building our savings back up from scratch after the double layoff so I think that 2013 is the most realistic time frame for the move. I'm excited about it!

My first release, SHIFTING PASSIONS is with Samhain Publishing. GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PAST (PsiCorps #1) is out with Liquid Silver Books and DAWN'S EARLY LIGHT (PsiCorps #2) will be out in July with LSB as well. I'm hoping to place a Halloween, Christmas (PsiCorps #3) and Valentine's Day story with them in the next five months as well as an erotic urban fantasy novel. I have a steampunk I'm revising to sub to Carina Press and I'm hoping they'll pick up my Angelic Prophecies series when it's done, so keep your fingers crossed for me!

I need to get some rest, I've had a headache for the last several hours and it's gettings worse, I likely need to stop staring at the computer and rest my eyes for a bit.

Is the Archangel story the most pressing WIP you have going, or is there something shorter that will be finished next?