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Post by davidvandyke on Sept 8, 2018 18:19:37 GMT
I know a lot of writers are concerned about the concept of "appropriation," whether racial, cultural, ethnic, whatever--basically, I would lump it all into "identity appropriation." Is it even a thing? What are the "rules"? How do we judge what to do? I find Steven Barnes (award-winning sci-fi writer and "lifewriting" guru) to be very clear-thinking and fairminded whenever discussing hot-button topics like this. He cuts through a lot of the emotional baggage and lays out the issues in a way most people can understand and often agree with. One of his recent blog posts struck me as the best explanation of the issue of "appropriation" in writing I'd ever read. Note that Barnes is biracial, though society today tends to label him "black" or "African-American." In this post, he uses the example of BLM, and I hope we don't go off on a high-disagreement tangent about BLM--let's stick to the applications to writing and how we approach it, please. stevenbarneslife.wordpress.com/2018/09/05/diversity-and-appropriation/ |
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DD
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Post by DD on Sept 8, 2018 20:31:23 GMT
Can you explain what he means by this:
"But…I’ve seen situations where actual members of a group were excluded, while the excluders play games with the symbols and rituals and art forms of the excluded."
And maybe give an example of what that looks like outside of a sociology textbook?
I'll be honest, I don't really believe in cultural appropriation. Or gender appropriation. Or any of the other stuff people howl about. I believe people shouldn't pretend to be something they are not for financial/social benefit, like pretending to be a woman to get female readers to share things they might not otherwise share if they knew they were really talking to a man, or pretending to be be African-American or Muslim-American to sucker those communities into providing support they might not give otherwise, or pretending to have cancer to drive pity purchases, or lying about being the child of a Veteran to get a scholarship, but that is about it. But then, I'm not much into victimology.
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Post by K'Sennia Visitor on Sept 8, 2018 21:13:40 GMT
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DD
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Post by DD on Sept 8, 2018 22:00:38 GMT
None of those helped. See, nobody who "appropriated" any of those things claimed to have invented or created it, or that it was part of their heritage. They just wore it. Other idiots may have claimed it was new or edgy, but it doesn't look like Katy Perry, the Jenner girl, or Miley said any such thing. And they aren't getting rich off having corn-rows and dreads; they're getting rich off being famous. They'll get just as rich if they shave their heads bald and hot-glue cotton swabs all over their backsides. (If that becomes the next popular thing, you heard it here first)
And I find this very telling:
"black women globally are subjected to European standards of beauty, and assimilation has been the mode of surviving and thriving in white-dominated spaces. The former argument, on its face, appears harmless. But in truth, it ignores the racial dynamics at work where black women are not only discredited or overlooked for wearing black/African hairdos, they are sometimes even deemed unprofessional and “ugly,” from the workplace to the social culture, whereas these hairstyles become “normalized” and even fashionable when white spaces and white people “borrow” them. This is power. This is cultural appropriation."
But then:
"In Allure’s August issue, it presumably instructed white women on how to achieve an afro, and used a white model for the feature image. Considering how significant the afro has been to black people’s identity and political history, it doesn’t seen like Allure put much thought into how offensive this could come off."
So do they want ethnic hair to be considered the epitome of style and beauty or not? Because that happens when the rich trend-setters, of any ethnic persuasion, make it hip. Keep slamming the people who can make it popular enough to be considered mainstream, fashionable, and professionally appropriate, and "European" beauty standards will always be the norm because that's all the movers and shakers are allowed to wear.
Goldfish grow to fit whatever container houses them. Confine them to a small tank, and they will always be small. Put them in a bigger tank, and they grow to fit that one. Let them swim free, and...well, look out, because there are some pretty damn big goldfish swimming around in ponds and lakes out there. Read enough history and you'll see culture works exactly the same way.
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Post by K'Sennia Visitor on Sept 8, 2018 23:50:47 GMT
None of those helped. See, nobody who "appropriated" any of those things claimed to have invented or created it, or that it was part of their heritage. They just wore it. Other idiots may have claimed it was new or edgy, but it doesn't look like Katy Perry, the Jenner girl, or Miley said any such thing. And they aren't getting rich off having corn-rows and dreads; they're getting rich off being famous. They'll get just as rich if they shave their heads bald and hot-glue cotton swabs all over their backsides. (If that becomes the next popular thing, you heard it here first) And I find this very telling: "black women globally are subjected to European standards of beauty, and assimilation has been the mode of surviving and thriving in white-dominated spaces. The former argument, on its face, appears harmless. But in truth, it ignores the racial dynamics at work where black women are not only discredited or overlooked for wearing black/African hairdos, they are sometimes even deemed unprofessional and “ugly,” from the workplace to the social culture, whereas these hairstyles become “normalized” and even fashionable when white spaces and white people “borrow” them. This is power. This is cultural appropriation." But then: "In Allure’s August issue, it presumably instructed white women on how to achieve an afro, and used a white model for the feature image. Considering how significant the afro has been to black people’s identity and political history, it doesn’t seen like Allure put much thought into how offensive this could come off." So do they want ethnic hair to be considered the epitome of style and beauty or not? Because that happens when the rich trend-setters, of any ethnic persuasion, make it hip. Keep slamming the people who can make it popular enough to be considered mainstream, fashionable, and professionally appropriate, and "European" beauty standards will always be the norm because that's all the movers and shakers are allowed to wear. Goldfish grow to fit whatever container houses them. Confine them to a small tank, and they will always be small. Put them in a bigger tank, and they grow to fit that one. Let them swim free, and...well, look out, because there are some pretty damn big goldfish swimming around in ponds and lakes out there. Read enough history and you'll see culture works exactly the same way. What if you created something. Something super cool. You were proud of it and loved it. But no one else did. People made fun of you for making it. Said it was stupid. You were stupid. While others just totally ignored you. Then say someone else came along, saw your thing, started using it, and all of a sudden everyone is saying, 'wow, that person is so cool. And their thing is so cool, too. They just do truly wonderful things with their thing." Wouldn't that at the very least annoy you? And then if you tried telling people, "hey, I made that thing! That thing is mine!" And people just blew you off, rolled their eyes. Said, "yeah, okay, whatever. But did you see how amazing that color looks on the other person? She's a goddess, and she's sooo smart." Would you start to get frustrated that no one cared about you or that you created the thing that everyone now has to have? Even if people know that the other person didn't create it. No one cares. They still get all the glory. The thing is connected to that person forever. And you never see a dime of royalties, or get a word of gratitude or appreciation? And then what if this same thing happened to you and your family all the time? What if it had been going on for hundreds of years? What if this other person's family had been stealing from your family for the past two hundred years, and you had to scream and shout and fight really, really hard just to get anyone to acknowledge this injustice? This isn't a perfect analogy, but I hope it's somewhat close. To me, I think you have to consider the history behind how many minority populations have been taken from and never or rarely received any credit/reward, plus, the frustration of no one caring until the dominant group does it. Why should the dominant group have to see a value in something before value is granted to things that you and your family/culture have valued for generations? I can imagine that it would feel really lousy to have things like that happen to you and your culture/family over and over again. If the dominant culture treasuring something allowed the minority to also profit and to then go out and make even more money/fame by expressing authentically, then it wouldn't be as big of a deal. It would still be annoying to be reliant on another culture to approve of and say you're cool though. No one should need that. And no one wants that. I don't know if this made any sense or not.  But I tried. |
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DD
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Post by DD on Sept 9, 2018 0:55:48 GMT
None of those helped. See, nobody who "appropriated" any of those things claimed to have invented or created it, or that it was part of their heritage. They just wore it. Other idiots may have claimed it was new or edgy, but it doesn't look like Katy Perry, the Jenner girl, or Miley said any such thing. And they aren't getting rich off having corn-rows and dreads; they're getting rich off being famous. They'll get just as rich if they shave their heads bald and hot-glue cotton swabs all over their backsides. (If that becomes the next popular thing, you heard it here first) And I find this very telling: "black women globally are subjected to European standards of beauty, and assimilation has been the mode of surviving and thriving in white-dominated spaces. The former argument, on its face, appears harmless. But in truth, it ignores the racial dynamics at work where black women are not only discredited or overlooked for wearing black/African hairdos, they are sometimes even deemed unprofessional and “ugly,” from the workplace to the social culture, whereas these hairstyles become “normalized” and even fashionable when white spaces and white people “borrow” them. This is power. This is cultural appropriation." But then: "In Allure’s August issue, it presumably instructed white women on how to achieve an afro, and used a white model for the feature image. Considering how significant the afro has been to black people’s identity and political history, it doesn’t seen like Allure put much thought into how offensive this could come off." So do they want ethnic hair to be considered the epitome of style and beauty or not? Because that happens when the rich trend-setters, of any ethnic persuasion, make it hip. Keep slamming the people who can make it popular enough to be considered mainstream, fashionable, and professionally appropriate, and "European" beauty standards will always be the norm because that's all the movers and shakers are allowed to wear. Goldfish grow to fit whatever container houses them. Confine them to a small tank, and they will always be small. Put them in a bigger tank, and they grow to fit that one. Let them swim free, and...well, look out, because there are some pretty damn big goldfish swimming around in ponds and lakes out there. Read enough history and you'll see culture works exactly the same way. What if you created something. Something super cool. You were proud of it and loved it. But no one else did. People made fun of you for making it. Said it was stupid. You were stupid. While others just totally ignored you. Then say someone else came along, saw your thing, started using it, and all of a sudden everyone is saying, 'wow, that person is so cool. And their thing is so cool, too. They just do truly wonderful things with their thing." Wouldn't that at the very least annoy you? And then if you tried telling people, "hey, I made that thing! That thing is mine!" And people just blew you off, rolled their eyes. Said, "yeah, okay, whatever. But did you see how amazing that color looks on the other person? She's a goddess, and she's sooo smart." Would you start to get frustrated that no one cared about you or that you created the thing that everyone now has to have? Even if people know that the other person didn't create it. No one cares. They still get all the glory. The thing is connected to that person forever. And you never see a dime of royalties, or get a word of gratitude or appreciation? And then what if this same thing happened to you and your family all the time? What if it had been going on for hundreds of years? What if this other person's family had been stealing from your family for the past two hundred years, and you had to scream and shout and fight really, really hard just to get anyone to acknowledge this injustice? This isn't a perfect analogy, but I hope it's somewhat close. To me, I think you have to consider the history behind how many minority populations have been taken from and never or rarely received any credit/reward, plus, the frustration of no one caring until the dominant group does it. Why should the dominant group have to see a value in something before value is granted to things that you and your family/culture have valued for generations? I can imagine that it would feel really lousy to have things like that happen to you and your culture/family over and over again. If the dominant culture treasuring something allowed the minority to also profit and to then go out and make even more money/fame by expressing authentically, then it wouldn't be as big of a deal. It would still be annoying to be reliant on another culture to approve of and say you're cool though. No one should need that. And no one wants that. I don't know if this made any sense or not. But I tried. Sure, but...there's no way to know who created anything more than a couple hundred years back at the very best. Anyone who keeps up with cultural anthropology knows that there are lots of things that arose in geographically isolated areas around the globe at approximately the same time. Artwork that looks strikingly similar. Geometric designs that are used in textiles, and they developed on opposite sides of the globe around the same time. Clothing styles. Hair styles. Weapon styles. Tools like the potters wheel. For example, there are a number of things that are thought of as being Chinese, but they actually came from the Mongols. Today we think of Mongols as being East Asian, but they were originally white Caucasians. So some Chinese things are actually "white" if you go back far enough. Populations are like a tide, always washing forward and pulling back, leaving bits of flotsam and jetsam. There's no real way to know where a lot of flotsam and jetsom originated before a certain cultural group took it and made it popular or useful. I'm sort of mixed ethnically, but one branch of my family tree comes from the ethnic group that "invented" fried chicken - the Scots. But I'll be you don't think of Scotland or the Scottish when you think of fried chicken, because it is such an awesome discovery that EVERYBODY does fried chicken now. In fact, fried chicken is usually associated with Southern African-American culture, but I'm not complaining, because as long as everybody keeps making fried chicken, I'm one happy camper. I don't even care if they are making a profit off of it. I found the whole thing about Afros and cornrows very odd, to be honest; did no one live back in the 70's? We all had perms teased up to be Afros. Even Bob Ross. Cornrows were a thing back then, too, and also in the 80's. It was not at all uncommon to see them in an office or other professional setting. The Native American look also, with braids and/or headbands. We were celebrating everybody; brotherhood and equality. I guess I just can't see who is losing out. Is somebody not getting paid when Katy Perry wears a certain hairstyle? Is she violating a trademark? Is someone losing work? Did she claim she owned the hairstyle and nobody else could wear it? Did 10,000 Chinese dressmakers go out of business when that girl wore a traditional Chinese dress to her high school prom? |
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Post by K'Sennia Visitor on Sept 9, 2018 1:27:02 GMT
Sure, but...there's no way to know who created anything more than a couple hundred years back at the very best. Anyone who keeps up with cultural anthropology knows that there are lots of things that arose in geographically isolated areas around the globe at approximately the same time. Artwork that looks strikingly similar. Geometric designs that are used in textiles, and they developed on opposite sides of the globe around the same time. Clothing styles. Hair styles. Weapon styles. Tools like the potters wheel. For example, there are a number of things that are thought of as being Chinese, but they actually came from the Mongols. Today we think of Mongols as being East Asian, but they were originally white Caucasians. So some Chinese things are actually "white" if you go back far enough. Populations are like a tide, always washing forward and pulling back, leaving bits of flotsam and jetsam. There's no real way to know where a lot of flotsam and jetsom originated before a certain cultural group took it and made it popular or useful. I'm sort of mixed ethnically, but one branch of my family tree comes from the ethnic group that "invented" fried chicken - the Scots. But I'll be you don't think of Scotland or the Scottish when you think of fried chicken, because it is such an awesome discovery that EVERYBODY does fried chicken now. In fact, fried chicken is usually associated with Southern African-American culture, but I'm not complaining, because as long as everybody keeps making fried chicken, I'm one happy camper. I don't even care if they are making a profit off of it. I found the whole thing about Afros and cornrows very odd, to be honest; did no one live back in the 70's? We all had perms teased up to be Afros. Even Bob Ross. Cornrows were a thing back then, too, and also in the 80's. It was not at all uncommon to see them in an office or other professional setting. The Native American look also, with braids and/or headbands. We were celebrating everybody; brotherhood and equality. I guess I just can't see who is losing out. Is somebody not getting paid when Katy Perry wears a certain hairstyle? Is she violating a trademark? Is someone losing work? Did she claim she owned the hairstyle and nobody else could wear it? Did 10,000 Chinese dressmakers go out of business when that girl wore a traditional Chinese dress to her high school prom? Cool. I did not know that about the Scottish inventing Fried Chicken, that's fun. And I know very little about the Mongols. Did you know that the Banjo came from Africa? I just learned that a couple months ago, and thought that was cool, too. I think you ask good questions and make good points. I don't really know the answers. (shakes head) I just try to read and learn as much as I can, and hope that my viewpoints grow healthily as I grow. That's why I love message boards so much. People are always teaching me new things and helping me learn to view the world through different perspectives! My great, great grandmother was native american. Sioux, I think. My mom has some Jewish blood from her ancestors. She only found out recently because at some point her family converted to Christianity, probably to escape persecution/concentration camps, and then they had to escape Russia under Stalin when my mom's mom was 3 years old. They went to Mexico and lived there until she was 7, before coming to the USA. On my dad's side of the family is Norwegian, German, Polish, and Irish. I was excited to see an O'Connel in my paternal grandmother's family tree cos I love fairies and stuff, so being Irish is just nifty. |
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DD
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Post by DD on Sept 9, 2018 2:38:35 GMT
You sound like a melting pot like me.  I'm glad your folks got out of Russia, because man, Stalin was straight up crazy evil. Have you ever heard of Melungeons or Black Dutch? They are clever terms for mixed-race clans. Basically, they are a mixture of Scots/Irish indentured servants, free blacks or escaped slaves, and Native Americans. The families knew who was who, and they tended to intermarry amongst the different mixed families and sort of look out for one another. There are some DNA projects going, and it seems the Melungeons tend to be more of African descent than Native American, while the Black Dutch tend to be more Native than African. I always grew up hearing my great-grandmother called Black Dutch, but had no clue what it was. It wasn't until I went to college and started researching Appalachian history that I discovered what the terms meant. It's pretty fascinating to read how they managed to get around all the laws and restrictions that would have prevented them from marrying, owning property, going to church, being buried in a church cemetery, entering certain businesses, etc. |
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Post by K'Sennia Visitor on Sept 9, 2018 2:48:17 GMT
You sound like a melting pot like me. I'm glad your folks got out of Russia, because man, Stalin was straight up crazy evil. Have you ever heard of Melungeons or Black Dutch? They are clever terms for mixed-race clans. Basically, they are a mixture of Scots/Irish indentured servants, free blacks or escaped slaves, and Native Americans. The families knew who was who, and they tended to intermarry amongst the different mixed families and sort of look out for one another. There are some DNA projects going, and it seems the Melungeons tend to be more of African descent than Native American, while the Black Dutch tend to be more Native than African. I always grew up hearing my great-grandmother called Black Dutch, but had no clue what it was. It wasn't until I went to college and started researching Appalachian history that I discovered what the terms meant. It's pretty fascinating to read how they managed to get around all the laws and restrictions that would have prevented them from marrying, owning property, going to church, being buried in a church cemetery, entering certain businesses, etc. Ooh, new people to learn about. Schweet! I was not familiar with either of those groups. Fascinating! And yep, I'm a melting pot, all right! Rhiannon, my paranormal character, is half Irish and half Jamaican. I think Jamaica is a super interesting place. One of those that sort of turns the whole "who were the victims?" argument on it's head a bit. What with all of the Irish slaves. I was watching Jamaican news broadcasts and it was fun because while everyone shown was dark of skin, they all had English/Irish/Scottish sounding names. And here is a video with a Jamaican man and an Irish man making joyful music together. The Irish dude has dreads, that he prolly wasn't born with, but who knows, he could have been? We don't know who is in his family tree. Anywho both guys are just friends having a great time. I love when cultures mix and collide. They make beautiful things together. It just sucks that so often they're forced together in unhappy situations, like slavery, conquest, and war. |
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Post by K'Sennia Visitor on Sept 9, 2018 6:08:38 GMT
I've heard that Jamaica has the highest murder rate in the world and that it's illegal to be gay, so if those things are true then they would be excellent reasons for Rhiannon to have been raised in the US or in Ireland.
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Post by gaylordfancypants on Sept 9, 2018 16:15:18 GMT
When it comes to this kind of stuff, I think about what would happen if everyone agreed on this point. What if nobody ever "appropriated" anything? What would that look like? Presumably, just to name one example, only black people would include elements of black culture in their fiction. Would that be regarded as a good thing?
No, obviously not. It would be called otherizing, it would be seen as offensive. Quite rightly -- it would be highly offensive.
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Post by prolificwriter on Sept 9, 2018 16:54:44 GMT
I find it amusing that he ended that post with Namaste.  |
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2018 1:15:30 GMT
So I took a DNA test last year, and discovered that I'm 51% Scandanavian. Which is interesting, because most of my ancestors came over from the British Isles. Turns out most of them were descended from the Viking invaders during the Danelaw. Basically, the bad guys from Netflix's The Last Kingdom. The Vikings were experts at cultural appropriation. In fact, you could say that cultural appropriation was their culture. And since I'm a descendant of Vikings, it's my culture too. So don't appropriate it, dammit! |
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But I tried. 
I'm glad your folks got out of Russia, because man, Stalin was straight up crazy evil. Have you ever heard of 
