Diversity in Literature & Media (WAS book differences)

[cindysphynx]

No: HPFGUIDX 40511

Bernadette wrote:

> Then I think that you are seeing a different issue here than I am
> seeing.  I'm not seeing it as a bunch of people saying "How dare
> you make a character black," but rather as "How dare you make
> changes from the original text just to appease a particular group
> of people."


Actually, I feel fairly confident that we are discussing the same 
issue, but that we simply disagree.

OK, let me go at this a bit differently.  Let's put Dean Thomas 
aside for just a minute and go with a hypothetical.  Let's say that 
in the original PS, all students are able-bodied.  The sorting of 
Hanah Abbott is in the original text as follows:

"A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on 
the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down."

Let's then say that some publicist decides the book is not 
sufficiently inclusive because there are no children using 
wheelchairs, and the publicist doesn't want to receive a bunch of 
letters complaining about this.  The text in SS is re-written as 
follows:

"A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails rolled her wheelchair out of 
line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes."

I suspect that members of this list would notice this clumsy change, 
because we notice *everything.*  But I doubt anyone would resent it 
or suggest that this is an example of the disabled lobby throwing 
their weight around, that it is tokenism, that the author's intent 
has been corrupted, that American literature and media are no good 
because of this sort of thing, that it is annoying, that it is 
toadying, that it is pushy, that it is reverse discrimination.  
Perhaps some people *would* say exactly that, but I personally 
wouldn't bat an eye at this change.  Maybe I'm wrong there and there 
*would* be a chorus of outrage that an able-bodied character was 
made to be disabled, but it's not a complaint I hear very often in 
other contexts.

Similarly, if we imagine that the British version contained no 
mention of Dean Thomas' height, but the American version described 
him as "tall," no one would care.  That suggests to me that perhaps 
some people are reacting strongly and primarily to the fact that the 
change involves race.

For some reason, then, when Dean Thomas' *race* is changed, some 
people become highly irritated.  What, exactly, is the difference 
between what was done with Dean (setting aside inadvertent FLINT-y 
matters such as the number of students remaining to be sorted) and 
my hypothetical with Hanah Abbott or my hypothetical involving 
Dean's height?

>A friend of mind dislikes tokenism, because, to
> her mind, it's like a giant neon sign flashing "Look!  We're good
> guys because we are consciously promoting a minority cultural
> character to prove that we don't discriminate!"  She said that it
> implies that unless she proves by specifying a particular
> character as being of color or other ethnic difference, then she
> is guilty of discrimination, even if in her head when she created
> the characters, she didn't see them as non-racially/ethnically
> diverse.  

Two things here.  

Your friend should understand that referring to racial diversity 
as "tokenism" will cause people like me to bristle every time, 
because it really does trivialize our concerns.  I find it rather 
inflammatory and insulting, to be honest with you.  I would say that 
people who appreciate diversity in literature and media do *not* 
want to see tokens; they want to see diversity -- a recognition that 
people of all races can make a contribution to the work being 
written or produced.

Second, I suppose that your friend is feeling some pressure to be 
inclusive when she writes.  I'm sorry she finds this upsetting, but 
the fact that she has a vision in her head of racial diversity is of 
no consequence if she doesn't translate that into her work and share 
it with others.  If her characters truly are diverse, I see no 
reason for her having such difficulty actually saying so on the 
page.  She should be delighted that her own internal vision of 
diversity will likely be embraced should she choose to share it.

> And, I didn't say that a book had to be 100% homegenous.  It's
> just that, sometimes, the mentions of aspects of racial/ethnic
> diversity in publications appear to be "self-conscious"
> insertions that don't appear to have an intrisic purpose in the
> story rather than a natural part of the work.  When I write,
> there is racial diversity because it is MY intent, not the intent
> of outsiders who think that they know better than I do what
> people ought to be reading.

See, this is what is so odd to me.  If we say that Ron is pale and 
has red hair and freckles, that's OK.  If we say Angelina is black, 
that's "self-conscious;" that it has no "intrinsic purpose."  Why 
should there be a different standard that requires a *purpose* for 
the inclusion of Angelina's race but no purpose for the inclusion of 
Ron's race?

As far as the relationship between the author and publisher, I don't 
have a lot to say.  Except this.  I don't see much basis for the 
assumption that JKR had this changed forced on her.  She is so 
powerful now that if SS is still being published with Dean Thomas as 
black, it is because JKR either does not object to it or embraces it.


>But what
> bothers me (and others) is that if it wasn't necessary to make
> that specific description in the original work, why the heck did
> it HAVE to be changed for JUST the U.S. audience?  

Again, this goes back to my suggestion that we shouldn't require 
that a desire to increase diversity in a book or specify the race of 
a character be strictly *necessary.*

So why did it have to be changed JUST for the US audience?  That's 
an interesting question.  I assume from it that if Dean Thomas' race 
had been changed in the British version also, no one would be 
complaining.  I would say that mentioning Dean Thomas' race was 
never strictly *necessary* in either the British version or the US 
version.  It's just more inclusive, IMO.  As you can see, I just 
don't happen to think the relevant inquiry is whether specifying 
race is "necessary," any more than I think Ron's hair color should 
be a secret because it is not "necessary" to specify it.  

The issue in my mind, then, is whether I should be annoyed that 
Dean's race wasn't amended in the *UK* version.  I'm not, because 
this discussion suggests that there were reasons to think UK readers 
understand certain other reference that imply racial diversity at 
Hogwarts in a way that US readers might not.  


>It implies
> that readers in the U.S. are incapable of imagining a group of
> people in a book as being diverse without having it shoved down
> the throat.  THAT seems to be the sticking point.... it's
> insulting to a proportion of the U.S. readership, including
> people who are all for diversity in life and literature.  

Again, why should the race of black characters be left to the 
imagination, but the race of white characters can be specified?  In 
other words, why is it "shoving race down the throat" (again, that 
is another rather loaded phrase) when the race of a black character 
is mentioned, but it is not when the race of a white character is 
established?  I am surprised by the idea that the problem here is 
that people are insulted because they weren't given proper credit 
for *imagining* diversity and instead were given straightforward 
information about the race of a single character.

> And I fail to see the reason why people keep missing the point
> that it's not whether the character is black, white, or of any
> other color that is the problem here, but that only in the United
> States was it felt necessary to PUSH the idea of the character
> being of a non-majority race.  We simply don't know whose idea it
> was that Dean be a person of color.  If it was JKR, then I have
> no problem with it because it was her intent that he be that way.
> But the implications of only having the U.S. text explicity
> stating Dean's race sounds to me as if the change in text was
> actually a change from what JKR had originally envisioned Dean
> Thomas to look like, simply to appease a noisy section of
> audience who want to dictate what people are shown in regards to
> race or ethnicity in books or films, no matter the original
> intent of the author.   


Again, you're making some assumptions there.  First, I think you're 
assuming that specifying Dean Thomas' race is "PUSH[ing]" an idea.  
I don't understand that point of view; you could easily see the 
change as correcting an omission, providing detail, enhancing the 
reader's visual image.  

Second, people seem quite willing to assume that JKR doesn't support 
this change.  I don't see the basis for that, either.  

Most importantly, however, I personally am quite grateful for 
the "noisy section of the audience" (yet another loaded phrase, 
because I doubt the people to whom you refer would like to see their 
concerns dismissed as "noise").  The "noise," I take it, is the 
willingness of some patrons to express their dissatisfaction with 
homogenous racial portrayals in books and media (all too frequently 
all-white portrayals) in a society that is tremendously diverse.  
Perhaps the trend toward having the racial diversity in the U.S. 
reflected in literature and media is annoying to some, but there are 
usually plenty of white characters that these folks can focus on and 
identify with if the presence of minority characters is bothersome 
to them.

Debbie:

>(1) the point had already been effectively made, in my mind, by the 
>earlier mention of Lee Jordan's dreadlocks, even though perhaps 
>British readers might have been tipped off by his enthusiasm for 
>the West Ham football team . . . 

Two points here.  First, the mention of Lee Jordan's dreadlocks does 
not establish that he is black.  It's a strong clue, but it isn't 
conclusive.  I have personally seen white people who choose to wear 
their hair in dreadlocks.  (Actually, when I first read this 
description, I found it rather awkward and I raised an eyebrow as I 
wondered whether this was an attempt to communicate that Lee was 
black; it wasn't until I saw the movie that I felt sure he was 
black.)  The description of dreadlocks is a strong clue, but it 
doesn't necessarily mean Lee Jordan is black, to me anyway.

Second, and more importantly, the fact that there is a single black 
character (Lee Jordan) does not make the addition of a second black 
character superfluous in my mind.  If the publishers and/or author 
decided they wanted to be clear that Hogwarts has black students, 
then specifying Dean Thomas' race seems a reasonable and 
straightforward way to go about it, IMHO.

Cindy