The "Black Lives Matter" Movement inspired this fantasy novelist's newest novel. She also draws inspiration from the historical oppression of indigenous people worldwide.
Showing posts with label Blacks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blacks. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 2, 2015
Friday, February 13, 2015
"Why do you talk like that?"
A question I've been asked all my life. Ridiculed and teased for the way I speak. It is absolutely and utterly ridiculous that this is constantly brought up, even among adults.
'You talk White'. No, I don't, fool, because there is NO SUCH THING. I'm sick and tired of this idea that only a Brown or Black person speaks in slang and with an accent.
Even among the Deaf who sign have 'accents' because ASL (American Sign Language) is a complete language and what the North American Deaf sign will not be understood in Russian Sign Language. So it is with us Speaking.
Accent is constrained and constructed by environment, culture, social group and geographic region. The only people who no longer speak with an accent are the deceased. But I'm not here to go on a linguistic tangent. What I will say is this: that people who still expect a person to SOUND a certain way BECAUSE of SKIN COLOR in this day and age shows ignorance and we haven't moved past historical antiquity.
I have known White peers who speak as what our society would say 'sound Black' and Blacks who 'sound White'. What do these terms actually mean? Are you saying that as a Brown person, I should be unable to speak without slang, colloquialism, and drop letters from my words? Are you also saying that a White person, who has lived in a particular area, has peers who speak the same, comes from an ethnic background, that the individual should not sound a certain way?
If the folks that approach me can say such things without the historical implications of that statement, then we as a society are even less prepared to deal not only with our own diverse selves, but am unable to relate or show respect towards a greater global community. The world is not cut and dry. Our own neighborhoods, even if it appears as a homogenous demographic, are far more complex and complicated.
Before you ask the question to me or anyone else on the way we speak, remember what day and age we live in. Remember we were never in a cut-and-dry situation. Remember the world was NEVER Black and White.
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
About being a writer. About being.
Speaking to a fellow writer online got this reply from me (this version you read is longer and elaborate) and also to think on another NEW post.
One of the questions, and this comes up in many media-related questions, is why we don't seem to know people of color and/or women in varying industries? My reply to this, both off and online, is by what I and others have experienced. I am a girl, therefore, I don't read comics, much less, the superhero variety. I was bullied by other girls for this and shunned by the boys, who thought I was a mutant! [Extra points to those that got the analogy and reference here]
There are also not enough diversity in the media, and before I go into one HUGE rant on this and waste my time and yours, the question followed that poets of color are not often acknowledged, or even known by the general populace (both majority and minorities).
I make it a point to write down people featured on documentaries: this is how I learned which books of theirs to get, what films they created, or what modern works they influenced.
Do you know, or, have heard of Rita Dove and/or Natasha Trethewey? No?
I gave Ms. Trethewey's poetry collection to friends and family in the U.S. and Jamaica as Christmas gifts! My older sister was especially thrilled as she tries to keep up with the poet laureates.
I think that in my experience (did read Nikki Giovanni and Ruby Dee's poetry anthology "Glowchild" as a child, and in my preteens, the Harlem Ren men and women), I do love poetry, and, because of culture, was spoon-fed it. Yet, as years went by, I began to shy away from the genre in its modernity because it grew incensed, enraged, as well as contrary to my own experiences and those close to me.
I'm glad that poetry is becoming diverse in tone again, and not just in one shade, or by one emotional dial.
I am a writer and I happen to be Black (unfortunately, I don't agree with this one-size-fits-all race stuff, and especially not on registrations forms, but it's all we have for now, so I must use it), but I too have been asked why I write what I write (furry, spec fic, fables, myth).
My prose has been called into question. Especially in high school when an English teacher accused me of plagiarism (that was a single incident, other English teachers, to their credit, were aware of my writing skills before I was).
There was another teacher that asked why I knew so much (something I noticed she didn't say to 'lighter' classmates). This same teacher also made many racially-charged statements throughout the term.
So many, in fact, that I and a classmate went to the principal to report her! I won't get you started on the Math teacher. That is for another post.
Sad, sad indeed that we have come such a long way, yet not long enough.
One of the questions, and this comes up in many media-related questions, is why we don't seem to know people of color and/or women in varying industries? My reply to this, both off and online, is by what I and others have experienced. I am a girl, therefore, I don't read comics, much less, the superhero variety. I was bullied by other girls for this and shunned by the boys, who thought I was a mutant! [Extra points to those that got the analogy and reference here]
There are also not enough diversity in the media, and before I go into one HUGE rant on this and waste my time and yours, the question followed that poets of color are not often acknowledged, or even known by the general populace (both majority and minorities).
I make it a point to write down people featured on documentaries: this is how I learned which books of theirs to get, what films they created, or what modern works they influenced.
Do you know, or, have heard of Rita Dove and/or Natasha Trethewey? No?
I gave Ms. Trethewey's poetry collection to friends and family in the U.S. and Jamaica as Christmas gifts! My older sister was especially thrilled as she tries to keep up with the poet laureates.
I think that in my experience (did read Nikki Giovanni and Ruby Dee's poetry anthology "Glowchild" as a child, and in my preteens, the Harlem Ren men and women), I do love poetry, and, because of culture, was spoon-fed it. Yet, as years went by, I began to shy away from the genre in its modernity because it grew incensed, enraged, as well as contrary to my own experiences and those close to me.
I'm glad that poetry is becoming diverse in tone again, and not just in one shade, or by one emotional dial.
I am a writer and I happen to be Black (unfortunately, I don't agree with this one-size-fits-all race stuff, and especially not on registrations forms, but it's all we have for now, so I must use it), but I too have been asked why I write what I write (furry, spec fic, fables, myth).
My prose has been called into question. Especially in high school when an English teacher accused me of plagiarism (that was a single incident, other English teachers, to their credit, were aware of my writing skills before I was).
There was another teacher that asked why I knew so much (something I noticed she didn't say to 'lighter' classmates). This same teacher also made many racially-charged statements throughout the term.
So many, in fact, that I and a classmate went to the principal to report her! I won't get you started on the Math teacher. That is for another post.
Sad, sad indeed that we have come such a long way, yet not long enough.
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Notes from the sketchbook
The post topic is originally from my notes in sketchbook, but first, a bit of news...
The FIRST DRAFT IS FINISHED! IT'S DONE! FINITOOO!!
Now that I got that off my chest, the long haul to edit the second draft begins...
**********
Stacey and Slash may appear as an ordinary couple, I mean, they're both dogs, right?
However, remember what I am trying to state: they are interracial (one is Black and the other is Italian).
Nowadays, many interracial, inter-religious, as well as intercultural couples, are considered very common and everyday to many folks.
However, such pairings were highly unusual in the 1930s, and even quite dangerous for the pair involved!
There was once what were called 'Miscegenation Laws'.
State officials, as well as other authority figures, had taken it upon themselves to keep, not only their own race, 'pure', but made it unlawful for other types of interracial couplings: this meant NO Asian/Black, NO Black/Native American, NO Native American/Asian.
NO ONE, under penalty of law, could marry OUTSIDE their race.
Even if couples were legally married elsewhere, in certain states, such marriages were considered illegal.
Furthermore, children born in such unions were considered (I HATE this term when applied to people) 'illegitimate'!
During both of the characters' development, not only has each had to fight against society's ideas about who can develop a relationship with whom, but oftentimes, the person has had to fight cultural standards, expectations, and identities.
With Slash, he struggles with his ethnic group's ideas of masculinity as well as how he must behave.
This is both within the gang subculture he has spent much of his adult life, but also the broader, wider culture he originates from.
With Stacey, she struggles with her working life, and with a society that has historically hampered, impeded, and hemmed in Blacks.
Throughout the story, she is underestimated, ridiculed, and misrepresented, by a society's need to separate the black individual from the post-modern world.
The FIRST DRAFT IS FINISHED! IT'S DONE! FINITOOO!!
Now that I got that off my chest, the long haul to edit the second draft begins...
**********
Stacey and Slash may appear as an ordinary couple, I mean, they're both dogs, right?
However, remember what I am trying to state: they are interracial (one is Black and the other is Italian).
Nowadays, many interracial, inter-religious, as well as intercultural couples, are considered very common and everyday to many folks.
However, such pairings were highly unusual in the 1930s, and even quite dangerous for the pair involved!
There was once what were called 'Miscegenation Laws'.
State officials, as well as other authority figures, had taken it upon themselves to keep, not only their own race, 'pure', but made it unlawful for other types of interracial couplings: this meant NO Asian/Black, NO Black/Native American, NO Native American/Asian.
NO ONE, under penalty of law, could marry OUTSIDE their race.
Even if couples were legally married elsewhere, in certain states, such marriages were considered illegal.
Furthermore, children born in such unions were considered (I HATE this term when applied to people) 'illegitimate'!
During both of the characters' development, not only has each had to fight against society's ideas about who can develop a relationship with whom, but oftentimes, the person has had to fight cultural standards, expectations, and identities.
With Slash, he struggles with his ethnic group's ideas of masculinity as well as how he must behave.
This is both within the gang subculture he has spent much of his adult life, but also the broader, wider culture he originates from.
With Stacey, she struggles with her working life, and with a society that has historically hampered, impeded, and hemmed in Blacks.
Throughout the story, she is underestimated, ridiculed, and misrepresented, by a society's need to separate the black individual from the post-modern world.
Sunday, August 19, 2012
'Stacey Hankin' as a little girl (circa 1922)
Yay! Art again! Sheesh... It's not productive OR fun when one's sick for awhile.
Here is my heroine, as a very tall 7 year old in the year 1921. So that puts her birth year in 1914, and the next year (1915) should be an important year North Americans, as well as anyone else who cares about history, should know. That is the year when the film, "Birth of a Nation" was released in theatres.
What is "Birth of a Nation"? Well, controversial is too mild a word to use.
Simply put, based on a bigot's book by the same name, both movie and book claim that the Ku Klux Klan won the South and freed it from the tyranny of blacks, who were demonized in both the book and film.
The author, whose name I will treat as Harry Potter's nemesis, I will not write it here on my blog, became a celebrity and his viewpoints were agreed by other racists across the country.
When Hollywood got wind of the book, instead of letting this dangerous volume remain within pages, decided it made a good film, no matter how disastrous and historically inaccurate it was!
Now, you see a cute picture of my protagonist and wonder why I am such a downer about mentioning this? Simply put, while researching my characters and their background, I began to wonder, what it must have felt like, being Black, or being any kind of minority, and what were the emotions when this film was released?
What terror could many American blacks have felt? What measures could they have taken to protect themselves and their communities? And worse of all, I have learned that the Civil Rights' Movement did not start in the late 50s and early 60s as many of us are taught in History class, but actually, many decades before.
What damage did "Birth of a Nation" do to the Movement? How much did this book and its companion movie set progress back?
****
Research this, DON'T use Wikipedia, I implore you, but more legitimate sites to research the author, his book, and the movie.
Maybe the film is even on YouTube, but PLEASE, see for yourself... And ask me why I write this with my character's art.
Sunday, May 27, 2012
Character as a spotlight on society
As an artist, I'm a product of my society.
In the December 2011 post, I uploaded the latest picture on my female protagonist, Stacey Hankin. As far back as this story goes, I always thought of a hound as her breed. I had already determined which kind back in elementary school.
When I posted this image, the response I received was, to paraphrase a close friend, "A hound! Why, out of all the dogs to choose, did you have to pick such an unattractive dog?" Later, the same friend told me the character was actually cuter than she expected.
I had, in early years, received similar responses, and therein lies the crux...
I've often admired the hound, for its hardiness, its stamina, and through a breeder's eyes, its history. The hound is one of the oldest dog breeds in the world.
There is a hound on almost every continent. The hound, oftentimes, without, or, with little human interference, has occurred naturally in many parts of human culture.
Now I come to the next point: in my story, though it is furry fiction, I still try to retain the elements of human society and construct. This means that while my story's cast consists entirely of dogs, they still try to represent the different races and ethnicities.
Stacey Hankin is my Black American woman, and if she were human, she would be very dark. Because of her darkness, she is ridiculed, not just from whites, but more so by blacks.
This theme features predominately in my story: this obsession in society to determine a person's worth and attractiveness by how light and dark they are. This plays out moreso in our so-called 'enlightened' or 'educated' society.
Many of us know about segregation, but by reading much history, one learns that laws once used race by determining how much mixture in an individual.
Amount of blood determined who one could marry, who one COULDN'T marry, to gain inheritance, to lose inheritance, and that laws were made to even decide who could or could not vote...
To witness archaic rules in motion nowadays, that to be of mix-raced in order to determine attractiveness, sickens me.
In the 21st Century, to still hear people asked if they are mixed to later be told they are beautiful is a clarion call to a change in society's attitudes.
We are responsible for our actions, we each make up the decisions that will fulfill our society's framework.
I'm hoping with this story, the stories I've published, and the stories yet to come, I will, in small part, make an impact to change these destructive ideas that continue to plague our society.
As a writer, as an artist, I have a responsibility to envision the world I wish to see, futures I may hope for.
We are the motes, the cogs, the molecules that make up society's cellular body.
What is your call to action? What will you do? What is your part?
In the December 2011 post, I uploaded the latest picture on my female protagonist, Stacey Hankin. As far back as this story goes, I always thought of a hound as her breed. I had already determined which kind back in elementary school.
 |
| "Stacey Hankin" (c) |
When I posted this image, the response I received was, to paraphrase a close friend, "A hound! Why, out of all the dogs to choose, did you have to pick such an unattractive dog?" Later, the same friend told me the character was actually cuter than she expected.
I had, in early years, received similar responses, and therein lies the crux...
I've often admired the hound, for its hardiness, its stamina, and through a breeder's eyes, its history. The hound is one of the oldest dog breeds in the world.
There is a hound on almost every continent. The hound, oftentimes, without, or, with little human interference, has occurred naturally in many parts of human culture.
Now I come to the next point: in my story, though it is furry fiction, I still try to retain the elements of human society and construct. This means that while my story's cast consists entirely of dogs, they still try to represent the different races and ethnicities.
Stacey Hankin is my Black American woman, and if she were human, she would be very dark. Because of her darkness, she is ridiculed, not just from whites, but more so by blacks.
This theme features predominately in my story: this obsession in society to determine a person's worth and attractiveness by how light and dark they are. This plays out moreso in our so-called 'enlightened' or 'educated' society.
 |
| "Beatrice and her sisters" (c) |
Amount of blood determined who one could marry, who one COULDN'T marry, to gain inheritance, to lose inheritance, and that laws were made to even decide who could or could not vote...
To witness archaic rules in motion nowadays, that to be of mix-raced in order to determine attractiveness, sickens me.
In the 21st Century, to still hear people asked if they are mixed to later be told they are beautiful is a clarion call to a change in society's attitudes.
We are responsible for our actions, we each make up the decisions that will fulfill our society's framework.
I'm hoping with this story, the stories I've published, and the stories yet to come, I will, in small part, make an impact to change these destructive ideas that continue to plague our society.
As a writer, as an artist, I have a responsibility to envision the world I wish to see, futures I may hope for.
We are the motes, the cogs, the molecules that make up society's cellular body.
What is your call to action? What will you do? What is your part?
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