There is a lot of discussion on social media lately among writers about which authors can or should be allowed to create characters that represent certain groups. The argument seems to be that unless an author can create an authentic representation of culture or ethnicity or race or gender, he/or she should not create the character. Also, unless the author is immersed in that particular group, there is no way he/she can create authentic representations.
When I was young, my first best friend was a pretty girl with a sweet round face, an angelic voice, and an energetic countenance. She had this beautiful dark hair that I was jealous of. It was the color of the antique wooden beams that adorned the ceilings of my family’s Victorian. And it was thick! Mine was the color of dead leaves and about as limp as a pile of them after a drenching autumn rain. I loved going to her house and tasting the different food and hearing the different sounds. I didn’t know she was Mexican. I wouldn’t have cared if I had known. She was just this funny, beautiful friend whose skin tanned in the summer sun where my pasty white blistered. My favorite babysitter was the oldest daughter of the only family of color in my small town. I don’t recall why she was my favorite. I just know that my sisters and I got really excited every time we knew she was coming. I remember laughing and laughing and laughing whenever she was around. My dad coached her brothers in Little League football. I don’t remember them as our African American friends. They were our friends. Period. Right before high school, my family moved to a bigger small town with a much larger Mexican-American community. I liked going to mass at Our Lady of Guadalupe because it was this old, gorgeous, holy-looking place. There was always a guitar and only sometimes an organ accompanying the same ol’ hymns sung across town. I swear, the Body of Christ tasted faintly of nacho flavored Doritos. I thought my new friends had interesting names, but they weren’t my Hispanic friends. They were my friends. Period. After college, I married a man whose family immigrated from Mexico. My kids are white. My kids are Mexican. My kids’ great maternal grandmother hailed from the Seminole tribe. My father’s family came here from Europe. Our family is our family. Period. One of my daughter’s best friends in high school was a phenomenal gymnast, but she was tall--way taller than you’d think for a gymnast. If you looked at her athletic body, you’d think she played basketball. She didn’t. But, of course, she was Chinese, so you might not think she was athletic at all. You might think she had a Tiger Mom and that she was good at math. Neither was true. As a toddler, she was adopted by a white, Catholic family. Oh, and she has a little sister who was also adopted from China, and guess what? Like a lot of sisters from a lot of cultures and races and ethnicities, they are about as different from each other as can be. I have no idea if my daughter’s friend represents Chinese people, or just tall Chinese people, or just Chinese cheerleaders, or only Chinese girls adopted by white people who prefer their daughters to be cheerleaders instead of mathletes. She’s just my daughter’s friend. Period. In my life, there are Catholics and Protestants and atheists and spiritualists. There are alcoholics and tea-totalers. There are differently-abled and hearing impaired. There are educated and uneducated, successful and not-so-much. There are liberals and conservatives.There are sweethearts and assholes. The people in my life have never come to me as representatives of anything. They come to me as people. And so do my characters. Writing communities in social media warn against perpetuating stereotypes. On the other hand, they warn that our characters better be authentic representations of skin color/culture/ethnicity/neighborhood/occupation/gender/blah, blah, blah or we risk offending everyone on the planet. That’s not how I live. That’s not how I write. I don’t create characters who represent anything. I simply accept people as they come to me. In life and in writing, it doesn’t get more authentic than that.
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AuthorDee Linn loves words. When she was in the third grade, her exasperated teacher told her she'd probably talk to a pole, if she happen to be sitting beside it. Not much has changed except that now she says it in writing. She is a single mom of four, a teacher of teens, a cheater at board games, and a lover of life. She's a Kansas girl, but travels to all kinds of places in her head with characters living there, some of which she's sure she's created. Some, she's not sure how they got there. But they are way more interesting to talk to than a pole. Archives
November 2017
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