Tag: diversity and inclusion

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what's lit

The Fight for Diversity in Publishing Competes With ‘American Dirt’ Success

American Dirt, Jeanine Cummins’ debut sensation, was met with controversy right off the bat when the Latinx literary community said some descriptions in the book appeared racist. Jeanine, who identifies as a white woman with a Latina grandmother, saw her author profile still rise with white readers and Oprah Winfrey claiming it as a marvel.

Whether readers think the novel had racist undertones or not, American Dirt reignited the conversation around diversity in publishing. But what changes should we expect?

A group of Latinx writers, spearheaded by Myriam Gurba, helped drive the campaign against the novel, which led to a meeting with Flatiron Books after the publisher canceled the book tour  over safety concerns for the author and booksellers hosting the events. The Flatiron Books president and publisher, Bob Miller, said he and his colleagues had been excited about the book’s release and its praise from major authors and Barnes & Noble and Oprah’s Book Club making the book a selection. In a statement, after the excitement wore off, he said:

“We were therefore surprised by the anger that has emerged from members of the Latinx and publishing communities. The fact that we were surprised is indicative of a problem, which is that in positioning this novel, we failed to acknowledge our own limits.”

The statement also added the publisher regretting the categorization of the novel under the migrant experience, the mention of Jeanine’s husband being an undocumented immigrant “while not specifying that he was from Ireland,” and a centerpiece at a bookseller dinner last May that “replicated the book jacket so tastelessly.”

The barbed wire illustration on the cover has been seen as offensive, and critics accused Jeanine of glamorizing the negative symbol of immigration with her book cover manicure. The blue watercolor-looking birds have become a part of Oprah’s Book Club profile photo on Instagram and the background of Jeanine’s website.

Flatiron Books plans to organize town hall meetings, where Jeanine will be joined by groups who have raised objections to the book. Dignidad Literaria responded with a letter from 142 writers of various ethnic backgrounds asking Oprah, who wields much literary industry power, to backtrack and drop American Dirt from its selection list. Some authors include Kali Fajardo-Anstine, author of Sabrina & Corina; Jasmine Guillory, author of The Wedding Date; and Angie Kim, author of Miracle Creek.

On Oprah’s Book Club Instagram posts asking for input on the novel, most of the comments are positive reviews. Jeanine, the author of The Crooked Branch, The Outside Boy, A Rip in Heaven: A Memoir of Murder and its Aftermath, has expressed her support for migrants along the U.S.-Mexico border on her website and asked readers to also send their support.

When I was traveling in Mexico and the borderlands researching for American Dirt, nothing surprised me more than the preponderance of HOPE among people who endure so much hardship. That is what the United States of America still represents to the people who risk everything to get here. So many good people in the US and Mexico are deeply committed to protecting refugees in their most vulnerable moments; these folks are out there just quietly saving lives every single day. If you are moved to do so, please support them however you can.

The Los Angeles Times featured a recent local event, organized by Myriam and other writers including Roxane Gay, about the American Dirt controversy. Roxane said of the novel’s author, Jeanine:

“This woman is going to be set for life, this book is going to earn royalties in perpetuity, and so it just reinforces what publishing already knows, which is as long as white people are translating the experiences of people of color, it will sell very well.”

Dignidad Literaria is holding another town hall meeting in San Antonio, Texas at the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center on Feb. 22.

With American Dirt at No. 1 this week on The New York Times Best Sellers list, the time period of the book’s success may last a few more months and most likely reach the end of the year. Roxane echoes the concern that diversity in publishing, especially related to this book, might not happen the way it needs to.

One of the main issues is a white author being reportedly paid a seven-figure paycheck to tell migrant stories that are not a part of her experience. The argument between readers is who gets to write others’ experiences versus if it’s fair to designate certain stories for certain groups.

All eyes are now on Oprah’s TV special she promised in response to the criticism. According to local Arizona publications, she was shooting Feb. 13 on location in Tucson, where 250 people were asked to meet at the Harkins Theatres Arizona Pavilions and moved to another location. Oprah had promised last month on CBS This Morning that she would shoot the special around the border towns mentioned in the book.

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what's lit

Romance Writers of America Debacle Reignites Diversity Conversation

Photo by Úrsula Madariaga from Pexels

Over the last week of the year, news spread of novelist Courtney Milan getting punished by Romance Writers of America for making claims that fellow romance novelists had written racial stereotypes into their works. Knocking diversity down a peg at the 9,000-member writers’ trade group, the news also showed how these groups are still struggling with supporting members of color and maintaining a diverse board.

Now a former RWA board member, Courtney, who identifies as Chinese-American, said on Twitter that fellow member Kathryn Lynn Davis had used stereotypes of Asian women in a book, according to media reports. Kathryn and Suzan Tisdale, who work together at an imprint, filed complaints with the RWA over Courtney’s comments, according to the organization’s statement.

This led to the RWA ethics panel suspending Courtney’s membership for one year and banning her permanently from leadership positions. When this news surfaced online two days before Christmas, RWA changed course to avoid “the spreading of false information, threats, and personal information” and rescinded the sanctions. Several board members resigned over issues connected to the situation while RWA members and other writers continue to express their opinions on social media.

For writers in any genre, RWA is considered one of the most valuable resources in the industry. From experience, I’ve been to one local event where I paid $10 and learned several book marketing techniques from a successful indie author. Around 50 people came to the event, crammed into a school classroom. I had never been to a regular literary group meeting that garnered such high attendance and audience engagement.

When I joined a local board of the Women’s National Book Association and attended the national meeting, other members warmly welcomed me. It was due to the attempt to diversify the board and the association as a whole. This is slowly becoming a priority at these long-standing writers’ organizations yet there are still a lot of missteps. For example, WNBA had a local board with a black president and vice president and the chapter fell apart due to the lack of financial resources the national organization wasn’t willing to contribute.

Like Courtney tweets below, these organizations depend on extra money from their members, who many haven’t yet been published and/or don’t have disposable cash to get the help the organization promises.

https://twitter.com/courtneymilan/status/1212844250137858049

I’ve also been a part of writing critique groups where I would be one of the only people of color in the room. I have expressed to writers when I believe a scene or the use of a character can come off as offensive. Once, I told a writer her story revolving around the police shooting death of her main character’s unarmed black male friend and it turning out to be all about the main character, who was a white female, could be seen as racist and/or insensitive. I added that the reader doesn’t see the black friend’s family or community who would be more devastated; just the white woman and her community. Writers may want to add diversity to their books but how it’s done can make a difference in whether they’ll receive backlash later down the road.

In RWA’s statement, it says Kathryn Lynn Davis lost a three-book contract because of Courtney’s tweets. The New York Times reports Suzan Tisdale has lost potential authors on her imprint over the controversy.

Personally, I’ve found solace and support in the growing number of black women’s writing and reading communities such as Mocha Girls Read, The Free Black Women’s Library, and Well-Read Black Girl. There’s been exponential growth in people of color establishing their own organizations due to not feeling comfortable within industry-respected organizations like RWA.

I started she lit as a literary lifestyle blog for all women because of the thick racial divide between white women and nonwhite women, millennial women and middle-aged women. Ageism also plays a role, where you put all these women from different backgrounds in one room and expect reading and writing to connect us all. But the range of time periods we’ve lived in perpetuates the racism or the general misunderstanding of each other.

The RWA story also touches on the lack of diverse beta readers writers may use. Writers tend to rely on their communities to go over their polished manuscripts, but those communities may not be that diverse, e.g. all women, all white women, all straight women, etc. A diverse panel of beta readers can help detect offensive descriptions that won’t receive such criticism and hurt an author’s career. A literary agent and a publisher may not see those issues because there is a diversity problem in the industry with most agents being white.

This is the second social media blow-up in the last two months involving well-known women writers oversharing a private conversation or matter on Twitter that turned into racial backlash caught by the eye of mainstream media.

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what's lit

2019 Literary Lookback: The Rise of Noname’s Book Club

Noname

Rapper Noname started a book club this past summer and has amassed a strong following with mostly millennial readers looking to discover a variety of books from authors of color.

With its August launch, the book club selected two books: Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire and We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby. Two books remained a constant over the months, with the latest twin picks being The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon and Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi.

The book club blossomed on social media—now having almost 67,000 followers on Twitter and over 38,000 followers on Instagram—and then moved to in-person meetings in Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Cincinnati, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. Photos from the meetings and from members make up most of the timelines on the two social media networks as well as vintage and stock photos of black people reading books. Letting members know they are seen and supporting their reading goals shift the book club, though helmed by a celebrity, away from the celebrity book club model that usually keeps the conversations online and seldom acknowledges members.

From cult classics to the words of emergent authors, Noname’s Book Club highlights books that speak on human conditions in critical and original ways.

That’s Noname’s Book Club’s mission statement, and it shows in the actions the group has taken to make an impact on the diverse consumers the literary industry tends to ignore.

supporting black-owned bookstores

The book club sends members to black-owned bookstores in seven cities to purchase the picks and some holding in-person meetings. One example is The Reparations Club in Los Angeles, which has quickly become home to many black creatives since opening earlier this year.

boycotting Amazon

Buying from the independent bookstores came from the book club’s stance on not buying books from Amazon. The boycott movement, popular with many indie booksellers and especially black literary groups, is to bring money back to those booksellers, especially the ones catering to consumers of color since they are usually not the top indie bookseller in their regions. Amazon has been blamed for taking necessary book sales from indie booksellers, especially with the e-retailer giant gaining a stronghold in the publishing industry creating its own books and other media based on books.

connecting with public LIBRARies

This month, the book club partnered with the Los Angeles Public Library to help members find the selected books free of charge. The book club posed the question of what should be its next partnership, and many followers chimed in, with Binghamton, New York getting a lot of votes.

In less than six months, the book club has made a major impact in magnifying the visibility of readers and authors of color, so the next year may bring more advancements in celebrating these literary stakeholders.

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what's lit

Women Authors Attack Sarah Dessen Critic in Social Media Uproar

Burst

This past week, young adult author Sarah Dessen tweeted a quote from a college article by a woman who campaigned against her books in a campus reading program years ago. Many authors including Roxane Gay and Siobhan Vivian came to Sarah’s defense—until fans clapped back when the woman was being called derogatory names by top women authors. The authors backpedaled with some Twitter users accusing Sarah of white female victimhood and the authors of attacking readers with opinions on their works.

As of the weekend, the discriminatory tweets have disappeared from top authors’ Twitter feeds, including Siobhan Vivian, author of YA book We Are the Wildcats, who tweeted “Fuck that fucking bitch” about the quoted woman with Sarah saying “I love you” back.

Dhonielle Clayton, author of multicultural fantasy YA novel The Belles and co-founder of We Need Diverse Books, called the quoted woman a “raggedy ass fucking bitch.” Tiffany Jackson, author of YA novels Allegedly and Monday’s Not Coming, agreed. Siobhan’s Twitter account doesn’t exist anymore and her professional website has been made private, and Dhonielle’s account, which was very active with thousands of followers and tweets, now only has tweets from Nov. 14.

The Nov. 12 article in question came from The Aberdeen News on Northern State University’s Common Read program. Brooke Nelson, now a master’s degree student, says in the article:

“She’s fine for teen girls. But definitely not up to the level of Common Read. So I became involved simply so I could stop them from ever choosing Sarah Dessen.”

Brooke, according to the article, helped with the 2017 selection, which became Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson, a memoir by a civil rights lawyer in pursuit of justice which will be a movie starring Michael B. Jordan and Jamie Foxx. Sarah’s 2016 novel Saint Anything was in the running, a Vulture article reported. After Sarah mentioned the criticism in the infamous now-deleted tweet, the university issued an apology on Twitter in support of Sarah and against the free speech of an alum. Even the reporter apologized for adding the quote.

https://twitter.com/kgrandstrandAAN/status/1194307799385300998?s=20

The Washington Post was one of the first news outlets to see the Twitter feud unfold. The reporter interviewed Brooke, who said the quote was taken out of context with her emphasizing she didn’t think Sarah’s book was appropriate as a top book for her college crowd, and asked for her input:

Nelson, for her part, said she hopes the controversy draws more people to read books that will encourage them to think critically about pressing social issues.

“If anything comes out of this larger conversation,” Nelson told The Post, “I hope it is that others will make it a point to read books like [‘Just Mercy’] that push them beyond their usual perspective and challenge their assumptions of society.”

https://twitter.com/sarahdessen/status/1195431073892749315

https://twitter.com/rgay/status/1195405484905250817

https://twitter.com/pronounced_ing/status/1195742500369162240

https://twitter.com/jodipicoult/status/1195744857047928840

https://twitter.com/jenniferweiner/status/1195470675034685441

https://twitter.com/nkjemisin/status/1195745641768652800

Not everybody is going to like your book. And sometimes like in Sarah’s case, your book may be heavily scrutinized in some scenarios, even in a small-town news story about a small-town university’s book program. This comes with the territory.

Also, this story shows even as outspoken writers you have to be careful about what you decide to share publicly. Social media is an important asset to connecting with fans and readers, and now some of the authors involved have chosen to start over or take a break while most just deleted the first tweet in support of Sarah and tweeted an apology instead.

Ignore the haters if you don’t have anything nice to say; if it’s threatening in any way, then report the tweet and block the user, but just breathe when you see something constructive that you don’t like. Let it go, and if someone asks about the criticism, don’t respond or say something diplomatic because at the end of the day not everyone is going to like your work and they have the right to say so.

The unfortunate Twitter saga has some followers promoting a boycott, so we’ll keep a watch on how the authors involved will be impacted. Earlier this year, Netflix announced making three of Sarah’s novels into films.

https://twitter.com/Felicity_M2/status/1195602749959933952

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film reviews what's lit

Dakota Fanning’s Role in ‘Sweetness in the Belly’ Sparks Debate on Whitewashed African Stories

IMDb

The debut of the trailer for a film based on a critically acclaimed novel starring former child actress Dakota Fanning as a “White Ethiopian Muslim” shook up social media Wednesday.

The film based on the 2007 novel Sweetness in the Belly by Camilla Gibb met backlash on Twitter where users described their disgust for an African story being told from a White perspective. It reflects a long history in Hollywood of putting a White actress as the star in an African story, but the backlash may also hurt a black-directed project.

Many Twitter users questioned how an Ethiopian Muslim woman is being portrayed by a White blonde actress, but it appeared the majority of the responders may not have been aware of the novel.

In the publisher Penguin Random House’s summary of the book, the story has the main character, Lilly, become orphaned by her parents’ murders. She is then raised in a Sufi shrine in Morocco before making a pilgrimage to Harar, Ethiopia (disclaimer: my paternal family’s homeland), where she not only teaches the Qur’an to children but also falls in love with a doctor. Even with sporting her hijab, her foreignness is targeted. This forces her to flee to England, where she feels like a real foreigner.

The premise has a problematic plotline that is being magnified in today’s hyper-racial atmosphere. With the book centering on a fictional White woman’s perspective of Islam in a black African country, the story could be seen as offensive with very few stories if any, especially in the Western mainstream, focusing on Ethiopian Muslim women.

The film actually has an Ethiopian director, Zeresenay Mehari. His 2015 film Difret, based on a true story, is about a young Ethiopian girl who accidentally kills her kidnapper and the lawyer defending her in the murder trial. With Angelina Jolie named as executive producer, the film can be seen on Netflix. Zeresenay stopped tweeting around the time of the promotion campaign for Difret, so there was no response from him on the social media network where his newest film was trending.

On Instagram, Dakota responded to the outrage by emphasizing her character’s British, non-native African heritage and that the film’s director is Ethiopian along with many of the characters that will revolve around her character.

“Based on a book by Camilla Gibb, this film was partly made in Ethiopia, is directed by an Ethiopian man and features many Ethiopian women,” she wrote in an Instagram story. “It was a great privilege to be a part of telling this story. The film is about what home means to people who find themselves displaced and the families and communities that they choose and that choose them.”

Hollywood has a long history of portraying African stories from a White perspective with vintage examples including Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra, Katharine Hepburn in The African Queen, and Meryl Streep in Out of Africa. Though Sweetness in the Belly is more modern, it still depicts a historical event—the civil war in Ethiopia that stretched from 1974 to 1991—without a major U.S. film to tell the story of native Ethiopians during that time.

Should Dakota have been attacked for her portrayal when the Ethiopian director obviously cosigned on the representation of his culture from the perspective of a White author’s fictional work? Or did the director feel this would be an acceptable representation of Ethiopian Muslims for America to digest? The backlash has reinforced the racial divide in storytelling, especially when it comes to women: pitting White women and non-White women against each other over how stories should be told involving non-White groups.

On another note, The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste, an Ethiopian female author who writes about wartime Ethiopia, comes out this month if you’re looking for a novel focusing on the East African country and its history.

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what's lit

How Disney’s Original ‘The Little Mermaid’ Perpetuated the White Mermaid Image

Chloe x Halle Twitter

Disney’s 1989 animated interpretation of The Little Mermaid brought the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale alive through Ariel with her manufactured White beauty that has become the trademark for mermaid images. But one book made me realize mermaids can be Black and any other complexion our imaginations want us to see.

It was Sukey and the Mermaid written by Robert D. San Souci and illustrated by Brian Pinkney. Sukey is forced to work on the farm by her stepfather, but she befriends a Black mermaid, Mama Jo, who gives her hope her life can be better. I loved the story, reread the book over and over. The mermaid in this story was Black and older with long silvery strands and an undersea attire that looked like armor made of gold. Ariel’s juvenescence may have enhanced her magic, but Mama Jo possessed a more sage magic, a majestic presence.

Black mermaids conquered conversation on July 3 at the news of Halle Bailey from Chloe x Halle and Freeform’s Grown-ish nabbing the part of Ariel in the Disney live action remake. The four-day Fourth of July weekend prolonged the uproar on social media where supporters who applauded a Black Ariel clashed with those who slammed a Black Ariel with the argument she can only be White due to the author’s Danish roots.

Since I’ve been working on a young adult novel about Black girls cosplaying as nightclub mermaids, I’ve noticed Disney’s imagery has even warped the marketplace for mermaid-centric merchandise, further emphasizing these mythical creatures can only be accepted as White.

Sukey and the Mermaid fell into my hands after my Ariel doll disappeared. Ariel, with her ketchup red hair and shimmery purple bra and green fin, was found under the Christmas tree when I was five-years-old. I would stick her under the faucet for her to swim in the ocean I created in the sink, put her beside my head at night in bed. Then she went missing.

Me and Ariel on Christmas before she met her untimely demise.

Years later, I learned Ariel was tossed in the trash. My mother despised the attention the only White doll she would ever buy me received over my Black dolls. The Black doll experiment conducted by psychologists Dr. Kenneth Clark and Dr. Mamie Clark in the 1940s found the participating Black children preferred White dolls and used more positive adjectives to describe them. This informed how my mother would raise my sister and me with only Black dolls since she knew a time when she could only get White dolls.

But she caved with Ariel, since I was obsessed with that mermaid. Ariel topped two birthday cakes in a row and became an epic Halloween costume complete with the shimmery green fin. Eventually Ariel was replaced by book mermaid Mama Jo and my Disney obsession moved on to brown-skinned Jasmine in Aladdin.

The controversy around Halle’s casting will hopefully die down as we accept a new image of a mermaid who could be reflected in more stories, products, and images for girls and women of various complexions.