Talking Diversity
Jan. 14th, 2013 11:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
valarltdSo, The Bechdel Test exists as a measure of roles for women in film and literature. Now, it has been proposed there be a Bechdel test for People of Color.
Define People of Color...
A couple of my co-authors class Middle-eastern people as PoC. I do not. My half-Greek&Lebanese step-sisters considered themselves white, because they weren't black. One also includes Jews, but again, not seeing it. Religion does not define your ethnicity.
Romany? I have no clue. Their features fall into "white-ethnic" for me, but my definition of "white-ethnic" is pretty broad and includes Mediterranian, Hispanic, Middle Eastern and most Indians.
So I decided to check myself before I wrecked myself.
Novels:
Nikolai has James Ligatos (Greek) talks to Iakobos, his cousin, thanking him for his help. James also talks to Stephen (African American) about Kentucky trying to secede from the Confederated States and their estimated travel time. He also talks to Benta (Israeli) in Rome, but we do not hear their conversation. (It can be assumed it is about matters of great importance, since he runs North America for her) NikoChan includes Kenyans, Indians, Brazilians, Japanese and other PoC who talk to each other about uprisings, weather satellites, and all the other minutae of running a world.
Alive on the Inside has a few of people of color: Ming Xia, Nagina, Marvello, Marie Leveau. But they interact mostly with the white main character, from whose POV the story is told. (one white character even freaks out over talking to Marie Leveau, partly because the woman is black)
Privateer's Treasure has a cast with a lot of PoC, including an interracial main romance. The men talk to each other about piracy and sailing and all the other business of their lives. The Moroccan and the Barbadan (?) talk of many things including sex and torture. OTOH, this one fails the Bechdel most egregiously, since there is only mention of two women.
Power in the Blood has a variety of PoC, including Gilgamesh, Josh (Judean), Samil (Issacharite), Martin Luther King Jr., and Lielit. None of them are main characters and they tend to not talk to each other. Again, white PoV character.
Hard Reboot, mostly white, mostly Celtic. (My co-author griped that everyone was Anglo. I told him that of the 8 main characters, ONE was Anglo. We had 2 Israelis, and 5 Irish, of varying descent) There is color on the streets--a black cyborg bounty hunter, Thai whores, Chinese workers, etc., but the book is focused on Sean O'Neill and his wife, Tara McLean, and the abuses the powerful people are committing in their lives. For Sean, only Tara and his brother Niall are really real, the rest of the world is wall-paper.
Spellbound Desire: Demarco Jackson, head of the Memphis combat mages, Officer Thomas (sister of his vice-president), Galena Ortiz of Las Quatras Brujas, a Tejano combat mage unit. The old Polynesian tattoo artist. Saraphina, the Romany landlady. But again, they mostly talk to the (white, Scottish) hero who is in town to fight his ancient foe. And of course, being Memphis, there is a lot of local wall-paper color, people not important to the romance or combat plot, who move through our characters' lives.
Curse of the Pharaoh's Manicurists: touchy. There are Egyptians, if you consider them PoC. They talk about their work, and about Charlie (white, American), on whom they are working. They're getting him ready to meet Osiris...
Glad Hands: Native American. Several Cherokee, including the main character. High Chief Mankiller gives Chuck a job. Fred Half-Moon (Crow) loses his temper. Stan (Mohawk) gives Chuck directions. John Littlefeather and Chuck talk. Charles and Linda Hummingbird talk to their son about Charles making partner at the ad agency, Linda's altar guild, the international incident he caused. Hannah talks to Chuck about her due date. Mother Vivian talks about God, interpretations, weddings and her wife's pregnancy. Dr. Singh lectures Chuck.
Shell-shocked: wall-paper. The clerk at the local grocery, a DHS inspector.
Heart of a Forest: set in 1216 England hinterlands. No PoC to be seen
(coming in Feb)
Barbarossa's Bitch: the Wildpack is a mixed batch, including an Apache courier, a black former boxer, a black woodcarver, a Hispanic who named himself after Juan Malverde. An older black man and his younger Hispanic lover, the black leader of a rival wildpack. But it is shown almost exclusively through the eyes of the lead character. Therefore, when they aren't interacting with him, they're background. OTOH, our hero has three biracial daughters and we see the older teaching the younger the alphabet song and sign language.
(coming in May)
Heart's Bounty: Hevik is light-skinned mainstock human. Miho is somewhat darker Human+, Rejan is dark-skinned mainstock human. The three of them have an interesting BDSM scene. We also have exotics (humans with custom pigmentations, green, purple and blue) It's space opera, and Earth race doesn't apply.
Blackhall's Transtemporal Medicine Show:
Eliza and Cassius Masterson are a married couple. They talk about many things, including their babies and their jobs.
Fenyang is South African, Samira is Egyptian. They are having a romance.
Of my short stories:
"Sky-rat" has a black character who gets killed early. Fail
The painting Anthony does in "Frosted Hearts" is multi-ethnic, but we never see the models except as wall-paper, helping him move the canvases. Partial Fail (2,3)
"Master Bear" has an ethnically (and observantly) Jewish top, and a black top. They both only interact with the two white main characters. (like the other tops, they are being "auditioned") Fail (2,3)
"Pushing the boundaries of Reality" has the same Israeli enterpreneurs as Hard Reboot. They talk about many things, from the new experiments to the ethnically Celtic woman they are both dating. Pass
"Eight Days Ablaze," our heroine and her family are Israeli and British living in the US. They talk about family stuff and pretty much avoid talking about the one white boy in the story. Pass
Samil, the Issacharite, puts in an appearance in "Between Despair and Ecstasy," but mainly interacts with his new white servant. Fail
Tamas Vardo and his cousins in "The Devil's Children" are Romany. (again, debateable as to whether this is PoC) One is dark enough to be mistaken for biracial. Pass
Hester in "Experiments" is 1/4 black. She interacts with her white owner and the Irish twins he has for his experiment. Fail.
Frank Stett in the Cliff Cody stories is a Caribbean black man, whose family still practices Voudoun out on World Four. He is, unfortunately, heroically dead at the beginning of "Plumbing the Depths" leaving hsi two white husbands to figure out how to continue without him. He is much more active in "Pride of the Rangers," the first of the Cliff Cody stories. "A Taste for Knowledge" needs more work. Fail.
The Adventuresses collection has a missing scene from "Burning for Eight Days," which has more Adina, but it's a lesbian sex scene with a holographic Janis Joplin. "That Time They Talk About" has our black main character interacting with a Hispanic gunslinger. "Rewriting Old Songs", "Change of Plans" and "Still Rolling" have a Cherokee lead character, but she mostly interacts with her white lover. "Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch" has a half-Cherokee Mother-in-law, making all of Amanda's kids 1/8th. Grandma and granddaughters talk. Grandma and grandson talk about zombies and how well he did fighting them. 6/10 stories have PoC, and 2 pass the test.
Into Dark Waters (revised): "Tuition Fees" has a multi-ethnic cast, but we see almost none of their stories. Again the wall-paper problem. "Hunger for the Edge" has a lead PoC, a blind Creole vampire. "Blood Rubies" gives us Samil from Privateer Plundered, but most of the people around him are ethnic white. "Serpants" has an Arabic and an Indian lead. There are a few white soldiers in the story, but most of the cast is Indian. 11 stories, 4 with active PoC. One passes.
Of the 13 stories in Riding the Nightmare none pass. Only 5 have PoC, and that's only if you count Romany as poC.
I have a tendency to make the PoC wallpaper, unless they are the main characters. Then again, I tend to make all the supporting and bit players into wall-paper.
Define People of Color...
A couple of my co-authors class Middle-eastern people as PoC. I do not. My half-Greek&Lebanese step-sisters considered themselves white, because they weren't black. One also includes Jews, but again, not seeing it. Religion does not define your ethnicity.
Romany? I have no clue. Their features fall into "white-ethnic" for me, but my definition of "white-ethnic" is pretty broad and includes Mediterranian, Hispanic, Middle Eastern and most Indians.
So I decided to check myself before I wrecked myself.
Novels:
Nikolai has James Ligatos (Greek) talks to Iakobos, his cousin, thanking him for his help. James also talks to Stephen (African American) about Kentucky trying to secede from the Confederated States and their estimated travel time. He also talks to Benta (Israeli) in Rome, but we do not hear their conversation. (It can be assumed it is about matters of great importance, since he runs North America for her) NikoChan includes Kenyans, Indians, Brazilians, Japanese and other PoC who talk to each other about uprisings, weather satellites, and all the other minutae of running a world.
Alive on the Inside has a few of people of color: Ming Xia, Nagina, Marvello, Marie Leveau. But they interact mostly with the white main character, from whose POV the story is told. (one white character even freaks out over talking to Marie Leveau, partly because the woman is black)
Privateer's Treasure has a cast with a lot of PoC, including an interracial main romance. The men talk to each other about piracy and sailing and all the other business of their lives. The Moroccan and the Barbadan (?) talk of many things including sex and torture. OTOH, this one fails the Bechdel most egregiously, since there is only mention of two women.
Power in the Blood has a variety of PoC, including Gilgamesh, Josh (Judean), Samil (Issacharite), Martin Luther King Jr., and Lielit. None of them are main characters and they tend to not talk to each other. Again, white PoV character.
Hard Reboot, mostly white, mostly Celtic. (My co-author griped that everyone was Anglo. I told him that of the 8 main characters, ONE was Anglo. We had 2 Israelis, and 5 Irish, of varying descent) There is color on the streets--a black cyborg bounty hunter, Thai whores, Chinese workers, etc., but the book is focused on Sean O'Neill and his wife, Tara McLean, and the abuses the powerful people are committing in their lives. For Sean, only Tara and his brother Niall are really real, the rest of the world is wall-paper.
Spellbound Desire: Demarco Jackson, head of the Memphis combat mages, Officer Thomas (sister of his vice-president), Galena Ortiz of Las Quatras Brujas, a Tejano combat mage unit. The old Polynesian tattoo artist. Saraphina, the Romany landlady. But again, they mostly talk to the (white, Scottish) hero who is in town to fight his ancient foe. And of course, being Memphis, there is a lot of local wall-paper color, people not important to the romance or combat plot, who move through our characters' lives.
Curse of the Pharaoh's Manicurists: touchy. There are Egyptians, if you consider them PoC. They talk about their work, and about Charlie (white, American), on whom they are working. They're getting him ready to meet Osiris...
Glad Hands: Native American. Several Cherokee, including the main character. High Chief Mankiller gives Chuck a job. Fred Half-Moon (Crow) loses his temper. Stan (Mohawk) gives Chuck directions. John Littlefeather and Chuck talk. Charles and Linda Hummingbird talk to their son about Charles making partner at the ad agency, Linda's altar guild, the international incident he caused. Hannah talks to Chuck about her due date. Mother Vivian talks about God, interpretations, weddings and her wife's pregnancy. Dr. Singh lectures Chuck.
Shell-shocked: wall-paper. The clerk at the local grocery, a DHS inspector.
Heart of a Forest: set in 1216 England hinterlands. No PoC to be seen
(coming in Feb)
Barbarossa's Bitch: the Wildpack is a mixed batch, including an Apache courier, a black former boxer, a black woodcarver, a Hispanic who named himself after Juan Malverde. An older black man and his younger Hispanic lover, the black leader of a rival wildpack. But it is shown almost exclusively through the eyes of the lead character. Therefore, when they aren't interacting with him, they're background. OTOH, our hero has three biracial daughters and we see the older teaching the younger the alphabet song and sign language.
(coming in May)
Heart's Bounty: Hevik is light-skinned mainstock human. Miho is somewhat darker Human+, Rejan is dark-skinned mainstock human. The three of them have an interesting BDSM scene. We also have exotics (humans with custom pigmentations, green, purple and blue) It's space opera, and Earth race doesn't apply.
Blackhall's Transtemporal Medicine Show:
Eliza and Cassius Masterson are a married couple. They talk about many things, including their babies and their jobs.
Fenyang is South African, Samira is Egyptian. They are having a romance.
Of my short stories:
"Sky-rat" has a black character who gets killed early. Fail
The painting Anthony does in "Frosted Hearts" is multi-ethnic, but we never see the models except as wall-paper, helping him move the canvases. Partial Fail (2,3)
"Master Bear" has an ethnically (and observantly) Jewish top, and a black top. They both only interact with the two white main characters. (like the other tops, they are being "auditioned") Fail (2,3)
"Pushing the boundaries of Reality" has the same Israeli enterpreneurs as Hard Reboot. They talk about many things, from the new experiments to the ethnically Celtic woman they are both dating. Pass
"Eight Days Ablaze," our heroine and her family are Israeli and British living in the US. They talk about family stuff and pretty much avoid talking about the one white boy in the story. Pass
Samil, the Issacharite, puts in an appearance in "Between Despair and Ecstasy," but mainly interacts with his new white servant. Fail
Tamas Vardo and his cousins in "The Devil's Children" are Romany. (again, debateable as to whether this is PoC) One is dark enough to be mistaken for biracial. Pass
Hester in "Experiments" is 1/4 black. She interacts with her white owner and the Irish twins he has for his experiment. Fail.
Frank Stett in the Cliff Cody stories is a Caribbean black man, whose family still practices Voudoun out on World Four. He is, unfortunately, heroically dead at the beginning of "Plumbing the Depths" leaving hsi two white husbands to figure out how to continue without him. He is much more active in "Pride of the Rangers," the first of the Cliff Cody stories. "A Taste for Knowledge" needs more work. Fail.
The Adventuresses collection has a missing scene from "Burning for Eight Days," which has more Adina, but it's a lesbian sex scene with a holographic Janis Joplin. "That Time They Talk About" has our black main character interacting with a Hispanic gunslinger. "Rewriting Old Songs", "Change of Plans" and "Still Rolling" have a Cherokee lead character, but she mostly interacts with her white lover. "Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch" has a half-Cherokee Mother-in-law, making all of Amanda's kids 1/8th. Grandma and granddaughters talk. Grandma and grandson talk about zombies and how well he did fighting them. 6/10 stories have PoC, and 2 pass the test.
Into Dark Waters (revised): "Tuition Fees" has a multi-ethnic cast, but we see almost none of their stories. Again the wall-paper problem. "Hunger for the Edge" has a lead PoC, a blind Creole vampire. "Blood Rubies" gives us Samil from Privateer Plundered, but most of the people around him are ethnic white. "Serpants" has an Arabic and an Indian lead. There are a few white soldiers in the story, but most of the cast is Indian. 11 stories, 4 with active PoC. One passes.
Of the 13 stories in Riding the Nightmare none pass. Only 5 have PoC, and that's only if you count Romany as poC.
I have a tendency to make the PoC wallpaper, unless they are the main characters. Then again, I tend to make all the supporting and bit players into wall-paper.
