Blogger: Etta Wilson
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I’ve just filled out the Census Form, providing vital information, and I’m eager to hear the compiled results telling how people, both citizens and non-citizens, define their race and language. We know the ethnic mix in the US is greater than it has been in years, perhaps since the early years of the twentieth century when wars and political imprisonment slowed the process of people coming to our shores.
For those of us who write fiction, we face the decision of our characters’ nationality. If we follow the adage, “Write what you know,” then we look at our own heritage and current situation. But a character from a different culture and background can often be a lively element and make the mix exciting.
How do we communicate the specific qualities that tell readers about a character’s ethnicity? How do we use those unique traits to make a character memorable, yet at the same time someone with basic human motivations that readers want to read about? And how do we avoid stereotyping our character’s ethnicity? What place and time period are we using for our stories and what are or were the racial tensions at that point?
Thinking about a character’s racial and national background is important before we start to write. It’s too easy to create characters just like ourselves. I think we may have too many white-bread stories, when our readers are actually becoming more of a mixed bag. Of course, writing about a heritage not our own will require some research, some immersion outside our own bathtub–and that’s not a bad thing!
“Immersion” is your key observation, first for research and then to develop friendships so we have someone from the other culture to read our rough drafts and look for red flags. This is probably the artistic question I have grappled with most, going back to the late ’60s when ethnic studies classes first appeared on the scene. There are also differences between cultures in how well they can show up within the limitations of the English language. For example, Zora Neale Hurston achieves an excellent rendition of African-American dialects, but I don’t believe anyone has done the same for the Spanish-background dialects of English in the USA, nor ever will. The problem comes from disconnects between the sound-systems and the orthography.
I agree completely, Etta. Readers (especially the young) want characters with whom they can identify, which includes ones who look like them and celebrate similar cultural values. White-bread characters communicate that books are for white people. But for readers to identify, the characters must feel authentic, not merely stereotypes. I would want to spend a lot of time with people of that ethic group before writing and get some good manuscript critique from them after. Building a trust relationship that will give honest feedback on my writing can be a challenge.
Hmn. In response to your comments, LeAnne, I’m sort of on the fence on this one. Getting feedback up to a point can be helpful. At the same time, I think it’s important to recognize profound political, social, cultural and even age-related divisions that can occur in any given “ethnic group.” It would be like asking a random Anglo-American to crit a manuscript set by a foreign author in the USA: a 50 year-old rural conservative Christian from the Bible belt, and a 20 year-old gay agnostic from San Franscisco are likely to have different views of American identity. If you don’t believe me, just clock in on an online news forum sometime, and watch the vitriol fly.
I’ve found this to very true in my current work-in-progress set in the USSR (when there was a USSR): Russians have sharply divided views of Stalin’s years in power. To give as honest a picture as possible, I’ve chosen to have different characters reflect the different viewpoints, ranging from stark black-and-white to subtle gray.
My suggestion is that when you solicit feedback, try to find people who appear to have balanced judgment, and then remember that they will inevitably carry their own prejudices and personal quirks, just as you carry yours. Because at the end of the day, you’re still going to have to make up your mind for yourself.
Brian, it’s interesting to see the reference to Zora Neale Hurston whom I haven’t read in a long time. Her rendition of dialect was certainly good for her time, but I wonder what 21st century readers would think. In light of the huge success of “The Help” they might have no trouble at all!
Thanks for great observations about how language from other cultures may or may not translate to English. I just today read that the Portuguese had no word for “temptation” and thus had difficulty translating the Lord’s Prayer.
Actually, I was scared to death to answer the Census race question. Some of my ancestors came to the “new world” in the 1600s, some of my ancestors were already in North America when the first colonists came, so my family is very mixed in race and ethnicity. However, on my mom’s side we are partly of Jewish heritage, and I really, really don’t want any federal government to have a record of that. My brother saw pictures of WWII extermination camp prisoners, one of whom was – in appearance – a double of my mother. Thus I decided to answer “AMERICAN” for my race.
I love to write about ethnic groups, love to study various ethnic backgrounds for my characters. I always do intensive language studies for my novels to understand my ethnic characters more fully, but I DON’T want my government or ANY government snooping into my heritage. IT’S NONE OF THEIR BUSINESS!
Etta, I think there will always be appreciation for writing done as well as Hurston, and likely ignominy for those who try it and can’t quite pull it off.
On your temptation example, the general principle is true (almost every year, I teach the pertinent lesson for the Perspectives on the World Christian Movement course), but I’m curious about this specific example. I’ve been working on Portuguese since two of my children married Brazilians. Both translations I looked at (O Livro and João Ferreira de Almeida Atualizada) use “tentação” for Matthew 6:13 and 26:41. Google Language Tools translates it as “enticement, temptation, seduction, snare.” I’m wondering if the translator worried about some additional meaning the word carries in Portuguese that presented a possible misinterpretation. I have heard of languages that had no word for “forgiveness.”
Lucy (and anyone interested in Russia) if you haven’t read Katherine Shonk’s short story collection,The Red Passport, get thee yonder and find a copy. Her “The Young People of Moscow,” about generational differences in post-Soviet Russia, may be my all-time favorite short story.
What a great post. It really makes one think. As to the census, I wish there was a “mutt” category. My heritage is so vast and my world experiences so much more, that they simply cannot be defined as “American”, “Caucasian” or “White”. The world is way bigger than those words.
And in my experiences, even sharing a backyard border with other equally lumped White Americans does not mean I am ANYTHING at all like them.
To use a stereotype is the death of good writing.
I was interested to read this blog post because I am writing a middle grade boy book with two African American main characters. They don’t have complex linguistic issues, they are just regular first-ring-suburban boys who solve mysteries.
I have wondered whether it is politically correct for me to be writing them, not being African American myself, but as a teacher I know many boys similar to these characters, and think that I can successfully do the job.
After reading The Help, I was encouraged, as Stockett is white, but she had a main character who was also white. Would her book have been as readily accepted if all the main characters were black?
LaVinda, it was true a few years ago that many editors felt African American stories should be written by African Americans, but that is no longer true. My Julius Lester quote was from his book in which he recanted the earlier position. This relaxing of opinions probably indicates the general US racial melding. For writers the questions is how to retain the good and interesting cultural qualities at the same time that we may be losing the uniqueness of language. Sort of tricky!
Thank you for responding to my post, Etta. I had set that project aside because I was unsure of how it would be received. Now I can proceed with confidence!