Sensitivity Writers. AKA: avoiding cultural appropriate in writing

[Umbran]

I would argue that this is what the concept of cultural appropriation does and why it is such a flawed idea.

Right. So, you think we are already good at respecting the creative forces of minority cultures, then?

 

[Bedrockgames]

A person like this who enters into the markeplace of art, and is actually successful enough for their intellectual borrowing to be noticed, but doesn't understand that you can't just take any old snippets, phrasings, themes, or styles that you want without issue? A person who gets into the marketplace of ideas, but doesn't have any concept of ownership of ideas?

My example was about emulating a style though, not about taking a snippet (which is why I said sampling would be another topic entirely). It is also why I talked about musical scales.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Right. So, you think we are already good at respecting the creative forces of minority cultures, then?

What I am saying is, the concept of cultural approbation is chasing an ideal, a perfect end state, at the expense of art and creativity. Further, I think it actually makes respecting the creative forces of minority cultures worse, for the reasons I laid out previously (it leads to less real cultural interaction and dampens our ability to empathize). Instead it puts people into cultural boxes and makes it very difficult for people to cross cultural lines. So I think this idea of the perfect way to handle creative elements from cultures outside your own is an example of the perfect being the enemy of the good.

I think the idea of cultural appropropriation is one of these things that is appealing if you are versed in a certain level of academic discussion. But once it gets into the real world, you start seeing plentiful examples of how it leads to a breakdown in creativity. And how it becomes a bludgeon for people to go after one another (like in the YA Twitter talked about in the article linked above). And that we are at the level where we have to hire consultants just to vet for cultural appropriation issues, then I think that shows just how impractical the concept really is (especially for an industry like RPGs where the money really isn't there for those kinds of things in the vast majority of cases).

 

[Bedrockgames]

Does this person actually exist? Because, if they don't, it is a hypothetical that distracts us from the real issue. And... such hypotheticals are really quite common in online argument today.

Yes, people like this actually exist. I think it is quite common.

 

[billd91]

I would argue that this is what the concept of cultural appropriation does and why it is such a flawed idea.

This is not unique to cultural appropriation. It's common to just about anything wielded by some whose zeal isn't leavened by experience with nuance. You see it everywhere, particularly with recent converts to religion, diets, analytical frameworks, and political ideologies.

 

[Bedrockgames]

This is not unique to cultural appropriation. It's common to just about anything wielded by some whose zeal isn't leavened by experience with nuance. You see it everywhere, particularly with recent converts to religion, diets, analytical frameworks, and political ideologies.

Except the concept itself kind of demands perfect. I think there is something religious about it. And the way it gets used for the most part is very aggressively as a way to attack people (often folks who didn't set out to hurt anybody at all, but just didn't follow the latest etiquette on the subject). Maybe I am wrong, but genuinely think that in 10 or 20 years people will look back on this concept as see it as deeply misguided. It has led to a lot of problems in creative communities. You don't have to agree with me, but I do think it is worth looking at the article Mercurius linked, and consider our points, and think about the possibility that we are right. I have definitely contemplated the possibility I am wrong on this. I don't take this issue lightly. But I think a lot of people who have picked up cultural appropriation as a rallying cry, are doing so with an amount of certainty and a sense of moral authority that makes me very uneasy.

And I think the class/education divide issue I bring up around it is also very real, and very overlooked

 

[Bedrockgames]

Good post.

Even aside from issues of cultural appropriation--although related to it, if in a more general sense--there's the concern every artist has, in whatever genre or medium, which is: "Has this been done before?" For example, if you're a budding science fiction writer and you have this great idea that you're certain no one has ever thunked before, chances are you're wrong - or at least that someone has thought of and probably published a very similar idea.

This is why I feel that originality has more to do with authenticity than it does novelty. A new author should be more concerned with being true to their own voice, their own vision, than they should with making sure that everything they write hasn't been done before in any shape or form. Of course being well-read in the genre, or at least spending hours and hours browsing The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction helps a good deal. While I'm loathe to suggest any rules or "Thou Shalts" to creative practices, I do think being a student of whatever form you're engaging in is a very good idea. And a true student is a lifelong learner.

Of course this does relate to cultural appropriation in that just as a new science fiction author is well-served by educating themselves in the genre, so too might it be a good idea for someone incorporating cultural ideas into their project to have a sense of that culture and any issues that may exist, and to be respectful of those issues. But if a person wants to entirely avoid any inkling of "cultural appropriation," then the end result is writing from one's own experience - as this article posits - which ends up greatly limiting, if not outright killing, creative imagination. To quote:

"But it’s not just writers who ought to be worried. The logical apogee of a prohibition on cultural intercourse is a future in which each person is allowed to document only his or her precise subjective experience. A future, in other words, where fiction is history. And that sounds like a very dreary prospect for us all."

The one thing I would add to this is there is a big difference to this and other 'though shalt' practices in writing. Knowing the genre you are writing for is important and people place a lot of emphasis on it, but it isn't viewed as a moral transgression if your writing shows a lack of awareness of a given trope being handled in a particular way another writer in the 1970s. And even then there are writers operating at different levels of awareness on this stuff because there is room for 'high' and 'low' in most genres. Some writers are adept at writing engaging and exciting stories, but might not have the literary grounding of some of their peers.

 

[S'mon]

just as a new science fiction author is well-served by educating themselves in the genre

Why's that?

 

[Bedrockgames]

Why's that?

There was a time when I wanted to be a horror writer and this same advice was pretty common. I ended up building myself a syllabus and reading through key books in the genre that I hadn't read before. I think it is basically so you don't cover the same ground as other writers, so you can build on what came before, and kind of treat the genre as a living conversation. I am not sure how I feel about the advice. I sometimes thought this advice made the genre too self aware, and too meta. But I also think the better writers do tend to read a lot in their genre and in other genres.

 

[billd91]

Except the concept itself kind of demands perfect. I think there is something religious about it.

This pretty much just tells me you are as bad with the nuance as the zealots who use it unwisely because you’re ascribing some kind of monolithic absolutism to it.