When Fantasy Meets Africa

The roaring success of the recent Black Panther film is another sign that fantasy worlds are changing. The fictional African country of Wakanda as portrayed in Marvel comic books has been isolated and stagnant, a common problem with "Othering" of non-white cultures. The plot of the film addresses its isolationist past and in doing so, blazes a trail for other fantasy universes in how they portray African-like nations.

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[h=3]Marvel Deals With its "Other"[/h]Othering is a process in which other cultures are viewed through a biased lens of exoticism and isolationism. These cultures are not integrated into the world but are rather static, often amalgamating a region's various cultures into one homogeneous mass. The culture may be portrayed as never having advanced beyond what defines it as exotic.

Any world creation will likely be influence by the beliefs of the time, and many fantasy worlds -- Marvel's superhero universe included -- paint different cultures with broad strokes for white audiences as a form of shorthand. This is how we got Wakanda as a technologically-advanced culture that never fully engaged with the horrors of war that have rocked the world at large. As Nate Jones puts it:

It refuses to trade with other nations, though as one line in the movie makes clear, Wakandans are still able to consume American memes. As we see in a Western television broadcast in the movie, Wakanda is able to get away with this by masquerading as an impoverished third-world country, and since the country’s leadership refuses to take international aid, the rest of the world doesn’t ask too many questions.

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The plot of Black Panther addresses this isolationism -- a byproduct of "othering" Wakanda as a a fictional nation in Africa -- head on, and makes it clear that the Marvel Cinematic Universe plans to integrate Wakanda into its narrative like any other nation. It's a bold choice that will likely change the static nature of Wakanda forever. Role-playing games face a similar dilemma.
[h=3]RPGs and Africa[/h]There hasn't been a great track record in nuanced representation of African nations in tabletop role-playing games. G.A. Barber uses Rifts Africa by Palladium as an example:

...with a decided lack of POC in the art, and the entire continent serves as a place for non-Africans to adventure in. There are 67 interior pictures in Rifts Africa, of which 54 depict non-Africans or landscape, and 13 depict Africans. The first picture with Africans in it has them acting as porters for a white game hunter. Four of the pictures (just under 25% of the pictures depicting Africans) depict Africans as monsters. None of the pictures show Africans using modern or futuristic technology or weapons, none of them are of Africans fighting monsters or “looking cool”. In a single book, ostensibly about Africa, only 19% of the pictures show Africans (omission), and the few depictions of them make it clear they are there as set dressing and nothing more (stereotypes and limited roles).

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Dungeons & Dragons has slowly, steadily, been addressing this issue. Fifth Edition has made efforts to be more inclusive, and that reflects in the diversity of character art. The lead image for the human race in the Player's Handbook is of a black woman. And yet, D&D still struggles with its broad strokes representation of African nations, as the controversy over the depiction of Chult demonstrates in Tomb of Annihilation:

Its point of inspiration is a campaign setting that, for years, has been written off as tone-deaf. The new adventure draws on D&D co-creator Gary Gygax’s adventure Tomb of Horrors and combines that with source material detailing Chult, a jungle peninsula first conceived of in a 1992 novel called The Ring of Winter, in which an adventurer travels to Chult’s dinosaur-filled wilderness seeking the eponymous artifact...The canonical Chultan peninsula finally congealed in a 1993 campaign setting as a dinosaur-infested jungle where heat wiped out even the strongest adventurers and insects carried fatal diseases. Reptilian races and undead skeletons dominate the land and humans live in tribal clusters and clans. Its major city, Mezro, “rivals some of the most ‘civilized’ population centers in Faerun,” the setting reads. Slavery is mentioned about 40 times. In D&D’s 3rd edition, it’s written that Chultan priest-kings worship “strange deities” in the city of Mezro. In D&D’s 4th edition, Chult is located on what’s called the “Savage Coast.” It’s said there that the city of Port Nyanzaru is controlled by foreign traders who often must defend against pirates. Mezro has collapsed. It just sank into the abyss. What remains is this: “Human civilization is virtually nonexistent here, though an Amnian colony and a port sponsored by Baldur’s Gate cling to the northern coasts, and a few tribes—some noble savages, others depraved cannibals—roam the interior.”

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Tomb of Annihilation works hard to create a more comprehensive African culture in Chult, but it may suffer from not enough nuance:

While many players I talked to enjoyed how the history and political structures of Chult were expanded in Tomb of Annihilation (and enjoyed the adventure’s plot generally), they were still unimpressed by its execution. Its setting is an amalgamation of African cultures, a trope frequent in 20th century media that flattens the dimensionality of human experiences on the continent, which contains hundreds of ethnic groups. There are nods to West African voodoo, Southern African click-based Khoisan languages, East African attire (like Kenyan kofia hats) and the jungle climate of Central Africa. Its fantasy setting dissolves “Africa” into an all-in-one cultural stew that comes off as a little detached, sources I interviewed said.

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Is it possible to depict a more nuanced fantasy Africa? Nyambe: African Adventures for 3.5 D&D, by Christopher Dolunt, offers some hope:

My motivation for creating Nyambe was simple. Africa was a major part of the Earth that has little or no representation in fantasy literature, let alone RPGs. When it does appear, it usually follows the pulp fiction model: steaming jungles, bloodthirsty cannibals, and dark gods long forgotten by the civilized races. Of course, historical Africa was nothing like that, so my goal for Nyambe was to create a fantasy version of Africa based on the actual history and mythology of Africa, rather than previous fantasy depictions. So, I went about taking snippets of history or myth, and twisting them, adding fantasy elements or changing specifics to make them fit into an OGL world.

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[h=3]Now What?[/h]Wizards of the Coast made considerable strides in increasing D&D's diverse representation and transitioning Chult from conquered land to fantasy nation, but there's still work to do. As more people of color play D&D, the game will need to change to accommodate its players' diverse views. With Black Panther leading the way, here's hoping future game designers will take note.

Mike "Talien" Tresca is a freelance game columnist, author, communicator, and a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to http://amazon.com. You can follow him at Patreon.

 

[Erdric Dragin]

There's an old adage to writing, and it's extremely simple and wise.

"Write what you know."

If you don't personally know and lived experiences of certain cultures and/or peoples for a very long period of time...you probably have no business writing with them as the subject of any writing (except research).

I know a woman writer who was going to write a historical fiction on the City of Cahokia, but she couldn't get around the fact that she was a white woman writing about a distinct culture that didn't belong to her and one she can easily slip into misrepresenting at moments in her story. She thought about doing a ton of research to validate her writing, but ultimately she realized it wasn't her place. She had great ideas, but at the possible expense of appropriation and misrepresentation. It just wasn't worth it.

 

[Gradine]

I think I can sum up my objection to that by saying that I don't think there are experiences that are universal to all black women. To believe otherwise is to create a stereotype out of the phrase "black woman" and one that is likely both negative and false. There might be experiences that are common to most black women in a particular place and time, whether to a majority or to a plurality. But any experience absolutely universal to that group would be one universal enough to extend beyond it as well, by virtue of our common humanity.

You seem to be unable or unwilling to separate "identity" and "stereotype". There's a pretty significant difference. I would say that as, presumably, non-black women, neither one of us really has the right to say for certain which is reality. I would say that most of the black women I know, have met, and have read have all concurred that there are experiences only black women face because of the facts that they are facts and are women. You'll hopefully forgive me that I'm more inclined to trust them on this than you.

Any quibbling about the meaning of the term "universal" semantics. Perhaps near-universal is the better turn of phrase but the existence of exceptions to any absolute in this regard should be taken as a given.

I would also not assert that though the experience of childbirth is exclusive to women, that it was so extraordinary in its uniqueness that it could not be understood or written about by a man. (And I'm using childbirth here precisely because I consider that there is no possible human experience more extraordinary and exclusive, so that no greater example could be given.)

I know several people who've given birth who would take exception to this, as well. I happen to be married to one of them. That wouldn't stop me from writing a story that contained child-birth, but I wouldn't presume to write a story from the perspective of a woman giving birth, because while I could intellectualize the experience by hearing and reading enough of those stories, I've still never felt them myself.

Nor in particular would I ever assert that there was something about being black that was as different from being white as the self-evident differences between men and women. The contrary position strikes me as overtly racist.

This is the crux, I believe, of your misunderstanding. You are absolutely correct that there are no inherent differences based on race (or really any other type of identity, save those grounded in biological reality, such as biological sex or maybe disability). The difference comes from how people are treated. Both as individuals by other individuals, and as an entire group by systems that are either inherently inequal (see: the U.S. criminal justice system and police bias) or that are technically equal but have failed to account or correct for historic inequities (see: U.S. housing policy and redlining). You can and many certainly do argue against these truths, but the data and historical facts are there and they do not lie and their conclusions are plainly obvious.

The common counter-argument, that these things all happen to (primarily impoverished) white people too, is true, but it ignores the fact (and again, decades of data) that they happen to people of color at well beyond statistically significant rates, across all social and economic classes. Class certainly plays a significant role, but far from the only one.

This is the sort of statement that makes me think we are not so far apart, and it is the sort of concession or viewpoint that removes my objection. But, as a precondition of being able to understand an experience, I must have some common experience with them. If I have no frame of reference in common, then I can never empathize with their experiences. I can't possible empathize with seeing something blue, if I've never seen anything blue. If someone tells me about the delight of eating a ripe mango, fresh picked from the tree, I can't fully sympathize unless I've done that very thing myself, but I can't empathize at all without knowledge of ripe fruit, sweetness, hunger, and so forth. If I have knowledge of ripe fruit picked fresh from the tree, sweetness in your mouth, juice dripping down the chin, and hunger satiated then even if I never eat the mango, I'm together with them in that place. (Full disclosure, I've eat a lot of ripe mangos.)

I reject this conclusion. You can quite easily understand and empathize with an experience you've never (and will likely never) personal had/ve. It will never be the totally perfect understanding that the individual who actually experienced it has, but certainly enough to empathize with. You yourself have castigated me in this very thread for not bothering to empathize with a position I've never experienced and couldn't comprehend(rightfully so, I'll add). But I like to think we've come closer to understanding and empathizing with one another, even if we haven't necessarily come any closer towards agreement.

 

[Gradine]

There's an old adage to writing, and it's extremely simple and wise.

"Write what you know."

If you don't personally know and lived experiences of certain cultures and/or peoples for a very long period of time...you probably have no business writing with them as the subject of any writing (except research).

I know a woman writer who was going to write a historical fiction on the City of Cahokia, but she couldn't get around the fact that she was a white woman writing about a distinct culture that didn't belong to her and one she can easily slip into misrepresenting at moments in her story. She thought about doing a ton of research to validate her writing, but ultimately she realized it wasn't her place. She had great ideas, but at the possible expense of appropriation and misrepresentation. It just wasn't worth it.

This is a better way of saying what I was trying to say earlier. Your friend might have done some great research and actually written a story was and might have even written the story with the appropriate level of respect and honor towards the culture, but it still wouldn't have been her story to tell. To say nothing of the ethical ramifications of publishing and consequentially earning a profit off the backs of a culture and story you don't own.

 

[Celebrim]

Rather than continue dealing with useless generalities, let's get really specific.

Alex Haley wrote the work 'Roots' about his heritage as a black man living in the United States. The work had a monumental impact on how Americans perceived the black experience in the United States and I heard many testimonies from whole generation of black men about how important the book and resulting TV mini-series was in their perception of themselves.

The problem is that it is a trivial matter to show that Alex Haley lied in every particular about the novel. He did not do the research he claimed he did. Anyone that does do the research will quickly find that the evidence he claims to have had, either does not exist or in fact directly contradicts and makes impossible the claimed events of the novel. Worse, not only is it entirely a work of fiction, but vast swaths of the novel - including all the most well remembered and most impactful scenes - are lifted almost verbatim from a earlier novel called 'The African'. Some 180 passages of the book roots were plagiarized from that earlier work, and this was so obvious that Alex Haley was forced to settle lawsuit with the author of 'The African' admitting to the plagiarism. In fact, it was so bad that they'd found manuscripts where Haley had stapled pages of 'The African' to his work to aid as a reference. Moreover, it is the opinion of many who have read both works, that the characters of 'The African' are more nuanced, complexly drawn, and authentic than the characters of 'Roots'. Where changes were made, it was often to throw out real historical detail, or elements that made the characters more human and more realistic. For Haley's work, it suited him better to create characters of transcendent nobility and courage, even if this meant sanding off the sort of things that made the character human.

The author of 'The African' is Harold Courlander. He is a white man.

I think this leaves us with a really difficult and complicated question. Of these two, which author, had more right to the story about a particular fictional black man - Alex Haley or Harold Courlander? Which treated the historical source material more respectfully? Which was more honest? Who had in fact done the greater research to be able to reach back through time and place himself in the place of a black slave? If in fact, Harold Courlander had no right to the story and if in fact he wrote a story lacking in power owing to his inability to understand a black slave, why did Alex Haley plagiarize his work? Is 'Harold Courlander' guilty of cultural appropriation, and so we excuse the theft? Should we tell 'Harold Courlander', "Don't write about African slaves; write what you know?", and if we are bold enough to tell him that by that same standard shouldn't we tell Alex Haley that?

 

[Rygar]

There's an old adage to writing, and it's extremely simple and wise.

"Write what you know."

If you don't personally know and lived experiences of certain cultures and/or peoples for a very long period of time...you probably have no business writing with them as the subject of any writing (except research).

I know a woman writer who was going to write a historical fiction on the City of Cahokia, but she couldn't get around the fact that she was a white woman writing about a distinct culture that didn't belong to her and one she can easily slip into misrepresenting at moments in her story. She thought about doing a ton of research to validate her writing, but ultimately she realized it wasn't her place. She had great ideas, but at the possible expense of appropriation and misrepresentation. It just wasn't worth it.

To be clear, are you asserting that no one should be allowed to write anything unless they are specifically a member of the target race and culture? To what degree does this go? Is the earlier Harry Potter example disallowed? As an American, can I write a story set in Berlin? Am I allowed to write a story set in California if I'm from a different state? Can I write a story about the French if I'm British? Am I allowed to write stories that include redheads if I'm blonde?

 

[Gradine]

Rather than continue dealing with useless generalities, let's get really specific.

On the contrary, the generalities are what are pretty important in this conversation. Your specific example, meanwhile, is pointless, a single exception you seem to think disproves the general rule. Yes, Harold Courlander was a person who did a remarkable amount of research in the lived experiences of black Americans and wrote with exceptional respect and honor to those experiences. He was also a white man who, by and large, made his living telling the stories of black people. That is, at best, an ethical gray area. One might make the argument that his lifes' work amounted to more good than harm, and I certainly wouldn't take that away from him.

And yes, Alex Haley plagiarized him when writing Roots. Unless that has ruined things for all black people everywhere forever, I'm not really sure what your point is bringing that up. I do know many black people who still see within Roots their stories (or at the very least, the stories of their ancestors) and point to it as a cultural artifact (both as a novel and through the multiple TV miniseries) that is, essentially, black stories told by black artists, and still powerful for that very reason.

Again, unless your point is that Courlander broke the "black ceiling" and Haley ruined all black peoples' claim to being able to tell their own stories as black people, I can't see any real point to this digression.

 

[Gradine]

To be clear, are you asserting that no one should be allowed to write anything unless they are specifically a member of the target race and culture? To what degree does this go? Is the earlier Harry Potter example disallowed? As an American, can I write a story set in Berlin? Am I allowed to write a story set in California if I'm from a different state? Can I write a story about the French if I'm British? Am I allowed to write stories that include redheads if I'm blonde?

The answer to all of these questions is, of course yes, but you knew that, because that was the point of these strawmen arguments.

We've been speaking in generals, but sure, let's get to specifics. If you are American, yes, you can write a story about a frenchman. If you are white in America, no, you should probably not write a story about being black in America. If I have to explain the difference to you, you probably haven't been reading this thread very critically.

But what the hell, while I'm here. There are plenty of cultures, primarily (but not exclusively) non-white, that been colonized by cultures that are primarily (but not exclusively) white. They have had their narratives and their histories ripped them, and many continue, to this day, to exist in the minds of most people strictly as lazy and mostly negative stereotypes. Even if you do your research and present the topic as well as you possibly can, there still exists the fact that you are stealing the narrative that doesn't belong to you from people whose narratives were historically stolen by people who look an awful lot like you. If it's important enough for you that the story be told, why not instead spend your energy signal boosting the people who are telling those stories because they actually belong to them?

 

[Eltab]

If you don't personally know and lived experiences of certain cultures and/or peoples for a very long period of time...you probably have no business writing with them as the subject of any writing (except research).

Holding to this guideline as you explain it, would prevent most anthropology-, history-, and archeology- -based novels from reaching the publishing stage.
It would serve to prevent people from learning about the experiences (pleasant or otherwise) of others, rather than increasing understanding of those experiences.

 

[Eltab]

by people who look an awful lot like you.

... but who were NOT me.

You are effectively demanding that the sons be punished for the sins of their fathers.

 

[Gradine]

... but who were NOT me.

You are effectively demanding that the sons be punished for the sins of their fathers.

I'm demanding nothing. I'm asking you to accept the historical realities that have put white people in a position of privilege over colonized and/or enslaved people, realities that have yet to be fully addressed and corrected. Until they have been, until full equity has been achieved, no, I don't think it's particularly appropriate for a white person to tell and sell the story of a colonized culture.

Do you have any arguments to any of my other points? Or did you expect trotted out the tired line of "Well I didn't own any slaves" would completely erase the realities of inequity today and totally invalidate everything else I said?