The UK was >92% white in 2001, and most of the students at Hogwarts are not named or assigned ethnicities at all. The most charitable thing I can say about this criticism of HP is that we have Americans looking at English fiction through the lens of contemporary US social movements, and saying some things that are kind of bonkers as a result.
Except most of the main characters are white, as well as the staff at Hogwarts and the Death Eaters and MoM etc and the series took place outside Hogwarts. The default in settings like this is being white, and this isn't simply an American thing. It's not like the UK hasn't got similar problems with race relations in the media.
Which is not related to JK Rowling mashing all North America into a single culture, which if true is certainly embarrassing. Having not read it I can't comment.
It is a separate issue to "The History of Magic in North America," though it is indirectly linked.
The UK was >92% white in 2001, and most of the students at Hogwarts are not named or assigned ethnicities at all. The most charitable thing I can say about this criticism of HP is that we have Americans looking at English fiction through the lens of contemporary US social movements, and saying some things that are kind of bonkers as a result.
Except most of the main characters are white, as well as the staff at Hogwarts and the Death Eaters and MoM etc and the series took place outside Hogwarts. The default in settings like this is being white, and this isn't simply an American thing. It's not like the UK hasn't got similar problems with race relations in the media.
Which is not related to JK Rowling mashing all North America into a single culture, which if true is certainly embarrassing. Having not read it I can't comment.
It is a separate issue to "The History of Magic in North America," though it is indirectly linked.
So your criticism is that JK Rowling... accurately reflected the demographics of the UK in her fiction? Or what?
JK Rowling has been accused of appropriating the “living tradition of a marginalised people” by writing about the Navajo legend of the skinwalker in a new story.
The Harry Potter author posted the first part of a four-part series, the History of Magic in North America on her website Pottermore, on Tuesday. Subsequent episodes are being published each day at 2pm until Friday. Tying in to the release in November of the film Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, the short piece of writing deals with the magical New World in the 14th to 17th centuries.
Although the new insights into the universe of Harry Potter were welcomed by many, the author was strongly criticised online by a number of voices from Native American communities, particularly over her writing about skinwalkers, which in Navajo legend are said to be evil witches or wizards who can take on the form of animals.
Sigh. She just shouldn’t have touched North America if she was going to gloss over everything that makes this part of the world what it is — the grotesque along with the sweet. This is who we are, for better or worse. Our history — all Americans’ history — needs respect, not pablum and stereotypes.
I’m a HP fan. It’s been tough over the years, as I’ve realized just how representationally flawed the books are (the real UK is far, far more diverse than Hogwarts, for example), but mostly I stuck it out for the seven books. Hadn’t paid attention to the whole Pottermore thing before now, though, because tooth-gritting frustration does not make for lifelong loyalty, surprisingly. But my interest in HP could’ve been reawakened by good worldbuilding. That would’ve shown me that Rowling has grown in the years since the books’ end, and that her afterthoughts are sincere, if belated. Also, this could’ve made for a much better story.
"Representationally flawed"?
Uh
Look, the HP books were written in the beginning as literally a writeup of the bedtime stories a broke single mother living in social housing told her kids. They're not escapist just as some kind of cynical marketing move. They're escapist because they were being told to children who needed an escape.
My reading of that particular point is that it's about ethnicity/race (and possibly other minority identity groups). I don't think having a larger percentage of non-white students at Hogwarts would have taken away from the books' function as escapism.
Yeah sure of course that's true. I'm just making the point that the story was created a completely different goal in mind. Like when I'm creating a story to tell my nephew about why it's a really good idea to use a pedestrian crossing instead of just running across the road, it has a magic zebra* in it because I want a way to introduce the zebra crossing concept, it does not have anything to say about how it's harder to live in Britain if you're an asian girl than if you're a white boy.
I think the HP stories do good work in dealing with the concept of privilege at all, because you can't help thinking "holy shit, it's definitely way better to be born a wizard than a stupid muggle" and that's a pretty damb good hook to start a discussion from at a level that even a young child can get a handle on.
And if you want to read that much into it, the whole "mudblood" thing is an additional pretty good (but safely neutral) way of illustrating that being racist is horrible and using racist privilege makes you a horrible person.
Yeah the thing HP does really well is sneak the idea of "bigotry is bad" along with a bunch of other good lessons into a children's story without it becoming a BIG DEAL in real life. Because she uses things that aren't a literal real world problem.
So instead of talking about how hating gays is bad, she talks about hating mudbloods is bad and kids and others pick up the lesson without any stupid kerfuffle.
The UK was >92% white in 2001, and most of the students at Hogwarts are not named or assigned ethnicities at all. The most charitable thing I can say about this criticism of HP is that we have Americans looking at English fiction through the lens of contemporary US social movements, and saying some things that are kind of bonkers as a result.
Except most of the main characters are white, as well as the staff at Hogwarts and the Death Eaters and MoM etc and the series took place outside Hogwarts. The default in settings like this is being white, and this isn't simply an American thing. It's not like the UK hasn't got similar problems with race relations in the media.
Which is not related to JK Rowling mashing all North America into a single culture, which if true is certainly embarrassing. Having not read it I can't comment.
It is a separate issue to "The History of Magic in North America," though it is indirectly linked.
So your criticism is that JK Rowling... accurately reflected the demographics of the UK in her fiction? Or what?
Since when has demographics defined any storytelling? She is free to make any characters whatever ethnicity or sexuality she wants - she's cool with Hermione being black. And it's not like that's stopped writers before. Besides, it's not like she didn't have minorities in Hogwarts, they just weren't as prominent characters.
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Captain Marcusnow arrives the hour of actionRegistered Userregular
edited March 2016
The State of the Art is a short story by Iain Banks, about the Culture finding Earth. It's excellent, and you should read it before clicking the spoilers below.
spoilers follow
I think it does a good job about explaining some of the downsides of the Culture. For one, Contact would rather destroy a planet than let it exist with the "wrong" views, if no one found out. Two, there's no hope in the Culture- they have nothing to look forward to in their hedonistic utopia, so there aren't any new inventions or ways of doing things. There's no future, just the present. And three, they have no problem with cannibalism.
I finished The Shadow Throne, second book of Shadow Campaigns series by Django Wexler.
Strange book, i read it quickly and i kinda enjoyed it, but everything in it just seems so mediocre, so i don't really know why i don't have a passion to criticise it more. Characters are two dimensional, the plot is not really interesting, the bad guys are boring, the world building is weak...
And yet, i would give it 6/10, and i don't know why.
I didn't enjoy the 2nd book all that much. I think it just started to get a little bit silly; for example
one of the characters is a woman, who disguised herself as a man after having run away from some kind of orphanage. Alright, I'll accept that in a Fantasy series and not think too hard about it, but in the 2nd book, you have another woman, from the same orphanage, doing the same thing.
Then there are the proper bad guys, working from the shadows being very generic
To me, the plot wasn't as strong as the 1st book, and it's sort of put me off from reading the 3rd book any time soon.
I started Everything's Eventual years ago and stopped when I got to the Dark Tower story because honestly I've never really wanted to start digging into that sprawling series. I roll my eyes in frustration whenever his other books bend over backwards to link up with DT stuff, and think it weakens them, but I finally got around to The Little Sisters Of Elluria. It was OK, but most of the other stories were better. 1408 is a very good haunted room story that manages to pack a lot of disturbing strangeness into its pages, and very much the sort of thing King does very well.
There are novels of his I love (Black House, The Shining), but his short stories get round the problem of his endings being a limp across the finish line and often feel like his stronger suit.
I started Everything's Eventual years ago and stopped when I got to the Dark Tower story because honestly I've never really wanted to start digging into that sprawling series. I roll my eyes in frustration whenever his other books bend over backwards to link up with DT stuff, and think it weakens them, but I finally got around to The Little Sisters Of Elluria. It was OK, but most of the other stories were better. 1408 is a very good haunted room story that manages to pack a lot of disturbing strangeness into its pages, and very much the sort of thing King does very well.
There are novels of his I love (Black House, The Shining), but his short stories get round the problem of his endings being a limp across the finish line and often feel like his stronger suit.
Now, imagine if the limp ending was actually three books out of a seven book series, and you have further reason to stay out of dark tower stuff. The first four are pretty good though. The first one would have been a really neat, focused stand-alone probably.
The UK was >92% white in 2001, and most of the students at Hogwarts are not named or assigned ethnicities at all. The most charitable thing I can say about this criticism of HP is that we have Americans looking at English fiction through the lens of contemporary US social movements, and saying some things that are kind of bonkers as a result.
Except most of the main characters are white, as well as the staff at Hogwarts and the Death Eaters and MoM etc and the series took place outside Hogwarts. The default in settings like this is being white, and this isn't simply an American thing. It's not like the UK hasn't got similar problems with race relations in the media.
Which is not related to JK Rowling mashing all North America into a single culture, which if true is certainly embarrassing. Having not read it I can't comment.
It is a separate issue to "The History of Magic in North America," though it is indirectly linked.
So your criticism is that JK Rowling... accurately reflected the demographics of the UK in her fiction? Or what?
Since when has demographics defined any storytelling? She is free to make any characters whatever ethnicity or sexuality she wants - she's cool with Hermione being black. And it's not like that's stopped writers before. Besides, it's not like she didn't have minorities in Hogwarts, they just weren't as prominent characters.
Sure, she could choose to do that. I just think it's strange to criticize her for not doing that. You can't say she's presenting an assumption of whiteness by accurately reflecting the ethnic composition of the place and time she's writing about. It's like criticizing a novel in Japan for having all the main characters be Japanese.
Again, I think this is part of importing American racial politics and assumptions about what diversity counts. Every British show I've watched lately has multiple major black characters, despite the fact that a whopping 3% of the UK is black. On the other hand, there's a distinct lack of Irish and central Asian characters. If you're adopting the American prism of race, in which the important divide is white/black, this seems natural. But if you want to properly represent traditionally marginalized groups in a British context, this doesn't make a lot of sense. If the concern is that Hogwarts is not demographically representative or diverse enough, we should be talking about why there are so few Irish characters, not so few nonwhite characters.
The UK was >92% white in 2001, and most of the students at Hogwarts are not named or assigned ethnicities at all. The most charitable thing I can say about this criticism of HP is that we have Americans looking at English fiction through the lens of contemporary US social movements, and saying some things that are kind of bonkers as a result.
Except most of the main characters are white, as well as the staff at Hogwarts and the Death Eaters and MoM etc and the series took place outside Hogwarts. The default in settings like this is being white, and this isn't simply an American thing. It's not like the UK hasn't got similar problems with race relations in the media.
Which is not related to JK Rowling mashing all North America into a single culture, which if true is certainly embarrassing. Having not read it I can't comment.
It is a separate issue to "The History of Magic in North America," though it is indirectly linked.
Actually, J.K. Rowlings specifically brought up the point a while back when a theater adaptation had cast a black woman as Hermione that she had never given her (or most other characters) an ethnicity. You're confusing the movies with the books.
You'll want to avoid his other book which apparently also features a white guy succeeding at everything through a story peppered with nostalgia references
Actually, J.K. Rowlings specifically brought up the point a while back when a theater adaptation had cast a black woman as Hermione that she had never given her (or most other characters) an ethnicity. You're confusing the movies with the books.
Unfortunately when writers do that it will default to white for the character most of the time, that's the down side to being 'color blind.'
Sure she's cool with Hermione being black, but that only happened with a stage play it wasn't said in the books (I don't recall her saying that was how she intended the character to be ala Dumbledore) and it sure didn't get into the movies. Movies which she had a ridiculous amount of control over which many authors don't with their adaptions. Nor did I see her bringing up any white characters being other ethnicities when the movies were going strong at the box office.
The UK was >92% white in 2001, and most of the students at Hogwarts are not named or assigned ethnicities at all. The most charitable thing I can say about this criticism of HP is that we have Americans looking at English fiction through the lens of contemporary US social movements, and saying some things that are kind of bonkers as a result.
Except most of the main characters are white, as well as the staff at Hogwarts and the Death Eaters and MoM etc and the series took place outside Hogwarts. The default in settings like this is being white, and this isn't simply an American thing. It's not like the UK hasn't got similar problems with race relations in the media.
Which is not related to JK Rowling mashing all North America into a single culture, which if true is certainly embarrassing. Having not read it I can't comment.
It is a separate issue to "The History of Magic in North America," though it is indirectly linked.
So your criticism is that JK Rowling... accurately reflected the demographics of the UK in her fiction? Or what?
Since when has demographics defined any storytelling? She is free to make any characters whatever ethnicity or sexuality she wants - she's cool with Hermione being black. And it's not like that's stopped writers before. Besides, it's not like she didn't have minorities in Hogwarts, they just weren't as prominent characters.
Sure, she could choose to do that. I just think it's strange to criticize her for not doing that. You can't say she's presenting an assumption of whiteness by accurately reflecting the ethnic composition of the place and time she's writing about. It's like criticizing a novel in Japan for having all the main characters be Japanese.
The default in writing is being white, that's why being 'color blind' isn't necessarily the solution to issues like this in fiction. Not yet. Unless it's established people will assume it. It's not like they'd be wrong with Harry Potter's ethnicity being white in the books. Japan does have minorities there, actually - and yes, they shouldn't be totally ignored either.
Again, I think this is part of importing American racial politics and assumptions about what diversity counts. Every British show I've watched lately has multiple major black characters, despite the fact that a whopping 3% of the UK is black. On the other hand, there's a distinct lack of Irish and central Asian characters. If you're adopting the American prism of race, in which the important divide is white/black, this seems natural. But if you want to properly represent traditionally marginalized groups in a British context, this doesn't make a lot of sense. If the concern is that Hogwarts is not demographically representative or diverse enough, we should be talking about why there are so few Irish characters, not so few nonwhite characters.
Why do you assume that media confronting racial issues is solely limited to America? It's not. Many western countries do exactly the same thing, from Australia to the UK - countries which have had their own terrible histories with minorities. Nor is this limited to black characters, since they're not the only minority with these issues - they're simply a minority which have a very high profile. This applies to Asians, Indians, LGBT etc.
Idris Elba, national treasure of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, is speaking to Parliament Monday in an effort to warn British legislators that the systemic racism of the U.K. television industry is robbing the nation of talent like himself. In the speech, published by The Guardian, Elba recalls how he "came very close to hitting [his] forehead" on the glass ceiling for black British actors. "There wasn’t enough imagination in the industry for me to be seen as a lead," he explains; he was destined to play "best friends" and "cop sidekicks" for the rest of his career. And so, like many British actors before him, Elba fled to America, where he received the career-making part of Stringer Bell in The Wire. Only then, once he had received a seal of approval from the Americans, did the British TV industry consider him for the lead in something like Luther. "When you don’t reflect the real world, too much talent gets trashed. Thrown on the scrapheap," Elba argues. "Talent is everywhere, opportunity isn't. And talent can't reach opportunity."
Sure she can add more Irish characters, more diversity the better.
The thing is authors aren't limited to real demographics, they have the power to do whatever they want with a characters ethnicity. So do movies and tv shows. Media which have difficulty with minority representation in many countries.
There's just so much that goes into this issue when it comes to fiction. I feel like going down some kind of demographic checklist to make sure you have the requisite diversity seems almost as bad in its own way as just making the characters all belong to one ethnic group.
Then you also have to talk about stuff like, let's say you want to include characters who belong to a culture you, at a minimum, never lived within. You can do your due diligence--talk to people of that culture, do research, etc--but that only goes so far.
As an author you're trying to write things that ring true, and in a certain sense are true, and that's really hard to do when you're talking about cultures you can never 100% understand not having grown up within them, lived within them, and so on. You have to imagine it and fake it, which granted is true for a lot of things in writing, but it comes fraught with a whole additional set of baggage when you're talking about historically oppressed minorities.
This is probably why you see a lot of authors going the "race blind" route. It's just so much simpler to not deal with the issue at all and let your readers decide for themselves. I'm not saying that's the correct way to go, if there is such a thing, but it's certainly understandable.
OremLK on
My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
There's just so much that goes into this issue when it comes to fiction. I feel like going down some kind of demographic checklist to make sure you have the requisite diversity seems almost as bad in its own way as just making the characters all belong to one ethnic group.
Why is that bad, exactly? Representation is important, because our world is diverse. It's not so much about a checklist as a means to be aware that there are other ethnicities and cultures that exist which may show up or being included doing have to be a bad thing to show up in author's work. It's given them equal time in the spotlight they otherwise wouldn't have access to, which is extremely important. Yes, it takes extra time, but writing isn't easy. It's hard. Not to mention the benefits for doing it right, gives books and media extra appeal to demographics who normally wouldn't be interested or as interested. Like color blind casting the balance is nowhere near shifted in the other direction, since it is completely different context when the other side gets more attention than they usually do, which has a lot to do with bad influences countries have dealing with race.
Then you also have to talk about stuff like, let's say you want to include characters who belong to a culture you, at a minimum, never lived within. You can do your due diligence--talk to people of that culture, do research, etc--but that only goes so far.
Which is why it's important to try. Authors won't get better at it by ignoring it, doing to much ends up with erasure.
As an author you're trying to write things that ring true, and in a certain sense are true, and that's really hard to do when you're talking about cultures you can never 100% understand not having grown up within them, lived within them, and so on. You have to imagine it and fake it, which granted is true for a lot of things in writing, but it comes fraught with a whole additional set of baggage when you're talking about historically oppressed minorities.
Which is why it's important for supporting diversity with authors as well as characters so authors have more material to work with and be shown how to do it right. Nor is this an impossible task, it's merely a difficult one. The internet, books, interacting with people from various countries and ethnicities etc makes it easier than it ever was in the past. Sure, authors will fail but that's always been the case with hard subjects. This is also why it's important to listen to complaints and trying to find answers, because authors can't avoid this with their work. It won't go away by ignoring it.
This is probably why you see a lot of authors going the "race blind" route. It's just so much simpler to not deal with the issue at all and let your readers decide for themselves. I'm not saying that's the correct way to go, if there is such a thing, but it's certainly understandable.
True. It is understandable, but it's not exactly going to make them good allies or encourage greater diversity in the publishing field on the page where minority readers need it most.
Well, I wasn't necessarily disagreeing that it's good to include diversity, more like observing that it's a tricky thing with a lot of layers to consider.
I do kind of feel like, except in select cases (very far future SF, secondary world fantasy with little basis in actual history, stuff like that), it's important to try and represent the real world truthfully in your work, whether that's the past, present, or extrapolated future. I think this is true in more and less serious works as well. Since the real world includes a huge variety of cultures and experiences, representing it truthfully obviously includes considering that.
However, when I was talking about going down a demographic checklist, I suppose what I meant was that I think it's important for an author to be true to the story he or she wants to tell. People can tell when you're being phony and doing things for ulterior reasons, and that can be offensive in its own way (i.e. the "token black guy" cliche). That doesn't mean I think you shouldn't make an effort, but it's got to make sense for the story and not only be put in there because, "oops, I forgot to include a gay guy" or whatever. I know that might seem like a strawman, but like I said, I'm not really disagreeing with you.
I think a considered effort to include diversity in your story is a good thing insomuch as it helps you truthfully tell said story. If you're writing a story set in modern day NYC and all your characters are white, straight, upper-middle class people then yeah, you fucked up. On the other hand, if you're writing a story set in a monastery in the European dark ages, it would just be bizarre and phony to, for instance, try to stick in a few Chinese characters.
Other than those kinds of extreme examples, I guess my point is that I'd rather see people be "race blind" (or same with other minority groups) than try to put in diversity but end up doing it inappropriately, or worse, be more offensive than not including diversity at all. (EDIT: Though of course there are many settings and stories where trying to be race blind actually would be quite offensive, and actually would damage the "truthfulness" of your story quite a bit.)
But, best of all--assuming it's appropriate to the story and setting--would be to include a diverse range of characters, cultures, experiences, and do it well.
OremLK on
My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
Sure she's cool with Hermione being black, but that only happened with a stage play it wasn't said in the books (I don't recall her saying that was how she intended the character to be ala Dumbledore) and it sure didn't get into the movies. Movies which she had a ridiculous amount of control over which many authors don't with their adaptions. Nor did I see her bringing up any white characters being other ethnicities when the movies were going strong at the box office.
Your position seems to be that that J.K Rowling needs to create minority characters far in excess of their representation in the British population, that she needs to identify them explicitly as minorities in the text, and that not doing so is a moral failure. I think we disagree about whether fiction should be expected to contort itself to match politics. I don't see either of us changing our minds about that.
I just finished 3 body problem. It was ok, I don't know...It felt more like the author was super stoked on explaining their premise and forgot to write a compelling narrative, maybe some of it got lost in the translation?
Which is why it's important for supporting diversity with authors as well as characters so authors have more material to work with and be shown how to do it right. Nor is this an impossible task, it's merely a difficult one. The internet, books, interacting with people from various countries and ethnicities etc makes it easier than it ever was in the past. Sure, authors will fail but that's always been the case with hard subjects. This is also why it's important to listen to complaints and trying to find answers, because authors can't avoid this with their work. It won't go away by ignoring it.
Authors are writing to tell a story. Stuff that they do or potentially could write, but doesn't advance the story, should not be included in the story. It would in no way enhance the Harry Potter franchise had Hermione been specified as "having a dark chocolate skin". Good authors know the rule of "Show, don't tell". Great authors know that one of the biggest tools they have is the readers imagination. If you read Harry Potter and you view the characters as being from a certain race, that's due to your bias and not because of J.K. Rowling. It also allows the vast majority of readers to imagine the characters in a way they are comfortable with.
Acting like it's bad to be race blind is silliness. The goal should be for everyone to be race blind. I shouldn't see the color of a person's skin, I should see a fellow human being. We should fight racism when it happens, but we shouldn't put it where it isn't happening and pretend we have a moral high ground.
You'll want to avoid his other book which apparently also features a white guy succeeding at everything through a story peppered with nostalgia references
Also avoid the movie they're making of RP1
I got up to the point where he had a heated, extremely detailed argument over a video game. And was extremely proud of how much he knew. And his friend chimed in with more info because he's oh so cool too.
Just one big slog of eighties stuff and how much he loves eighties stuff and oh hey did you know this about this from the eighties?
Ugggggh I am batting zero when it comes to picking sci fi lately.
You'll want to avoid his other book which apparently also features a white guy succeeding at everything through a story peppered with nostalgia references
Also avoid the movie they're making of RP1
I got up to the point where he had a heated, extremely detailed argument over a video game. And was extremely proud of how much he knew. And his friend chimed in with more info because he's oh so cool too.
Just one big slog of eighties stuff and how much he loves eighties stuff and oh hey did you know this about this from the eighties?
Ugggggh I am batting zero when it comes to picking sci fi lately.
I just finished 3 body problem. It was ok, I don't know...It felt more like the author was super stoked on explaining their premise and forgot to write a compelling narrative, maybe some of it got lost in the translation?
Nah, that sounds like something that happens all the time. Especially in sci-fi imo.
Quid, the Southern Reach trilogy is as fine an SF story as I've read in a long time. You should pick it up and give it a whirl. I have Brian Catling's The Vorrh on my shelf, a book I haven't read but which has garnered some stellar reviews.
If it doesn't tickle your fancy sink into the warm bath that is classic SF for a bit. Have you worked your way through Phillip K Dick's back catalogue? You should!
You'll want to avoid his other book which apparently also features a white guy succeeding at everything through a story peppered with nostalgia references
Also avoid the movie they're making of RP1
I got up to the point where he had a heated, extremely detailed argument over a video game. And was extremely proud of how much he knew. And his friend chimed in with more info because he's oh so cool too.
Just one big slog of eighties stuff and how much he loves eighties stuff and oh hey did you know this about this from the eighties?
Ugggggh I am batting zero when it comes to picking sci fi lately.
I've read a lot of books that I have ended up not liking, but I think that RP1 is one of the few books that I actually hate. At one point a scene is described as "it was like the fight scene in [x] movie". It is a book that examines the question "What if nostalgia came to dominate media so much that actual creativity just ceased to exist?" and comes to the answer "That would be totally awesome!"
You'll want to avoid his other book which apparently also features a white guy succeeding at everything through a story peppered with nostalgia references
Also avoid the movie they're making of RP1
I got up to the point where he had a heated, extremely detailed argument over a video game. And was extremely proud of how much he knew. And his friend chimed in with more info because he's oh so cool too.
Just one big slog of eighties stuff and how much he loves eighties stuff and oh hey did you know this about this from the eighties?
Ugggggh I am batting zero when it comes to picking sci fi lately.
I've read a lot of books that I have ended up not liking, but I think that RP1 is one of the few books that I actually hate. At one point a scene is described as "it was like the fight scene in [x] movie". It is a book that examines the question "What if nostalgia came to dominate media so much that actual creativity just ceased to exist?" and comes to the answer "That would be totally awesome!"
And let's not forget all the latent sexism! Because holding a grudge because the girl picked your buddy and not you isn't utterly creepy, no sir.
If you want a kinda-scifi book about video games and nostalgia, may I suggest YOU by Austin Grossman? It's got some navel gazing but it's far less obnoxious than Ready Player One.
I'm kinda screwed in getting any more books. I don't have proper wifi where I'm at so there's no way to get more on to my Kindle. And the closest book store is a ways out. I might look in to graphic novels and comics for my tablet I suppose.
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Mike Danger"Diane..."a place both wonderful and strangeRegistered Userregular
I'm about halfway through If on a winter's night a traveler and it's fucking great, that's all
O'Brian's The Ionian Mission. As excellent as ever, and just as I think I'm getting the hang of the sailing jargon he pulls out a word or phrase that leaves me flailing, like "forecourse in the brails" or something.
For perhaps the hundredth I will regret the lack of any more Crowe/Bettany/Weir films made of these very fine novels.
O'Brian's The Ionian Mission. As excellent as ever, and just as I think I'm getting the hang of the sailing jargon he pulls out a word or phrase that leaves me flailing, like "forecourse in the brails" or something.
For perhaps the hundredth I will regret the lack of any more Crowe/Bettany/Weir films made of these very fine novels.
The Aubrey books are a huge guilty pleasure of mine. I disagree about the movie, though. It was good, but... it didn't really do justice to the books. It left you with no sense of Aubrey's buffoonery or Maturin's cunning. But... as an exercise in cinematic grognardism, it was pretty excellent.
I just finished 3 body problem. It was ok, I don't know...It felt more like the author was super stoked on explaining their premise and forgot to write a compelling narrative, maybe some of it got lost in the translation?
Nah, that sounds like something that happens all the time. Especially in sci-fi imo.
True. Also, I'll chime in and suggest to *NOT* read the sequel, The Dark Forest. I mean, I've been listening to both by audiobook, and while the first one had some rough spots, at least things kept moving toward *something*. A couple weeks ago, I just had to stop listening to The Dark Forest because it was just so, very dry and meandering. I know the author has someplan to pull it altogether, but man, it just didn't seem worth it.
The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it. ~ Terry Pratchett
Which is why it's important for supporting diversity with authors as well as characters so authors have more material to work with and be shown how to do it right. Nor is this an impossible task, it's merely a difficult one. The internet, books, interacting with people from various countries and ethnicities etc makes it easier than it ever was in the past. Sure, authors will fail but that's always been the case with hard subjects. This is also why it's important to listen to complaints and trying to find answers, because authors can't avoid this with their work. It won't go away by ignoring it.
Authors are writing to tell a story.
Indeed, but when their stories have minorities off screen that it starts to look weird or at worst, unintentionally racist. Especially in urban fantasy. Even Tolkien had people with other ethnicities in his Middle Earth universe, it wasn't white people everywhere.
Stuff that they do or potentially could write, but doesn't advance the story, should not be included in the story. It would in no way enhance the Harry Potter franchise had Hermione been specified as "having a dark chocolate skin".
Why would Hermione being a minority hurt the book? There are black girls in the UK. And Asians, Indians, LGBT etc. It'd be a bit strange for Hogwarts not to have any minority students or not have characters interact with minorities in the UK. It's already weird how there was one gay character in the whole series and Rowling didn't show it in a book. One person. There were more werewolves then gay people in that series.
And Rowling disagrees with you, she's perfectly ok with making Hermione a minority.
Rowling did a good job with representation and various themes like racism and classism in HP, but she was far from perfect with it.
Good authors know the rule of "Show, don't tell". Great authors know that one of the biggest tools they have is the readers imagination.
True, but they also should expect representation since minorities exist in our world. Authors don't get pats on their back for invisible minorities being in their books, that creates erasure.
If you read Harry Potter and you view the characters as being from a certain race, that's due to your bias and not because of J.K. Rowling. It also allows the vast majority of readers to imagine the characters in a way they are comfortable with.
Rowling wasn't afraid to make sure certain characters were shown to be minorities, Cho Chang for instance. No reader's going to think that's a white girl's name and she wasn't the only minority in the books. That bias is built in to western society, it won't go away by ignoring it. Unfortunately readers remain comfortable with visualizing white characters, which is terrible. And publisher's aren't helping by white washing covers.
Acting like it's bad to be race blind is silliness. The goal should be for everyone to be race blind. I shouldn't see the color of a person's skin, I should see a fellow human being. We should fight racism when it happens, but we shouldn't put it where it isn't happening and pretend we have a moral high ground.
In a perfect society this wouldn't be an issue, unfortunately we're not in that world. Racism exists and the default remains white, at least in the West. That's why in Hollywood "race blind" roles end up with white actors. Fellow human beings come in various different ethnicities and sexualities, why not celebrate them? Fiction occurs in worlds shaped by our reality, and it can influence society for the better or the worse, actively and subconsciously. Ironically HP was confronting racism in its very pages and it wasn't shy about that subject, authors shouldn't be afraid to do that in their books. That is definitely the moral high ground, which Rowling herself was apart of.
Your position seems to be that that J.K Rowling needs to create minority characters far in excess of their representation in the British population, that she needs to identify them explicitly as minorities in the text, and that not doing so is a moral failure. I think we disagree about whether fiction should be expected to contort itself to match politics. I don't see either of us changing our minds about that.
Since when is there a quota on how many minorities appearing books? That's up to the author's discretion. They can make every person in a book a vampire if they want to, but having minorities with good representation is a bridge to far? What's wrong with identifying them as minorities? Minorities deserve to know they are represented in books. Rowling herself did this in Harry Potter. Fiction is effected by the author's politics and today it's being noticed more than ever before, which is a good thing. It means minorities are being heard and that authors and publishers will put a higher priority in going after that audience rather than ignoring them. Racial politics are already occurring in book publishing.
Whitewashing happens when a publishing company represents a non-white character on the cover of a book with a white representation. This has been going on for decades — probably centuries — and seems to show no signs of letting up. There have been a couple widely publicized examples of this (Liar by Justine Larbalestier and Magic Under Glass by Jaclyn Dolomore), which have forced publishers to re-release the covers with more accurate character depictions. Yet this public shaming hasn’t stopped it as a widespread industry practice.
The bestselling American author Rick Riordan has thanked his Russian publisher for no longer “whitewashing” its jacket illustration of his character Carter, an African American boy who has been depicted as white on the covers of various foreign language editions of Riordan’s young adult series.
Riordan’s Kane Chronicles cover the adventures of siblings Carter and Sadie Kane, who are descended from the magicians of Ancient Egypt. Carter’s skin is “dark brown”, like his Egyptologist father, he tells readers in the first pages of The Red Pyramid. His sister Sadie’s is much lighter, as she takes after their mother, who was white. “Carter, you’re getting older. You’re an African American man. People will judge you more harshly, and so you must always look impeccable,” his father tells him.
Why would Hermione being a minority hurt the book? There are black girls in the UK. And Asians, Indians, LGBT etc. It'd be a bit strange for Hogwarts not to have any minority students or not have characters interact with minorities in the UK. It's already weird how there was one gay character in the whole series and Rowling didn't show it in a book. One person. There were more werewolves then gay people in that series.
And Rowling disagrees with you, she's perfectly ok with making Hermione a minority.
Rowling did a good job with representation and various themes like racism and classism in HP, but she was far from perfect with it.
I'm the one who brought up that Rowling was OK with Hermione being cast as a non-white character in the play. So, I think we're on the same page on that topic. Rowling wrote HP from a racially neutral position; it's the reader that is applying their own personal racism to the story.
Rowling wasn't afraid to make sure certain characters were shown to be minorities, Cho Chang for instance. No reader's going to think that's a white girl's name and she wasn't the only minority in the books. That bias is built in to western society, it won't go away by ignoring it. Unfortunately readers remain comfortable with visualizing white characters, which is terrible. And publisher's aren't helping by white washing covers.
Again, this is the reader applying their own personal racism. Cho Chang doesn't automatically have to be oriental in appearance. It could be that she was adopted from Africa as a baby and renamed, or is the child of immigrants from eastern europe.
In a perfect society this wouldn't be an issue, unfortunately we're not in that world. Racism exists and the default remains white, at least in the West. That's why in Hollywood "race blind" roles end up with white actors. Fellow human beings come in various different ethnicities and sexualities, why not celebrate them? Fiction occurs in worlds shaped by our reality, and it can influence society for the better or the worse, actively and subconsciously. Ironically HP was confronting racism in its very pages and it wasn't shy about that subject, authors shouldn't be afraid to do that in their books. That is definitely the moral high ground, which Rowling herself was apart of.
Some books are about celebrating various ethnicities. That doesn't mean that they all must do so. And, as Rowling demonstrated, you don't have to use any real world races to demonstrate the effects of racism.
I recently finished the Mistborn and Bands of Mourning books by Brian Sanderson, and really enjoyed them. But they can be some very heavy reading. After that, I read Kevin Hearne's Staked, which is just another fun romp of a story, and not serious at all. It was a nice change of pace, but it makes it really difficult to go back to Sanderson for Elantris. His writing is so heavy and specific, that it doesn't make it flow quickly.
I finished Last Mortal Bond, ending of Chronicle of Unhewn Throne by Brian Staveley.
It's better than terribly dissapointing Providence of Fire, but only slightly so. I found ending simply unsatisfying, 75 % of main characters were irritating, and the level of GRIMDARKNESS and EDGINESS and DOES HUMANITY EVEN DESERVE TO BE SAVED was completely unbearable. Abercrombie and Erikson write more lighthearted books, for God's sake!
I'm the one who brought up that Rowling was OK with Hermione being cast as a non-white character in the play. So, I think we're on the same page on that topic. Rowling wrote HP from a racially neutral position; it's the reader that is applying their own personal racism to the story.
That's ignoring how racism is tied into society, which effects all of us. Authors can combat this with their writing, as well as giving those reader representation.
Again, this is the reader applying their own personal racism. Cho Chang doesn't automatically have to be oriental in appearance. It could be that she was adopted from Africa as a baby and renamed, or is the child of immigrants from eastern europe.
True, but I don't recall Rowling saying or doing anything about the casting of minorities in the movies and this is an author wish an unusual control over her adaptions. And if she did that, why wouldn't it be ok to bring that up subtly or as characterization? Even Luna Lovegood and Neville had that covered in the books, I don't see why a minority (or them being minorities) would be a bad thing given the same opportunities.
Some books are about celebrating various ethnicities. That doesn't mean that they all must do so. And, as Rowling demonstrated, you don't have to use any real world races to demonstrate the effects of racism.
Can you define "celebrating" for me in this context? I'm not saying all books need to be micro-focused on their plights, merely acknowledge their existence and give minorities a higher priority as an audience. People are going to notice when specific authors keep minorities off the page or in the background, especially when they're being adapted - the public will react to books doing that and it won't always be with approval. Yes, authors don't have to use real races to discuss racism but that isn't an excuse to ignore minorities in their books. Hermione being black would have actually made her arguments more potent, especially since the later books dropped the childish charm as the readers got older.
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Except most of the main characters are white, as well as the staff at Hogwarts and the Death Eaters and MoM etc and the series took place outside Hogwarts. The default in settings like this is being white, and this isn't simply an American thing. It's not like the UK hasn't got similar problems with race relations in the media.
It is a separate issue to "The History of Magic in North America," though it is indirectly linked.
So your criticism is that JK Rowling... accurately reflected the demographics of the UK in her fiction? Or what?
Yeah the thing HP does really well is sneak the idea of "bigotry is bad" along with a bunch of other good lessons into a children's story without it becoming a BIG DEAL in real life. Because she uses things that aren't a literal real world problem.
So instead of talking about how hating gays is bad, she talks about hating mudbloods is bad and kids and others pick up the lesson without any stupid kerfuffle.
Since when has demographics defined any storytelling? She is free to make any characters whatever ethnicity or sexuality she wants - she's cool with Hermione being black. And it's not like that's stopped writers before. Besides, it's not like she didn't have minorities in Hogwarts, they just weren't as prominent characters.
spoilers follow
I didn't enjoy the 2nd book all that much. I think it just started to get a little bit silly; for example
Then there are the proper bad guys, working from the shadows being very generic
To me, the plot wasn't as strong as the 1st book, and it's sort of put me off from reading the 3rd book any time soon.
There are novels of his I love (Black House, The Shining), but his short stories get round the problem of his endings being a limp across the finish line and often feel like his stronger suit.
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Now, imagine if the limp ending was actually three books out of a seven book series, and you have further reason to stay out of dark tower stuff. The first four are pretty good though. The first one would have been a really neat, focused stand-alone probably.
Sure, she could choose to do that. I just think it's strange to criticize her for not doing that. You can't say she's presenting an assumption of whiteness by accurately reflecting the ethnic composition of the place and time she's writing about. It's like criticizing a novel in Japan for having all the main characters be Japanese.
Again, I think this is part of importing American racial politics and assumptions about what diversity counts. Every British show I've watched lately has multiple major black characters, despite the fact that a whopping 3% of the UK is black. On the other hand, there's a distinct lack of Irish and central Asian characters. If you're adopting the American prism of race, in which the important divide is white/black, this seems natural. But if you want to properly represent traditionally marginalized groups in a British context, this doesn't make a lot of sense. If the concern is that Hogwarts is not demographically representative or diverse enough, we should be talking about why there are so few Irish characters, not so few nonwhite characters.
Actually, J.K. Rowlings specifically brought up the point a while back when a theater adaptation had cast a black woman as Hermione that she had never given her (or most other characters) an ethnicity. You're confusing the movies with the books.
You'll want to avoid his other book which apparently also features a white guy succeeding at everything through a story peppered with nostalgia references
Also avoid the movie they're making of RP1
Unfortunately when writers do that it will default to white for the character most of the time, that's the down side to being 'color blind.'
http://www.kameronhurley.com/why-writing-colorblind-is-writing-white-a-rant/
https://stardustedsirens.wordpress.com/2014/02/03/the-problematic-approach-of-colorblind-writing/
Sure she's cool with Hermione being black, but that only happened with a stage play it wasn't said in the books (I don't recall her saying that was how she intended the character to be ala Dumbledore) and it sure didn't get into the movies. Movies which she had a ridiculous amount of control over which many authors don't with their adaptions. Nor did I see her bringing up any white characters being other ethnicities when the movies were going strong at the box office.
The default in writing is being white, that's why being 'color blind' isn't necessarily the solution to issues like this in fiction. Not yet. Unless it's established people will assume it. It's not like they'd be wrong with Harry Potter's ethnicity being white in the books. Japan does have minorities there, actually - and yes, they shouldn't be totally ignored either.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-32957610
Why do you assume that media confronting racial issues is solely limited to America? It's not. Many western countries do exactly the same thing, from Australia to the UK - countries which have had their own terrible histories with minorities. Nor is this limited to black characters, since they're not the only minority with these issues - they're simply a minority which have a very high profile. This applies to Asians, Indians, LGBT etc.
http://www.vulture.com/2016/01/idris-elba-speaks-to-parliament-on-uk-racism.html
Sure she can add more Irish characters, more diversity the better.
The thing is authors aren't limited to real demographics, they have the power to do whatever they want with a characters ethnicity. So do movies and tv shows. Media which have difficulty with minority representation in many countries.
Then you also have to talk about stuff like, let's say you want to include characters who belong to a culture you, at a minimum, never lived within. You can do your due diligence--talk to people of that culture, do research, etc--but that only goes so far.
As an author you're trying to write things that ring true, and in a certain sense are true, and that's really hard to do when you're talking about cultures you can never 100% understand not having grown up within them, lived within them, and so on. You have to imagine it and fake it, which granted is true for a lot of things in writing, but it comes fraught with a whole additional set of baggage when you're talking about historically oppressed minorities.
This is probably why you see a lot of authors going the "race blind" route. It's just so much simpler to not deal with the issue at all and let your readers decide for themselves. I'm not saying that's the correct way to go, if there is such a thing, but it's certainly understandable.
Why is that bad, exactly? Representation is important, because our world is diverse. It's not so much about a checklist as a means to be aware that there are other ethnicities and cultures that exist which may show up or being included doing have to be a bad thing to show up in author's work. It's given them equal time in the spotlight they otherwise wouldn't have access to, which is extremely important. Yes, it takes extra time, but writing isn't easy. It's hard. Not to mention the benefits for doing it right, gives books and media extra appeal to demographics who normally wouldn't be interested or as interested. Like color blind casting the balance is nowhere near shifted in the other direction, since it is completely different context when the other side gets more attention than they usually do, which has a lot to do with bad influences countries have dealing with race.
Which is why it's important to try. Authors won't get better at it by ignoring it, doing to much ends up with erasure.
Which is why it's important for supporting diversity with authors as well as characters so authors have more material to work with and be shown how to do it right. Nor is this an impossible task, it's merely a difficult one. The internet, books, interacting with people from various countries and ethnicities etc makes it easier than it ever was in the past. Sure, authors will fail but that's always been the case with hard subjects. This is also why it's important to listen to complaints and trying to find answers, because authors can't avoid this with their work. It won't go away by ignoring it.
True. It is understandable, but it's not exactly going to make them good allies or encourage greater diversity in the publishing field on the page where minority readers need it most.
I do kind of feel like, except in select cases (very far future SF, secondary world fantasy with little basis in actual history, stuff like that), it's important to try and represent the real world truthfully in your work, whether that's the past, present, or extrapolated future. I think this is true in more and less serious works as well. Since the real world includes a huge variety of cultures and experiences, representing it truthfully obviously includes considering that.
However, when I was talking about going down a demographic checklist, I suppose what I meant was that I think it's important for an author to be true to the story he or she wants to tell. People can tell when you're being phony and doing things for ulterior reasons, and that can be offensive in its own way (i.e. the "token black guy" cliche). That doesn't mean I think you shouldn't make an effort, but it's got to make sense for the story and not only be put in there because, "oops, I forgot to include a gay guy" or whatever. I know that might seem like a strawman, but like I said, I'm not really disagreeing with you.
I think a considered effort to include diversity in your story is a good thing insomuch as it helps you truthfully tell said story. If you're writing a story set in modern day NYC and all your characters are white, straight, upper-middle class people then yeah, you fucked up. On the other hand, if you're writing a story set in a monastery in the European dark ages, it would just be bizarre and phony to, for instance, try to stick in a few Chinese characters.
Other than those kinds of extreme examples, I guess my point is that I'd rather see people be "race blind" (or same with other minority groups) than try to put in diversity but end up doing it inappropriately, or worse, be more offensive than not including diversity at all. (EDIT: Though of course there are many settings and stories where trying to be race blind actually would be quite offensive, and actually would damage the "truthfulness" of your story quite a bit.)
But, best of all--assuming it's appropriate to the story and setting--would be to include a diverse range of characters, cultures, experiences, and do it well.
Your position seems to be that that J.K Rowling needs to create minority characters far in excess of their representation in the British population, that she needs to identify them explicitly as minorities in the text, and that not doing so is a moral failure. I think we disagree about whether fiction should be expected to contort itself to match politics. I don't see either of us changing our minds about that.
Authors are writing to tell a story. Stuff that they do or potentially could write, but doesn't advance the story, should not be included in the story. It would in no way enhance the Harry Potter franchise had Hermione been specified as "having a dark chocolate skin". Good authors know the rule of "Show, don't tell". Great authors know that one of the biggest tools they have is the readers imagination. If you read Harry Potter and you view the characters as being from a certain race, that's due to your bias and not because of J.K. Rowling. It also allows the vast majority of readers to imagine the characters in a way they are comfortable with.
Acting like it's bad to be race blind is silliness. The goal should be for everyone to be race blind. I shouldn't see the color of a person's skin, I should see a fellow human being. We should fight racism when it happens, but we shouldn't put it where it isn't happening and pretend we have a moral high ground.
I got up to the point where he had a heated, extremely detailed argument over a video game. And was extremely proud of how much he knew. And his friend chimed in with more info because he's oh so cool too.
Just one big slog of eighties stuff and how much he loves eighties stuff and oh hey did you know this about this from the eighties?
Ugggggh I am batting zero when it comes to picking sci fi lately.
Try the Southern Reach trilogy?
Nah, that sounds like something that happens all the time. Especially in sci-fi imo.
Blizzard: Pailryder#1101
GoG: https://www.gog.com/u/pailryder
If it doesn't tickle your fancy sink into the warm bath that is classic SF for a bit. Have you worked your way through Phillip K Dick's back catalogue? You should!
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I've read a lot of books that I have ended up not liking, but I think that RP1 is one of the few books that I actually hate. At one point a scene is described as "it was like the fight scene in [x] movie". It is a book that examines the question "What if nostalgia came to dominate media so much that actual creativity just ceased to exist?" and comes to the answer "That would be totally awesome!"
And let's not forget all the latent sexism! Because holding a grudge because the girl picked your buddy and not you isn't utterly creepy, no sir.
For perhaps the hundredth I will regret the lack of any more Crowe/Bettany/Weir films made of these very fine novels.
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The Aubrey books are a huge guilty pleasure of mine. I disagree about the movie, though. It was good, but... it didn't really do justice to the books. It left you with no sense of Aubrey's buffoonery or Maturin's cunning. But... as an exercise in cinematic grognardism, it was pretty excellent.
True. Also, I'll chime in and suggest to *NOT* read the sequel, The Dark Forest. I mean, I've been listening to both by audiobook, and while the first one had some rough spots, at least things kept moving toward *something*. A couple weeks ago, I just had to stop listening to The Dark Forest because it was just so, very dry and meandering. I know the author has someplan to pull it altogether, but man, it just didn't seem worth it.
Indeed, but when their stories have minorities off screen that it starts to look weird or at worst, unintentionally racist. Especially in urban fantasy. Even Tolkien had people with other ethnicities in his Middle Earth universe, it wasn't white people everywhere.
Why would Hermione being a minority hurt the book? There are black girls in the UK. And Asians, Indians, LGBT etc. It'd be a bit strange for Hogwarts not to have any minority students or not have characters interact with minorities in the UK. It's already weird how there was one gay character in the whole series and Rowling didn't show it in a book. One person. There were more werewolves then gay people in that series.
And Rowling disagrees with you, she's perfectly ok with making Hermione a minority.
Rowling did a good job with representation and various themes like racism and classism in HP, but she was far from perfect with it.
True, but they also should expect representation since minorities exist in our world. Authors don't get pats on their back for invisible minorities being in their books, that creates erasure.
Rowling wasn't afraid to make sure certain characters were shown to be minorities, Cho Chang for instance. No reader's going to think that's a white girl's name and she wasn't the only minority in the books. That bias is built in to western society, it won't go away by ignoring it. Unfortunately readers remain comfortable with visualizing white characters, which is terrible. And publisher's aren't helping by white washing covers.
In a perfect society this wouldn't be an issue, unfortunately we're not in that world. Racism exists and the default remains white, at least in the West. That's why in Hollywood "race blind" roles end up with white actors. Fellow human beings come in various different ethnicities and sexualities, why not celebrate them? Fiction occurs in worlds shaped by our reality, and it can influence society for the better or the worse, actively and subconsciously. Ironically HP was confronting racism in its very pages and it wasn't shy about that subject, authors shouldn't be afraid to do that in their books. That is definitely the moral high ground, which Rowling herself was apart of.
Since when is there a quota on how many minorities appearing books? That's up to the author's discretion. They can make every person in a book a vampire if they want to, but having minorities with good representation is a bridge to far? What's wrong with identifying them as minorities? Minorities deserve to know they are represented in books. Rowling herself did this in Harry Potter. Fiction is effected by the author's politics and today it's being noticed more than ever before, which is a good thing. It means minorities are being heard and that authors and publishers will put a higher priority in going after that audience rather than ignoring them. Racial politics are already occurring in book publishing.
http://www.yalsa.ala.org/thehub/2012/12/10/it-matters-if-youre-black-or-white-the-racism-of-ya-book-covers/
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/nov/18/rick-riordan-publisher-dropping-cover-whitewashing-black-hero-kane-chronicles
http://thebooksmugglers.com/2010/02/cover-matters-on-whitewashing.html
This type of behavior is shameful, and contributing to poor practices regarding race with the industry.
I'm the one who brought up that Rowling was OK with Hermione being cast as a non-white character in the play. So, I think we're on the same page on that topic. Rowling wrote HP from a racially neutral position; it's the reader that is applying their own personal racism to the story.
Again, this is the reader applying their own personal racism. Cho Chang doesn't automatically have to be oriental in appearance. It could be that she was adopted from Africa as a baby and renamed, or is the child of immigrants from eastern europe.
Some books are about celebrating various ethnicities. That doesn't mean that they all must do so. And, as Rowling demonstrated, you don't have to use any real world races to demonstrate the effects of racism.
It's better than terribly dissapointing Providence of Fire, but only slightly so. I found ending simply unsatisfying, 75 % of main characters were irritating, and the level of GRIMDARKNESS and EDGINESS and DOES HUMANITY EVEN DESERVE TO BE SAVED was completely unbearable. Abercrombie and Erikson write more lighthearted books, for God's sake!
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That's ignoring how racism is tied into society, which effects all of us. Authors can combat this with their writing, as well as giving those reader representation.
True, but I don't recall Rowling saying or doing anything about the casting of minorities in the movies and this is an author wish an unusual control over her adaptions. And if she did that, why wouldn't it be ok to bring that up subtly or as characterization? Even Luna Lovegood and Neville had that covered in the books, I don't see why a minority (or them being minorities) would be a bad thing given the same opportunities.
Can you define "celebrating" for me in this context? I'm not saying all books need to be micro-focused on their plights, merely acknowledge their existence and give minorities a higher priority as an audience. People are going to notice when specific authors keep minorities off the page or in the background, especially when they're being adapted - the public will react to books doing that and it won't always be with approval. Yes, authors don't have to use real races to discuss racism but that isn't an excuse to ignore minorities in their books. Hermione being black would have actually made her arguments more potent, especially since the later books dropped the childish charm as the readers got older.
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