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Today was the first time in a LONG time I got the, "Where are you from?" question and South Carolina/military brat NOT being what they wanted to know. "Your face shape... I was wondering if you were Inuit?" And I know that whole exchange can be awful sometimes, but luckily this was someone actually just being curious in a nice way. It also made me realize that, not counting racist types, I actually LIKE it when people notice I've got more heritage than my white side. It's much more common for me to pretty much get the opposite reaction -- when people find out I'm half Korean, so many of them go on and on about how shocking that is because I don't look Asian at all. And then I have to endure people scrutinizing me and still feeling the Korean bit is unbelievable. This time it wasn't even the eyes, which is what I usually get when it does happen. They're just squinty enough or whatever. This all had to do with facial structure.
Speaking of Asian-ness, there has been some interesting dialogue in the book world about AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander) lists going around this month. Like, yay, they're doing it but wow, Americans don't seem aware of the rest of the world. Apparently a lot of Asian (full stop) authors and Asian descendants in other countries get labeled as Asian American for the lists. Of course, coming up with a good inclusive term is proving divisive. I'm liking Asian and Asian Diaspora best, but recognize that using Diaspora will require some education with much of the public.
And some of this has tied into this Lindsey Ellis thing that happened a bit ago. Personally, I really enjoyed her videos and was unfazed by her tweet ("Also watched Raya and the Last Dragon and I think we need to come up with a name for this genre that is basically Avatar: the Last Airbender reduxes. It’s like half of all YA fantasy published in the last few years anyway.") and even her response about how you have to "squint" at it to see it as racist. I DID think it came off as a bad take, but was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. Especially on Twitter, which seems to conclusively prove that conciseness and clearness can't at all be equated (no matter what my journalism courses said).
Then I watched her video about being cancelled for it and... now I actually am pretty annoyed about it all and think maybe it was a crap tweet with some (hopefully unconscious) casual racism in it. See, thing is, I trust her to be really on point with her videos. She knows what she is doing and I could see so much of that in her video. So, yeah, it's like two hours of her apologizing or re-apologizing for social media gaffs of the past and talking about how cancel culture can be so toxic and how so much of it is spear-headed by cis-white women with their own weird agendas... and yeah, it was a powerful video.
But underneath all that... it also seemed to be a two hour video where she wanted to make sure she did not acknowledge there was anything problematic about the tweet. For example, when referring to it, she almost exclusively referred to the Raya vs Airbender part, which makes the kerfluffle look extra silly. She only once mentioned the YA part once (and the YA part is the bit that made me cringe a bit in the first place) and carefully made sure to use a non-Asian/Asian Diaspora author and one documented as being inspired by Avatar. One author is not half of YA, and it HAS been a tooth and nail struggle to get strong A/AD representation over the years because it's always been a bit of, well, we have ONE getting published, isn't that enough? There's been a huge uptick in published A/AD book from what I can see with my committee work and it ought to be celebrated. Heck, not long before her tweet I read some pieces from Asian authors who had a hard time even getting reviewed in the U.S. because book industry folks decided they likely couldn't write in English since it was a second language and even if it WAS well written then obviously it was ghost written. So, Ellis' tweet did not come at a good time. Anyway, so then she goes on to say that groups are not monolithic (good point!) but then goes on to cherry pick her half-Asian American friend who had no issue with her tweet and... stop there. And so on and so on. So by the end I felt a little unnerved. It was like she wanted to say I will apologize for ANYTHING, but this is my line. I will not admit, as a pretty big voice about media (including getting to do videos for the Great American Read) that it could upset someone to imply that books reflecting their culture can be distilled down to a cartoon made by white dudes who borrowed lots from a greater mythology. It makes me feel like she doesn't have my back, so why would I support her? And it's not that I was looking for an apology. If she didn't mean it, don't apologize. But it would have taken very little to say, "Angry white ladies blew up this cancel culture charge, but don't let that hide issues in publishing. Here's why some people may have legitimately been concerned about that tweet."
Anywho, other than trying to be a good librarian (and Asian Diasporic or whatever) being aware of the book world, I'm fully vaccinated including the post two week wait and finally got to get out and about! I was bummed to get cancelled on Thursday, which was the two week mark. I'm increasingly aware that I like to celebrate milestones and it felt like a day that needed it! But Friday I got to meet up with a friend and GO INSIDE A BOOKSTORE. Mostly to pick up a preorder, but just going inside felt beautiful and made me pine for author events. And we found a place that sold Cornish pasties. (delicious) Saturday I got to see other friends and visit the Butterfly Pavilion. And Sunday was getting up super early to take bee photos with a coworker (and become better friends) and then Venezuelan food (and a haircut). Mostly it was all outdoors, which still makes me way more comfortable and I'm definitely taking my mask everywhere.
Speaking of Asian-ness, there has been some interesting dialogue in the book world about AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander) lists going around this month. Like, yay, they're doing it but wow, Americans don't seem aware of the rest of the world. Apparently a lot of Asian (full stop) authors and Asian descendants in other countries get labeled as Asian American for the lists. Of course, coming up with a good inclusive term is proving divisive. I'm liking Asian and Asian Diaspora best, but recognize that using Diaspora will require some education with much of the public.
And some of this has tied into this Lindsey Ellis thing that happened a bit ago. Personally, I really enjoyed her videos and was unfazed by her tweet ("Also watched Raya and the Last Dragon and I think we need to come up with a name for this genre that is basically Avatar: the Last Airbender reduxes. It’s like half of all YA fantasy published in the last few years anyway.") and even her response about how you have to "squint" at it to see it as racist. I DID think it came off as a bad take, but was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. Especially on Twitter, which seems to conclusively prove that conciseness and clearness can't at all be equated (no matter what my journalism courses said).
Then I watched her video about being cancelled for it and... now I actually am pretty annoyed about it all and think maybe it was a crap tweet with some (hopefully unconscious) casual racism in it. See, thing is, I trust her to be really on point with her videos. She knows what she is doing and I could see so much of that in her video. So, yeah, it's like two hours of her apologizing or re-apologizing for social media gaffs of the past and talking about how cancel culture can be so toxic and how so much of it is spear-headed by cis-white women with their own weird agendas... and yeah, it was a powerful video.
But underneath all that... it also seemed to be a two hour video where she wanted to make sure she did not acknowledge there was anything problematic about the tweet. For example, when referring to it, she almost exclusively referred to the Raya vs Airbender part, which makes the kerfluffle look extra silly. She only once mentioned the YA part once (and the YA part is the bit that made me cringe a bit in the first place) and carefully made sure to use a non-Asian/Asian Diaspora author and one documented as being inspired by Avatar. One author is not half of YA, and it HAS been a tooth and nail struggle to get strong A/AD representation over the years because it's always been a bit of, well, we have ONE getting published, isn't that enough? There's been a huge uptick in published A/AD book from what I can see with my committee work and it ought to be celebrated. Heck, not long before her tweet I read some pieces from Asian authors who had a hard time even getting reviewed in the U.S. because book industry folks decided they likely couldn't write in English since it was a second language and even if it WAS well written then obviously it was ghost written. So, Ellis' tweet did not come at a good time. Anyway, so then she goes on to say that groups are not monolithic (good point!) but then goes on to cherry pick her half-Asian American friend who had no issue with her tweet and... stop there. And so on and so on. So by the end I felt a little unnerved. It was like she wanted to say I will apologize for ANYTHING, but this is my line. I will not admit, as a pretty big voice about media (including getting to do videos for the Great American Read) that it could upset someone to imply that books reflecting their culture can be distilled down to a cartoon made by white dudes who borrowed lots from a greater mythology. It makes me feel like she doesn't have my back, so why would I support her? And it's not that I was looking for an apology. If she didn't mean it, don't apologize. But it would have taken very little to say, "Angry white ladies blew up this cancel culture charge, but don't let that hide issues in publishing. Here's why some people may have legitimately been concerned about that tweet."
Anywho, other than trying to be a good librarian (and Asian Diasporic or whatever) being aware of the book world, I'm fully vaccinated including the post two week wait and finally got to get out and about! I was bummed to get cancelled on Thursday, which was the two week mark. I'm increasingly aware that I like to celebrate milestones and it felt like a day that needed it! But Friday I got to meet up with a friend and GO INSIDE A BOOKSTORE. Mostly to pick up a preorder, but just going inside felt beautiful and made me pine for author events. And we found a place that sold Cornish pasties. (delicious) Saturday I got to see other friends and visit the Butterfly Pavilion. And Sunday was getting up super early to take bee photos with a coworker (and become better friends) and then Venezuelan food (and a haircut). Mostly it was all outdoors, which still makes me way more comfortable and I'm definitely taking my mask everywhere.
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Date: 2021-05-17 08:31 pm (UTC)From:Well, my mother was often mistaken for Alaska Native, so I guess it goes both ways! Guess it's all that Bering Strait land bridge stuff. :)