My take on the Cultural Appropriation hoohah

[davidlevine]

There's been a lot of noise recently in the writerly lobe of the left blogosphere about the question of "cultural appropriation." I missed the Wiscon panel where the recent dust-up started, and I've read only bits and snippets of the ongoing discussion.

The issue came up in the comments thread of a friendslocked post by another writer. In that thread I confessed that I had no idea whatsoever what, exactly, cultural appropriation is and how to avoid it. littlebutfierce pointed me to a couple of specific posts that helped me get my head around the issue, what I feel about it, and why people get so wrapped around the axle about it.

From andweshallmarch I got the idea that cultural appropriation consists of presenting yourself as a member of a culture not your own (which I think everyone would agree is both heinous and rare) and that every majority writer should make the attempt to put themselves in another's shoes -- to write sympathetically about cultures not their own. This I can totally relate to.

From clairelight, on the other hand, I got the idea that only writers with talent, skill, and Responsibility should even attempt writing about other cultures. This I have some trouble with, because a) this doesn't really provide guidance to anyone, because all writers believe they have talent, skill, and Responsibility; and b) this doesn't allow beginning writers to learn-by-doing.

I suppose I could buy into clairelight's concept if I assumed that beginning writers would be allowed to try writing about other cultures as long as editors and critiquers acted as a filter to prevent less-than-sensitive works from being published. But we all know that tastes vary; people argue with Gordon Van Gelder's and Sheila Williams's selections all the time. So who gets to say "you, you have Talent, you may write about other cultures; but you, you have no Talent, you may only write about your own culture"?

I think the bottom line in this, as in so many things in writing, is: the rules are the rules, but you can get away with anything if you can somehow (e.g. through skillful writing) convince the reader to accept it. Problems arise when people think they are good enough writers to break the rule "thou shalt not pretend intimate knowledge of a culture not your own" but they are wrong, and unfortunately the definition of "good enough" is determined by each individual reader.

That's why there's argument about what cultural appropriation is and how to avoid it. A sensitive and skillful portrayal of a culture other than the writer's is diversity and is good; an insensitive and ham-handed portrayal of a culture other than the writer's is cultural appropriation and is bad. But the difference between these is the difference between well-written and not-so-well-written. Many stories fall into the huge gray area between the extremes, where individual taste dominates and it can be difficult even to articulate the reasons a story works or doesn't work. But because this issue is so important, each reader's opinion on a story or a class of stories is elevated in significance, and disagreements on whether a story is successful or not turn into larger arguments over whether what the story was trying to do was appropriate or not.

For myself, I think that I will continue to do as I have done: to write about people, from whatever culture, and to imbue them with humanity to the best of my ability.

Comments

[hank.livejournal.com]

The story I love to point out is that of Ward Churchill, who has made a career out of being more Indian than thou, turns out isn't of native American ancestry. And Iron Eyes Cody, who symbolized native Americans for years in movies and on tv and was famous for insisting that their traditions be honored and respected, turned out to be of Sicilian parents.

As a cross-breed, I'm more sensitive than most on this issue. I learned Choctaw before I learned English and I practice its religion, but I am only 1/4 Choctaw, grew up in various suburbs (the great cultural leveller), and pass for white. So, am I Choctaw? Highly politicized Indians (like Ward Churchill) would say no. One AIM activist famously said that no Indian that grew up off a reservation was "really" Indian.

What about the case of a skillful writer who convinces people of things that are not true? A friend of mine from Texas of Apache lineage used to get apoplectic when anyone mentioned "Hanta Yo." And if you want a major rant, get me started on Orson Scott Card's Alvin the Maker novels, with his casual appropriattion of the history and life of Tecumseh to serve his own beliefs and ends.

In a similar vein to "cultural appropriation," what of the folks who think no male writer can ever honestly write about the interior life of a woman, or vice versa? Okay, Dickens only saw women from the outside, but was that also true of Tolstoy with Anna Karenina? (And note that I use two writers from the 19th century, as it is safer than going after any modern writers.)

I don't have any good answers, David, but I try to make up for it by coming up with interesting questions.

[davidlevine]

This points up a detail I hadn't considered: although it's generally considered a bad thing to present yourself as a member of a culture not your own, there are often open questions as to whether or not a person really is a member of a given culture. Another gray area, another point of argument. (One specific case here is whether men and women are really members of each other's culture.)

When writers, even skillful writers, say things that aren't true, they will fail to please every reader (specifically they fail to please those who know the true story). The same arguments will ensue as between readers who are and are not pleased by a work because of the quality of the research and writing -- only more intense. And, as above, there may be arguments between members of a culture over whether or not a particular thing about that culture is "true."