Writing the Other Read online

  Disrespectful Dialect

  Elsewhere in this book, in the essay “Appropriate Cultural Appropriation,” Nisi states that “all speech is (arguably) made in one or another dialect; in ­attempting accurate transcription of any particular version of English, we mark it as nonstandard and in some sense deprivilege it.” (92) If your goal is to connect rather than distance your reader from what you’re writing, you need to think carefully about how you represent your characters’ speech. Dialect is very much a verbal analogue of the marked state, and because of this its use can be a bad move.

  Even worse than transcribing speech with overly zealous accuracy, however, is careless or inaccurate transcription. Many of your readers will be blown completely out of whatever milieu you wished to establish. Those belonging to or deeply familiar with the ROAARS classification you’re supposedly representing will distrust everything else you attempt to show them; those only slightly acquainted with it may be distracted from the point you want to make, or the story you’re trying to tell, as they puzzle over what Miz So-an-so said: Was that a typo? A word they ought to look up in their dictionary? Do people really talk like that? Where and when? And why?

  We’re not saying that reproducing colloquial speech patterns is a mistake—simply that it is difficult to do well and can lead to mistakes.

  Examples: Turning again to Cacek’s “Belief,” we find numerous improbable sentences attributed to the formerly enslaved Samuel. Appraising the dead soldier he says, “Whoo-wee, will yor lookit all dem medals.” (230) When the two come across a group of children, he comments, “It be hard t’see dem so young, but you gotta know dey be happy here. Some o’ ’em even happier den when dey was breathin’.” (238) Giving the soldier a piece of fruit, Samuel jokes that “Yesshur, ol’ Chancy gots t’have da chance t’eats dat peach. Yesshur.” (239)

  “Yesshur” is repeated. Not a typo, then. So is “yor” “you?” Are both “dem” and “ ’em” “them?” Why the distinction? And “da” is filling in for “the”; perhaps it ought to be pronounced “duh” rather than “dah”?

  Even after all this processing, Samuel’s speech sounds like no one else’s—at least no one else that Nisi has ever heard. You don’t want your readers to have to work this hard, and you don’t want them to be this dissatisfied with the results of their efforts.

  The Saintly Victim

  You commit this faux pas when you emphasize the evil of racism, sexism, child abuse, murder—whatever!—by increasing the innocence of the victim. For example, when you show that child abuse is wrong by making your child victim spotlessly perfect. This child has never stolen a cookie—never even given it a thought!

  Yeah, right.

  Don’t create a blameless victim so good that Mother Theresa looks Hell-bound in comparison. For that matter, you needn’t make the victim particularly good at all. Evil behavior is evil behavior. Gay-bashing is wrong, and it doesn’t matter if the victim was trying to force his unwanted attentions on the man who beat him up.

  Counter-Example: “Night They Missed the Horror Show” by Joe R. Lansdale (Schow 1988).

  The main character and his buddy are racist whites who rescue a black classmate, their quarterback, from violent rival teammates who find him when his car breaks down. It turns out the quarterback stole the car. He was not free of sin, though of course he didn’t deserve to be attacked by the rival team.

  “Don’t Go There!”

  If you do, you’ll lose almost all your readers.

  In addition to the previously mentioned unfortunately-named character in Julie Smith’s mystery novel 82 Desire, here are a couple of other “places” not to go:

  “Hitler was a good guy, just misunderstood.” As with the “dark hordes,” there’s no real need to elaborate on this theme. It’s a guaranteed loser. Trust us on this one.

  “The rape victim who falls in love with her/his rapist.” We’re willing to believe this happens in real life, but (a) not very often, and (b) we don’t care. We won’t read any further. Neither will many other readers.

  Conclusion

  You Can Do It!

  If you’ve just read the preceding section, you may be feeling a little discouraged right now. There are so many ways to go wrong. You’ll no doubt be able to think of some on your own that we haven’t mentioned.

  Remember, though, that the possibility of failure is no excuse for not making the attempt.

  At this point, you’re much better prepared to succeed than you were when you first started reading this guide. You have techniques. You have examples. You have new ways of talking about what you want to do, new ways of seeing characters, of seeing otherness.

  And you know that you’re not alone. You are one of many writers seeking to improve the stories we tell each other by making them about all of us, in all of our glorious differences. Past students of Writing the Other workshops have stayed in touch, offering one another help and constructive criticism. If you’d like to contact fellow readers of this guide in a similar spirit, you can do so through the Writing the Other website: ­

  www.writingtheother.com.

  You may also find support for this aspect of your work among people you already know. Share this guide with them. Do the exercises together. Pool your knowledge. If you’d like to have us come to your area and present the live version of the workshop, you can contact us via the website, at the URL above.

  As you put your new Writing the Other tools to use, they’ll sharpen, and your awareness of how best to employ them will expand. You’ve reached the end of this guide, but you’re at the beginning of an exciting new phase in your work. Congratulations on getting off to a good start!

  Exercise 8

  Create a list of resource people with whom you’re acquainted. Include people of different ROAARS characteristics than your own, people with non-ROAARS differences, people whose judgment, taste, and insight you respect. Take two minutes to compile your list.

  As you review the results of this final exercise, think about how you can connect with these people in ways that will improve your writing in the areas we’ve covered. Your current relationships with them may well range from bare acquaintance to marriage, and this will affect the kind of help you’ll ask of them, as well as how you’ll compensate them for their help. They may be eager to assist you. They may prefer to refer you to someone else. Or they may disagree entirely with any attempts at writing the other.

  There’s one way to find out.

  Try it.

  Works Cited

  Barnes, Steven. Lion’s Blood. New York, NY, Aspect/Warner, 2002.

  ———. Zulu Heart. New York, NY, Warner, 2003.

  Burke, James Lee. Purple Cane Road: A Novel. New York, NY, Doubleday, 2000.

  Cacek, P.D. “Belief.” Al Sarrantonio, ed., Redshift: Extreme Visions of Speculative Fiction. New York, NY, Roc, 2001.

  Cannavo, S. Think to Win: The Power of Logic in Everyday Life. Amherst, NY, Prometheus Books, 1998, 232.

  Child, Lincoln. Utopia. New York, NY, Doubleday, 2004.

  Davis, Chan. “Critique and Proposals,” , 1949.

  Delany, Samuel R. Dhalgren. New York, NY, Bantam, 1975.

  ———. Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia. New York, NY, Bantam Spectra, 1976. As Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia. Hanover, NH, Wesleyan University Press/University Press of New England, 1996.

  Do the Right Thing. Produced and directed by Spike Lee. 120 min. Universal Pictures, 1989. DVD/Videocassette.

  Egan, Greg. “Wang’s Carpet.” Bear, Greg, ed., New Legends. New York, NY, Tor, 1995.

  Ehrenreich, Barbara. Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America. New York, NY, Metropolitan Books, 2001.

  Fowler, Karen Joy. Sarah Canary. New York, NY, H. Holt, 1991.

  Glory. Produced by Freddie Fields, Pieter Jan Brugge, and Ray Herbeck Jr., and director by Edward Zwick. 122 min. Columbia/Tri-Star Studios, 1989. DVD/Videocasse
tte.

  Hamilton, Laurell K. Cerulean Sins. New York, NY, Berkley, 2003.

  Hardman, M.J. Comments made in person during session of “Writing the Other” workshop, Madison, Wisconsin, May 25, 2003.

  Hogan, James P. “Madame Butterfly.” Brad Linaweaver and Edward E. Kramer, eds., Free Space. New York, NY, Tor, 1997.

  Hot Shots! Produced by William Badalato and directed by Jim Abrahams. 83 min. Twentieth Century Fox, 1991. DVD/Videocassette.

  In Living Color. Produced by Keenan Ivory Wayans. Fox TV, 1990-1994. DVD.

  Lansdale, Joe R. “Night They Missed the Horror Show.” Schow, David J., ed., Silver Scream. Arlington Heights, IL, Dark Harvest Press, 1988.

  ———. Savage Season et seq [Hap & Leonard mystery series]. Shingletown, CA, Mark V. Ziesing, 1990.

  Lethal Weapon. Produced by Joel Silver and Richard Donner, and directed by Richard Donner. 110 min. Warner Studios, 1987. DVD/Videocassette.

  Mitchell, Margaret. Gone With the Wind. New York, NY, Avon Books, 1973.

  Mosley, Walter. Devil in a Blue Dress et seq [Easy Rawlins mystery series]. New York, NY, W.W. Norton & Company, 1990.

  Parker, Robert B. Promised Land et seq [Spenser mystery series]. Boston, MA, Houghton/Mifflin, 1976.

  Peters, William. A Class Divided: Then and Now. New Haven, CT, Yale University Press, 1987.

  Petrie, Donald, director; Richardson, Doug, story; Schulman, Tom, screenplay. Welcome to Mooseport. Beverly Hills, CA, Twentieth Century Fox, 2004.

  Shawl, Nisi. “The Tawny Bitch.” Hopkinson, Nalo, ed., Mojo: Conjure Stories. New York, NY, Warner, 2003.

  Smith, Julie. 82 Desire: A Skip Langdon Novel. New York, NY, Fawcett Columbine, 1998.

  Steinbeck, John. Travels with Charley. New York, NY, Viking Press, 1962.

  Stirling, S.M. “Shikari in Galveston.” Harry Turtledove, ed., Worlds that Weren’t. New York, NY, Roc, 2002.

  Thomas, Sheree R., ed. Dark Matter. New York, NY, Aspect/Warner, 2000.

  ———. Dark Matter 2: Reading the Bones. New York, NY, Aspect/Warner, 2004.

  Zettel, Sarah. Fool’s War. New York, NY, Aspect/Warner, 1997.

  Recommended Reading/Viewing

  Anonymous. Black People Love Us.

  .

  Auel, Jean M. The Clan of the Cave Bear: A Novel. New York, NY, Crown, 1980.

  Barnes, Steven. Lion’s Blood. New York, NY, Aspect/Warner, 2002.

  ———. Zulu Heart. New York, NY, Warner, 2003.

  Baker, Kyle. The Cowboy Wally Show. New York, NY, Dolphin/Doubleday, 1988.

  ———. I Die at Midnight. New York, NY, Vertigo/DC Comics, 2000.

  ———. Why I Hate Saturn. New York, NY, Piranha Press, 1990.

  ———. You Are Here. New York, NY, Vertigo/DC Comics, 1999.

  Delany, Samuel R. Dhalgren. New York, NY, Bantam, 1975.

  ———. Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia. New York, NY, Bantam Spectra, 1976. As Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia. Hanover, NH, Wesleyan University Press/University Press of New England, 1996.

  Do the Right Thing. Produced and directed by Spike Lee. 120 min. Universal Pictures, 1989. DVD/Videocassette.

  Egan, Greg. Schild’s Ladder. New York, NY, EOS/Avon, 2002.

  ———. “Wang’s Carpet” (The Hard SF Renaissance, edited by David G. Hartwell & Kathryn Cramer)

  Fowler, Karen Joy. Sarah Canary. New York, NY, H. Holt, 1991.

  ———. Sister Noon. New York, NY, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2001.

  ———. “What I Didn’t See.” SciFiction, July 2002, .

  Frost, Gregory. “The Prowl.” Hopkinson, Nalo, ed., Mojo: Conjure Stories. New York, NY, Warner, 2003.

  Griffith, Nicola & Pagel, Stephen, eds. Bending the Landscape: Fantasy. Clarkston, GA, Borealis/White Wolf Publishing, 1996.

  ———. Bending the Landscape: Horror. Woodstock, NY, The Overlook Press, 2001.

  ———. Bending the Landscape: Science Fiction. Woodstock, NY, The Overlook Press, 1998.

  Hannibal. Produced by Dino De Laurentiis, Martha De Laurentiis, and Ridley Scott, and directed by Ridley Scott. 131 min. MGM/UA, 2001. DVD/Videocassette.

  Harris, Thomas, The Silence of the Lambs. New York, NY, St. Martins Press, 1988.

  Hopkinson, Nalo, ed. Mojo: Conjure Stories. New York, NY, Warner, 2003.

  Lansdale, Joe R. Savage Season et seq [Hap & Leonard mystery series]. Shingletown, CA, Mark V. Ziesing, 1990.

  ———. “Night They Missed the Horror Show.” Schow, David J., ed., Silver Scream. Arlington Heights, IL, Dark Harvest Press, 1988.

  McHugh, Maureen F. China Mountain Zhang. New York, NY, Tor, 1992.

  ———. Mission Child. New York, NY, EOS/Avon, 1998.

  McIntyre, Vonda N. The Moon and the Sun. New York, NY, Pocket, 1997.

  Mosley, Walter. Devil in a Blue Dress et seq [Easy Rawlins mystery series]. New York, NY, W.W. Norton & Company, 1990.

  Ruff, Matt. Sewer, Gas & Electric. Atlantic Monthly Press, 1997.

  Shawl, Nisi. “The Tawny Bitch.” Hopkinson, Nalo, ed., Mojo: Conjure Stories. New York, NY, Warner, 2003.

  Smith, Alexander McCall. The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency. Cape Town, South Africa, D. Philip, 1998. New York, NY, Anchor, 2002.

  Something’s Gotta Give. Produced by Bruce Block (II), Nancy Meyers, and Suzanne Farwell, and directed by Nancy Meyers. 123 min. Columbia/Tri-Star Studios, 2003. DVD/Videocassette.

  Sterling, Bruce, “Maneki Neko.” The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, May 1998. A Good Old-Fashioned Future, New York, NY, Bantam, 1999.

  The Silence of the Lambs. Produced by Edward Saxon, Kenneth Utt, and Ron Bozman, and directed by Jonathan Demme. 120 min. Orion Studios, 1991. DVD/Videocassette.

  Thomas, Sheree R., editor. Dark Matter; Dark Matter 2: Reading the Bones.

  Ward, Cynthia. “The Lost Homeland.” Griffith, Nicola & Pagel, Stephen, eds., Bending the Landscape: Horror. Woodstock, NY, Overlook Press, 2001.

  Zettel, Sarah. Fool’s War. New York, NY, Aspect/Warner, 1997.

  Mixed

  Burke, James Lee. Purple Cane Road: A Novel. New York, NY, Doubleday, 2000.

  Gibson, William. Count Zero. New York, NY, Arbor House, 1986.

  ———. Neuromancer. New York, NY, Ace, 1984.

  Glory. Produced by Freddie Fields, Pieter Jan Brugge, and Ray Herbeck Jr., and director by Edward Zwick. 122 min. Columbia/Tri-Star Studios, 1989. DVD/Videocassette.

  Hamilton, Laurell K. Cerulean Sins. New York, NY, Berkley, 2003.

  Lethal Weapon. Produced by Joel Silver and Richard Donner, and directed by Richard Donner. 110 min. Warner Studios, 1987. DVD/Videocassette.

  Parker, Robert B. Promised Land et seq [Spenser mystery series]. Boston, MA, Houghton/Mifflin, 1976.

  Smith, Julie. 82 Desire: A Skip Langdon Novel. New York, NY, Fawcett Columbine, 1998.

  Stirling, S.M. Against the Tide of Years. New York, NY, Roc, 1999.

  ———. Island in the Sea of Time. New York, NY, Roc, 1998.

  ———. On the Oceans of Eternity. New York, NY, Roc, 2000.

  ———.“Shikari in Galveston.” Harry Turtledove, ed., Worlds that Weren’t. New York, NY, Roc, 2002.

  Beautiful Strangers: Transracial Writing for the Sincere

  by Nisi Shawl

  “I’d never write about a person from a different ethnic background. The whole story would probably be full of horrible stereotypes and racist slurs.”

  Amy closed her mouth, and mine dropped open. Luckily, I was seated when my friend made this statement, but the lawn chair must have sagged visibly with the weight of my disbelief. My own classmate excluding all other ethnic types from her creative universe!

  I think this sort of misguided caution is the source of a lot of sf’s monochrome futures. You know the ones I mean, where some nameless and never discussed plague has mysteriously killed off everyone with more than a hint of
melanin in their skin. I wonder sometimes what kind of career I’d have if I followed suit with tales of stalwart Space Negroes and an unexplained absence of whites.

  But of course I don’t. I boldly write about people from other backgrounds, just as many of the field’s best authors do. Suzie McKee Charnas, Bruce Sterling, and Sarah Zettel have all produced wonderful transracial characters, as I show in examples below. Before getting into their work, though, let’s discuss how to prepare for your own.

  If you want to go beyond the level of just assigning different skin tones and heritages to random characters, you’re going to have to do some research. Because yes, all people are the same, but they’re also quite different. For now, we’ll set aside the argument that race is an artificial construct and concentrate on how someone outside a minority group can gain enough knowledge of the group’s common traits to realistically represent one of its members.

  Reading’s a very non-confrontational way to do this. Be sure, though, if you choose this route, to use as many primary sources as possible. If researching a story about first contact between a stranded explorer from Aldeberan and a runaway slave, for example, you’d do much better reading The Life & Times of Frederick Douglass than Uncle Tom’s Cabin. The latter is an important and moving book. But not only is it a work of fiction, it was written by a non-slave; therefore, it’s a step further removed from the authentic experience you need.

  Websites on minority culture abound. Any half-­decent search engine will bring up a freighter’s worth of URLs on African-Americans, for instance, and at least a page or two on lesser-known groups.

  For a less cerebral approach, check out nearby ethnic history museums. Art collections, historical dioramas, anthropological displays, and so on can provide you with strong visuals. Some are interactive and allow you to pick up a few aural and tactile sensations as well. For locations, look under “Museums” in the yellow pages, or consult a travel guide for your area.