Working across cultures requires openness to criticism. Image Shutterstock.
Lionel Shriver – the author of We Need to Talk About Kevin – is definitive in her thoughts about ‘sensitivity readers’ – cultural experts who check manuscripts when authors are writing outside their own cultural milieu.
Shriver has described the practice as a form of censorship. It ‘has a gagging effect,’ she said. ‘Unrelenting anguish about hurting other people’s feelings inhibits spontaneity and constipates creativity. The day my novels are sent to a sensitivity reader is the day I quit.’
The advent of social media gave previously unheard minority voices a public space, and consequently issues around minority representation and cultural appropriation have been generating heated debate for several years now. And the pressure for inclusion and diversity has never been greater.
Positive outcomes
The Young Adult book world has led the way, with campaigns such as #WeNeedDiverseBooks and #OwnVoices that over the past few years have opened debate on representation and the importance of publishing diverse writers.
Sometimes books have been withdrawn from publication and reworked to deal with social media critiques. Earlier this year, for instance, Asian American writer Amélie Wen Zhao withdrew and reworked her debut fantasy novel Blood Heir, after African American readers claimed its depictions of slavery were insensitive. It will be now be released in November.
As this case and others show, these issues affect writers from any background, whenever we draw from cultural influences that are outside our lived experience.
Often these stories are run with headlines such as ‘persecution is endemic in the vicious world of Young Adult publishing’. But this kind of coverage misrepresents a deeply nuanced and complicated argument.
Worse, it obscures what are more often positive outcomes for both readers and writers.
Writing different subjectivities
‘I think it’s easy for white writers to get their noses out of joint on this question,’ said bestselling YA crime writer Ellie Marney. ‘But we need to look at the context: how white publishing is, how much harder it is for anyone from a minority to get published in the first place.’
Marney has written characters from different backgrounds to hers – in her teen thriller No Limits, one protagonist was Anglo-Indian, while there was an Indonesian character in her Circus Hearts trilogy. In both cases, she employed a sensitivity reader to check accuracy of her characters.
She said that she isn’t necessarily comfortable with representing characters from different cultures than her own, and that it’s important to think why. ‘I keep questioning – why is this necessary? What is the purpose of this perspective? Why do I need this perspective that I don’t know?’
For Marney, keeping these questions in the foreground is crucial, and part of the responsibility of writing a book. But even when she has some familiarity with a culture, she uses a sensitivity reader as well.
‘I speak Indonesian and I lived in Indonesia for a few years,’ she said. ‘But even so, that doesn’t necessarily mean that I feel comfortable writing non-white characters. I still need someone to check that I’ve written truthfully.’
Another kind of editor
The sensitivity reader isn’t in fact a new phenomenon. It’s a new twist on a long-established tradition.
Just as expert consultants have always been brought in by publishers to advise on specialist areas of knowledge, and editors have always advised writers on aspects of syntax, grammar and structure, so sensitivity readers can help writers to make their books better, by picking up on inaccuracies and stereotypes.
This is an ethical question – perpetuating harmful stereotypes of any minority, whether they are LGBTQI+, Indigenous, disabled, culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) or even simply women – can contribute to real-life suffering. In the case of writing for young people, it can directly contribute to bullying or ostracism.
The other side of the coin is that more truthful representation can contribute to mutual understanding, which is ever more desirable in today’s polarised world.
Sometimes people assume that removing stereotypes means that minorities have to be shown in a relentlessly positive light. But this again misunderstands the process. Pollyanna portrayals, as much as negative stereotypes, emerge from a notion that only certain kinds of people inhabit the full range of humanity.
But as much as it’s a question of ethics, consulting cultural experts is also a question of artistic craft. Getting rid of clichés and inaccuracies can only improve your work.
It’s important too to remember that using a sensitivity reader won’t insulate your work from criticism. No one person can speak for their entire community. Although Jennifer Kent made her gruelling film Nightingale in deep consultation with Tasmanian Aboriginal elders, it didn’t prevent it from generating controversy.
Whether you take the advice of a sensitivity reader is ultimately your decision. But you should be prepared to take criticism openly, in the spirit of collaboration.
The most important thing to remember is that their job – as with any other kind of editor in the writing process – is to make your work better. And if you take advantage of what they can offer you, they will.
