we've identified the problem, so what's next? where's the revolution?

October 30, 2015 9:21 AM

Equity in Publishing: What Should Editors Be Doing? "My job as an editor is to publish the best writing—wait for it—by a variety of writers. With regards to Best American Poetry, we're correct to call out the clear conflation of "best" and "white"—too often "We just published the best writing we could find" is a terrifying excuse for not publishing diversely. And this diversity—no, this equity, because I don't just acquire a writer of color and call it a day, returning to white business as usual—does require work."

The PEN American Center editorial roundtable participants were Antonio Aiello, Alexander Chee, Anna deVries, Hafizah Geter, Amy Hundley, Amy King, Greg Pardlo, Morgan Parker, Camille Rankine, Danniel Schoonebeek, and Jeff Shotts.

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Daniel José Older, BuzzFeed: Diversity Is Not Enough: Race, Power, Publishing

The disproportionally white publishing industry matters because agents and editors stand between writers and readers. Anika Noni Rose put it perfectly in Vanity Fair this month: "There are so many writers of color out there, and often what they get when they bring their books to their editors, they say, 'We don't relate to the character.' Well it's not for you to relate to! And why can't you expand yourself so you can relate to the humanity of a character as opposed to the color of what they are?"

So we are wary. The publishing industry looks a lot like one of these best-selling teenage dystopias: white and full of people destroying each other to survive.

Anna Holmes, NYT Magazine: Has 'Diversity' Lost Its Meaning?

Doerr was quick to issue an apology for what he called "an unfortunate joke," but his conflation of a few additions with substantial changes in corporate hiring and recruitment practices inadvertently revealed what's so irritating about the recent ubiquity of the word "diversity": It has become both euphemism and cliché, a convenient shorthand that gestures at inclusivity and representation without actually taking them seriously.

Mira Jacob, BuzzFeed: I Gave A Speech About Race To The Publishing Industry And No One Heard Me

Here is the thing about how discrimination works: No one ever comes right out and says, "We don't want you." In the publishing world, they don’t say, "We just don't want your story." They say, "We're not sure you're relatable" and "You don't want to exclude anyone with your work." They say, "We're not sure who your audience is."

Best American Poetry, previously: Potential applicant for the Amina Arraf Fellowship in the Arts
Diversity in children's literature, previously: Where do you find out about Russian criminals?

posted by divined by radio (5 comments total)

The myth of meritocracy is one of the key things keeping institutional racism going, even (especially?) in liberal contexts.
posted by mellow seas at 10:32 AM on October 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

#weneeddiversebooks

Much of the children's lit community is talking about this, as we damn well should.
posted by the_blizz at 10:38 AM on October 30, 2015

Ooooofff. This is so, so good. (Even though the first guy has a bit of chicken/egg confusion going on. I think he's right about education, but how is that going to improve if we don't start bringing people of color into the culture at all levels, as gatekeepers, as writers?)

I am a mixed-race Asian American (so, I'm also white) working at a smallish publishing company. (I identify myself as white in every industry diversity survey. I don't think the industry should get to use me to make their numbers look better.) I was recently promoted out of my first entry-level role, and at the same time I moved into children's publishing, which is especially concerned with diversity lately following the rise of the We Need Diverse Books movement (jinx, the_blizz!). I think my company has published some fantastic titles featuring characters of color, ones I'm incredibly proud of. And yet...

The editorial department at my company is very, very white. We share articles about diversity with each other (I might share this one, in fact); we have lunches to discuss diversity, we include figures on diversity when pitching books to the editorial team. But I also fear that what we're really doing is responding to a "trend," we're "trying" to be more diverse, in a way that some of the editors quoted are mocking near the end of the piece. The end result (in the form of our books) is good, but I'm not sure most of our editors really get it from a social justice standpoint, and I wonder if that still causes harm. I know what I would have to say about this as an outside observer, but when it's my job that I love on the line, I become afraid.
posted by sunset in snow country at 11:01 AM on October 30, 2015 [3 favorites]

In a similar story, there has been a proposal in American theater to address the question of diversity (or lack thereof) with a Jubilee year, during which participating theaters will commit to producing plays by women, people of color, the disabled, and LGBTQA writers.

I don't know how successful it will be, but, as a white, male, straight playwright -- I'm all for it. I've crunched the numbers will local theater and we could have every theater in town produce three seasons of plays only by women, as an example, and still be nowhere near equity, as we have a hundred years of history of almost exclusively plays by men. And that's not even looking at the other voices that have been excluded.

There have been a few complaints, as far as I can tell all by white men, unsurprisingly. Because God forbid there be one single year where they are excluded in the way that women have been for a millennium.
posted by maxsparber at 12:11 PM on October 30, 2015 [3 favorites]

"The first thing to be said is: by practicing this art, you will disappoint, can only disappoint, you will always always disappoint. Your most practiced rejection, however worded, however encouraging you fashion it to be, is still a rejection. It is still a disappointment.

The next thing to say is: the editor must disappoint. Practice this art long enough, and you will disappoint many. Hundreds, and then thousands. You will carry this with you. You will lament that you have to hone a skill that makes you detestable."
posted by clavdivs at 5:43 PM on October 30, 2015 [1 favorite]