What to do when "nonfiction" centers Whiteness?

The other day, I came across a copy of The House That George Built (by Suzanne Slade, illustrated by Rebecca Bond, Charlesbridge, 2012).

A play on The House That Jack Built, the book features a sing-songy rhyme on the righthand side of each spread (“This is the lot / that grand, scenic spot, / for the President’s House that George built”) and a more detailed history of the President’s house’s conception, building, and completion on the left. Painterly watercolors add to the book’s storybook-like feel.

Not until more than halfway through does the book acknowledge that our White “Founding Fathers”--the ones who fought so gallantly for freedom--enslaved other human beings to create the President’s House. And even that information is couched in bowdlerizing language: “By now over one hundred workers--free men and slaves--lived on the construction site in small, temporary huts. They labored from sunrise till sunset, six long days a week. But with presidential duties and the house, George worked seven.” In the Author’s Note, the topic of enslaved people’s labor on the President’s House is similarly relegated to a small paragraph towards the end. That’s it.

I am accustomed to prettified versions of America’s history, but I lingered over this one (which somehow never showed up on my radar screen back in 2012). Here’s why: I cannot mentally square the care and precision the creators took to call the building the “President’s House” rather than the “White House” (it was not called “the White House” until the early 1900s) with the revisionist decision they made to frame the book around the idea that “George built” it.

Why so careful to get the building’s name right, but so free to credit a slaver with having built it, when the only actual building that George participated in was pounding in some wooden stakes to mark the site?

Accuracy is a big deal in anything labeled nonfiction. I’ve been on enough award committees to know that even the slightest error can doom a book. The author and editor were probably hyper-aware of this as they made the decision to consistently call the building the “President’s House”. But what to do when accuracy isn’t the issue so much as White-centricity? I can already hear the denizens of George-defenders telling me “but it was his project! He envisioned the house, that’s what the authors meant, it’s supposed to be a metaphor! Anyways, you have to consider the time--slavery was legal!” OK, I get all that. And, I also get that George’s point of view isn’t the only point of view from which we can look at this story. Where’s The House That WE Built, told from the point of views of the enslaved Black people, free Black people, and immigrants who actually built the thing?

I do see some promising signs of change. More and more reviewers are naming a White-dominant narrative as a problem (Kirkus being a prime example), but we also need authors and editors to consider whether their narratives--particularly their “nonfiction” narratives--are White-centric.

Consider, for example, Bold Riders: The Story of the Pony Express (by John Micklos, Capstone, 2015).

Over and over, this pithy book presents First/Native Nations people as one of a series of obstacles the brave Pony Express riders needed to surmount:

“The route crossed mountains, rivers, and deserts. Winter snowstorms and spring floods might prevent delivery. Riders also needed to cross land claimed by many American Indian tribes. Some of these tribes were warlike. How could lone riders get through?” (p. 13)

“Riders spent long hours in the saddle and faced many dangers. They might get trampled by a herd of stampeding bison. They might have to outrun hostile American Indians. Even if all went smoothly, they finished their shifts stiff and sore from their hard rides.” (p. 19)

“The brave Pony Express riders had many adventures and faced many dangers. History shows that the Paiutes were at war with settlers and soldiers along the Pony Express route. When riders said they had tangled with or escaped hostile Paiutes, they were likely telling the truth. Sometimes they even had scars to show. We also know that some riders lost their lives in the line of duty.” (p. 20)

The p. 20 quote, in particular, intrigues and troubles me. Micklos seems to know that something in this narrative is “off”, and is defending his White-centric narrative with “these are FACTS.” But that’s a strawman argument. I don’t think anyone would dispute that Paiute people fought White Pony Express riders.

The problem is the way the narrative is framed and constructed in the first place. Why were the Paiute people attacking?  Were they, in fact, attacking--or defending themselves?  Page 13 refers to land “claimed by many American Indian tribes,” but if the First/Native Nations people were there first, wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that the White people “claimed” that land? Why are the First/Native Nations people described as “hostile” and “warlike”, while the White people are described as “soldiers”? Why, for that matter, don’t we use the term “invaders” instead of “riders”? Where are the narratives that are just as by-the-numbers accurate, but centered in non-White points of view?

Don Tate’s Poet comes to mind, as does 1621: A New Look At Thanksgiving, and for teens, Howard Zinn’s Young People’s History. I’d love more. Leave them in the comments (and publishers, feel free to send us more of the real thing!).

Ed. 6/19/2016: Alyssa Mito Pusey, Senior Editor at Charlesbridge and Editor of The House That George Built, responds via CBC Diversity.  In her post, Alyssa models what a productive, constructive dialogue can look like, and also bravely shares her own feelings:

For me, it’s a nerve-racking time, in some ways. Authors and editors are being held to more rigorous standards, and I really don’t want to mess up. I certainly don’t want to incur the wrath of the blogosphere. More importantly, I don’t want to produce books that perpetuate racial stereotypes and white privilege, however unintentionally.

My fears aside, this is also an exciting and empowering time. I feel like my eyes are being opened, like I’m learning and growing with every article and blog post—Allie’s included. I’m receiving and acquiring more biographies of people of color. I’m asking experts and other readers for honest feedback on questions of representation. And I’m trying with every book to be as inclusive as possible.

I’ve got a long way to go, clearly. But I hope to keep on improving as an editor—and to do what I can to help publish nonfiction that accurately reflects our diverse world.

Alyssa, a huge thank THANK YOU goes out to you from me and the whole RWW team.  I particularly admire how you make space for your own fears as well as the excitement and empowerment you're feeling, and how you phrase this as a "yes, and" rather than a "yes, but"--you're excited AND afraid, not excited BUT afraid.  This is a crucial distinction, and something I, as a white person, need to practice, as this type of thinking runs counter to white culture.  Again, thank you.

BEA Round-up, Housekeeping, and some links

Image by Lisa Nowlain

With today’s post you get a twofer: first, a brief recap of School Library Journal’s (SLJ's) Day of Dialogue; second, some housekeeping reminders and links.

I traveled to Chicago for BookExpo America (BEA) last week. One of the main reasons I went was SLJ’s Day of Dialogue on Wednesday. Check the link and you’ll see why; it was an amazing line-up of book people. But as wonderful as those authors and illustrators were (and are), the panels were overwhelmingly White. Yes, there was at least one person of color on each panel, but 20% (or less) representation isn’t enough. And the fact that there was not a single First/Native Nations panelist is unacceptable. Plus, the two keynote speakers and all four moderators were—you guessed it—White. Now, I’m honestly not sure how much of this is on SLJ and how much is dictated by the publishers, but I’m assuming that SLJ will work to do better if they have anything to say about it based on their commitment to cultural competency in their reviews.

Now, on to the housekeeping. It’s been a while since we’ve highlighted our supporting documents, all of which can be found directly underneath our banner. Don’t forget to look at our FAQs; we’ve added a few things since our inception. We get questions sometimes about our comment policy, so check that out too. And finally, don’t forget to visit the blogs in the Kindred Spirits section as often as you can!

Here are some links from the last few weeks:

Latinxs in KidLit: a history of the Belpre (first in a proposed series; also, check Latinxs in KidLit for features on winning Belpre authors/illustrators)

Large Fears Twitter chat on diversity and book awards

Debbie Reese has written a series of posts on Thunder Boy Jr., the new picture book debut from National Book Award winner Sherman Alexie (illustrated by Caldecott Honoree and many time-Pura Belpre winner Yuyi Morales):
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

Have you been watching the #WhitewashedOUT hashtag on Twitter this month? This link will give you a bit of background on the situation, spurred on by so many appalling Hollywood casting decisions. A related hashtag to follow: #StarringJohnCho, which imagines the Harold and Kumar star in big Hollywood roles played by White male actors. Good stuff there.

Finally, from the NCTE blog: “In my own work with Black high school writers, I want my students to see not only themselves in what we are reading, but I want them to recognize their own capacity to be writers and thinkers.” - Latrice Johnson

Free Choice Reading & Tokenism

Being in a public library, at this time of year all I can think is “summer reading,” and I know that for many it is the same.   Kids need to read during the summer; kids read when it’s fun; it’s fun when they get to choose their own reading.  

But choosing their own reading really means just that; if a grownup is suggesting a book, it’s almost automatically tainted. So having a selection of books that kids can choose from is key.   Ergo: summer reading lists.

What is in your summer reading list? Do you have one, or use one? What kind of choice does it offer readers?

Last year Edith Campbell assembled a group of colleagues to create the We’re the People summer reading list.  Now in its second year, it gently suggests at the top of the website that you use it to “add to your summer reading list” books that are written, illustrated, and about people of color or First Nations/Native Americans.   However, I think it functions beautifully as a stand alone summer reading list in its entirety, and calls attention to the a “one of each” token representation that sadly still exists in many book lists out there.

The title of this list recalls for me the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH)’s “We the People” Bookshelves that were promoted 2003-2011.  The program awarded sets of selected titles to public and school libraries; each year’s “classic” book collection was related to “a theme important to the nation's heritage. ...In addition to introducing young readers to good literature, the Bookshelf promotes understanding of abstract or general ideas through the power of particular stories.”  The first year’s list, on Courage, included Little House on the Prairie and The Matchlock Gun.  Debbie Reese posted a wonderful letter by Jean Mendoza in 2007 about continuing concerns with these booklists, asking that the “We the People” Bookshelf “get in synchrony with reality.”  Some of the final lists in the project showed slight improvement.

Besides summer reading lists, many libraries offer free books in the summer, as outreach or incentive for summer reading programs.  My library offers a giveaway book as the prize to approximately 6000 children who read at least 20 days in the summer.  Buying enough paperbacks that will offer the right selection to any kid who stops in one of our 17 libraries is a challenge; we want to make sure that when they browse the prize bin, they feel they are being awarded a prize.   We buy most of these books from Scholastic’s Literacy Partnerships, the arm of the publishing giant through which providers who are giving away books to children can buy very cheap paperbacks.  Scholastic has always offered titles to serve a diverse community, though I still wince when I must seek out the word “multicultural” in the curated sets, and dodge over-used standards and problematic titles.  We don’t rely on Scholastic, as it also does not fully meet our demand for popular non-fiction and graphic novels.  At the same time that I sense its selection is improving, we continue to advocate for and secure funding to raise our price point per giveaway paperback, so that we can shift more of our purchases to other vendors.

In its related arm Scholastic Reading Club (through which kids can purchase inexpensive paperbacks through their classroom), Scholastic’s We Have Diverse Books partnership with We Need Diverse Books resulted in a “Special Collection of More than 75 Diversity-Themed Books for Children” list, and there are plans for 8 such lists in the 2016-17 year.  It’s progress, I guess.  Still, I yearn for kids to have the choice wherever they look for a selection of recommended books that will inspire them to read for themselves, for fun, without having to seek the “special” section.

Reviewing While White: A Tyranny of Petticoats

by Megan Schliesman

I like the concept of A Tyranny of Petticoats. This short story collection is subtitled “15 Stories of Belles, Bank Robbers & Other Badass Girls.” In her introduction, editor and contributor Jessica Spotswood writes: “I realized what I really wanted was to edit an anthology of stories about clever, interesting American girls throughout history written by clever, interesting (though not necessarily all American) women.” (p. x)

What’s not to love?

So yes, I like the concept, and in fact many of the stories, but I’m also struggling with how the theme is explored when it comes to racial and cultural diversity.

My first moment of unease came a bit later in the introduction. Spotswood states: “I suggested that we think diversely in terms of geography, historical eras, and our heroines’ races, sexualities, religions, and opinions on all manner of things.” So far so good. Then she goes on, “America is a melting pot. I hoped our fifteen stories could, in some small way, reflect that reality.” (p. xi)

The Tyranny of Metaphor

While there have been both critics and defenders of the term “melting pot” (and alternates, such as “salad bowl,” that have received some traction), reading it here was a disappointment. I understand the good intentions in using it, but  America—in present and in the past—is a place of vibrant diversity and complicated realities surrounding that diversity, and I think readers deserve explicit acknowledgment of this. “Melting pot” doesn’t begin to cover it.

But, ok. Melting pot.

There are fifteen stories in A Tyranny of Petticoats. Eight of the stories feature characters of color: five about African Americans, one about a Chinese American, one about Latinas, and one about a character referenced as “brown” with no development of this aspect of her identity. A ninth story is about a character who is Inuit. So, at first glance, promising when it comes to racial and ethnic diversity.

And yet, of the fifteen writers contributing to A Tyranny of Petticoats, only four of them, from what I’ve been able to determine, are women of color, and none of the contributors are from First/Native Nations. This is not nearly as diverse as I was hoping given the stated intent to reflect diversity. And while I don’t want to negate the diversity of voices that contributed to A Tyranny of Petticoats, the resulting diversity of stories across the collection was a strange, and at times unsettling mix.

Kekla Magoon, who is African American, wrote about an African American teen in “Pulse of the Panthers.” The other three contributors of color are of Asian Pacific heritage. Marie Lu wrote the story about the Inuit girl in Alaska. Caroline Tung Richmond and Y.S. Lee both wrote stories about White protagonists. The three remaining stories about the African Americans, the one story about the young woman who is “brown,” the one story about the Latinas, and the one story about the Chinese American, were all written by White authors. Of these, the story about the Latinas, the story about the Chinese American, and one of the stories about an African American (along with one story about a White character written by a White author) have supernatural/mystical elements. The story about the Native Alaskan has a spiritual element.

Let me be more specific:  The one representation of Latino culture in this anthology is a story about the three fates who are living out their current lives as three Mexican American sisters; the one representation of Chinese American culture is a girl who can see ghosts and commune with spirits; the opening story about an African American young woman who escaped enslavement with her father and is part of a pirate ship crew ends with her becoming a ghost of the sea; and the one representation of First/Native Nations cultures is an Inuit girl who saves herself from violent White traders with her own grit and some guidance from the Seal King.

One of These Things Is Not Like the Other

If I were reading an anthology of the extraordinary that goes beyond courage, grit, and fortitude—one in which mysticism, the supernatural, and perhaps spirituality were a clearly stated scope of the collection—I wouldn’t have been as unsettled, especially if that collection were broadly diverse in intent and specifically diverse in execution, and clarified its scope in terms of both spiritual beliefs and the fantastic (which are two very separate things). In such a collection, any representation of culture would, by nature of the overarching theme, be expected to include something supernatural or otherworldly and perhaps spiritual. I think of the marvelous collection Diverse Energies published by Tu Books/Lee & Low. It was intentionally diverse science fiction and fantasy and it felt (although I have no doubt it wasn’t) effortless.

But this is framed and clearly stated as historical fiction, and the inclusion of stories with supernatural, if not spiritual, elements was a strange choice to me. Surely there are plenty of “badass girls” who can be imagined throughout and across U.S. history and authentically grounded in a variety of cultures without resorting to the fantastic. What am I to make of these stories? Are they grounded in any authentic cultural beliefs, or simply spun from their authors’ imaginations?  The same is true of the spiritual element in the Inuit story—is this drawn from cultural beliefs, or the author’s imagination? If it is “authentic,” there is also the question, as Debbie Reese recently noted, of whether it is in fact religious and whether including it might be considered sacrilegious.

There is an author’s note following each story and as a general rule they reveal the thought and inspiration that went into the tales. Following “El Destinos” [sic] Lesley Walton writes, “”I always found mythology to be a delicious combination of magic and humanity….I thought of all those times when one’s cultural and national identity seemed at odds, and I wondered what might it be like to be divine and yet, at the same time utterly human….suddenly I had Valeria, Rosa, and Maria Elana, three immortals sent down to live as Mexican American sisters during the years after the Texas annexation” (p. 83).  Marissa Meyer’s note for “Gold in the Roots of Grass” talks about her fascination with western history and the gold rush, and her joy in doing research, but gives no mention to the Chinese American content of the story (p. 185). In her note following “The Journey” Marie Lu writes of loving Julie of the Wolves and of researching Alaska, loving “the blurred line between history and Inuit folklore….the facts already feel magical” (p. 41). J. Anderson Coats writes of the Mother Carey legend that is part of the opening story, “Mother Carey’s Table,” and of the fact that “about 25 percent of sailors on pirate or privateer vessels were people of color” (p. 19).

One of the first things I pay attention to in any anthology is the diversity of contributors, whether or not diversity is in any way the point of the collection. If it lacks racial diversity, I’m more than just disappointed. I’m angry. Because to my mind, from where I’m standing in the twenty-first century, the creators of that anthology failed a major requirement in executing their vision, whatever that vision was. They have failed their vision and they have failed readers. I say this even if I read and like the stories or poems included.

The failure for me in A Tyranny of Petticoats is less clear-cut. There are marvelous stories in this collection, including Magoon’s “Pulse of the Panthers,” about an African American teen living in rural California whose view of the world expands when her family hosts a group of Black Panthers from Oakland in 1967; Y.S. Lee’s “The Legendary Garrett Girls,” about two White sisters tending bar and taking no crap on the Alaskan frontier in 1898; and “Pearls” by Beth Revis, in which a young White woman escapes Chicago and an unwanted marriage, finding independence and community both on the Wyoming frontier in 1876.  Two stories, “City of Angels” by Lindsay Smith, set in 1945 Los Angeles (featuring the character with “brown” skin), and “The Whole World Is Watching” by Robin Talley, set in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic convention and featuring an African American woman, have main characters who are lesbian.

Again, I don’t want to negate the diversity that exists in this collection. And I’m not suggesting that the answer to “Who can write what?” is to simply “Write what you know” because what a writer knows is not necessarily so easily defined nor is it static. But this anthology definitely fell short for me by not ensuring a broader range of diversity among the contributors. I think this contributed to serious gaps between idea and execution, particularly when it comes to the inclusion of the supernatural in half of the stories that are racially diverse. This is true regardless of the fact that I enjoyed many of the individual stories as pieces of fiction. This misplaced, mistaken exoticism in an anthology of historical fiction feeds into broader cultural stereotypes, and that is something I’m sure was never the intent of this anthology, or of the individual writers. But the “magical” person of color and the “spiritual” Native are, indeed, the dominant representation of racial and cultural diversity here.

There is a a second volume in the works, The Radical Element: A Tyranny of Petticoats 2. There are some wonderful authors already contributing--I hope even more diverse voices will be included. It is stated as being a mix of fact, fiction, and fantasy. I’ll also be curious to see how well those combined elements and the writers serve the stated theme of "young woman throughout history whose voices have been ignored too long."

Why Host An African American Read-In?

Two years ago through my awesome professional learning network on Twitter, particularly thanks to Ebony Elizabeth Thomas, I found out about the National African American Read-In.  This event is sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and the Black Caucus of the NCTE and has been held since 1989. You can find out more on the NCTE’s African American Read-In site. The more I read and researched about the Read-In, the more convinced I became that I needed to host one at my library!

And yet I knew that when someone thought of my small town (population around 17,000 - but that’s being very generous, really) they might ask themselves why I felt an event like this was a perfect fit for my patrons.  According to the 2014 census the African American population of my small mountain town in New Mexico is .07%. For New Mexico as a whole, the African American population is 2.5%. That, of course, was exactly why I thought it was a perfect fit.

It is White people’s racism that makes us think African American literature is only for African Americans.  By that same account, it is our work as White people to dismantle this misconception.  No one assumes only White people will want to read Shakespeare or, say, Emily Dickinson.  We are taught those works are universal, they are for everyone. But too often, racism tells us that books by Native people or POC are only for the members of those groups.  We conveniently forget the windows element of “doors and windows” and assume that means minority groups have windows into the White experience.

The African American Read-In was the perfect chance for my libraries to open some windows.  And to share some great books - of course. For one week, we designed all our programs for 0-5 around books and songs by African American artists and writers.  We sang and danced to Ella Jenkins songs and read Langston Hughes poems at Toddler Time.  After school, we lined the spaces of our reading circle with books by African American authors and read picture books by Jacqueline Woodson and N Joy out loud. In the second year of our celebration, three local AP English classes visited from the high school and spent an hour reading picture books.  We designed a program for our homeschool book club around Faith Ringgold’s Tar Beach.

Because I had a clear vision of how I wanted these programs to happen, getting staff buy-in wasn’t really hard.  Instead of vaguely hand-waving “let’s do something for Black History Month, I guess?” the African American Read-In gave staff some real direction and a framework. From there, it was easier to see why we were doing this - and measure impacts.

In each of these programs, we talked to patrons about the African American Read-In and we shared bookmarks we’d downloaded from the NCTE toolkit.  We always had piles of books (for all ages) by African American authors and illustrators on hand and encouraged them to check them out or even just browse through them. One thing I trained my staff on in preparation for these events was that we wanted to be deliberate about these programs.  I didn’t want to present it as an incidental program - I wanted patrons to understand that planning and thought had gone into these events, that our library was choosing to promote and spotlight this work. I agree that we, as White Librarians, need to do more than just talk about and use these books during Black History Month.  But I also love that the African American Read-In takes place in February.  It’s a way to do more than make a display but to put the titles in hands and in action. Every time we saw how children laughed or were entranced by this work, it was a reminder that these books are for everyone during every month of the year. Using them, programming around them, thoughtfully choosing them, watching patrons embrace them made a much stronger impact and meant so much more than just putting them out with a “It’s February, You Know The Drill!” sign.

This year, during one of the AP English classes sessions, a particularly intense boy suddenly started waving his hand around, calling me over.  It was such an elementary school gesture for a senior in high school to make, it made me smile.  When I walked over to him, he had two books spread out in front of him, a juvenile non-fiction book and picture book.  

“Look,” he whispered, gesturing at them both insistently, “they are both about - about - Gullah.” He was especially proud that he had made this connection and he was grinning at me.

I realized this very smart almost 18 year old boy had never heard of Gullah before.  “Yes,” I said.  “Gullah is a language and a group of people.” He was nodding but had already looked away and was reading the notes in the books.  He mostly, I think, just wanted to show me what he’d found.  He was already back to the books.

This encounter is why I knew the African American Read-In was valuable, essential even, to my patrons.  Windows matter.  So do White librarians unequivocally standing up for the concept that these books deserve a place in our collection and our programming because they are relevant, useful, and even joyful for everyone. Promoting and programming for the African American Read-In has been eye-opening for patrons and staff, which was another goal.  It’s on White librarians to start the progress and push forward on the idea that books by African American authors, any by Native writers and other writers of color, are for all our patrons: no matter where we’re located.

The African American Read-In was our first push forward at my library, but it won’t be our last.  I urge you to look at your community connections and your programs and see how you can participate in the African American Read-In next year.  It’s not too early to start planning now. 

Here's some pictures from our Read-Ins!

Hannah and Allie Talk Jewishness and Whiteness

Guest Blogger Hannah Gomez and Allie Jane Bruce. Thanks Lisa Nowlain for the images!

Allie:  Today we're joined by Hannah Gomez, a librarian, reviewer, WNDBer, blogger, and Deep Thinker.  Hannah, thank you so much for joining us for a conversation on Jewishness and Whiteness and how they intersect (or don’t) here at Reading While White.  We’re all so grateful.  And while this is a me-and-you conversation, I want to name at the outset that Sam is also Jewish--I’m not “the one” Jew on this crew!

I just started reading How Jews Became White Folks & What That Says About Race in America by Karen Brodkin.  I barely finished the Introduction, and already I’m like YES.  On p. 3, she differentiates between “ethnoracial assignment” and “ethnoracial identity”--the difference (if there is one) between how the world sees us, and how we see ourselves.  So here’s my question for you: How do these two concepts manifest in your life?

Hannah: Oh wow! I love new terms like that. I definitely think about that a lot, and how concerned I get when people misuse “race” and “ethnicity” as if they’re interchangeable (like how people seem uncomfortable with the word “sex” and use “gender,” even though those, too, are not the same!). Race is what you are, and it’s the biological* thing that you can’t shake - unless you have a LOT of money, you can’t really alter your appearance significantly enough. Ethnicity, though, is culturally based, and it can be chosen or rejected, held onto or forgotten. So I think Brodkin’s terms are similar.

I was adopted, so I can’t speak to all my family tree, but from what I know, I am not genetically descended from any branch of Jews. That said, I was raised by an Ashkenazi Jew as a Jew, and as such my ethnic and cultural upbringing were tied to American Ashkenazi culture--at least from my mom’s side. That being said, when I spout out the Yiddish terms that are 100% natural things to come out of my mouth, people find that jarring, because while my racial identity is technically biracial (half Black, half White), I am no Nella Larsen. I can’t pass, so what people see when they look at me is not all that I am. So my ethnoracial assignment, I guess, is Black, mixed, or of color - and in the US, I am assumed to be African American, at least by White and Black people. Latinx people, especially if they hear me speak Spanish, ask if I’m Cuban, Dominican, or something else Caribbean. My ethnoracial identity, though, has more pieces to it, and I didn’t grow up a part of a large African American community. I grew up in Tucson, and my father is Chicano, so my social surroundings were definitely more Chicana/o and Jewish than anything else.

I think that’s why I often get, especially from Jewish friends, the “compliment” that “Sometimes I forget you’re Black, because you’re just Hannah to me.”

*I know race is commonly described as not biological at all, and a total construction, but that’s a derailment used to excuse racism. Race is real because society made it so, and when I say here that it’s biological, I mean it’s the thing that, for the most part, manifests in your genes with regard to appearance.

Allie: Yikes.  I’m so sorry.  The density of insults-per-words is ridiculously high there--you’ve got “Being Black is bad,” “I’m going to casually erase a crucial component of your identity,” and “I deserve a medal for having said the previous two things.”

My mom’s side is Jewish (Ashkenazi, reform) too, but it was a much bigger part of her childhood than it ever was mine.  We did Christmas and Chanukah, Easter and Passover, and I remember eating apples and honey on Rosh Hashana, but that was pretty much it.  She definitely brought some cultural elements into the mix, though; she still has a compulsive need to feed people at every moment.  I refused to try lox over and over as a kid, bewildered as to how anything so bright and slimy could possibly taste good.  When I finally tried it as a teenager, something very deep in my gut said “this is RIGHT,” and I’ve been eating lox ever since.

I did a brief volunteer stint in Jackson, Mississippi, at an after-school program, and while I was there I felt a deep homesickness that often expressed itself as a longing for lox, which was not readily available.  Once, I drove half an hour to the one bagel place that advertised itself as having lox.  I was so excited--it was right there on the menu, “lox and bagel.”  I ordered it, repeating myself twice (the girl at the counter had never heard anyone order it before), and waited to savor it… only when it came, it was a bagel with veggie cream cheese, lettuce, tomato, and a piece of lox.  I was so upset.  I traded it in for the right combination: bagel, plain schmear, tomato, onion, and lox (they didn’t have capers), totally aware that I was probably fulfilling a stereotype as I insisted that veggie cream cheese and lettuce simply would not work.

I had a lot of interesting experiences in Mississippi, actually.  I was one of a few White volunteers at an after-school program that was 100% Black kids.  The kids were totally stunned when I revealed I was half Jewish.  When I left, a small group came to me and said “Miss Bruce, are you going back to Egypt?”  That’s a sharp contrast to here in New York, where everyone takes one glance at me and immediately knows I’m Jewish.  In retrospect (and with education) I’ve realized that I had no business being at that program in Mississippi; I would have served the world better by spending those months unpacking my own Whiteness.

Hannah: I refused to eat lox for the longest time, too! And I still won’t go near gefülte fish.

Allie: Me too!  I hate the stuff.  And the maror (bitter herbs) we have to eat on Passover.  I was usually the youngest at Seders, and I always wanted to ask, “Why on this night do I have to eat these damn herbs when I could be eating jellybeans?”

Hannah: Your point about unpacking your privilege only after performing some sort of community service or other “service” to the underprivileged speaks to me, too. I worked with low-income kids in a summer school program when I was done with college (and before, but in different settings) and didn’t realize until after I was done what a disservice I did them by assuming they all had internet access at home, interest in applying to fancy colleges, etc.

In my family, where my dad is Catholic, my mom is the Ashkenazi one but was raised a secular Jew, so we did the Christmas and Hanukkah thing, took off of school and work for Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, and had a (speedy) Passover seder. In college, I attempted to become more Jewish and even had a fellowship at Hillel and a Birthright trip, and looking back, I realize that it wasn’t really that I wanted to explore religion and theology but just that I was desperate to be accepted as a Real Jew since I couldn’t rely on “looking Jewish.” And I hated that whole year of college where I tried to do that. Now, although I went to Shabbat services with a friend once a month or so (she was converting, and I just wanted to try it out again) last year, I really find that secular Judaism, intellectual Judaism, and cultural Judaism are the only Jewish domains where I actually feel welcome and like my contributions, upbringing, and past experiences are valued without question. I work a few hours a week for our branch of PJ Library/PJ Our Way, and as a college student (prior to Hillel), I interned at our Jewish Federation. Whether I want to try religious Judaism or not, I am generally finding that the stares I get for not looking right, even to other Ashkenazi Jews, makes it not worth the hassle.

Allie: And that’s where we get into all this thorny business of race and Judaism and “looking Jewish.”  It’s so bizarre.  You are more educated in Judaism than I, and you’ve spent much more of your life practicing Judaism than I have.  And yet, I’ll bet if we stood next to each other and asked 10 people “which of us is Jewish?” 9 of them would point to me.  I have the complexion (light but tan skin coupled with dark hair) and especially the (dark, thick, curly) hair of a prototypical Ashkenazi Jewish person.

I’ve lived outside DC, in the midwest, in London, and in Mississippi, and I’ve never felt more Jewish than I do now--living in New York.  Everywhere else, I was another White person.  Here, I’m (often) a Jewish White person.  I’ve never had this experience before--I present as White AND as Jewish.  The one does not cancel the other out.

And here’s an interesting thing we share: The most hurtful experiences I’ve had that relate to my Judaism have come from other Jewish people, and it sounds like that’s true for you too (the ones who stare, or who’ll never really accept you as Jewish because of your Blackness).  For me, it’s the ones who call me a “fake Jew” or a “self-hating Jew” or “the wrong kind of Jew.”  Six days after I moved to New York, I went for a haircut, and the hairdresser (with whom I’d exchanged maybe 2 sentences) ran his fingers through my hair and proclaimed it to be “nice, thick, BEAUTIFUL Jewish hair!”  It’s hard to hear myself called a fake Jew after an experience like that.

Hannah: There are parallels here with skin tone politics and intragroup racism in the Black community too, but that’s a post for another time and another blog…

I guess what I’ll end with is that every time I look at it, I still come to the conclusion that I feel Jewish and am Jewish, and especially that my politics and ethics and intellect are Jewish, so I can’t not be Jewish. But I still haven’t found a way to be a part of a Jewish community (at least IRL; I have found like-minded internet friends and websites) where I don’t feel like I have to either perform or do a lot of catchup work to understand what’s going on. I don’t know that I’ll ever feel any differently given the many different spaces I’ve tried to enter and then left, but I certainly hope I will someday.

Allie: Thanks again for this conversation, Hannah. Let's continue it in the comments section.  Have a wonderful Passover!!

Sarah Hannah Gómez is a former school librarian and currently works as a freelance writer and editor, fitness instructor, and project leader at We Need Diverse Books. She lives in southern Arizona. Find her online at shgmclicious.com and on twitter @shgmclicious

Reviewing While White: Unidentified Suburban Object

By Nina Lindsay

Spoiler alert.  There is no way to discuss Mike Jung’s second novel here without fully revealing the twist that the industry reviews manage to dance around.  So here we go.

Now in seventh grade, Chloe Cho is pretty fed up with the microaggressions that result from being the only Korean American (even Asian American) in her school.  To add to the annoyance of constant comparison to famous violinist Abigail Yang, and ridiculous mispronunciations of her name, her parents ever more firmly refuse to discuss anything about their life in Korea, while her best friend, Shelley, seems to go overboard in helping Chloe explore her roots.  When a new teacher, Ms. Lee, becomes the second Korean American in the school, and assigns a project to explore family history, Chloe finally succeeds in pressing her parents for their story, and it is not quite what she expected.  Her parents, it turns out, are not only not from the United States. They are not from planet Earth.

The only known survivors from Tau Ceti Four, her parents escaped destruction in an experimental spacecraft her mother was developing.  Because of their very close physical resemblance to Koreans, they tried first to settle in Korea, but quickly found they stood out there too much because they “did it all wrong, everything from speaking the language to finishing a bowl of noodles. It was very, very uncomfortable” (p. 146).  So they found safety in a place where people don’t know any better: Primrose Heights, a super-white suburb somewhere in the United States.  Chloe’s father assures her that despite “all the stupid crap” she has to listen to, the alternative is worse. To this Chloe responds, “What’s worse than being surrounded by racists all the time?” (p.148-9)

Jung is very, very funny.  It’s this humor that allows him to explore the intersections of cultural and individual identity, friendship, and being thirteen with immense clarity through an unusual conceit. It’s when the twist happens, when we enter the surreal, that the emotional narrative starts to feel more real.  It may be, in fact, that White readers have more access to empathize with Chloe through this preposterous lens, since it seems so hard for us to otherwise see racism.

A few weeks ago, the Library of Congress announced that it would stop using the term “illegal alien” in subject headings.  It is great news, but tempered by the fact that the replacement phrases are negatives: “noncitizens” and “unauthorized immigration.”   Sometimes seventh-grade humor seems to best way to expose, live with, and struggle against this kind of absurdity.  Chloe does, as she returns to school with her new knowledge about herself, on page 153:

I trudged into the building and stopped at the trophy case next to the main office. If you stand at just the right angle you can see your reflection in the glass on the side closest to the front door, and I stared at myself. Kids’ faces appeared over my shoulder, some of them looking at me curiously, then were replaced by others. None of those faces looked like mine, of course. None of them ever had. That wasn’t anything new--people were always treating me like I was from outer space, and I’d never looked like everyone else, no matter how I acted or what I wore. Were things actually all that different now?

I can imagine a myriad of reader responses to Jung’s novel, including disquiet or discomfort, but Jung seems to make a safe place to explore them through his use of fantasy or surreality or absurdity ….or whatever it is you want to call this singular story.