#prosopagnosia representation

[cripplecharacters]

Hello!! I’m a fic writer and have had the idea of giving one of the characters I’m writing for prosopagnosia. Within the canon, he mistakes the protagonist for someone he used to know (the protagonist is unable to correct him) and doesn’t realize his mistake until much later on, where he then comments that the two aren’t actually similar at all, in reference to their personalities. He’s also known to refer to people with notable visual traits, at least in the online circles I’ve run in.

I have a couple smaller questions in regards to how I should proceed:

Is it reasonable for him not to have been aware that the way he perceives faces is different?

Would it be incorrect to have him identify others by facial features? Not in the sense of “the one with the short nose” or anything, but “this one has red eyes” and “that one has a scar”. Something easily picked out on the face. Would those be identifiable traits at all?

My fic isn’t meant to have much of an overarching plot, and it’s just supposed to be funny/slice of life. This character is important though and will be a consistent presence. What jokes might my characters make, what jokes should I avoid making, and what jokes is the character going to hear the most and get sick of real quick?

Thank you for your ask! Whether or not he realizes he can’t recognize faces depends on both his character and the severity of his prosopagnosia, as it can range from difficulty differentiating faces to being unable to distinguish faces from objects. From the experience of myself and most people I know with prosopagnosia he’d probably just assume he’s bad with faces and not think any deeper than that, but it isn’t a universal experience.

It's also fine if he recognizes people by unique facial features! Despite not being able to picture someone's face he could try to remember key aspects of someone’s face like a prominent mole or a crooked nose, though I agree something like ‘short nose’ is too vague. The more unique and prominent, the easier he’ll have remembering it (to clarify when I say ‘remembering’ I mean remembering that they have that feature, not being able to picture it). He can also try recognizing people by clothes they always wear or unique hairstyles, though it can get confusing if someone decides to change their hair or he meets a stranger with the same hat as his one friend. The easiest way for me to recognize someone is by their voice or calling their name and waiting for them to respond.

Have a nice day!

Mod Rot

Hi!

Usually I identify people by hairstyle or specific articles of clothing, although unique traits like a scar or red eyes would certainly help as confirmation! (Of course, personality as well--but speaking about visual traits, this is what I look for.)

I hate when people change their hairstyles, it makes them totally unrecognizable for a while. Often I can figure out who someone is a few minutes into a conversation, maybe shorter for people I know really well, but changes to big recognizable features throw me off. (Don't ask how many times I've been in conversations with people and had No Idea who I was talking to...)

So yes, it's realistic to go off facial features, although non-face features may be more common as an identifier. It's also realistic to mistake someone for another person entirely. I often think people look alike and they just are similar heights with similar hairstyles to non-face-blind people.

Joke-wise, I make fun of myself for not recognizing people. It's embarrassing, sure, but in hindsight it makes a good story. I don't like being teased about it, it makes me feel bad or inadequate that I can't recognize people. But when I do it? Funny story!

Mod Rock

Hello,

As someone with a similar condition (I've always heard it referred to as face blindness,) I use a few different things to recognize people;

Glasses. A lot of people I know have unique glasses and I use those to recognize them. I know this person because they have blue, red, and gold glitter in their glasses, and I know this person because she has electric teal wire-frame glasses.

Hair. This only works when people have an unusual hair colour or style. If someone has one side of their head buzzed, I recognize them by that. If someone has very long red hair, I recognize them by that.

I also look at distinct facial features. I know someone who wears red contacts and I recognize them by that. Something like a scar or very distinct facial features can help me recognize someone.

Voices. I'm not excellent at recognizing voice but I can recognize a distinct vocal quirk, like a Louisiana accent.

Context is also important. The biggest thing I struggle with is recognizing people out of their usual context. I struggle to recognize most of my old classmates outside of high school and school-related functions like graduation ceremonies. If I see an old classmate or even a family member in the drive-thru, it's hard to recognize them unless they have something distinct about them or I know them really well (such as if they were in my friend group.)

And then there are little things I pick up on that help me recognize people I wouldn't otherwise recognize. I work in a drive-thru so I can recognize a lot of people by their orders or by the cars they drive. I can recognize a few people based on their names when they order on the mobile app- if they order and don't use the app, it takes me a minute. I can recognize most of the regulars because they usually know my name and make conversation.

And yes, like you mentioned, personalities.

I didn't know I struggled to perceive and recognize faces for a very long time, I thought everyone was the same way. If it had never been pointed out to me, I probably still wouldn't know that I need to do things differently. It's not something that's easy to notice without outside help telling you that no, actually, most people can recognize people they know or even people they've met a few times.

So yes, he sounds very realistic based on my experience. He sounds like he has it pretty severely. And, by the way, the same situation happens to me all the time. And it's extremely embarrassing when it happens.

I make a lot of "I barely recognized you!" jokes with people who know I have face blindness. They aren't extremely funny but it's my way of saying "You've changed something about your appearance" or "Wow, it's been a long time!" I don't know of many face blindness jokes either, it's not something we often have the opportunity to joke about. If he draws people, he might make a joke about "Yeah, this probably isn't the best career" or "I know, don't quit my day job." Or he could do something kind of like Toph Beifong and react to someone else's art with "Don't worry, I think it looks exactly like the person." Maybe if they're looking for someone and he points out a random person like "Hey, there they are!" only for the group to realize he's messing with them?

Maybe you could repurpose some blind jokes and make them about "I can't recognize people" instead of about "I can't see"?

Mod Aaron

[1-ker0sene-1]

×Kerosene Intro×

About Admin

I won't be telling my real name, but I don't mind just being called Kerosene or Kero. I'm over eighteen so if you see me on your MDNI posts I promise I'm an adult 🙏. I'm physically disabled and wheelchair bound, if you want to know more about that for some reason- feel free to ask I'm not ashamed of it at all. I write specifically for disabled readers, as I don't see a lot of fanfiction catering to us. I try to write readers as a rounded person and portray the struggles of a disability. ALSO. SO OPEN TO MAKING WRITING BUDDIES. I'M INSANE BUT ILY GUYS

Request Info

Requests are open! You don't have to be disabled to request particular disabilities. You don't have to be disabled to enjoy my writing either. Either way my posts might reach someone who doesn't get fanfiction representation♥️ If you want to request a disability, but don't want to publicly, please feel free to dm me and I won't even mention you specifically if you don't want. Right now, I write for a generic manual wheelchair user reader. I try not to delve too deep into the cause of the disability, so hopefully as many as you can, can still relate and feel included.

×Masterlist×

Call Of Duty

Series

The Dead Do Talk - Johnny MacTavish

Never Just Two - Ghoap

3 Bullets - Ghoap

Never Enough - Simon Riley

I Bite - NikPrice

Mutual Gain - Kyle Garrick

Oneshots

Therapy FWB - Simon Riley

Weekly Appointment - Kyle Garrick

Caregiver - Johnny MacTavish

Silver Springs - John Price

Home Is Where You Are - Poly141

Competition - TF141

Requests

Arthritis - Poly141

Prosopagnosia - TF141

Migraines - TF141

POTS - TF141

Epilepsy - Simon Riley

Ideas

(blurbs, unsure if they'll get full writings)

1, 2, 3, 4

[1moreff-creator]

Thank you DRDT crew!

Even though I’ve only been a fan for a short time compared to others, the amount of love I have for this series is hard to put into words. It has slowly grown to be my favorite DR-related media of all time, for a multitude of reasons. Everything about it is remarkably impressive, and I just wanted to say thank you for bringing us such an amazing experience.

I got into DRDT through Weeby Newz’ streams. I had just finished binge watching her SDRA2 streams, but this “Danganronpa Despair Time” one looked interesting. Especially because I kept seeing a video by Ocean Unknown popping up in my recommended, which said something about “David’s reveal”. So I decided to watch those vods too.

Fast-forward a binge watch, and… I was in love. It didn’t even register how attached I’d gotten to every single character, and how intrigued I was to see how everything would play out.

I absolutely wouldn’t have started a Tumblr blog without DRDT. But now I have, and it’s been one of the most fun experiences I’ve had in fandom. So, from the bottom of my heart:

Thank You!

Thank you for the dedication to do such a long and arduous project!

Thank you for the beautiful art! I’ve always been a fan of DRDT’s unique style, and those animations always take my breath away, no matter how many times I see them.

Thank you for all the amazing characters you’ve brought to life! I love them all so much, I could thank you for each one individually.

… So I will.

•Thank you for Teruko! Because she’s one of my favorite protagonists from anything ever, as her intriguing and complex personality is always a joy to analyze.

Also, uh, thank you for the prosopagnosia rep. I probably have that too, but I would have never found out without DRDT. It really explained a lot about my life, so it can be said this series has changed me forever :D

•Thank you for Xander! It’s refreshing to see a character like him being so important to the story, with so many mysteries still surrounding him!

•Thank you for Charles! Because this nerd is one of the most likable and enjoyable characters I’ve seen in any fangan.

•Thank you for Ace! Because he manages to be both very funny and very interesting and complex whenever needed.

•Thank you for Arei! It’s always nice to see a ‘mean’ character with such well thought out motivations and such drive to change.

•Thank you for Rose! Her attitude always makes me feel calm when I think about her, and I’m really interested in seeing where her character and themes are going to go.

•Thank you for Hu! Another one I’m really intrigued by, I can’t wait to know more about her!

•Thank you for Eden! For showing that even “the nice one” characters can have depth and complexity. Also representation win, the nicest girl ever is a lesbian!

•Thank you for Nico! They are so, so interesting. I feel like I’m overusing the word “intriguing”, but they really are so fun to think about. Also representation win for the enbies! Love to see it.

•Thank you for Whit! Because he’s funny, and interesting, and there’s definitely something wrong with him it’s nice to have a character that doesn’t have any big issues :D

Just kidding! The reason I love DRDT so much is that everyone gets to be a little fucked up, as a treat!

And representation win! The coolest guy ever is bisexual!

•Thank you for J! She’s funny and cool and- you guessed it, intriguing. I am running that word to the ground, but it’s true for everyone!

•Thank you thank you thank you for Veronika!!! She’s so great. She’s fantastic. She always brings a smile to my face, she’s so perfect in every way shape and form. God I love her so much, I want her to go as insane as her crazy little heart desires. And more representation! Sorta jealous of the pansexuals who got this freak (affectionate).

•Thank you for David! How can a character be so complex, that you look at Literature Girl Insane and decide it needs more literary references to properly convey them? Well, David’s the answer, and geez. He’s just so fantastically written, it’s incredible. Another big win for the bisexual community imo.

•Thank you for Levi! He’s really cool, and everything about him is interesting.

•Thank you for Arturo! Because as much of a weirdo as he can be, his entire character is just really, really interesting.

•Thank you for MonoTV! Because it’s funny and its personality has to be one of the most unique I’ve ever seen for mascot characters.

•Thank you for Mai! I mean, who?

•Thank you for Unnamed Classmate! Because they’re really nice and I can’t wait to see where they go.

And of course…

•Thank you, so much, for Min! She may very well be my favorite character from anything ever. Everything about how she’s written is phenomenal, her personality and struggles are so well developed, I could gush about her for hours! She means so much to me, I can’t properly describe how in love I am with her.

Thank you for the laughs! From the arm wrestling scene, Charles getting obliterated by MonoCredits, “milk tastes good”, Teruko tripping over Nico… Not to mention the greatest joke ever conceived: the bathroom investigation. I laughed for a solid minute or two when I first watched it, just replaying the funniest thing ever on loop.

The Q&As were also really funny, and I never really had an issue with the way the were written. I fully understand and support if you decide not to do them ever again, but they were fun while they lasted. From Nico’s favorite ice cream flavor being “the flavor”, to us forgetting people can have friends aside from Mai I mean who, all the way to that time you directed us to inform ourselves on what a pant pocket is.

Thank you for the tears! Because I still can’t watch Min’s final hug without my chest hurting, a lot. Even some of the frames from the Sleepy MV, that beautiful piece of art, get me to tear up just looking at them.

Thank you for the mysteries! From the murders which are really fun to theorize about, to everything related to Mai Akasaki and the multiple source code secrets. And don’t even get me started on the LGI MV, that insanity (affectionate) has been eating at my brain ever since it released. Everything about it is fantastic, even the things we still haven’t solved.

Where’s footnote 8, dev?! Did you put it in your pant pockets?! (/j)

Also, tangentially, thanks for introducing me to the LGI album. It’s a really good album ^^

Thank you for the research you’ve put into everything! Things like Ace’s talent causing his eating disorder are really appreciated, they show a genuine care and love for the project.

Thank you for all the little details you might think no one notices, but that we love to see! Things like the first Nonstop Debate ending in perjury, Teruko listing Xander as one of the people whose secret was unrevealed, David’s eyes being different in his genuine breakdowns to his little thing in Ep 11, strychnine not being listed with the other custom weapons because Charles made the list, the note Xander received having a proper full message which has been obscured (I can only make out “it is” at the bottom, but it’s clear the message is there), the charm on Teruko’s thing-that’s-probably-a-MonoPad-but-may-be-something-else being the same as Unnamed Classmate’s phone charm, all the interesting details in the character profiles, among so many other things.

This also includes details revealed on Q&As. Arei being ambidextrous, Teruko liking “girly” clothing, Xander having a weak sense of taste, Ace having 9 siblings, Veronika’s earring being related to a friend, all the favorite and least favorite colors and ice cream flavors. As well as the few things we know about people like Felicity and Elliot that made the community fall in love with them for no apparent reason. It just makes them all seem so human!

Thank you to the voice actors, as well! They’ve all done such an amazing job, no exceptions! In particular, Veronika’s unhinged laughter, the dialogue after Ace’s almost murder, Min’s last words, David’s speech post the “guilty as charged” incident… but it’s all fantastic, all the characters are voiced really well.

And thank you for so much more! If I kept going, this post would never end. DRDT just means more to me than any finite number of words could ever convey. Without your work, the days pass by tastelessly /ref. So, one last time for the road:

Thank you for everything!

(God I love the Sleepy MV so much. It’s so pretty!!!)

[rosyfingered-moon]

Sejak episode 14

He really went "guys, I think we should stop the king from interrogating people. I mean, think about the poor spy when he's caught 🥺" and they all just accepted this as a normal, not at all suspicious thing to say

The poison was on the yongpo!!! How very Count of Monte Cristo!

HE GETS CREEPIER FOR EVERY EPISODE AND I LOVE IT. Please let Lee Gyu-hoe play the villain in every sageuk from now on, he's so incredibly persuasive at this brand of delulu evil!! I love the long ass Rasputin beard fluttering after him whenever he storms off feeling that he has been Humiliated and must Seek Revenge

I'm so happy that this new and improved Mong-woo can read between the lines 🥰

But if she is gonna be as ride or die for Yi In as she claims, I think a good first step would be to tell him about this plot that she personally set in motion and is still ongoing behind his back, idk.

The devil works hard but the torture gnomes work harder!

Lol honestly very relatable that he forgot Master Chu's face. Finally some representation for the prosopagnosia community!

When I tell you I had goosebumps throughout this entire exchange. They are both such marvelous actors. Also wanna give a shoutout to the sound designer! The musical score has probably been great all along, but this was the first episode I watched with headphones on and my god

It's so funny to me that he seems to be genuinely impressed and delighted by how evil Minister Park is. He's like "I can only hope to be as evil as you one day daegam 😍 I served the others for personal gain, but you... I'm serving for love"

Very ooc for Myung-ha to even consider this cursed alliance. Like didn't you learn anything from trying to plot with other people?? Just do your own thing man! Get creative!!

Another terrific actor. I love her polished, arrogant diction that is so entirely at odds with the haunted look in her eyes.

My darling Dong!! If no one will protect you I will!!!

Sorry writernim for thinking there would be catty jealousy drama... I should never have doubted you. (Very amusing though when she stomps her little foot on Mong-woo's proffered handkerchief and Mong-woo looks shocked that her gentleman rizz has failed, lmaooo)

LIPSTICK POISON!!! Even better than the robe! But as always with this trope I wonder: how on earth can it kill the person being kissed and not the person wearing it? I assume this is a different poison from the one she used on the former king, since that was clearly more slow-working than this could be supposed to be... and simultaneously strong enough to seep through several layers of fabric which would reasonably then also cross through the protective barrier of Dong sanggung's plump and lovely lips. Much to think about.

There's manspreading and then there's this

I'll be honest I did experience a few bisexual emotions while watching this scene. I assume he's got her all figured out here and will shove her away with his virtue intact in the first seconds of ep 15, but the sexual tension between him and the Toxic Lipstick is pretty intense lol. I feel like he considered going for it, just for like 2 seconds. Not a bad way to go after all.

Also, remember what I said about the sound design because it really goes extremely hard in this scene!! Those ominous strings! A most excellent episode!

[dysgeographica]

This blog is the first im hearing of this. Do you know anything about telling the difference between this and aphantasia?

basically, aphantasia is about not being able to visualize while dysgeographica is about not being able to navigate. those two things can overlap — namely, an aphantasic person and a dysgeographic person might share the inability to visualize mental maps. but that’s just the middle of the venn diagram.

so an aphantasic person won’t only be unable to visualize mental maps, they’ll be unable to visualize anything at all, while a dysgeographic person could have an incredibly vivid visual imagination when it comes to everything else. and a dysgeographic person will likely struggle with aspects of navigation other than mental maps, while an aphantasic person could be able to navigate just fine without actually seeing the mental map in their head.

obviously, these are generalizations, but it should give you an idea of the differences between the two.

i also wouldn’t be surprised if dysgeographica is related to aphantasia, though, given the overlap between the two. i know there’s evidence of a connection between dysgeographica and prosopagnosia for a similar reason — they both affect a person’s ability to create visual representations in their head, whether it be places or faces — so i can see aphantasia also being related in that way.

generally speaking, though, if you’re trying to identify which one you’re experiencing, i think the two basic questions to ask are “do you have trouble with visualization when it comes to things other than maps/places?” and “do you struggle with aspects of navigation other than seeing the maps/places in your head?”

i hope that helps!

[charlemane]

it feels kind of dumb to complain about something as niche as bad prosopagnosia representation? but also every time i see this condition depicted in fiction they do it so, so stupidly

[rabbitjaguar]

OCtober day 9

I'm not sure if a neurological disorder really counts as a character flaw, because I typically think of like personality traits when I think of character flaws, but drawing a representation of Ransom's prosopagnosia was the most interesting idea I could come up with, so I went with it.

[naruthandir]

I'm gonna be real with ya'll I do understand why we want to make Tolkien inclusive by drawing elves with different ethnicities and that's AWESOME but is anyone going to talk about it from a character design perspective.

I mean just think about it. Diversity in the way we draw characters is not only good from an inclusivity standpoint it is just. Objectively better? I think? Because otherwise you are left with a bunch of characters that all look so very similar do each other and half the time you can't tell who is who. You can't really tell them apart. I found that it was a lot easier to read and be invested in the silmarillion if I imagined the characters having different skin colors and features.

Same applies to body types. Making a character fat may not be good only for inclusivity "woke points" as some like to call it. It is literally better to have characters with recognizable silhouettes. I never got the hate for the changes in character design in She-Ra for example, when they are, from a technical standpoint, easier to animate and more visually interesting and distinct.

(this is also the reason I don't really watch live action because I have prosopagnosia and I can't tell who is who half the time)

Also next time someone says "representation doesn't matter" tell them that the whole reason Latin America is majority catholic is because they made the virgin Mary indigenous. There's a story about La Virgen de Juquila, a small town from near where I live, that goes something like this: The Spanish brought their God, but people weren't keen on it. One day the church was set on fire, and the statue of the virgin was burnt and her skin made brown. The priests tried to restore it, to no avail. They say the virgin herself wanted to make her skin brown, so the people of the region could better see themselves in her.

Like I'm not religious and I kinda despise the church but this is literally the oldest trick in the book and it works. People like it when the people in stories, their icons, look like them. It just makes the Monke Brain happy. It makes *my* Monke Brain happy. And I feel like happiness is always a net positive.

And while I am no one to tell anyone what to do, I do think it's a good thing, when we make our characters diverse, just for the reasons listed above. I genuinely don't see why anyone would be upset at this? I've seen people be upset. They say it goes against the lore. Casting Sean Bean as Boromir goes against the lore as well, I don't see anyone complaining. He was a good pick, and that's that, even if his hair color isn't the same as in the books. We deal with it and move on. Might be slightly annoying, but the books will always be there for us Black Hair Boromir truthers.

[webtoon-related-tournaments]

25 characters so far! if we keep that pace we'll have 20k husbands by the end of the submission time.

anyway all that to say, do not hesitate to submit more characters. I know for a fact some have not been submitted yet, or have been submitted but without a picture and so haven't been entered, although I don't want to point fingers or anything

(Rovan from Tacit is on meds, Hephaistus from Lore Olympus has three artificial limbs, a bunch of cursed characters from Cursed Princess Club can't see or talk or use their hands, two or more people from Unordinary who don't have powers in a world where it's the norm/who have their powers taken from them, at least two if not three other characters from To Be Ordinary who have disorders or disabilities, isn't there someone in a wheelchair in blood-ink, the Masked Fables' heroine is sick, the Paper Faces girl has prosopagnosia, the MC of Our Time is in a coma, the ghost from Ghost on the Roof has burns and the MC has anxiety, there's amnesia in Shadow Bride, Perfect Mariage Revenge, Blood Reverie, Raven Saga and Sisters at War, and a bunch of other characters who miss an eye or have burns or scars on them, from Surviving Romance to In the Bleak Midwinter...)

Go wild! Spread the word! I'm looking for disabled webtoon characters!

(I'd get that you don't want to submit characters who are 'bad' representations such as the characters from My Deepest Secret or Chasing Tails who became serial killer because of their mental disorder, but they count too! you can submit them! they'll probably be forced out of the poll on the first round but they'll have made number!)

(another parenthesis digression: people who supposedly have magical powers but can't access them/don't have powers but everyone else has, are considered disabled too! be it Subzero, Unordinary, Stray Souls...)

and for all the action webtoons, as long as it's shown that what they went through has some effect on them, all those traumatized characters count! John from Unordinary, basically every main character from Wished you were dead, characters from Everything is Fine...)

and the ones who have eating disorders count too! Serena from Serena, or Iju Han from Perfect Marriage Revenge!

[mizkit]

new blog post: Release Day: WEAR WOLF!

new blog post on https://mizkit.com/release-day-wear-wolf/

Release Day: WEAR WOLF!

WEAR WOLF is available now!

I have to tell you that I am already–like, this is cool. Before the book even came out, I had a couple of people comment about the fact that my hero in this book is face-blind (has prosopagnosia), because they’d never seen a character with that disability before. I’ve had a couple more people comment since, and I’m really pleased to have brought a kind of representation to peoples’ attention with this book. I’m aphantasic (I don’t see pictures in my head), which is not unrelated to face-blindness, although I’m not actually prosopagnosiac (IDK if that’s actually a word, I might have just made it up) myself, so I have *some personal sense of not holding an image of…well, anything, actually…in my head, and hope I’ve done a reasonably good job depicting the condition.

Anyway! The book is out now, contains a hero with a lesser-known disability/condition, and also, oh, some of you might notice Noah’s only six in this, when he was eight in the recent Buck the Halls — you will correctly guess that WEAR WOLF is set about 18 months before Buck, shortly after HOLD MY BEAR, but like all the Virtue stories, is a standalone HEA that can be read in any order. :)

ONWARD!

Where oh WEAR could she be? Wolf shifter and fashion designer Zane Bellamy has a secret: he’s ‘face-blind,’ unable to recognize people easily no matter how often he’s seen them.

Victoria Hawthorne has a secret, too, but she’s a long-term substitute teacher, and if she’s learned anything from teaching first graders, it’s that the best way to keep a secret is to not tell anybody. She and Zane have that in common…but absolutely nothing else.

Haute couture collides with ordinary life when Vicki wins a dress design by Zane himself. She knocks him off his feet when they meet…and even so, his face-blindness means he won’t recognize her the next time they see each other!

Vicki has no real plans to put down roots, especially because some of Virtue’s founding families make it clear outsiders are unwelcome—although her students, especially six-year-old Noah Brannigan—don’t seem to feel the way the town elders do.

But when local-boy-made-good Zane returns to make her gown, everything changes in a heartbeat—even as Vicki fears there’s no way this instant attraction can turn into something lasting. And although Zane can’t deny the connection he has with Vicki, he’s never really believed in fate…until circumstances run out of his control and he realizes he’s about to lose everything. But thanks to Noah’s interference, Zane might have one last chance to make it right with Vicki, and earn their fairy tale ending.

Love is blind in WEAR WOLF, a charming, steamy standalone that will have you in stitches with a guaranteed happily ever after and no cliffhangers. If you’re looking for charming, funny paranormal shifter romance, buy now and fall in love with the Virtue Shifters!

*Thor: All words are made up dot gif

[wetdreamdrops]

Does Prosopagnosia Take the Eyes Out of Face Representations. Evidence for a Defect in Representing Diagnostic Facial Information following Brain Damage - Roberto Caldara, Philippe G Schyns, Eugène Mayer, Marie L Smith

[cassolotl]

[From Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, S01E02: Lost and Found.]

Dirk has no idea who Farah is in the photo, but when they rescue her and get her back to the flat she recognises Dirk and he apparently already knows her name and seems surprised to see her.

This scene felt very familiar to me as a faceblind person - so I’m just assuming Dirk is faceblind too. (He’s definitely autistic, let’s be honest. And autistic people are more likely to be faceblind.)

[eeee-lye]

As someone who cannot remember most names and as someone with prosopagnosia who cannot remember most faces, meaning that I struggle to match the few names I do remember to the few faces I remember, can we stop using “other character can’t remember protagonist’s name or face” as a universal sign of indifference or disdain on behalf of the character that doesn’t remember?

There’s this extremely ableist idea that people who care should remember names and faces, and any shown inability to do either indicates negative character qualities.

It takes me months, sometimes years, of regular contact with someone to be able to remember their name. It’s surprisingly disabling, speaking as someone who used to run Magic the Gathering tournaments and needed to pair people--whose names I struggled to remember, whose faces I struggled to recognise--together for the rounds. A simple thing of pairing people off becomes incredibly difficult, to the point of provoking hand-shaking panic and dread, when you don’t have two abilities most people take for granted.

Even the trope of “not having enough interest in the speaker to remember”, which is what is usually implied in this usage, is based in ableist assumptions of the kind of focus and interest humans are expected to grant another human--a focus and interest of which many disabled and neurodiverse people may not be capable. When someone tells me their name, I am focusing as hard as I can, but it vanishes somewhere into my brain beyond my ability to retrieve, and it will take scores of repetition for that name to become accessible to me.

I can say the name over and over in my mind and it still doesn’t become an accessible memory. The moment I get distracted by something else, which I readily do, it vanishes, and then I have to endure the embarrassment of asking again ... and again, and again, and again.

I’m sure that some people, sometimes, may not care enough about other people to remember names or faces, even though they could, meaning this trope has perhaps an element of truth. The larger, more important truth is, though, that an inability to remember is often an experience of disability--meaning that disabled people are continually subject to the ableism of being associated with indifference, disdain or purposeful lack of interest, focus or empathy. Are you so wedded to showing something that is occasionally true that you need to write the experiences of disabled people as elements of antagonistic characters? Is there no other way you can show this character’s personality without using disability as a shorthand?

In books, my inability to remember names and faces is seldom if ever an aspect of a caring protagonist.

Until it is, stop using a disabled experience to indicate an indifferent or antagonistic character.

[rosecorcoranwrites]

Pretty much my thoughts on how silly wanting everything filtered through your own identity is. While representation is a good, it is not the only good. Some stories really wouldn’t make sense by adding in women or POCs, but should still be told because they are still good stories. That being said, there were African soldiers on the French side waiting to get on the boat at the beginning of the film, and there were nurses and civilian women on the ships throughout the movie. True, Dunkirk wasn’t about women or POCs, but that’s because the historical event at Dunkirk mostly involved white male British and French soldiers (I will say their choice of all black-haired white-skinned actors made it really hard to tell who was who on the beach, but that’s more an issue of make-up). Other war movies, like Mrs. Miniver and Red Tails are about women and black soldiers, but I get the feeling that a person who describes Dunkirk as “an excuse for men to celebrate maleness” probably hasn’t seen too many war movies...

Yes, this movie did celebrate masculinity, but not toxic masculinity people like to talk so much about. It celebrated civilian fishermen who hopped on their boats to go to an active war zone for a chance at saving some lives. It celebrated pilots who stayed long after it was safe to try and shoot down enemy planes who kept coming. It celebrated the kindness of not telling a shell-shocked soldier that he did something terrible by accident. It celebrated masculinity at its best, which is probably why every woman I’ve talked to is either eager to see it or already saw it and loved it. Because women who aren’t clouded by a hatred of “maleness” can enjoy stories that aren’t filtered through female characters.

[booksandwords]

Holding Up the Universe by Jennifer Niven

Read time: 3 Days Rating: 4.5/5

The quote: People are shitty for a lot of reasons. Sometimes they're just shitty people. Sometimes people have been shitty to them and, even though they don't realize it, they take that shitty upbringing and go out into the world and treat others the same way. Sometimes they're shitty because they're afraid. Sometimes they choose to be shitty to others before others can be shitty to them. So it's like self-defensive shittiness. - Jack Masselin

There is some much positivity in Holding up the Universe from the body positivity to the messages about living with neurological disorders to changing perceptions to the value of family. What is great about the characters is their diverse depth. There is a racial diversity you would expect in a modern American high school but it isn’t in your face it’s just there, within the two main characters one is Anglo, one is mixed race African American – Anglo but has his mother’s dark skin. There is LGBTQ representation but like the racial diversity, it isn’t in your face it is mentioned and not dwelled upon.

It has a point of predictability we are all semi-aware of the end game but it’s the journey that matters. Holding up the Universe is a glorious journey that is fast-paced and takes a few surprising twists. For me this was more a character-based story, it is more about Jack and Libby than the plot. The support cast is introduced as needed with family and school family being basically the only people met. It is a pleasant way of reading but it does require engaging characters with good writing to succeed.

Jack has a neurological disorder called prosopagnosia, face blindness (he has been given a deliberately bad case), he cannot recognise people by their faces, he can see them, but can’t recall them. Then I started trying to walk in his shoes, I tried to think how I would identify the people in my life, how hard that must be. I live with my own neurological disorder and Jack’s hiding it, coping with it as best he can is so accurate. I spent so much time screaming at the book that is me, I did that. Jack’s family are great because they feel real, in particular, his little brother Dusty is just adorable, as is the robot.

And Libby. Libby is fantastic. Never does Jennifer Niven imply that she is a healthy weight, just that she is a healthier weight than she was and Libby is going to own it, not be a slave to people’s expectations. That body positivity is something that the age bracket this book is aimed at really need to read. A reminder that we come in all shapes and sizes and colours. Her creating fictional backstories is just something that people do (or is that a type of person that I know too many of) and the name selection for the people was king.

Jennifer Niven succeeded in creating good characters and suitable writing, Holding up the Universe is captivating and enjoyable while sending brilliant messages to people. 4.5 stars, I’m feeling like more could have been done with some of the support cast. This is a book that deserves all the praise it gets and more. For me this is essential for libraries and I would suggest reading it if you want a look with a window to what someone else is experiencing.

Goodreads