#race and diaspora

[forthosebefore]

Are there Black dialects of Spanish?

Some people got a surprising result after taking an MIT dialect quiz. It was meant to guess what U.S. dialect the test taker spoke and the person's native language. As results started coming in, many Spanish speakers saw their English dialect had been marked as “U.S. Black Vernacular/Ebonics”

But what's the connection between speaking Spanish and U.S. Black Vernacular?

In the United States, dialects spoken by African Americans are sometimes referred to as Black English, African American Vernacular English, or even Ebonics. Though the terms have had different levels of popularity, having a specific name at all has given African Americans the ability to reclaim their language practices as a joyous part of their identity. 

But much less common are terms and discussions about Blackness and Black language beyond English. If Black English dialects exist, are there also Black forms of other languages due to colonization? For example, are there Black Spanishes and Black Portugueses, too? Read more here.

Source: Are there Black dialects of Spanish? by Aris M. Clemons

Visit www.attawellsummer.com/forthosebefore to learn more about Black history.

Need a freelance graphic designer or illustrator? Send me an email.

[ratasum]

Do you ever think about the fact that in GW1, the first asura we meet are just a few months/years out from fleeing the six lost cities deep underground? The fact they have settlements is a testament to their resilience because we're talking people who fled an apocalypse with nothing but what they could carry and the clothes on their backs.

The fear and despair was probably still incredible palpable in those early years, but they can't SHOW that, because they're in an unfamiliar world with alien creatures where THEY'RE the aliens. They're smaller and weaker and only have their intellect to rely on.

You show an ounce of weakness in a situation like that and you get killed, and I get the feeling they understood that deeply.

I think about it a lot.

[writingwithcolor]

Japanese Q Speedround: Google Is Right There

Hi, it’s mod Rina. It’s time to speedrun some asks. 

@troublsomeidiots​ asked: 

I'm writing a character who is both black and Japanese and lives in japan in a primarily Japanese area and wanted some help in writing a person who is biracial who lives in primarily homogenous society? Like what kind of struggles she would face, especially as a person who has never met anyone who is black other than in passing?

Open Youtube. Hit search bar on Youtube. "being black in japan" "half black half japanese in japan" "black hafu in japan". Try different combinations of keywords. Bon voyage.

(neither Marika nor I are Black. We will not be speaking to experiences we do not have.) (we can outsource to some of our friends if you ask a specific question. These are not specific questions.) 

(Black Japanese readers--please feel free to comment if there’s something you want OP to know!)

@layzeal​ asked: 

Hello! I have a question regarding family/last names in Edo period Japan. My story takes place in 1816, my character was born in 1796 from a commoner family (that she gets separated from a few years later, and in a different country).

I've read that regular people in Japan didn't adopt the use of family names until Meiji restoration, but I'm not sure how true that is. Would a family of commoners in that period carry a family name, or would they only use their first names? And any idea if that family would have to present a last name when moving/passing by a different country that does use them?

It's important for me to know, since the existence of a last name or not would quite heavily influence how hard it'd be for the family to meet again, and which means would be used. Thanks in advance!

When I gave Google some keywords from your query, the second result explained how pre-Meiji commoners without family/clan names used bynames to distinguish themselves, and gives additional data on them. Maybe give it another Google? 

@weavefeather asked:

Hello, I am a writer and I really need some advice. I am wotking on my book since a few years, maybe 2 or 3, and I finally got the points together how it could begin. My plan is that my MC (named Nanami Kudo) is an lawyer of the FBI and has to go to her homecountry Japan, beacuse they send her to foreign investigations about a syndicate of people.....  And the some things happen, like her brother who still lives in jp doesn't really welcomes her, some complications with the police and so on... 

But thats not the point! Im really struggling to take in words how she gets to the other country, leaving her home behind and her partner she worked with. Do you have any advice on it, maybe how to structure it, some words or scenarios that fit?

How she gets to the other country: …..She flies there.

How US government agents/workers relocate and what the experience is like: That's your job to google. We are not government agents. Try anecdata on reddit, reddit AMAs, and Quora.

It’s unclear what her relationship/proximity to Japan is. What kind of nikkei is she? Is she mixed race or monoracial? How much Japanese can she speak? So many unknowns. Go read our Japanese tag and appreciate just how many ways one can be a Japanese person. Until then, you are nowhere near close to being able to write a nikkei homecoming plot. 

Lastly, you are the author. Give us scenarios yourself and come back to us.

In Conclusion

Guys, you all gots to google some more. It’s beneficial to both of us: not only do we get to help with more specific things and have enough info to do so, but you don’t have to wait months until your ask comes through the backlog only to receive an answer you could have researched in anywhere from a couple days to 3 minutes. 

~ Rina

“But Rina, I don’t know how!” 

You’re in luck!

First, try one of our own post on Google shortcuts. 

Second, stay tuned for some very relevant posts...

COMING SOON: WWC’s A Beginner’s Guide to Academic Research

[edenfenixblogs]

Fellow white/white passing Ashkenazim:

Did you also have trouble identifying your race as a child? I ask because I was talking with another Jewish person recently, one who I know personally and have known for several years. Do you recall being actually physically darker skinned as a child?

Because I’m home visiting my family right now and all the photos of me as a child… I was just straight up brown. And I remember everyone always commenting on my “tan” that was just how I looked. But now I’m pasty AF. And I remember it happening. At some point in high school the shade of foundation I wore drastically lightened. And I thought I’d just been spending too much time inside and needed sun. But it never darkened again. I also remember my mom commenting on how “pale” I was getting. And my friend was telling me that she also had the same experience.

And I have this theory that many (idk if it’s most or all or just a minority but a lot of people) Ashkenazim also have this experience.

In many ways, “whiteness” was thrust upon many of us without our consent as a result of centuries of oppression, expulsion, genocide, and abuse in European countries. As such, I wonder if this is a legit genetic quirk we share or if anyone has ever studied or looked into this.

Im not trying to negate the privilege we get as white passing people or trying to step on anyone’s toes here. I’m just curious how many other people have experienced this?

[nashvillethotchicken]

And when I get my all black interview with the vampire remake ala the wiz then what

[misterjt]

Joy Ride brings subtle wisdom to an otherwise bawdy comedy. Audrey’s core need is for belonging and acceptance. Instead of having her find it abroad, the film directs her to look to her friends who stood up for her on the playground or buoyed her through college. The idea of a pilgrimage leading you back to the loved ones who have been there all along is also a common plotline in a girl’s- or guy’s-trip narrative. But given Joy Ride’s cultural context, it is a clever undoing of the motherland trope. Audrey’s friends are her redemption because they’re part of the same complicated diaspora and know what it’s like to struggle to belong in specific ways.

—Nina Li Coomes on how Joy Ride subverts the motherland trope

[anqaspond]

fucking finally a book about racism that isnt centered around america

[sleepynegress]

Just scanned the tag and while there are plenty of posts about Kit Harrington doing SLAVE PLAY in the UK, and much fewer noting that Olivia Washington (I'm A Virgo), the co-star is Denzel Washington's daughter in a big stage production debut. In this particular promo interview for it, the idea of Black audiences being invited on certain nights is questioned... And I have to wonder if senior nights, ladies nights (for gender-based performances of shows) or nights for the hearing impaired, or family nights in a theatre setting (all of which occur) have been questioned like this?? It's also interesting that she addressed Kit about it. I know the show is controversial. White people and Black people hate it for varying reasons. Having not seen it but only reading the various opinions and gazes of those who have... I know it covers one Black man's own psychological wrangling with his own perception of his interracial experiences in sexuality entangled with his Blackness and the racialized/racist perceptions of that, entangled with ancestral memory in enslavement, and embodied by several people ranging in color and shade from Black to white. ...And it's comedy/drama(trauma). So I'm not surprised. Theatre that is challenging and offensive and at the margins should always be an essential thing, regardless of my own personal disgust about a piece. Anyway, I'm ending w/ this video of Janelle Monae's Screwed for no reason, whatsoever...except maybe because that sexualized gaze, especially when on Blackness and queerness is always fucked up/exploited/etc, etc...:

Will probably add more when/if I read the play... All that said, I'm glad both lead performers handled those questions well.

[salty-software-engineer]

Man I just finished Babel and I was excited to read discussions online because there's so much going on in it with so many little things and just....angry white people. Everywhere. Truly a dead dove moment.

[kyliafanfiction]

I do like Spacebattles/Sufficient Velocity as websites, but both have a tendency to trip themselves up on the stupidest shit and act as though stuff that is not canon in any way is 100% settled canon.

Like, not even 'this is a matter of debate' it's 'there's literally zero textual evidence'

[secular-jew]

You're horribly racist

All people are equal in my eyes, and have equal value. I do have opinions of terrorists, and comment solely on behavior and actions, while race is never a consideration. Maybe you should look up the word in a dictionary first, before displaying the race card. Or provide a specific example of racism, let alone "horrible racism."

[tianshiisdead]

My last post on the topic (forgive me for the recent repetitive malding I'll shut up after this)

>spreads rumors about a Chinese diaspo being linked to the gov

>called out for conflating Chinese diaspo with gov, shown proof the accusations were false, this is correctly called sinophobia (which manifests as conflating rando Chinese esp diaspo w gov as one mindless entity)

>'but what about gov!!!!'

??? Truly harassing cn diaspo online and feeding violence against cn diaspo in English spaces and the virulent racism against Chinese and ppl who look like us in the west will get you so far politically, China cares so much about randos who don't even have Chinese passports! Bringing up the gov when you've been charged with racism against a Chinese individual translates to 'Chinese people are their gov and my racism against them and harm against them is justified because of it'. There's no other interpretation. You can say what you want, but your end point is that you are okay with and support Chinese diaspo communities facing racialized violence. The gov topic was laid to rest when your accusations were PROVED WRONG, unless you think Chinese diaspo should in fact have to answer for their gov based purely on race and dont get to protest when people spread provably false rumours about them. If you want to complain about depictions or politics you can do it without falsely implicating the Chinese person in question just because she correctly identified the provably flase accusations as driven by sinophobia, ie conflating her with a state she has fuck all to do with. Thanks! That's all.

[althaeaofficinalis]

the way I simply refuse to participate in race discourse on this or any other website. please I am not arguing with white people about race or people of color who think all mixed people are just white. you cannot make me.

[johnwicklover1999]

i hate explaining headcanons because if i were to be asked about why i headcanon scout as so heavily mixed (especially mixed native american) or why i'm so attached to yet so torn over māori sniper or the incredible complexities i admire about jewish medic and my headcanons about heavy's family history in siberia i could provide paragraphs upon paragraphs of pure, utter passion.

but if you asked me some shit like why i headcanon scout as italian i'd shrug until my shoulders hit god. look at him ... idk dude.

[sidewalkchemistry]

December 26th (First Day of Kwanzaa!)