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Re: More on Humor and More on Multicultural Literature
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From: Uma <uma_at_gobrainstorm.net>
Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2013 11:42:31 -0700
Colleen, I agree that Lowji's an interesting book, and works for all those reasons you mention. It works too because Candace Fleming has taken risks, and she's also done considerable work. That said, I will tell you that someone I know who is herself Parsi didn't entirely love the book, and found the depiction of the family--the jokes, the carting around of the ancestral portraits--mildly stereotypical. Even the child's name--why the honorific "ji?" she wanted to know. I had no answers, but her questions made me think.
Despite that I maintain that it is a brave book, because it does a few things that are worth noting: as you say, it refuses to privilege America over India, and the boy ends up maintaining his old friendship while forging new ones. He also ends with a kind of fused identity that he himself has crafted, not one that is imposed on him. And most of all, for the purposes of this discussion, nobody is suffering from horrible oppression, and we don't end up feeling terribly sorry for the main character. Ergo, readers who are South Asian like the main character need not end up feeling ashamed or embarrassed for themselves. That is something I hear over and over again from young readers of South Asian origin when they read well-respected books set in the region, that without exception have contexts of oppression, suffering, and social problems. My own middle grade, The Grand Plan to Fix Everything, was my little effort to counter this flood of what I think of as "oppression literature" set in developing countries. I
'm not saying these books don't speak truth, I hasten to add, but there are other truths as well.
I say all this to suggest that authenticity may be a moving target. My take on South Asia and the diaspora is very specifically mine, drawn from my upbringing and travels and experiences, a narrow slice at best. Someone with a different background may have a completely different take, so who's authentic? But thematic elements and subtext are something else altogether; they are much more within an author's control. For me, especially in a humorous book with cultural context, it's those subtle elements that can leave me willing to forgive flaws--or not.
Uma Krishnaswami Writer, Author of Children's Books http://www.umakrishnaswami.com Faculty Chair, MFA-Writing for Children & Young Adults, Vermont College of Fine Arts
On Feb 22, 2013, at 10:17 AM, Colleen Kelley wrote:
Yes, this is what I loved about Lowji Discovers America. The humor exists not because someone else is laughing at Lowji, but because of the humor Lowji and his family see in how things are done differently in India and the US. It also exists because of the reader's surprise at how Lowji makes aspects of his native culture work in the new culture. More humor occurs when Lowji and some American boys his age discover a common nonverbal language, and Lowji shows his superior skills in this area.
Received on Fri 22 Feb 2013 11:42:31 AM CST
Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2013 11:42:31 -0700
Colleen, I agree that Lowji's an interesting book, and works for all those reasons you mention. It works too because Candace Fleming has taken risks, and she's also done considerable work. That said, I will tell you that someone I know who is herself Parsi didn't entirely love the book, and found the depiction of the family--the jokes, the carting around of the ancestral portraits--mildly stereotypical. Even the child's name--why the honorific "ji?" she wanted to know. I had no answers, but her questions made me think.
Despite that I maintain that it is a brave book, because it does a few things that are worth noting: as you say, it refuses to privilege America over India, and the boy ends up maintaining his old friendship while forging new ones. He also ends with a kind of fused identity that he himself has crafted, not one that is imposed on him. And most of all, for the purposes of this discussion, nobody is suffering from horrible oppression, and we don't end up feeling terribly sorry for the main character. Ergo, readers who are South Asian like the main character need not end up feeling ashamed or embarrassed for themselves. That is something I hear over and over again from young readers of South Asian origin when they read well-respected books set in the region, that without exception have contexts of oppression, suffering, and social problems. My own middle grade, The Grand Plan to Fix Everything, was my little effort to counter this flood of what I think of as "oppression literature" set in developing countries. I
'm not saying these books don't speak truth, I hasten to add, but there are other truths as well.
I say all this to suggest that authenticity may be a moving target. My take on South Asia and the diaspora is very specifically mine, drawn from my upbringing and travels and experiences, a narrow slice at best. Someone with a different background may have a completely different take, so who's authentic? But thematic elements and subtext are something else altogether; they are much more within an author's control. For me, especially in a humorous book with cultural context, it's those subtle elements that can leave me willing to forgive flaws--or not.
Uma Krishnaswami Writer, Author of Children's Books http://www.umakrishnaswami.com Faculty Chair, MFA-Writing for Children & Young Adults, Vermont College of Fine Arts
On Feb 22, 2013, at 10:17 AM, Colleen Kelley wrote:
Yes, this is what I loved about Lowji Discovers America. The humor exists not because someone else is laughing at Lowji, but because of the humor Lowji and his family see in how things are done differently in India and the US. It also exists because of the reader's surprise at how Lowji makes aspects of his native culture work in the new culture. More humor occurs when Lowji and some American boys his age discover a common nonverbal language, and Lowji shows his superior skills in this area.
Received on Fri 22 Feb 2013 11:42:31 AM CST
