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Cultures and books as bridges OR If beautiful, not true, If true, not beautiful
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From: Charles Bayless <charles.bayless_at_gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2014 11:54:53 -0500
Years ago, living in Australia when our children were quite young, we used to travel and camp in the outback to view Aboriginal rock art. As the children were young, we were eager that they should not only be grounded in their own culture (America) but be exposed through children's books to the full range of Australian culture, including Aboriginal culture. Mr. Tingle's observation that self-identity is at a very granular level such as Sioux, Choctaw, Seminole, Cherokee, Hopi, etc. each with their own culture, heritage, and language is even more true for Aborigines. Isolated in Australia for 40,000 years, their fragmentation into truly astonishingly distinct groups is fascinating. Roughly 25 linguistic families and 700 or so distinct languages within those families and often with only few hundred or thousand speakers.
This was around the millennium and in Australia, as here, there was a lot of discourse about who had the right to tell stories. The Australian government and the states had various programs to encourage or subsidize Aboriginal writing and publication.
Our experience, as interested but foreign parties, was that in the big cities, the easily available books of Aboriginal folklore were usually written by dominant culture Australians but with a good chance that it was illustrated by an Aboriginal artist. When you went out into the near Outback you could often find books completely By and About Aborigines. When you went to the most remote and inaccessible communities, because of the government programs, you could also find books By and About. But City, Near Outback, and Remote represented three styles of books, reflecting, it appeared to me, a difference in ambassadorial or bridging roles and a difference in target markets.
The City books about Aborigines were primarily by dominant culture people
(usually with significant engagement and experience with Aboriginal communities but still dominant culture) for the dominant culture market. The Near Outback books were by Aborigines but for two markets, dominant culture tourists as well as local consumption. Remote books were primarily for local market (i.e. Aboriginal) consumption.
What was interesting to me was the difference in the children's reactions to the three types of books. Ready engagement with the City books, passing engagement with the Near Outback and virtually no engagement with the Remote books. There is an old adage that when translating poetry "If beautiful, not true, If true, not beautiful." I think that adage was the explanation for the three types of books and the kids' reactions. For the City books, there was sufficient grounding in their own Western culture that they could without difficulty engage with text and illustration (they were all within the picture book age range). But as an adult, and having read some of the original Aboriginal folklore, I could see that the City books were providing essentially a toned down, culturally translated version of the story that took off some of the more stark cultural edges and differences. With that lower barrier to cognitive entry, the kids were much more able to engage. So fundamentally, these cultural translations were beautiful (engaging) but not especially true (accurate to the original). At the other extreme, the Remote books, the text was very close to a literal translation from the original language. But it wasn't just a language translation issue. The required cultural precepts and assumptions necessary to comprehend the narrative structure were fairly extensive. If you weren't versed in that local Aboriginal culture and value system, it was very hard for an adult to engage with the narrative, much less a child.
There is no intended judgment being rendered on this circumstance. And this is not to say that both the authors, dominant and minority, can't be equally effective in their story telling to different audiences. But I think it does shed light on a dynamic between dominant and minority cultures which we haven't discussed.
In the circumstances of dominant and minority cultures (of whatever nature; religion, race, ethnicity, language, class, gender, etc.), authors and illustrators are often functioning in their books as cultural translators, or ambassadors or as a bridge between one group and another. They may do it more or less well. And it makes a difference what the target audience might be. It also makes a difference the degree to which the dominant and minority culture are variant from one another. Is there a lot of cultural commonality/analogs or very little? The Australian instance is a little extreme. You have dominant culture (98% of the population) being Western culture, relatively recent immigrant, in a highly urbanized environment
(90%) functioning almost entirely in a manufacturing, extractive and knowledge economy, engaging with (in the more extreme instances) Aboriginal cultures that are remote, rural, ancient lineage, and largely hunter-gatherers. The gulfs in cultural assumptions between them can be fairly extensive.
Does it make a difference whether a dominant culture person with deep interest, good intent and respect does the storytelling versus an author from that minority culture? Sure. But what difference? They are both translating. The minority culture author is translating from minority to majority as is the dominant culture person. But the dominant culture author has primary knowledge of the dominant culture and secondary knowledge of the minority culture whereas the minority culture author is in the reverse position. They are both making a cultural translation but from different vantage points.
It has been argued that minority culture authors should have superior capability in cultural translation because the minority culture cannot avoid the majority culture. There is certainly logic in that argument and empirically there is some truth to it as well. But it is not uniformly so. Minority cultures are often as prone to myths and misunderstandings of the majority culture as vice versa.
Recognition of these different contexts and differences in objectives shape what you might view as appropriate actions. If your goal is helping the minority culture to sustain and preserve itself and maintain some integrity
(purity) and resist, as for example the French so staunchly attempt to do with regard to the English language, the cultural pressures of the dominant culture, then desiring that only minority culture authors do the cultural translating makes perfect sense. On the other hand, if your objective is to spread awareness of the minority culture among the dominant culture, then you are likely to be more successful doing that via ambassadors/authors of both the dominant and the minority culture who have deep knowledge and respect of the other culture.
I know I am drawing a long bow from a narrow experience but I have seen this dynamic play out as an outsider living in a number of different countries and as a consultant working with large organizations (where different divisions and subsidiaries display many of the attributes of fear, ignorance and competition between each other). There is always a need for more bridges and ambassadors. I think it adds a further level of complexity to an already complex issue. The purposes and objectives of cultural translation matter.
I think we see some of this dynamic in the earlier discussion regarding why the CSK award goes so frequently to such a small group of author/illustrators and why the CSK winners have such a quick out-of-print experience. As I said then, by restricting the award to only African American authors/illustrators AND only those writing about the African American experience, they are statistically confining themselves to a very small market and audience. Such constrictions also reduce competition which in turn usually presages higher costs and lower quality. In the context of the above discussion of bridges and ambassadors, you are essentially limiting yourself to a single group of ambassadors, those from the minority culture. Given the ratio of population size, you haven't just cut the number of ambassadors in half, you have probably reduced the diplomatic forays by 75% or more.
The fastest way to increase the variety and quality of stories celebrating the African American experience would likely be to shift the CSK criteria by one word: by African Americans OR about African Americans. Will some dominant culture writers upset or get wrong some minority culture precepts or assumptions? Sure. But it is also true that some minority culture writers will upset or get wrong the majority culture precepts and assumptions. But over time and with volume of effort and good will, much of it comes out in the wash. If, however, you restrict the number of bridges and the number of ambassadors, you are likely to materially slow or significantly impede awareness in both communities of the other.
Regardless of the details, I wanted to raise the trade-off issue between purity (restricting story tellers) and coverage (the number exposed to the other in any fashion) by thinking about stories as bridges and authors as ambassadors.
Charles
________________________________
Charles Bayless
Managing Director
(office: +1 404 898-9096
)mobile: +1 678 938-4854
*e-mail: charles.bayless_at_decisionclarityconsulting.com
IM: charlesbayless10
Website: www.decisionclarityconsulting.com
LinkedIn: <http://www.linkedin.com/in/charlesbayless1> Charles Bayless
Bio Site: <https://sites.google.com/site/charlesbayless/> Charles Bayless
Received on Thu 27 Feb 2014 10:56:38 AM CST
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2014 11:54:53 -0500
Years ago, living in Australia when our children were quite young, we used to travel and camp in the outback to view Aboriginal rock art. As the children were young, we were eager that they should not only be grounded in their own culture (America) but be exposed through children's books to the full range of Australian culture, including Aboriginal culture. Mr. Tingle's observation that self-identity is at a very granular level such as Sioux, Choctaw, Seminole, Cherokee, Hopi, etc. each with their own culture, heritage, and language is even more true for Aborigines. Isolated in Australia for 40,000 years, their fragmentation into truly astonishingly distinct groups is fascinating. Roughly 25 linguistic families and 700 or so distinct languages within those families and often with only few hundred or thousand speakers.
This was around the millennium and in Australia, as here, there was a lot of discourse about who had the right to tell stories. The Australian government and the states had various programs to encourage or subsidize Aboriginal writing and publication.
Our experience, as interested but foreign parties, was that in the big cities, the easily available books of Aboriginal folklore were usually written by dominant culture Australians but with a good chance that it was illustrated by an Aboriginal artist. When you went out into the near Outback you could often find books completely By and About Aborigines. When you went to the most remote and inaccessible communities, because of the government programs, you could also find books By and About. But City, Near Outback, and Remote represented three styles of books, reflecting, it appeared to me, a difference in ambassadorial or bridging roles and a difference in target markets.
The City books about Aborigines were primarily by dominant culture people
(usually with significant engagement and experience with Aboriginal communities but still dominant culture) for the dominant culture market. The Near Outback books were by Aborigines but for two markets, dominant culture tourists as well as local consumption. Remote books were primarily for local market (i.e. Aboriginal) consumption.
What was interesting to me was the difference in the children's reactions to the three types of books. Ready engagement with the City books, passing engagement with the Near Outback and virtually no engagement with the Remote books. There is an old adage that when translating poetry "If beautiful, not true, If true, not beautiful." I think that adage was the explanation for the three types of books and the kids' reactions. For the City books, there was sufficient grounding in their own Western culture that they could without difficulty engage with text and illustration (they were all within the picture book age range). But as an adult, and having read some of the original Aboriginal folklore, I could see that the City books were providing essentially a toned down, culturally translated version of the story that took off some of the more stark cultural edges and differences. With that lower barrier to cognitive entry, the kids were much more able to engage. So fundamentally, these cultural translations were beautiful (engaging) but not especially true (accurate to the original). At the other extreme, the Remote books, the text was very close to a literal translation from the original language. But it wasn't just a language translation issue. The required cultural precepts and assumptions necessary to comprehend the narrative structure were fairly extensive. If you weren't versed in that local Aboriginal culture and value system, it was very hard for an adult to engage with the narrative, much less a child.
There is no intended judgment being rendered on this circumstance. And this is not to say that both the authors, dominant and minority, can't be equally effective in their story telling to different audiences. But I think it does shed light on a dynamic between dominant and minority cultures which we haven't discussed.
In the circumstances of dominant and minority cultures (of whatever nature; religion, race, ethnicity, language, class, gender, etc.), authors and illustrators are often functioning in their books as cultural translators, or ambassadors or as a bridge between one group and another. They may do it more or less well. And it makes a difference what the target audience might be. It also makes a difference the degree to which the dominant and minority culture are variant from one another. Is there a lot of cultural commonality/analogs or very little? The Australian instance is a little extreme. You have dominant culture (98% of the population) being Western culture, relatively recent immigrant, in a highly urbanized environment
(90%) functioning almost entirely in a manufacturing, extractive and knowledge economy, engaging with (in the more extreme instances) Aboriginal cultures that are remote, rural, ancient lineage, and largely hunter-gatherers. The gulfs in cultural assumptions between them can be fairly extensive.
Does it make a difference whether a dominant culture person with deep interest, good intent and respect does the storytelling versus an author from that minority culture? Sure. But what difference? They are both translating. The minority culture author is translating from minority to majority as is the dominant culture person. But the dominant culture author has primary knowledge of the dominant culture and secondary knowledge of the minority culture whereas the minority culture author is in the reverse position. They are both making a cultural translation but from different vantage points.
It has been argued that minority culture authors should have superior capability in cultural translation because the minority culture cannot avoid the majority culture. There is certainly logic in that argument and empirically there is some truth to it as well. But it is not uniformly so. Minority cultures are often as prone to myths and misunderstandings of the majority culture as vice versa.
Recognition of these different contexts and differences in objectives shape what you might view as appropriate actions. If your goal is helping the minority culture to sustain and preserve itself and maintain some integrity
(purity) and resist, as for example the French so staunchly attempt to do with regard to the English language, the cultural pressures of the dominant culture, then desiring that only minority culture authors do the cultural translating makes perfect sense. On the other hand, if your objective is to spread awareness of the minority culture among the dominant culture, then you are likely to be more successful doing that via ambassadors/authors of both the dominant and the minority culture who have deep knowledge and respect of the other culture.
I know I am drawing a long bow from a narrow experience but I have seen this dynamic play out as an outsider living in a number of different countries and as a consultant working with large organizations (where different divisions and subsidiaries display many of the attributes of fear, ignorance and competition between each other). There is always a need for more bridges and ambassadors. I think it adds a further level of complexity to an already complex issue. The purposes and objectives of cultural translation matter.
I think we see some of this dynamic in the earlier discussion regarding why the CSK award goes so frequently to such a small group of author/illustrators and why the CSK winners have such a quick out-of-print experience. As I said then, by restricting the award to only African American authors/illustrators AND only those writing about the African American experience, they are statistically confining themselves to a very small market and audience. Such constrictions also reduce competition which in turn usually presages higher costs and lower quality. In the context of the above discussion of bridges and ambassadors, you are essentially limiting yourself to a single group of ambassadors, those from the minority culture. Given the ratio of population size, you haven't just cut the number of ambassadors in half, you have probably reduced the diplomatic forays by 75% or more.
The fastest way to increase the variety and quality of stories celebrating the African American experience would likely be to shift the CSK criteria by one word: by African Americans OR about African Americans. Will some dominant culture writers upset or get wrong some minority culture precepts or assumptions? Sure. But it is also true that some minority culture writers will upset or get wrong the majority culture precepts and assumptions. But over time and with volume of effort and good will, much of it comes out in the wash. If, however, you restrict the number of bridges and the number of ambassadors, you are likely to materially slow or significantly impede awareness in both communities of the other.
Regardless of the details, I wanted to raise the trade-off issue between purity (restricting story tellers) and coverage (the number exposed to the other in any fashion) by thinking about stories as bridges and authors as ambassadors.
Charles
________________________________
Charles Bayless
Managing Director
(office: +1 404 898-9096
)mobile: +1 678 938-4854
*e-mail: charles.bayless_at_decisionclarityconsulting.com
IM: charlesbayless10
Website: www.decisionclarityconsulting.com
LinkedIn: <http://www.linkedin.com/in/charlesbayless1> Charles Bayless
Bio Site: <https://sites.google.com/site/charlesbayless/> Charles Bayless
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