LINES OF THE DAY

". . . But the past does not exist independently from the present. Indeed, the past is only past because there is a present, just as I can point to something over there only because I am here. But nothing is inherently over there or here. In that sense, the past has no content. The past -- or more accurately, pastness -- is a position. Thus, in no way can we identify the past as past." p. 15

". . . But we may want to keep in mind that deeds and words are not as distinguishable as often we presume. History does not belong only to its narrators, professional or amateur. While some of us debate what history is or was, others take it into their own hands." p. 153

Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History (1995) by Michel-Rolph Trouillot

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

Reading Wednesday -- What We CAN'T Read

Science Fiction and Fantasy short fiction written by African American authors is what the average sf/f reader won't be able to read.



Fireside's  Fiction’s report, #BlackSpecFic, finds less than 2% of SF stories published in 2015 were by black writers; Black science fiction writers face 'universal' racism, study finds.

Full data Excel spreadsheet of African American stories can be viewed here  found in Sf/F short fiction publications, including Analog, Beneath Ceaseless Skies (still despise that name!), etc.
The report, published by the magazine Fireside Fiction, states that just 38 of the 2,039 stories published in 63 magazines in 2015 were by black writers. With the bulk of the industry based in the US, more than half of all speculative fiction publications the report considered did not publish a single original story by a black author. “The probability that it is random chance that only 1.96% of published writers are black in a country where 13.2% of the population is black is 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000321%,” says the report.

 The report, with links, that includes accompanying essays, here.
Author Troy L Wiggins wrote in another accompanying essay that: “The truth is that I have a better chance of being wrongfully convicted of a crime than I do of selling a piece of short fiction to a major speculative fiction magazine.”
This situation is just, just -- well there are no words to describe what this situation is, except three.

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