Harry Potter and the Minorities Issue:
A Closer Look At The Discrimination Theme in the Series
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Harry Potter and the Minorities Issue:
A Closer Look At The Discrimination Theme in the Series
Karen Angella Brown, BA, MPhil (Cambridge)
Oxford University DPhil candidate.
Tutor in English Language and Literature
& Modern Languages at Oxford Tutorial College
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Contents
Acknowledgements
vii
Introduction
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Chapter 1
Is it Really a Black (or White) Thing? : A Daring
(Mis)-Interpretation of the Absence of Ethnic
Minority Leads in the Harry Potter Series.
9
Chapter 2
Ability or Disability? : The Stigma of Being Different
29
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Acknowledgements
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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For my beloved sister Yvonne.
To Dr. Toby Garfitt,
who has been a source of great reassurance in my academic life.
To Aruna Nair,
whose infectious enthusiasm for Harry Potter got me addicted too.
To Rohan Nunes,
my best friend since high school, who promised to read a whole book if I ever wrote one.
To Ben Spencer,
my fierce co-debater on imperialism and capitalism, who carried my music in Rome and
made many helpful suggestions while I was planning and writing this book.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Introduction
‘Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed
people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that
ever has.’
▬Margaret Mead (1901-68), Anthropologist
It is an overdose of visibility that contributes most to the invisibility of the
minority. There is a systematic silencing of the masses of late, otherwise
known as “political correctness.”
In addition to banning the use of
derogatory terms related to minority groups—words such as “cripple” for the
Disabled, “yellow” or “nigger” for a person of Asian or African descent, or
“faggot” for a person of non-orthodox sexual orientation—notions of political
correctness also prohibit highlighting the reasons why one is a minority, or
drawing too much attention to the realities of discrimination in contemporary
society. Apparently it is not politically correct to talk about race anymore.
And all the aforementioned minority groups are battling against the Stiff
Upper Lipismi of a mainstream that so eagerly awaits the opportunity to
accuse you of being “bitter,” “playing the race card,” or trying to evoke
sympathy from them for something that it not their fault. After all, racism is
such a ghastly accusation, bigotry is such an ugly word and “all men are
equal anyway”…This is the most typical trait of the mainstream: It has a great
affinity for touting clichés and “PC” statements that are often used entirely
out of context, or lacking in intrinsic meaning, or which have no basis
whatsoever in reality.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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In fact, it is just as politically incorrect for a person to say that he or she
has been the victim of gender, sexuality or race-related snobbery and
exclusion as it is to acknowledge personal prejudices against these groups.
But as Patricia Williams reminds us, ‘if race is something about which we
dare not speak in polite company, the same cannot be said of viewing race.’1
The same applies to gender and physical disabilities. And even though the
visibility factor is sometimes lessened with sexual orientation and mental
disabilities, the stigmas associated with these traits are equally unbearable.
Prejudice, and in particular racism, stems from humanity’s inability
and sometimes blatant refusal to look beyond the surface of things—and
people—to find commonalities of experience, or even a reason not to hate and
discriminate. And it is hard for the average person to see anything beyond
the surface, partly because we have already made up our minds what we
want to believe, but mostly because it takes too much effort. It’s always the
“who” and the “what,” but never the “why.” The “why” is far too
complicated, and if it doesn’t concern us directly then why bother?
I became most aware of this fact recently while I was sitting in an
Oxford graduate common room overhearing a group of students discussing
the last cinematic installment of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. A
mixed-race American girl of Caucasian and Asian descent commented on the
absence of ethnic minority groups in the films, innocently finishing off her
remarks with what has to qualify as one of the most politically incorrect
1
Williams, Patricia J. Seeing a Color—Blind Future: The Paradox of Race. New York: The Noonday
Press, 1997. (p. 17).
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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artistic assessment of the twenty-first century: ‘The only diversity you see in
The Lord of the Rings are the Orcs, and they are black,’ she said with
astonishing conviction. The remark was greeted with almost total silence,
and I could not help but wonder if this was because a black person was
actually sitting in the room. What else might I have overheard if I could have
turned into a bat and perch myself on the wall?
Later that day when I recounted my eavesdropping to a group of black
friends, they eagerly took advantage of the opportunity to remind me that my
own overwhelming affinity for Tolkien’s novels and the Lord of the Rings films
was full proof of the fact that I was a ‘coconut’—in other words, a black
person who is white on the inside. And so, through my own fears of being
accused of “jumping on the mainstream bandwagon,” I decided not to inform
them of my latest Anglo-Saxon obsession: Harry Potter.
Harry Potter the protagonist is the quintessential social outcast, the very
antithesis of “normal.” His struggles seem to typify and epitomize that of
every minority group. In The Philosopher’s Stone2 he is the orphan child
shunned and abused by his blood relatives. He must endure not only the pity
but also the stigmas associated with hailing from a “broken home;” he is the
insecure newcomer: scarred, tormented, traumatized, but highly gifted. In
The Chamber of Secrets he is the wrongfully accused whom others look upon
with suspicion, fear and hatred. The Prisoner of Azkaban reacquaints the hero
2
As I am quoting from the British version of the book, I will use this title rather than the American
one (The Sorcerer’s Stone).
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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with haunting memories of his infancy that had somehow been suppressed or
forgotten, only to resurface when he is in his most vulnerable state. It is in this
book, arguably the best in the series so far, that Harry is most victimized by
the horrific realities of his past. And the fourth and fifth installments in the
series—The Goblet of Fire and The Order of the Phoenix—portray the anguish of
a protagonist tainted with the stigma of insanity.
Also, his non-wizard (or ‘Muggle’) upbringing, in addition to the fact
that he is not a ‘pure-blood’ wizard, relegates him to an inferior and
persecuted class within the wizarding community. Some would even argue
that Harry Potter the protagonist is the shunned and crucified messianic hero
with whom rests the sole power to deliver his kind from the clutches of a
consummate evil in the guise of an archetypal ‘Dark Lord’.
Harry Potter the protagonist is everything that the mainstream isn’t.
And yet, he is also everything that the mainstream embraces, idolizes and
imagines itself to be: white, middle-class, popular and famous.
Is this perhaps why the Warner Brothers adaptation of The Philosopher’s Stone
sidelined almost all of Rowling’s peripheral ethnic characters and provoked
criticism from minority groups in the news media? One New York Times
critic even declared that ‘at a time when London is filled with faces of color,
the fleeting appearances by minority kids is scarier than the film’s villain,
Voldemort.’ii And even though the moviemakers denied receiving formal
complaints about the lack of ethnic minority actors in the first film, since then
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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they seem to have made obvious efforts to redeem themselves. Shortly before
the release of The Chamber of Secrets, a Warner Brothers spokesman informed
the New York Daily News that there was more all-round diversity in the
second film, and not just blacks but also other ethnic actors “because there are
more scenes with large groups of kids.”iii The third film (Harry Potter and the
Prisoner of Azkaban [2003]) also featured a marked increase in the number of
ethnic actor appearances.
But it seems to me that we’re asking the wrong questions and raising
irrelevant issues with regards to racial imbalances in the mainstream media.
How can any increase in the number of ethnic minority “background actors”
actually solve the problem of the under-representation of ethnic minorities in
the film and entertainment industry? Should we not be more concerned about
the absence of ethnic programs, books and so forth, as well as the dominant,
seemingly unalterable tastes and dispositions of the mainstream with regards
to race?
Instead of clamoring for more ethnic minority background actors in
Harry Potter, should we not be lobbying to publish an ethnic equivalent to
Harry Potter—one who is also universally immortalized and endearingly
embraced by a collective consciousness that finds inspiration in him? And by
complaining about the absence of ethnic minorities in the film adaptations,
are we also implicitly faulting the author for not creating ethnic minority
leads?
Can one demand that the constraining and often humiliating
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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conditions of affirmative action be attributed to literature and authentic storytelling as well?
And most importantly, how does J.K. Rowling treat the theme of
discrimination against minorities in her work? Are we perhaps downplaying,
or perhaps outright ignoring an important commentary and critique on
minority-related issues in contemporary society by choosing to focus on
externalities such as the skin color of the characters?
After all, George
Orwell’s contemporaries never quite “got” Animal Farm. It was only after the
banned preface of the first edition of the text that the critics began to
acknowledge Animal Farm as one of the greatest allegories ever constructed.
Robert Weaver explains:
The essay…was written as a preface…but was not included in the
published book and only discovered in the author’s original typescript
some years later. It is now a favorite citation for critics of our
supposedly free press, as an illustration of how the media can work to
suppress uncomfortable truths without this necessitating some vast
conspiracy. 3
Similarly, many people are of the view that J.K. Rowling has constructed a
reality-check
allegory
of
institutionalized
discrimination
and
racial
stratification in contemporary society in the Harry Potter novels. Yet others
argue that it cannot have been such an important theme if the critics have
only glossed over it thus far, and especially since it does not come across from
watching the movies, at least at first glance, that Rowling is at all concerned
with minority-related issues.
3
‘Orwell’s Preface to Animal Farm’ can be found at http://home.iprimus.com.au/korob/Orwell.html.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Therefore, the aim of this book is, literally, to exhaust the theme of
discrimination as portrayed in the Harry Potter novels. Unlike most of what
has been written thus far on the so-called “Harry Potter phenomenon”, my
book has no biographical pretensions: As I do not know J.K. Rowling
personally, I cannot say that I find her private life or her past nearly as
interesting as her work. Nor is the book meant to be a defense of the author—
After all, not enough people in the mainstream are concerned enough about
social imbalances or the lack of ethnic minorities in all aspects of the
entertainment industry for any Anglo-Saxon author to require a defense
anyway. But this is also precisely why the Harry Potter series, as well as this
book, needed to be written.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Chapter 1
‘Human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their
minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives.’
▬William James (1842-1910), American Psychologist and
Philosopher.
‘Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.’
▬from Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (p. 216).
Is it Really a Black (or White) Thing? : A Daring (Mis)Interpretation of the Absence of Ethnic Minority Leads in the
Harry Potter Series.
‘We’ve lost the moral tone in literature,’ says G.P. Taylor, compatriot and
contemporary of J.K. Rowling, and author of the popular Shadowmancer. In an
interview with the BBC to promote his first book, he declared that literature
was in an ‘ambiguity state,’ and that he was trying to ‘bring the story with the
moral back again and hopefully speak to people.’iv In a later interview with
NPR radio, Taylor commented on the absence of black lead characters in
Anglo-Saxon and most of mainstream literature. He admitted that he bore
this lack in mind when he created the Shadowmancer hero Raphah, a
multilingual African who joins forces with two Yorkshire teenagers in the
fight against the evil vicar Demurral, who, like Rowling’s Voldemort,
epitomizes wickedness and leads the archetypal “dark side” in Shadowmacer.
In the following extract from the aforementioned interview, Taylor cites the
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Harry Potter series as one example of the ethnic deficiencies in English
literature:
“There [was] no good, positive black characters in children’s literature
over here. We have Harry Potter who is the white Anglo-Saxon
protestant … with his dark hair. We’ve got Hermione and Ron. But
there is no place in English literature where people of color have been
used as positive role models. And I did consciously want to do that.”v
Indeed it is a fact that, although ethnic and social diversity is prevalent in our
society, it is not adequately reflected in the media or in books. And I
sympathize with Graham Taylor for wanting to correct this very subtle but
significant imbalance.
However, Taylor’s revelation of his authorial intention shows
extraordinary naivety and a somewhat endearing lack of understanding of
not only the racial divide, but also the marketing strategies used to target a
book such as his to a mainstream audience.
If indeed he could have
understood, then he would have known, first of all, that touting the virtues of
his black protagonist could hurt his book sales amongst a mainstream
readership—a fact of which the reviewers at the BBC North Yorkshire Book
Club were most aware when they summarized the novel and identified the
two English characters in one paragraph as “two attractive heroes who will,
no doubt, feature in future adventures.” But here they never bothered to
mention Raphah, who is the third and arguably most important component of
Taylor’s trinity of protagonists (They are somewhat similar to the Ron,
Hermione and Harry trinity from the Harry Potter novels).
But instead,
Raphah is mentioned once at the very end of the synopsis section of the
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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review as the “mysterious friend who offers a tantalizing glimpse of another
country and culture.” vi
One cannot deny that Taylor’s writing envelops Raphah’s character in
an aura of deep mysticism that is highly reminiscent of contemporary
perceptions of blackness amongst the Caucasian majority in Western societies;
and this more than anything else compromises the character’s validity as a
“protagonist” in the strictest sense. However, regardless of this technicality,
Raphah remains a principal character, and is by all means equally attractive
as the other two Shadowmancer leads, Kate and Thomas—a fact the
aforementioned book reviewers never bother to mention. Moreover, words
such as “mysterious” and “tantalizing” immediately confirm mainstream
perceptions of the exotic. A description such as this also affords the publicist
the opportunity to associate Raphah with otherness and difference without
stating explicitly that he is an African—and hence, generally speaking, black.
So here we see a situation where Taylor’s valiant attempt to empower
the ethnic minority character is thwarted by the mainstream book reviewer’s
instinctive urge to not only tokenize and exoticize him, but also to conceal
what Taylor obviously then considered to be the most vital and integral part
of the character’s identity from the potential reader. Also, in his eagerness to
transmit a message of inclusiveness, one could enquire what his intentions are
with regards to other ethnic minorities? Does he intend to continue
addressing the literary imbalances he identified by including a different
ethnic lead in each book henceforth? Or does the trend end with Raphah? If
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the aforementioned North Yorkshire Book Club review is any indication, then
I believe the latter is the more likely outcome.
But there is no way G.P. Taylor could have known or recognized this
because, being a part of the Caucasian majority, he has been socialized to
view himself as the norm, and to view others with a level of difference that
borders on the other-worldly alien. Though he may readily identify tokenism
and exoticism, he can never truly understand its effects or the degree of
snobbery often associated with the gaze of the norm upon the social Other.
Another important demonstration of Taylor’s lack of understanding of the
racial divide is his own patronizing attitude towards race, a product of his
privileged white upbringing, no doubt, and one for which he cannot entirely
be blamed.
Yet the tone of self-congratulation and slight condescension remains
unmistakable—a white author revealing an intention to take up the task of
including a black ethnic minority amongst his lead characters—presumably in
contrast to other English or Anglo-Saxon writers who have neglected to do so
in the past. In other words, «I must write a black lead character here so that ethnic
minorities can feel more included in the mainstream» is the general gist, and it can
only be the assertion of one who is not only highly conscious of the privileges
associated with his race, but who also deems himself capable of extending the
favor of inclusion to the social Other from that presumed position of power.
In other words, he runs the risk of being seen to “include” an ethnic minority
in his prose “out of the goodness of his heart,” as the saying goes.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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But I am not being malicious to G.P. Taylor—at least not intentionally
anyway. As a matter of fact, I believe him to be a decent man with good
intentions. And truth be told, I rather liked Shadowmancer. It was only after I
heard the aforementioned interview that I became critical—after discovering
exactly why the character Raphah was created.
Author, book and character
have to be subjected to serious re-evaluation when a writer declares such lofty
aims for his work.
But Shadowmancer is undoubtedly a decent piece of
storytelling. Taylor is by no means a racist. Nor is his outlook typical for a
person of his race and clergyman background. Therefore, credit must be
given to him for being brave enough to talk about race in these times, and also
for being socially sympathetic enough to actually want to address and correct
racial imbalance in the book media.
But though he was probably not aware of it as yet, his method of
including ethnicity is no different from that of the Hollywood mainstream
media who, whenever accused of excluding or under-representing ethnic
minority groups, will inevitably insert a few more brown faces in the sea of
white ones in response to the criticism, and then pat themselves on the back
for fulfilling their affirmative action duties—but not before rolling their eyes
and sighing for a few moments about the tendency amongst ethnic minorities
to “play the race card.” That is the whole point of belonging to a minority
group or race in the age of political correctness: You are made to understand
in a most subtle manner that you don’t matter as much as your mainstream
counterpart. But you must understand and accept this notion silently and
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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implicitly. And never complain. Otherwise, you will be committing the
extremely “politically incorrect” act of “bringing up the past,” mentioning the
unmentionable or “dwelling unfairly and unnecessarily on race.”
And you are supposed to live up to all of the mainstream’s
preconceived ideas about your race, and in some cases, your nationality. For
instance, many a newly-made acquaintance in America and Great Britain,
upon finding out what my nationality is, are constantly taken aback by the
fact that I don’t speak like George Lucas’s Jar-Jar Binks,4 or that I don’t end
every sentence with “yeah mon!”, or that I’ve never smoked marijuana. Most
of the times these stereotypes are not offensively expressed, but the point I’m
making here is that, as a minority one must understand and accept that the
charge rests with the empowered mainstream majority not only to include
you, but more importantly, to define you as a social entity. And you must
either comply with these definitions, or become the object of suspicion—
because the mainstream does not like its established views and orthodoxy
opinions to be challenged.
As a minority you must at all costs maintain and uphold the
mainstream’s delusions of its own Enlightenment and progressive thinking.
Thus when the typical mainstream specimen starts a sentence with ‘I am openminded but…’ (when speaking of racial inclusiveness) the ethnic minority
must be prepared to accept that whatever follows the ‘but’ is perfectly
justified, no matter how offensive and xenophobic it might be. And when a
Caucasian tells you that you don’t act like the other black people they know,
4
From the 20th Century Fox motion picture Star Wars: Episode 1 (The Phantom Menace).
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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or when a white man uses his preference for dating black women as a pick up
line, you’re supposed to feel flattered. And when they tell you they have
‘loads of black friends,’ or when the president of your country points out that
he has 2 black people occupying high positions in his team, you are supposed
to feel reassured that they could never be racist.
Taylor was obviously not aware of these impossible subtleties. But I
suppose sooner or later he will realize that subtlety is the only way to
transmit important messages to an audience so severely allergic to overt
criticism, and who regard overly grand gestures of “minority inclusiveness”
with silent distaste—Perhaps one of the reasons why Shadowmancer will never
be quite as popular as Harry Potter? Though we will have to wait for the
Shadowmancer motion picture5 before pronouncing the final verdict, at the
moment Rowling leads Taylor by far in the popularity stakes.
What the likes of George Orwell and J.K. Rowling seem to know only
too well, and G.P. Taylor must come to understand, is that the mainstream
looks far more favorably upon allegories and parodies, and can only tolerate
pointed ugly accusations if they are symbolic and brimming with subtlety.
Rowling has not only mastered these skills, she has also done more than any
other Anglo-Saxon author with regards to locating and qualifying the
minority experience in her work, as well as scathingly criticizing all forms of
institutionalized bigotry in contemporary Western societies—even if the
movies and the book critics do not adequately portray these themes. The
5
G.P. Taylor, in the aforementioned interview with the BBC, states that his agents are currently
negotiating talks with film producers for the rights for Shadowmancer.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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book critics may have glossed over them in the typical “checklist” fashion of
highlighting the “hallmark Harry Potter themes.” But not many of them have
given much weight to what are arguably the most important Harry Potter
topics; and understandably so, since it is not “politically correct” to dwell too
much on major infringements upon human dignity. Why confront these
uncomfortable socio-political issues when we can just pretend that they are
almost as unreal as the magic?
Bearing this in mind, however, there is at least one point on which I
can wholeheartedly agree with Taylor: subtlety certainly has a downside to it,
and may even be over-rated. Universal comprehension often evades subtlety,
because it plays into the destructive tendency amongst most human beings to
see only what they want to see and hear only what they want to hear. And
with the advent of the film making industry gaining more and more
dominance on a global scale, it is easy for the mainstream audience to
embrace Harry Potter as a cultural icon, or a mere entertainment blockbuster,
rather than the significantly poignant social critique that it is. Hence, the
majority of the mainstream audience chooses to respond to Harry Potter as
mindless
entertainment, even if on some
subconscious
acknowledge that its themes are topical and important.
level they
Therefore, while
subtlety has allowed Rowling to gain unequivocal access to the mainstream
audience, and to target them with important messages, it also means that they
are woefully free to dismiss and ignore the fact that she has constructed a
scathing indictment of their very own ideals.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Finally, Taylor’s misconceptions are not unique to him, but rather
typical of all who occupy a similar position, and still have the courage to
comment on race issues in these modern times, as well as the decency to care
about the fate of the marginalized and the oppressed. However, his beliefs are
hinged upon the mainstream’s misguided assumption that affirmative action
approaches can actually counteract prejudice or eliminate racial imbalances.
But this is a grave mistake. If affirmative action is—as construed by many
people—a political dilemma and societal shortcoming, then it is an even
bigger mistake to attempt applying it to authentic storytelling, regardless of
the lack of ethnic characters in mainstream literature and media. Yes, the
imbalance exists. Yes, it is mostly a question of race. But the question he
should be asking himself is not why there aren’t more ethnic lead characters
in Anglo-Saxon and mainstream literature, but rather why there aren’t far
more authors of ethnic backgrounds accessing the mainstream market with
the same likelihood of profitability, popularity and success as people such as
himself and J.K. Rowling.
We don’t need more ethnic minority children appearing in the
background—or even the foreground—of the Harry Potters and the
Shadowmancers of the mainstream. What we need is a reprogramming of
mainstream minds with the viewing of more films, television programs and
books about ethnic minorities. Why can’t Daytime NBC dedicate a half hour
slot to Chinese soap opera with English subtitles? Why doesn’t MTV have a
daily showcase for music from all over the world including Africa and the
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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Middle East? Are pop, rock, country, R&B and the occasional Reggae hit from
some emerging Bob Marley successor the only kind of music worthy of the
ears of the mainstream audience? Why do the BBC and NBC almost
invariably only show Olympic medal ceremonies when a British or American
athlete is standing on the podium, when the populations of these countries
are comprised of so many different nationalities?
And why don’t the
Paralympics receive the same level of media coverage, when they are also
part of the Olympic Games?
And why do we have special shops for children’s books geared
towards ethnic minorities while children of all ethnicities can go to Barnes
and Noble and pick up the latest Diana Wynne Jones or Terry Pratchett?
Considering that all ethnic groups contribute to mainstream economics by
embracing the likes of Harry Potter both in print and on screen, we should also
be encouraging white children to also expose their minds to non-white
protagonists—other than the ones that come out of Hollywood or the music
industry, the latter being yet another form of iconism that in no way reflects
the majority of minority experiences.
But the mainstream refuses to admit that too much minority
representation makes them uncomfortable. Who wants to watch a bunch of
people in wheelchairs racing in the Olympics when there are far more
attractive, more perfect and more “normal” people to be over-hyped and
touted as national heroes? Why expand our viewing horizons to include
authentic representations of other nationalities and races when it’s so much
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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easier to live with the established notions stereotypes we already “know” to be
true? Why read anything that does not portray a protagonist created exactly
in our image—or the image we would like to have of ourselves? Meanwhile,
the subtext of inequality and non-inclusiveness pervades every aspect of
society, and still we persist in believing that tokenism can actually resolve
issues related to the under-representation of minorities in the media.
Tokenized representations within the Anglo-Saxon mainstream
media—plus the occasional hybrid Hollywood-Bollywood blockbuster—are
extremely inadequate, but so far, that is all we have. Ethnic programming is
still sidelined, stung by the stigma of otherness and pinching the pocket a
little bit more: If one wants to see international programs, one has to pay extra
money for satellite or special cable channels. In order to see a foreign film
you must go to “Arts Picture Houses” as pay $2 more than you would at a
regular movie theatre. Until the mainstream is of the disposition to make
these forms of media more accessible to a wider audience, and until they can
embrace ethnic protagonists with the same endearment and enthusiasm as a
Harry Potter, then the imbalance in ethnic representations in popular
literature and media will never be eliminated, despite the efforts of good
Samaritans like G.P. Taylor.
No one should be in a position to “include” or “tolerate” ethnic
minorities. The fact that ethnic minorities exist is enough to validate their
worthiness of inclusion. We waste our time begging for more “inclusiveness”
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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when we should be demanding equality, and setting the appropriate
mechanisms in place in order to achieve it.
This is by no means to say that one has to be qualified to write ethnic lead
characters by being of that particular ethnicity. As G.P. Taylor and countless
ethnic authors have proven, one does not have to be White or Black or Arab
or Asian or Indian to create a protagonist of that race. But still, we cannot
deny the self-reflexive nature of writing. It is a truth universally
acknowledged that there is an element of autobiography in even the most
fictitious, contrived, fantastical piece of prose.
Nor can we ignore the
prevailing tendency among the mainstream to embrace what it considers to
be most representative of itself. And we certainly cannot pretend that we are
not guided or motivated by the same herd instincts of centuries past. Despite
the diversity in the racial make-up of contemporary Western societies, social
groups are still to a large extent segregated.
In my travels I have come across individuals of various races and
nationalities who have never had a black person—and sometimes no person
of ethnic minority background at all—in their social circle. But most of the
time this was due to lack of social opportunity rather than racist or elitist
inclinations.
I have even been to communities in the United States and
Western Europe where I met people who told me that they had only ever seen
dark-skinned people on television, and meeting me was the very first
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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opportunity they ever had to be so close to a black person. And there was
nothing offensive at all in their lack of information or their curiosity.
If I should read an autobiography or a novel written by any of these
individuals, I could hardly expect them to portray a black person from any
standpoint other than the mysterious outsider or curious exotic. Fifteen years
ago when I was still living in a small community in Jamaica and had never
traveled or spoken to a Caucasian, I viewed them in very much the same way
and would have exoticized them in my writing too. And so I can’t see that
there is any shame in not knowing—i.e., if the opportunity to find out has
never presented itself. And sometimes this is precisely what depicts the
reality of our situation and our understanding of the Other most accurately.
But it is the not-wanting-to-know and the fear of inclusiveness that are
most worrying. There is a prevailing sense of dread in the mainstream that
whites will one day constitute the minority rather than the majority—along
with the powerful but silenced notion that the arrival of that day must be
staved off for as long as possible! A sure way of doing that is by vilifying the
minority group, or by exhibiting indifference. The attitudes range from
limiting the representation of minorities to mere tokens in the media,
portraying certain minority groups in a bad light, or ignoring them altogether.
The latter tends to be the case with the Disabled, and indifference is
sometimes worse than outright hatred.
It is the willful ignorance, indifference and mild xenophobia of the
educated, well-informed mainstream—who are supposed to be great
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
21
advocates of “tolerance,” and who are more accustomed to seeing difference in
their midst—that is the greatest cause for concern. Mainstream selfportraiture is no more realistic than the rather nebulous concept of “equality.”
But while the mainstream rejects unattractive truths and realities it deems too
ugly to face, it is still defined by social realism and therefore embraces the sort
of realities that reveal themselves on the superficial level of outer appearance.
But even the non-mainstream can embrace the Ron, Hermione and Harry trio
because they are real in the sense of realistically portraying how friendships
and groups are formed—not just by way of racial similarities, but also
background, talents, interests and so forth. They are by no means an elitist
trio of “cookie-cutter” kids with perfect teeth and unwavering self-confidence.
Instead, each one is a social misfit, an oddity in his or her own way that on
some level we can all relate to regardless of race, nationality or socioeconomic background.
There is Hermione, the studious geek, and the puritanical and selfrighteous know-it-all who is far too “preachy” for her own good. She is also
born to two Muggle parents who can never access her world, unlike Ron and
Harry who both have an established heritage in the wizarding world. We
have Ron who hails from a considerably poorer background than most of the
other children in his social environment, and who resents his poverty. And
then there is Harry, the uber-persecuted outcast who finally finds friends and
a niche he can belong to, only to have further upheavals and trauma thrown
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
22
in his path because he’s famous for all the wrong reasons—Rowling could
never be accused of being kind to this protagonist.
Initially there is a sense of the solidarity of the outcasts in this trio of
leads, and so it is not surprising when they come to create a tight-knitted,
exclusive unit, fiercely loyal and protective of each other. Each one
contributes something different and important to the group, and even though
Harry is the main character, the trio is a negotiation of identities rather than
the dominance of one over the others. There are important messages here not
only about courage, friendship, love and so forth, but also tolerance and
acceptance of people who are fundamentally and irrevocably different. It is
neither abnormal, nor is it a crime, that none of them is an ethnic minority, or
that other Anglo-Saxon writers have not created ethnic leads. But
unfortunately, the fact that they are all white is what most people can see.
Because of the high visibility of race, it becomes easy for Rowling’s important
message to go over the heads of the very audience it was targeting in the first
place.
And so the problem is not the absence of ethnic lead characters in AngloSaxon and mainstream literature, but rather the persistence of specific, though
subtle, values within Western societies that contribute to the general
dispositions that typify the tastes of the mainstream audience—dispositions
that cause it to respond differently to ethnicity, and which render it almost
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
23
permanently bound to its debilitating stereotypes. These dispositions are the
product of an overtly elitist value system that silences, ignores and excludes
the minority.
Having been raised in a country where Blacks are the majority rather
than the minority, and then going to live and study in places where the
reverse is true, I have come to realize that there is a great dissimilarity in the
way I locate myself in society, and the way most African Americans or British
people of African descent view themselves and function as part of their social
environment. Despite the professing of “Equal Opportunities for all,” there is
no doubt in my mind that there are significant physical and psychological
disparities in the way social privilege and expectations—in terms of having
certain ambitions—are tied to race in Britain and the USA in contrast with the
Caribbean. For example, no one would laugh at me in my country if I said
‘one day I will become the President or the Prime Minister.’ But a black
woman born and raised in America or Britain would think twice about
revealing such an ambition.
It would be interesting to find out if she would even consider herself
capable of having that ambition in the first place. I once conducted my own
little “mini-survey” amongst some of my British students just to get a view of
how they located themselves in British society.
One black girl fervently
declared that she knew that no matter how much greater her qualifications
were, she could never run for Prime Minister because the majority of the
mainstream would not vote for her because they are incapable of seeing
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
24
beyond the fact that she is black. It was quite alarming to me how well she
understood that becoming the Prime Minister was not an ambition she was
allowed to have. Unfortunately, her apathy is not unique, as I soon
discovered that many more young blacks in Britain shared the same view.
David Magezi, a black medical student at Oxford who was born in
Uganda and raised in rural England, once remarked that he was not the only
black student to have achieved all A’s on his A’Level exams. But none of the
other black students in his examination-year applied to Cambridge or Oxford
University, simply because these schools were considered to be an elitist
environment where they could not fit in or would not be accepted. One
wonders where they might have got the idea that Blacks cannot be a part of
the elite, and how long it took—between the time they were born and the time
they left school—for them to internalise that kind of oppression.
And so, having had the chance to study both Anglophone and
Francophone Caribbean and African literature all my life, there has never
been a shortage of black protagonists and heroes in my realm of
“mainstream,” whom I could admire, relate to, and analyse. And so from a
cultural standpoint, it is much easier for me to fully embrace a Tolkien or a
J.K. Rowling as literary representations of another culture, and other literary
myths, to which I can relate without the resentment of feeling that my race is
being mis-represented, under-represented or under-valued. But this is simply
because I never had to look to Anglo-Saxon writers to fill a space that must
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
25
invariably be occupied by the ethnic author, and I was never raised with
silent notions of my inferiority being constantly confirmed by the media.
The media in developed Western societies aggravates discrimination against
minority groups by constantly proliferating negative publicity about them,
thus reinforcing stereotypes about races or individuals customarily relegated
to the role of otherness in mainstream culture. For example, it is quite shocking
how the BBC continues to commit certain unforgivable sins, despite the
twentieth century invention of—and insistence on—political correctness. In a
recent documentary adaptation of Homer’s Odyssey, hosted by a famous
Englishman and former Olympian, they decided to include Blacks in the
program. Presumably this move was supposed to be regarded as a valiant
attempt to “include” ethnic minority representation in their programming.
But funnily enough, the only black characters featured were the oneeyed monsters whom Odysseus encounters on the island of Cyclops, as wells
as the athletes whom he must compete against at the Olympic games in the
land of the Phaecians.
vii
And it wasn’t just some of the athletes who were
black: they were all black. Odysseus and the tournament judges were the
only whites in that scene. And of course, Odysseus won every event he
competed in. Someone should have told the BBC that it is better not to
include Blacks at all than to insert them in minor, stereotyped roles such as
that of monsters and athletes in Greek mythology.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
Surely it must be
26
politically correct to have a publicist who considers such things before
projecting these images on an increasingly gullible audience.
In similar fashion, Warner Brothers made a great blunder with The
Philosopher’s Stone adaptation. But it was not in the exclusion of ethnic
minority kids from background scenes, or even the fact that important
peripheral characters of ethnic minority backgrounds—like Parvati Patel, or
the black duo of Dean Thomas and Angelina Johnson—were either
completely ignored or excluded. Their great mistake lies rather in their
realization of the character Firenze, a Centaur. Perhaps it was not a mistake at
all but a deliberate contrivance designed to concur with prevailing racial
stereotypes—but of course, one cannot expect them to admit that any time
soon.
In Greek mythology the Centaurs were not only brought into disrepute
with both gods and men, they were also irrevocably associated with
debauchery, savageness and violence. Being half-man and half-horse,
Centaurs were aggressive and unintelligent beasts,6 but J.K. Rowling
challenges the mythical stereotype by ascribing a high degree of nobility of
character to Firenze, who, despite fierce opposition from other defiant
Centaurs who refuse to help humans/wizards, saves Harry from Voldemort
in The Philosopher’s Stone. Rowling specifically describes Firenze as a Centaur
with long blond hair, a white ‘palomino body’ with ‘astonishingly blue eyes.’7
And yet he was portrayed as a black man with spiky hair in the Warner
6
7
Wordsworth Reference, p. 65.
Philosopher’s Stone, (p. 187) & The Order of the Phoenix, (p. 529).
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
27
Brothers film. Associations with current racial stereotypes need no further
explanation, as the image of the black man embodying beastly characteristics
is a notion only too deeply entrenched in the minds of the mainstream
audience.
An authentic portrayal of the real Firenze, with his shiny blond hair
and startling blue eyes, would have at least challenged the mainstream
audience to rethink some of its assumptions regarding race, even if only on a
subconscious level. But then again, most movies are not made to transmit
important messages or to bring about social change or a socio-psychological
reassessment. After all, “the Harry Potter phenomenon” is now one of the
most successful moneymaking enterprises in the world, and at the end of the
day most of what comes out of Hollywood has the simple aim of making as
much money as possible. And unfortunately, the surest way of reeling in the
millions is to show the audience what it wants to see, what it believes to be
true and what it wants to believe is true.
Coincidentally, this sort of
blundering, willful ignorance of the masses happens to be one of the major
themes in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the latest volume in the
series thus far.
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
28
Chapter 3
‘Have it your own way, Potter,’ said Malfoy, grinning
maliciously. ‘If you think they can’t spot a Mudblood, stay
where you are.’
▬Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, (p. 110)
Ability or Disability? : The Stigma of Being
Different
A nice turn of phrase borrowed from Jessica Mitford’s Hons and Rebels (p. 153). See the
Bibliography for full reference.
ii
The quote is taken directly from http://www.hogwartswire.com/archives/000321.html. However, the
New York Times critic is not identified.
iii
See above link.
iv
The full Alex Hall interview with G.P. Taylor can be downloaded at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/northyorkshire/culture/bookclub/reviews/2003/07/shadow2.shtml
v
Interview title: ‘‘Shadowmancer’ Touted as ‘Hotter than Potter.’’ RealPlayer or Windows Media
keyword: «Shadowmancer».
vi
The quotes in this paragraph are taken directly from
http://www.bbc.co.uk/northyorkshire/culture/bookclub/reviews/2003/07/shadow2.shtml.
vii
The Program aired on BBC1 on Sunday, August 15 th between 8-9 PM. More details can be found at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/features/greek_gods/odyssey.shtml.
i
Copyright © Karen Angella Brown, 2004.
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