To the World!

N.K. Jemisin's article 'Describing characters of color in writing'

Mary Anne Mohanraj's article on approaching characters of colour

Renee Harleston's article How to 'Write Characters of Color Without Using Stereotypes'

Working with Colour, a resource site for writers

the book Writing the Other by by Nisi Shawl and Cynthia Ward, which had a description that cut deep, because I've definitely fallen into this trap out of fear:

and then a video recommended by @sheprd (thank you!) about pitfalls in descriptive language

I haven't gotten my hands on Writing the Other yet (it's still in the mail!) but from reading my way through these articles and watching the Princess Weekes video, I now understand that 'white-ifying' a character you're worried about is a lazy and cowardly solution. so, if I do ever finish the book Eres loses Everything, I'll keep her as is, do my best to be thoughtful, and hire a sensitivity reader to pick out any blind spots.

Writing Diversely FAQ

Writing With Colour blog

A conversation between many writers on writing diverse characters

Four Tips to Help You Incorporate Diversity and Inclusion in Your Writing

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AND DON´T USE AI.

do you want to talk about it? /nf

basically they had a messy friendship breakup (I think i told you about it) and now they don't really talk to me anymore

not shocking cause it was really a duo in a trio type thing but it's okay cause I have new friends who are really cool and it hopefully won't go weird like all of my trio friendships have 👍

im glad you have new and better friends I am manifesting for you that it goes well

REAL

he came home at like 9:50, which was right the same time I was heating dinner

"1. 2. 3. Eyes. On. Me." *said with such intense glare and direct eye contact it made one person tear up in fear*

"WE RAISE OUR HANDS TO SPEAK!" *even Stratt follows the rule the rest of the meeting*

"I can wait..." *said in a normal volume in a room of screaming frustrated scientists. they all quiet immediately*

Idk if this has been done already, but I found it hilarious

(Template under the cut)

Like. Imagine one of the scientists studying Astrophage gives Grace a paper detailing their recent findings and Grace being locked in on something else, he just looks up, skims the paper, then pulls out a red pen from somewhere and marks it, “B+, you forgot to account for…” then after a 5 minute lecture on how to improve, he goes back to typing or smth. The scientist just standing there baffled thinking ‘B+? What are we in? A classroom?”, and kind of bum hurt that they only got a B+ (bc ofc they want an A) so they go back to researching with a new ferocity cuz dammit they’re going to get that A. Cue the science team being fueled by Dr.Grace’s grades, them just rubbing it into each others faces if they get A’s or A+’s. Headcanon 2 is that he just keeps gold star stickers in his pockets so for example: All of them are in a meeting, Dr. smth pipes up with a good suggestion and he goes, “Great job! You get a gold star.” And just puts it on their phone case or badge and moves on, everyone is flabbergasted and a bit jealous except for the scientist who is just vibrating with happiness and a bit of fear because the co-dictator of the world just gave them a gold star.

Extra: Grace also hits Stratt with the 1 2 punch of “A+! Here’s a gold star.” On one of her presentations after staying up for 36+ hours and slaps a gold star on her forehead before conking out on the desk. Carl is in the corner desperately trying not to laugh bc Grace just did this in front of the entire Petrova task force while Stratt is just staring at him in confused amusement. Extra-extra: The mess hall on Stratt’s Vat has a ‘Fridge-board” which is a magnetic board acting as a fridge for all of their papers with A’s on it. Grace just being mortified when he learns that he’s been grading and giving gold stars to the top minds of the world and Stratt having to assure him that it boosts morale and that it’s fine.

(Once he gets sent off to space, everyone in the task force keeps their stars to remember him, because he never said goodbye.)

Space (and stars) are a much newer concept to Erid, at least relative to us. They cannot perceive stars. They can't even see their own sky.

And then here we are, utterly obsessed. The number of songs, movies, and TV shows that reference stars, the moon, our sun, it's light, astronauts, space — we can hardly go five minutes without bringing up at least one of those things. NONE of them are things Eridians have an established affinity for; to them, they're scientific concepts, and that's pretty much it.

And yet, stars are one of the first things our kids learn how to draw. We have a specific name for the connections we trace between them, and those constellations have been built into thousands of years of our history. We fought a proxy war based on who could get to them the fastest. I absolutely believe that, to Erid, this would be our defining characteristic above and beyond anything else.