Sasquan. Latino Kids Lit List. Ask A Mexican. Política in kids lit.

WorldCon 2015 - How inclusive of Latinos & Native Americans?

 

The world's biggest SF/F convention will be held in Indian Country of Spokane, Wash., next August. Since I participated in many "Spanish strand" workshops/panels in WorldCon 2013 in San Antonio, I've suggested they should continue the Latino inclusion and involve some Native American speakers on panels and workshops. Officially, I've received no response. The one move they made at changing their all-white, very-old/male speakers list was to add Tananarive Due. Questions about Latino and Native American author-inclusion and workshops remain.

The World Science Fiction Society (WSFS) produces WorldCon. It's part of the long-running F/SF establishment that's dominated speculative lit for decades. Its old direction of good-old-boy club has changed somewhat to include women. Then blacks. Then Asians. But it's an uphill climb for them to change themselves into a group better reflecting 21st Century North American spec lit. How is it that Sci-Fi people are so retrograde conservative?

Another piece of that establishment is The Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America, SFFWA. Here's recent posts about them

"In the early 90s, I applied and was first denied entrance (I'm from Mexico, but still live here) until I argued that America is the whole continent and that Mexico is in America and thus I should be admitted to SFWA (I had done everything asked for). They eventually relented, letting me in as the first Mexican in SFWA, and a few years later managed to drop me when I was late paying my annual dues (by no more than a week). I agree: let´s do something new and multinational about it."

"I decided not to join (not based on this update)."

"I am definitely ready for a multinational thing."

I don't know exactly what everyone might mean. But there's NO reason that Chicano, Latino, Native American, black and other historically underrepresented authors should have to worry about anything other than creating their art. PERIOD. Exclusion, privilege, bureaucracy, chauvinism of any form have no place in speculative literature. Or much of anywhere else.

If you're thinking of maybe attending Sasquan next year, here's what they say about being included in workshop/panels: "Sasquan would like to hear from you if you’re interested in being considered as a panelist and/or a performer. We don’t know everyone and Worldcons always find a few good panelists/performers by encouraging volunteers to apply."

You can add your ideas on their website. Maybe I'll see you there.

Remarkable Latino Children's Lit of 2014

Just in time for gift-giving season, here's one group's list of kid's books--some written by Latino First Voices--with Latinos as the main characters.

"Latinas for Latino Lit (L4LL) announces our annual "Best of the Best" children's literature titles written by or about Latinos. Selections include award-winning authors such as Duncan Tonatiuh and publishers ranging from household name New York presses to community-focused, independent companies.

"Why publish this list now? At the end of the year, "tastemakers" such as The New York Times and National Public Radio (NPR) publish their "best of" lists. Inevitably, their selections feature few, if any Hispanic authors. The L4LL Remarkable Latino Children's Literature of 2014 selections spotlight this glaring absence, rooted not in Hispanic authors' lack of talent. Rather, their exclusion reflects the tastemakers' significant professional blind spots and institutional flaws."

You can go to their site and download the list.

 

¡Ask a Mexican! Happy Birthday: Thoughts on 10 Years of Raising DESMADRE

History will decide the Chicano authors and their literature that should be called classic. But I don't know how history could omit Gustavo Arellano and his works. In the guise of humor and satire, el hombre has produced some of the tightest, most precise, chignón funny writing of our generation. Here's a message from him:

"This week marks the 10-year anniversary of this infernal columna—10 pinche years already! The Mexican is not much for retrospectives—that's a gabacho thing—but I do want to take a moment to offer thanks to a couple of cabrones: former OC Weekly editor Will Swaim for giving me the idea for the column; VICE Media chingón Daniel Hernández for writing the Los Angeles Times profile that changed my life; Scribner for printing ¡Ask a Mexican! in best-selling book form; mi chula esposa for all her support and pickling my peppers (and that is not a metaphor); Tom Leykis for hosting a call-in-version of ¡Ask a Mexican! all these years (subscribe to his podcast at www.blowmeuptom.com); all the haters, whose vile words remind me why I started writing this in the primera place; my friends and familia for the obvious reasons; the Albuquerque Alibi for being the first newspaper besides my home periódico to have the huevos to run the column; and, lastly but not leastly, ustedes gentle readers, whose eternal curiosity about Mexicans makes this weekly rant an eternally rollicking bit of DESMADRE. To the next decade or 50!"

If you'd like to send him best wishes, or another windmill for him to use his lance on and dissect, do so.

Should Latino/a authors do YA lit with la política?

If you're a Latino/a writer who thinks the political has no place in Latino kid's lit, that it can't be engaging to young people, that it won't earn good reviews, that such novels won't be successful, here's a Sunday NYTimes book review of Paolo Bacigalupi's new YA, The Doubt Factory. He's no Chicano, but he's got otras sangres that spice up his prose. Here's a snapshot of what he did:

"Paolo Bacigalupi [and Alaya Dawn Johnson] are attempting a path in their latest books, thrillers that don’t just marry the personal to the political, but exploit the fantastical conventions of genre to make a head-on critique of the contemporary political landscape.

"To be a teenager is to be acutely aware of power, in all its forms — by virtue of having so frustratingly little of it. Which means adolescent protagonists impose a limiting factor on political fiction. They turn to science fiction and fantasy and play politics to their heart’s content: There’s no believability ceiling to how teenagers in futuristic societies can change their worlds. Following up award-winning Y.A. dystopian novel, Bacigalupi’s Ship Breaker, an impassioned astonishment of linguistic ingenuity and innovative world-building, but also an attack on the politics of poverty and oppression.

"Now, Bacigalupi uses conventions of genre to attack a thoroughly unconventional brand of evil: the public relations experts and scientists-for-sale who conspire to replace certainty with manufactured doubt, nicknamed The Doubt Factory: “The place where big companies go when they need the truth confused. . . . The place companies go when they need science to say what’s profitable, instead of what’s true.” Tobacco industry lobbying, pharmaceutical companies’ manipulation of the F.D.A. — Bacigalupi doesn’t shy from indicting real-world doubt merchants by name and deed.

"In our proudly post-postmodern world of antiheroes and shades of gray, the value of nuance, in fiction and beyond, is almost axiomatic. To see the world in black and white is to see it through a child’s eyes. Bacigalupi is challenging this conflation of simplicity with naïveté, which makes for a somewhat flat narrative, but a stirring cri de coeur. Compromise, complication, doubt: These are his enemies. Maybe there’s nothing childish about moral clarity; maybe to understand that some stories have only one defensible side is what it means to grow up.

a VERY Chicano-political fantasy novel

"In the end, this is the message for young readers: Wake up. Ask questions. Challenge authority. Form your own opinions. Fight injustice, no matter the cost. These days, suggesting that a book has an overt message is almost an insult, as if purpose is incommensurable with art. Maybe so: these are not perfect novels. But they’re bold and ambitious, unafraid to charge into territory too often avoided, their authors keenly aware: Some messages are too important not to deliver."

You can read the entire article and then decide whether you'd like your next kid's book to get a review like this. I wish it so.

Es todo, hoy,

RudyG, a.k.a. Chicano spec author Rudy Ch. Garcia, who might go to Sasquan if there's a good reason.

Sasquan, and Milán with the accent

As a Chicano writer of fantasy and science fiction, in 2013 I was invited to participate on eight panels of the World Science Fiction Convention, also known as WorldCon, the biggest annual gathering for sci-fi/fantasy, including the prestigious Hugo Awards for best fantasy and sci-fi of the past year. I felt more overwhelmed by the number of panels than I felt honored, so I trimmed it down to five. You can read about my Con experience in the series Strange Chicano in a Stranger Con.

My panels were part of Lone Star Con's "Spanish Strand," the organizers' effort to diversify a normally very white-attended event. Honored to be involved in that, at the conference I turned out to be one of just a handful of Latino spec fans or writers. For WorldCon to improve Latinos', and other's, participation, I made a few recommendations in my report. Apparently, I should have made more, like, including some as special guests.        

The 2015 WorldCon, Sasquan, will be held in Spokane. According to their latest (Aug.) progress report, the line-up of guests of honor looks much like 2014 LondonCon and 2013 LoneStarCon, as well--a bunch of white people. You need to go back to 2011 for the last time a non-European, non-white person received such an invitation, Peruvian-born Boris Vallejo.

Vallejo invited because?

It's funny to see a Sasquan graphic of brown, green and purple aliens, wondering if that indicates a growing awareness of the need for the American sci-fi/fantasy too-white community to diversify itself more than it did at LoneStarCon. Or perhaps that was meant to be a one-time effort. Especially given that next year's con will be held in the Northwest, in a city named Spokane and for a con named Sasquan.

Spokane was named for a Salishan tribe, the Children of the Sun. Sasquatch, the Big Foot creature that's the take-off for the Con's title--was the original Halkomelem tribe's name for the creature. And here's a map of the tribes who were forcibly removed so that SF/F fans can enjoy next year's event without having to worry about "Indian raids" or paying anything to those tribes.

People like to say that I'm "frustrated" or "bitter" bringing up such history, so to pre-empt that, here's the short version. The city of Spokane's land wasn't settled in the 1800s; it had been lived on, in and with for thousands of years by Salish-speaking tribes, renamed the Flathead tribe. Beginning with the 1855 Hellgate (appropriate?) Treaty, the U.S. gov't, military, and illegal white squatters took over 20,000,000 acres of homelands, built railroads through their villages, forged signatures of their leaders and eventually ratified the "relocation" to the Jocko (Flathead) Reservation. The Salish practiced a belief in nonviolent resistance to meet the threats of bloodshed and starvation they faced if they didn't relocate. To keep tribes from exercising to at least hunt outside of the reservation, in 1908 the Swan Valley Massacre sealed the deal. Included in the desecration of a way of life were American heroes like U.S. Grant, James Garfield, and maybe some ancestors of those who'll attend Sasquan 2015.

Sherman Alexie, SF indio author

So, next year, instead of simply trying to diversify the Con's attendance as WorldCon did in San Antonio, organizers could consider INCLUSION of Native American SF/F authors as invited guests. Maybe Sherman Alexie, author of Flight will be available. If he's not, I don't doubt he could suggest other First Nations authors who've written spec lit. At the least, I could provide some names.

But I'm not done being "frustrated and bitter." Since the Con is on the West Coast, why don't organizers realize what was begun in LoneStarCon with the Spanish Strand should be continued by INCLUSION of Latino SF/F authors? Putting aside my own literary obscurity, there are many who could help increase Latino participation from populous California and the Northwest--for instance, Victor Milán or Junot Díaz (writing a new sci-fi) as Special Guests. Or how about some youth for Toastmaster, for a change, like Matt de la Peña or Amy Tintera? There are many more, but at the moment, none on the Con's agenda who would interest Latinos into attending. Chingau, what if they were interesting to Anglo attendees?

spec author Matt de la Peña

Here's two other points, adjusted, that I suggested to WorldCon organizers:

• If high school and college Latinos (add Native Americans) are desired, more day passes need to be made available to nearby communities. Attendance could turn significant and be a good investment where it is normally not available.

• Con organizers should allow for one very famous gringo author on every panel related to Latinos (add Native Americans) in order to attract sufficient, Anglo attendees. Small audiences for such issues can be interpreted as belittlement.

Amy Tinter SF novel

If you want to contact them, here's the word from Sasquan organizers: "Make Sasquan a truly unique convention. We're always looking for program suggestions. If you have any, drop by our Idea Forum. We'll be sending out invitations to be on programs, between this fall and next spring. Sasquan would like to hear from you if you're interested in being considered as a Program Panelist and/or Events Performer. Fill out our Panelist/Performer Volunteer form."

By the way, I hope Sasquan doesn't fall into minority-bloc mentality and use an Asian SF/F writer to fulfill a "quota." In 21st Century U.S., Asians are definitely in and easy, all over the screen and on the tube whenever the historically under-represented Others need to be assuaged. An Asian SF/F writer would be good diversity for WorldCon. What I've been talking about is INCLUSION of Latinos and Native Americans. They are different, even if not as accepted and respected.

To pre-empt another point, someone might suggest I volunteer to help diversify WorldCon's exclusion of us and the indios. Bastions of white privilege should fix themselves, not expect our free time and labor to divest themselves of what we point out to be exclusion-problems of their own making. I would help. As soon as WE saw more reasons for doing so. Like I did at LoneStarCon. And, if I have a new book coming out, as a Chicano spec writer I hope to attend Sasquan. I hope its program and speakers list gives me and others more reason than that for doing so.

The accent in Milán

I recently had an exchange with SF author Victor Milán where I pointed out that the accent in his last name didn't appear on the cover of his latest book, Dinosaur Lords. In La Bloga's Latino Spec Lit Directory, we hadn't established what he considered himself, but now that's settled. Here's how it went:

1st response: "Thanks, Rudy. Also thanks for including me in the Latino Spec Lit Directory. My father was puertorriqueño; I have considered (and characterized) myself as a Latino writer pretty much throughout my career. Also, thanks for reminding me about that accent mark...."

2nd response: "All done. Wrote to Editor Claire asking for the change. For them as don't know: that's not an affectation. Milán is my family name. It's not on my birth certificate, but they didn't do none o' that there furrin stuff in Tulsa, Oklahoma in the mid-1950s. But I've used it as my name pretty much everywhere the "ick" (as a long-ago lady friend amusingly termed it) was an option. Also, those who have followed my work know that Victor Milán is my professional name as well as my actual surname. And so appears on much if not most of my published writing.
"It shouldn't be hard to change. It's not as if it's incorporated into the swell painting or anything. And when the becomes a Bigassasaurus of a blockbuster movie, the accent's gonna be on my name in the credits, too. So there." - Victor Milán

Es todo, hasta Sasquan(?),

RudyG, aka mestizo (part Latino, part-Native American) spec lit author Rudy Ch. Garcia

People of color moving white, spec-lit world. Writing opp

My post last week about Project Hieroglyph and People of Color (PoC) is one more nail in the coffin (okay, maybe just a tiny tack) of privileged publishing of speculative lit exclusion of U..S. minorities. [Spec = sci-fi, fantasy, magical realism, horror, fables]. Members of Hieroglyph decided to answer in detail the questions I posed. I did mean to stir the waters, but not for my individual benefit. For the purpose of helping break down the cement ceilings in U.S. publishing, cracking under their own exclusivity. I'll post their response when it comes in. Or join Hieroglyph and add to their discussion.

PoC seem to be a hot topic, especially in spec lit. Rumors circulate about an East Coast anthology written by diverse authors. Also, the 2015 Spokan, Washington, WorldCon is named Sasquan, which should open up possibilities to Native American writers. Since the 2013 WorldCon in San Antonio included a dozen "Spanish" workshops, Sasquan would do well to build on its progressive moves to attract a more diversified attendance, especially from the black and latino writers concentrated in Calif.

However, it's not simply that dark people are trendy. Opening the U.S. publishing doors to PoC would definitely inject perspectives and worldviews into genres that some, like Hieroglyph, believe have become overly pessimistic, gloom-and-doom, robbing spec lit of vitality, instead of portraying futures of many possibilities, and Hope. YA lit is not the only genre thirsting for that.

As a former student and instructor of Clarion West describes it: "I am all for utopian visions of the future. We ARE the future. As children and grandchildren of immigrants and those who have worked the land, survived great hardships, and learned not to rely on the dominant society, Latinos are ideally positioned to inherit the earth, deal with cultures that differ greatly from our own, and take innovative approaches to high tech, low tech, and all the little techs in between. - Kathleen Alcalá

What she expressed about Latinos, applies as well to other PoC. We should not just see what develops. We should move to develop it. Join in where and as you can and bring along your bro's or amigos, including the progressive white ones.

-->

Here's Ernesto Hogan's take: "This all keeps giving me flashbacks to the beginning of my career thirty years ago. You should let Hieroglyph know there are a number of diversity-oriented movements (postcolonialism, Afrofuturism, Latinonautica . . .) going on right now, in fact it seems to be the coming thing. The new generation, no matter of what ethnic group or where they live, sees technology as part of their natural environment, rather than a tool the oppressors are using to keep them down. And our Cultura tends to be anti-dystopian, pleasure-generating--we've won themover with our music, food and art in the past and present; this will continue. Maybe we can not only save science fiction from it's own stereotypes, but literature from being a means of expressing clinical depression. I better stop before I this becomes a silly manifesto."

I didn't think any of this was "silly."

Diverse stories wanted for Weird Western Antho

Another example of PoC-generated activity in the spec lit world came from a lively Facebook discussion this week. Cynthia Ward began with, "I would be curious to see a Weird Western anthology that didn't feature mostly white male writers." Over 130 posts later, she initiated a possibly breakthrough anthology. So, if you're not in it for the money, consider sending, or writing, your Weird Western short story, soon.

Yeah, Cynthia's white, but knows it. That won't satisfy Sherman Alexie, but she has at least one story in Indian SF.

What's Weird Western? - A literary sub-genre that combines elements of the Western with another literary genre, usually horror, occult, or fantasy. Steampunk has been added, SF could maybe get in.

Cynthia explains, "I want to put out this anthology with Native American contributors. Mexican, Chicano, Nuevo Mexicano, Californio, and other Latino/Latina/Hispanic perspectives are not only wanted, but necessary. I'm defining multi-cultural inclusively, not that a story featuring nothing but straight white cis-gender men is going to get in. I hope the anthology will prove worthy of the interest it has generated and hope it proves worthy of interest, attention, and excitement."

Initial guidelines: diverse authors/characters/viewpoints/perspectives [not the usual straight, white, able-bodied cis cowboys/ranchers/pioneers/etc]; approx 1k - 10k words; reprints preferred; pays $5/story + royalties; published by WolfSinger Publications. One story submission at a time, in DOC or RTF; time period(s) should be 1600s CE-1910s CE, although earlier time periods will be considered.

Setting(s) should be primarily in the US/Territories west of the Mississippi, northern Mexico, and/or in western Canada). E-mail for questions and submissions.

Cynthia Ward on her credentials for editing a multi-ethnic antho: "I'm a straight white/Anglo cis woman, which may be an element some writers will weigh when considering whether to submit a story. Also, I'm OK with people sharing considerations I should bear in mind as editor, given my various privileged statuses and the fact that, although I was born in Oklahoma and lived in the West for nearly all my adult life (since 1983), I'm not a life-long resident."

As author of this post, I'll say that until we have many PoC editors with the publishing resources and connections, Anglo editors progressive enough to publish us will be an avenue we might want to take advantage of. I'm going to attempt that.

If you have questions, you can contact Cynthia at marketDoTmavenDoTsubscriptionsATgmail.com or check her lit credentials.

          

Rushdie on Márquez

Speaking of PoC having unique perspectives, you'll probably enjoy Salman Rushdie's piece on Gabriel García Márquez, Magic in Service of Truth, where he re-examines magical realism. Two excerpts, but the entire piece is enlightening.

"In the Macondo of Gabriel García Márquez, imagination is used to enrich reality, not to escape from it."

"No writer in the world has had a comparable impact in the last half-century. [Márquez] was the greatest of us all."

Naia - one scientist discovers her male whiteness

BUT, white-male-dominated perspectives continue, with one scientist

A 12,000-year-old female skeleton found in Yucatan (that's in dark-peopled Mexico, scientists) was named Naia, but in describing HER, one scientist said SHE, a Native American, resembled the actor Patrick Stewart, a white male, who's not even indio or mexicano. Really?

Es todo, hoy,

RudyG, aka Rudy Ch. Garcia, author of the Chicano, alternate-world fantasy, The Closet of Discarded Dreams

EXTRA! - Hieroglyph posted responses to last week's questions.