Facebook Twitter Instagram
    Facebook Twitter Instagram Pinterest
    BAUCE
    SUBSCRIBE
    • Hustle

      Financial Influencer Reni The Resource Shares 8 Saving Hacks For Chronic Spenders

      January 27, 2023

      These Are The Best Companies For Black Women To Work And Build Their Career At

      January 23, 2023

      Franchise Expert Kechia Taylor Shares 5 Benefits Of Starting A Franchise Business

      January 25, 2023

      How To Create An Effective Open Enrollment Communications Strategy

      January 18, 2023

      Top 10 Black Life Coaches For Black Women To Work With In 2023

      January 24, 2023
    • Believe

      What It Means to Retire as a Self-Made Woman

      January 11, 2023

      Entering Your 30s And Feeling Less Sure Of Yourself Than Ever? Consider This

      November 9, 2022

      10 Ted Talks To Help Black Women Entrepreneurs Grow Their Businesses

      October 14, 2022

      4 Ways To Set Yourself Up For Success After College

      September 29, 2022

      How To Build Your Confidence in 30 Days

      August 30, 2022
    • Earn

      How to Grow Your Investments at Home

      January 27, 2023

      5 Best Credit Cards For Black Women Entrepreneurs

      January 20, 2023

      Planning For Retirement Early Matters — Here’s Why

      January 27, 2023

      Financial Expert Octavia Conner Shares 5 Ways Women Can Prevent Foreclosures And Repossessions Amid A Recession

      January 18, 2023

      Here’s How Investing In Gold IRA Can Prevent Inflation After Your Retirement

      January 11, 2023
    • Live

      The Difference Between Soft And Full Glam Makeup

      January 27, 2023

      6 Ways To Date While Traveling And Working Abroad

      January 26, 2023

      5 Tips for Increasing the Comfort of Your Home Office

      January 27, 2023

      The First Step: A Traveling Guide For Beginners

      January 23, 2023

      7 Reasons Why Your Period Might Be Late Sometimes

      January 23, 2023
    • Profiles

      How This 28-Year-Old Made $11M From Founding Her Own E-Commerce Academy

      December 23, 2022

      How Aysia Hilliard, Founder of Trapstix, Leveraged TikTok To Accelerate Her Business’ Growth

      November 29, 2022

      Meet Kelley Jamison Who Is Opening The 1st All Black And Woman Owned Adoption Agency

      November 28, 2022

      Here’s How Beth Smith Redesigned Her Life: From Corporate CPA To Top Interior Designer For Home Goods

      November 27, 2022

      TikTok Star And Comedian, Mel Mitchell On The Importance of Seeing Black Girl Joy

      December 18, 2022
    • About
      • Advertise
      • Jobs
      • Contact
    BAUCE
    Live

    Removing Literary Limits in African-American Books

    By KaShawn ArcherJuly 30, 20164 Mins Read
    Share
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Email

    I consider myself an avid reader. You can catch me in the library searching for intriguing novels, turning the pages in everything from classic to contemporary genres, and browsing Books-a-million for the next thought-provoking hardback. Where you are not likely to find me is in the “African-American Books” section. Now before you give me the side-eye, I by no means have a problem with reading books by African-American writers, some of my favorite authors are African Americans (Sharon M. Draper, Zora Neal Hurston) nor do I have some type of self hate issues. I do however have a problem with the limitations black authors and readers seem to be putting on themselves in regards to books.

    Black Girl reading

    When I walk into a store and head for the book section I’m truly disgruntled by the lack of diversity in the division deemed African-American. I’m faced with countless covers of recycled plotlines all telling the story of some pretty female who has had a hard life and is trying to make it out of the hood. She’s faced with back stabbing friends and subjecting men. Her “come up” always involves a music industry tycoon or athlete. We have to do better. The titles even further my distaste with cliché’s like Hood love part 2 or Around the Way Girls. It’s the same redundant storyline over and over, not to mention the cover art of greased up bodies or resemblance of video vixens. Reading is one of the oldest forms of entertainment in the world and is one of the few mediums today where the author’s gender or race hardly contributes to how good a book is.

    I remember when I was younger and like so many others I became engulfed in the Harry Potter series. For a long time I thought J.K. Rowling was an American middle-aged male, neither was the case but that didn’t matter. Once you start reading a novel who wrote the book is neither here nor there its how you connect with the characters and the storyline. So why are so many black authors, particularly African-American women placing these limits on themselves in their writing?

    You don’t have to create a novel about trying to make it out of the hood to deem it black you can just as easily move those characters into spectrums of the Sci-Fi fiction or mystery novels and still have them be about people of color. Through limiting our writing we are essentially indulging in the stereotypes of society that we fight so hard to change daily. Books cross racial boundaries and we are eluding ourselves from the viewership we could be having. It isn’t as if the people writing these novels are not good writers. I admit that I have taken the time to read a few and these are talented individuals.

    What if a black author wrote a story of the similar genre as Harry Potter and it became a phenomenon? Your writing would branch out into film or television providing another medium to showcase the talent blacks and visually bringing your characters to life and in turn broaden mainstream representation of black men and women. Some argue that these types of books are more widely accepted by large publishing companies and we don’t have the same opportunities to expand our storylines in books. If that is true then we can take the same approach many are taking with television, just like we are creating Web Series like Awkward Black Girl. When 27-year-old Amanda Hocking couldn’t get her novels picked up by a publishing company she self published them on e-books and made over 2 million dollars last year. Our African-American authors can adopt similar methods. We don’t limit what we read to one specific type of genre so we shouldn’t limit what we write either. We owe it to ourselves too continue to push the boundaries in all areas of media like we have been doing for so many years and that includes literary media.

    Share. Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Email Reddit WhatsApp
    Previous Article‘Red Tails’ Needs Support from All
    Next Article What We Love: Between Women
    KaShawn Archer

    Related Posts

    7 Reasons Why Your Period Might Be Late Sometimes

    January 23, 2023

    What Are the Requirements for Title Loans in Indiana?

    January 16, 2023

    5 Creative Ways To Style Your Bed For Maximum Relaxation

    January 12, 2023
    View 3 Comments

    3 Comments

    1. anumati on January 24, 2012 6:15 pm

      OMG I can totally relate. As a college student, practically all my readings are for assignments. I rarely ever read fiction books and if I do they are recommended by my professors and are about topics that we’ve covered in class. I don’t know what the AA fiction market looks like, to be honest I never visit that section in the library or bookstore. However, yesterday I went online to renew some books at my library and they had an a section highlighting AA writers. I clicked on the link and was literally disgusted with the picks. All of the were the cliche “Hood Love” type books you mentioned. *sigh* On that note, I went to a book signing last week for Layli Phillips Maparyan’s “The Womanist Idea”. It’s not fiction, It’s an anthology of womanism, but I highlight recommend it.

      Reply
    2. anumati on January 24, 2012 9:21 pm

      OMG I can totally relate. As a college student, practically all my readings are for assignments. I rarely ever read fiction books and if I do they are recommended by my professors and are about topics that we’ve covered in class. I don’t know what the AA fiction market looks like, to be honest I never visit that section in the library or bookstore. However, yesterday I went online to renew some books at my library and they had a section highlighting AA writers. I clicked on the link and was literally disgusted with the picks. All of the were the cliche “Hood Love” type books you mentioned. *sigh* On that note, I went to a book signing last week for Layli Phillips Maparyan’s “The Womanist Idea”. It’s not fiction, It’s an anthology of womanism, but I highlight recommend it.

      Reply
    3. anumati on January 24, 2012 9:22 pm

      OMG I can totally relate. As a college student, practically all my readings are for assignments. I rarely ever read fiction books and if I do they are recommended by my professors and are about topics that we’ve covered in class. I don’t know what the AA fiction market looks like, to be honest I never visit that section in the library or bookstore. However, yesterday I went online to renew some books at my library and they had a section highlighting AA writers. I clicked on the link and was literally disgusted with the picks. All of the were the cliche “Hood Love” type books you mentioned. *sigh* On that note, I went to a book signing last week for Layli Phillips Maparyan’s “The Womanist Idea”. It’s not fiction, It’s an anthology of womanism, but I highly recommend it.

      Reply

    Leave A Reply Cancel Reply

    Facebook Twitter Instagram Pinterest
    • Advertise
    • Privacy Policy
    • Contact
    • Jobs
    © 2023 BAUCE MEDIA LLC

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.