Do you hate nuance? Does it take up too much space, eat up the inches? Do you rely on tension, conflict and clear distinctions instead? Now that the presidential campaign has made race a news story again, it's time to pull out more delicate tools for writing. Our usual sledgehammer approach won't do.
Let's start with the definitions. When you question whether Hispanic or Latino voters will elect a black candidate, do you find out how many identify themselves as black? When you write about the health status of Asian Americans, are you including Hmong immigrants or third-generation Japanese citizens? Both? Do you mean people from Vietnam or India? The Middle East?
"It's very hard to say who is in this community," said Karen Narasaki, president of the Asian American Justice Center, at Unity recently. "There's debate about where the edges are. What does it mean to be Asian American?" The question is more than philosophical. Stories that wrap all Asian groups together miss the wide range of social and economic access among them. "You totally miss the story," Narasaki said.
Narasaki argued that reporters, like much of America, tend to think of race in a bilateral way. Perhaps we've moved beyond framing everything as "black and white," but we still incline toward lumping groups in opposition and distinction to one another. That's why we so often frame issues as if "whites and Asians" do, think or experience life in one way, while "Latinos and blacks" take a position opposite. "The media needs to be more accurate as we think of the continuum of race," Narasaki urged.
One group almost entirely absent from our portrayals is Latinos who are black. During slavery, 10 times as many African captives were taken to Spanish-speaking countries as to the northern cities, pointed out Lori Robinson, editor and publisher of VidaAfroLatina.com. The so-called "black-brown conflict" relies on the mythical concept of Latinos as a homogenous group, she said, "as if none of us were both."
It's our job to point out the privileges conferred by skin color and the inequities that our racial system often upholds. When we portray contrast, distinction and conflict, we know we can grab attention and hang on to it. But we also can prop up a way of thinking that doesn't reflect lived reality. Worse yet, our imaginary boundaries cloud the debate over racial equity. Instead of shining light on injustice in society, we limit our ability to see one another in full.
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