[IBARW] Miscellany
Aug. 5th, 2008 08:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mirrorshardIt's International Blog Against Racism Week, so here's a brain dump for you.
First - I posted about this on Eithin the other day, but it's worth mentioning here - the blog Skin Coloured is "intended to be a collaborative, visual exploration of what it is to be non-white in a white culture." I'm white myself (dark skinned, but unmistakably white), but this issue fascinates me. Racism, art & design, and usability issues all rolled into one.
They're looking for more pictures with examples, so please do drop them a line if you have any.
Second - London is plastered with advertisements for Spamalot, the Monty Python musical, and this particular crop proclaim that Sanjeev Bhaskar is Arthur, King of the Britons. Apart from a Kitchener reference in the design, the advertisements make no mention at all of the fact that this nigh-stereotypical Englishman (technically he was Welsh, but try telling that to the English who idolize him) is being portrayed by an unmistakably subcontinental actor. It's rather nice to see, and what's even nicer is that (as far as my Google-fu can tell) nobody is complaining about it.
Third - I've posted before about doing body art, but something I've never mentioned in the past is that all the models I've used for this have been white. It's always annoyed me, but it's hard to talk about most of the time because you end up coming off like the creepy guy who's desperate for a Hot Asian Girlfriend. I know why they're all white, of course - it's because they were all friends, and most of my social life is via geek-dom. And geek-dom isn't just whitebread, it's practically Tesco Value white bread. The bi and poly social groups are better, but not much better.
First - I posted about this on Eithin the other day, but it's worth mentioning here - the blog Skin Coloured is "intended to be a collaborative, visual exploration of what it is to be non-white in a white culture." I'm white myself (dark skinned, but unmistakably white), but this issue fascinates me. Racism, art & design, and usability issues all rolled into one.
They're looking for more pictures with examples, so please do drop them a line if you have any.
Second - London is plastered with advertisements for Spamalot, the Monty Python musical, and this particular crop proclaim that Sanjeev Bhaskar is Arthur, King of the Britons. Apart from a Kitchener reference in the design, the advertisements make no mention at all of the fact that this nigh-stereotypical Englishman (technically he was Welsh, but try telling that to the English who idolize him) is being portrayed by an unmistakably subcontinental actor. It's rather nice to see, and what's even nicer is that (as far as my Google-fu can tell) nobody is complaining about it.
Third - I've posted before about doing body art, but something I've never mentioned in the past is that all the models I've used for this have been white. It's always annoyed me, but it's hard to talk about most of the time because you end up coming off like the creepy guy who's desperate for a Hot Asian Girlfriend. I know why they're all white, of course - it's because they were all friends, and most of my social life is via geek-dom. And geek-dom isn't just whitebread, it's practically Tesco Value white bread. The bi and poly social groups are better, but not much better.
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Date: 2008-08-06 12:39 pm (UTC)