Readers need diversity in their regular literary diets

I don’t usually go in for chain Facebook notes, but when I was tagged in one asking me to list… I don’t usually go in for chain Facebook notes, but when I was tagged in one asking me to list 15 fictional characters that would stick with me forever, I couldn’t resist.

At first glance, my list of characters — from Hermione Granger to the joyfully eccentric 80-year-old Maude from “Harold and Maude” — was pretty diverse. But upon statistical analysis, a few similarities stuck out at me.

Ten of my 15 fictional characters were white women. More broadly, 11 of the 15 were women, and 13 of the 15 were white. Three were British and the rest were American. All were heterosexual.

I had found my New Year’s resolution.

I am not demonizing the natural tendency of human beings to relate to, identify with and seek out representations of people who are like them. But I don’t think the lack of diversity in what I read is that simple. I had four male characters on my list, but of all the men I know who compiled their own lists, none cited more than one woman as a major life influence, and most didn’t cite any.

These guys are not chauvinists. Overall, they are men who I believe respect and value women. I would even consider some of them feminists — and as a women’s studies student, my standards are high. So what’s going on?

My theory is that because the Western literary establishment promotes and values the work of white, Western men above all others, the closer you are to being a white, Western man, the more exclusively you will consume literature by and about people like you, unless you actively seek out alternatives.

On the flip side, if you are a minority or a woman, you might seek out literature about people like you, but it’s likely that white male writers will remain a staple of your literary diet. Furthermore, this is normalized. My all-heterosexual list of influential characters passed without comment, but if a gay reader compiled such a list and didn’t include a single straight character, he would probably encounter at least some teasing — that is, if anyone had ever heard of the characters he listed.

In her essay, “White Privilege: Unpacking The Invisible Knapsack,” Peggy McIntosh lists 50 examples from her life of ways in which she benefits from white privilege. Point 31 reads: “I can choose to ignore developments in minority writing … or disparage them, or learn from them, but in any case, I can find ways to be more or less protected from negative consequences of any of these choices.”

This summarizes neatly the double standard that I feel is at play when people of different social identities shop their local libraries. Although I would be the first to argue that a truly well-read person ought to have some diversity in his or her reading list, I have not walked the walk. I have only read for pleasure one book by a nonwhite author (Junot Díaz) — “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” —  in the past year. I have not taken the time to read even that black literature which is well-known and praised by mainstream literary critics. I have not read Toni Morrison’s “Song of Solomon” or any of the works of Maya Angelou or Langston Hughes, and I only read “Their Eyes Were Watching God” when it was assigned. As McIntosh predicts, I have been more or less — in fact, I would say totally — insulated from the negative consequences of my ignorance.

Think about it this way. If I were an Asian woman who read virtually nothing but literature by and pertaining to Asian people, if I had only read three books by non-Asian authors in the past year, if I had never read a word of the canon from Shakespeare to Vonnegut, would I be considered well-read? I highly doubt that no one would take notice of the fact that most of my reading list was comprised of writers of my own race.

So my New Year’s resolution is to begin actively and earnestly seeking to diversify my reading palate. Because although those who are not white, Western men will always be exposed to the work of those who are, people in the majority will remain largely ignorant about the work of minority writers unless they actually seek it out. And I feel I have a responsibility to do exactly that. I would recommend others do the same.