Let's stop reflexively comparing Chinese writers to Chinese writers, Indian writers to Indian writers, black writers to black writers. Let's focus on the writing itself: the characters, the language, the narrative style.
Celeste NgRead
There's this sense that whiteness is the default and does not need to be questioned. That you've got a race if you're black, or any kind of Asian, or any kind of Native American, but that you have no race if you are white.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote highlights the idea that whiteness is often seen as the standard or norm, while other races are explicitly identified.
Celeste Ng's quote addresses the societal perception of race, suggesting that there is a prevailing assumption that being white is the default state of humanity, free from racial categorization. In contrast, individuals of other racial and ethnic backgrounds are constantly reminded of their racial identity, which implies that the dominant culture perceives whiteness as the unmarked or neutral position in discussions about race and identity, leading to an imbalance in how race is understood and represented in society.
Themes
WhitenessRaceIdentitySocietyDefaultPerception
In practice
Example use cases
During a lecture on racial identity, this quote could be used to illustrate how societal norms view race.
More from Celeste Ng
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For me, any story I tackle begins with the human relationships and not the plot.
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It's so easy, as a writer, to get stuck in your own head, to live in the little worlds you create. To forget that there are people out there reading your work, people who may be deeply affected by what you do, that you are writing not just for yourself, but for them.
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What I remember about race relations in the 1990s is that you showed your awareness by saying you didn't see race, that you were colour-blind.
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In fiction you're not often writing about the typical; you are interested in outliers, the points of interest. Part of it comes from feeling I was the only Asian or person of colour... another part comes from my personality: I'm an introvert, and my usual survival mode in a large group is to stand by a wall and watch everybody.
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