Cultural appropriation

[Stumpy Pepys]

Can someone explain why this is a bad thing? Or where the line should be drawn.

I'm certainly guilty of it.

[delicatemoth]

Here you go.

[Stumpy Pepys]

Here you go.

Cultural Appropriation: The Fashionable Face of Racism

Doesn't sound like the author's exploring the subtleties and nuances of this topic.

[ad hoc]

Headlines rarely explore nuance. I think it was a good article, and does raise questions and make room for nuance. Like you i am unsure of where the line is, and this is worth exploring, but I think the article that DM posted does a good job of explaining why it is something we should think about.

[WOM]

Can someone explain why this is a bad thing? Or where the line should be drawn.

I'm certainly guilty of it.

It's a great deal of bunk.

i.e....If you go out for a curry, you're respecting a tradition. If you cook a curry, you're culturally appropriating someone else's identity.

i.e....If you go to a first-nations drumming circle; good. If you're a drunk teenage girl at a rave and wear a Made In China head-dress; bad.

i.e....If you're a white woman wearing a sari; bad. If you're an Indian man wearing a three-piece suit; good.

It makes no sense. None. And I live with a woman who is very, very strongly on the opposite end of the opinion spectrum from me.

But then I'm a white man, so what do I etc etc etc....

[Jah Womble]

What people choose to do in their own time is fine - I think that 'cultural appropriation' becomes problematic when somebody is trying to trade off it.

Jamie Oliver, anyone?

[Satchmo Distel]

If you take credit for it or make money from it that could have gone to the originators. Cultural plagiarism.

[steveeeeeeeee]

Depending on my mood, when a year 8 or 9 kid strolls into my class and si stupid enough to say, "wagwan sir!", I'll record it as a racist incident and set a 15 minute detention, but I'm largely doing it because I don't like the cheek of the child, rather than I actually find it cultural appropriation.

I'd argue UK cities thrive on cultural appropriation; Bristol, London, Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham. Their greatest musical accomplishments depend on white kids pretending they're Mississippi blues men, Jamaican Rastas, or Harlem B-Boys. But, Derrick May wouldn't agree:

Derrick May has had enough: 'Ma-a-a-n,' he says, 'let me tell ya something. Dance music has been fucked up. You've got all these motherfuckers who don't know shit about where the shit comes from, they don't have no fucking idea what the fuck is happening and they're making money and they're fucking up the scene. Dance music is dead. I hate to say it. I do it for a living. I love it. I do it as an art, okay: But I know that when I have to sit back and see some bullshit Adamski shit... that's bullshit. On the charts! Number F-ing One! Okay?'

Tony Wilson rises to the challenge: 'I'm sure The Rolling Stones and The Beatles sounded pretty shitty to the real R&B people but without The Rolling Stones and The Beatles, you'd never have even known you had R&B in America.'

'Well I don't know about that,' says Derrick. 'It took some particular bureaucrat to give a nigger a chance. That's the bottom line to that, okay? They say it's not a dictatorship, but it is. We can't do anything unless you tell us to as much as we try. We can kick you in the ass, but guess what? You gonna stab us in the fuckin' back! All right? So don't tell me.

'We - and when I say we, I mean blacks - we all do something and you'll come behind us and turn it around and add somebody singing to it or some sort of little funky-ass or weak-ass chord line or whatever and get some stupid record company that doesn't know jack shit about shit to put £50,000 behind it and you got a fucking hit because you stuffed it down motherfuckers throats. So, this group, y'know, has tremendous success and I don't know what to say, man. I've just been busting my ass, it comes from the heart y'know. They do it and they just take drugs!

'Obviously dance music has to progress in one form or another and there was always some sort of relationship between pop music and dance music. But, we as black people have always had to deal with the fact that we've had to be better because, since the beginning of time, we've had to walk into a white person's house and clean a white motherfucker's ass, okay? So don't tell me.'

[WOM]

If you take credit for it or make money from it that could have gone to the originators. Cultural plagiarism.

One of Mrs WOM's better examples (which I agree with) is whities doing native painting knockoffs in the Norval Morrisseau style. It's not a style that's necessarily unique to Norval, but it is clearly unique to first-nations people...so you know....don't do it.

[ad hoc]

My students in Jenin gave me an Arafat style kaffiyeh. I've never worn it because in part I don't feel I've earned the right. I'm not a freedom fighter.

I will, however, happily make falafel.

I don't really know where my line is but I obviously have one

[WOM]

What people choose to do in their own time is fine - I think that 'cultural appropriation' becomes problematic when somebody is trying to trade off it.

Jamie Oliver, anyone?

Come now. A cook shouldn't trade in 'cultural' flavours or food styles?

[Sits]

What people choose to do in their own time is fine - I think that 'cultural appropriation' becomes problematic when somebody is trying to trade off it.

Jamie Oliver, anyone?

Is this because he's released a "Jerk Rice"?

[Duncan Gardner]

I received a kefiyah as a child (as a gift from our Palestinian neighbors).

We never ate falafel or couscous over there as my Ma didn't fancy them.

As Fat Reg almost sang: Jamie- Jerk off

[WOM]

Wearing another tribe's religious symbols is probably somewhere over the line. I mean, not that it should be illegal to wear a yarmulke if you want to...but you're probably looking for trouble.

[ursus arctos]

Do you mean outside of shul?

It's a weird example to pick, given that all men are expected to wear them in shul (and at funerals) and baskets of them are kept to provide cover for non-believers and the forgetful.

[Stumpy Pepys]

I saw the issue of Jamie Oliver's Jerk Rice as one of inauthenticity, in that he used the wrong ingredients, rather than one of cultural appropriation.

Are we saying someone in Jamaica should be hauled over the coals for making brown sauce?

[WOM]

Do you mean outside of shul?

It's a weird example to pick, given that all men are expected to wear them in shul (and at funerals) and baskets of them are kept to provide cover for non-believers and the forgetful.

No, I mean non-Jews wearing them as a cultural affectation 'on the street'. Like a crucifix or Star of David as an ornament or trinket.

[ursus arctos]

Have you ever known anyone to do that?

[ad hoc]

I think it was more than the wrong ingredients - doesn't jerk effectively mean barbecued (with certain spices) and since rice is not barbecued it simply didn't make sense

[Stumpy Pepys]

Have you ever known anyone to do that?

Not a bad way to cover a bald patch.

[ursus arctos]

Maybe it's New York, but people here would question your sanity if you did that as a goy.

[WOM]

Have you ever known anyone to do that?

No. It was an example of how wearing one group's religious or pseudo-religious symbols could cause upset beyond, say, wearing a dollar-store Indian head-dress to a rave.

[treibeis]

Can someone explain why this is a bad thing? Or where the line should be drawn.

I'm certainly guilty of it.

Yes, but you're allowed to wear a Lederhose and a tablecloth shirt, now that you're German and that.

Or haven't you fully defected yet?

[ursus arctos]

He hasn't signed for Bayern, has he?

[ad hoc]

WOM your examples are pretty clear no?

It's a great deal of bunk.

i.e....If you go to a first-nations drumming circle; good. If you're a drunk teenage girl at a rave and wear a Made In China head-dress; bad.

Celebrating and experiencing someone else's culture is clearly fine (and indeed desirable). Attending a performance, having someone explain it, learning and immersing. Good. Using cultural artifacts without thought (especially with the historical context and power dynamic.) Bad

Doesn't feel like rocket science