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Lately, conservative thinkers have been expressing horror and outrage over the notion of “sensitivity readers”—an unfortunate term for people like me who read manuscripts, at an author’s request, to make sure the author hasn’t inadvertently written something ill-informed or wrongheaded. Sensitivity readers (other, better terms include “expert readers” and “authenticity readers”) are representatives of an oft-marginalized group who try to ensure that the portrayal of the group—be it Jews, people of color, LGBTQ people, or people with physical disabilities and mental-health issues—is not dimwitted. Sometimes a sensitivity reader is a friend of the writer’s; sometimes it’s an academic; sometimes it’s a person of a given background who’s paid $250 to $500 to read a manuscript and provide feedback and advice. Authors need not take the advice of their sensitivity readers. No book contract has ever been canceled on the advice of a sensitivity reader. Sensitivity reading is not censorship.
Marjorie Ingall talks about her work as a sensitivity reader, publishing’s current growing pains with being inclusive, and the current battle surrounding it all.
A cursory glance at headlines of contemporary America today could easily draw the conclusion that the rights of immigrant communities and minorities are in reverse. Just take the current administration’s attempts to increase Immigration and Custom Enforcement’s capacity to detain immigrants, or the 2017 Muslim ban, which denied entry to over 150 million people from six Muslim-majority countries.
It’s this increasing hostility that has significantly informed U.S.-based poet and co-creator of the Emmy-nominated web series Brown Girls, Fatimah Asghar’s debut poetry collection, If They Came For Us. Her poems tackle themes as far-ranging as sexuality, belonging, and identity, while also capturing the challenges of being a queer Pakistani Muslim woman in modern America.
May poetry save us all.
The Case of the Estranged Father has been solved at The CW: The network’s Nancy Drew pilot has tapped Freddie Prinze Jr. to play Nancy’s dad, TVLine has learned.
Based on Carolyn Keene’s beloved novels, the potential drama series follows 18-year-old Nancy (newcomer Kennedy McMann) during the summer after her high school graduation. Though Nancy thought she’d be leaving her hometown for college, a family tragedy holds her back another year, and she finds herself embroiled in a ghostly murder investigation that unearths dark secrets.
Well this is just perfect casting.
Source : Confessions Of A Sensitivity Reader: Critical Linking, March 20, 2019
