Fighting the Norm #NotMyAriel

Here is one of the many dangers of having an ethnocentric curriculum.

If we live in a world which constantly assures you that you are the norm. I have asked educators to complete a similar this task previously.

Think about the last 5 people you mentioned in the stories in your lessons, people you credited, people who wrote the books you are reading,

Now remove all the people that are men, then all who are white, heterosexual, middle class, able-bodied, etc. Who are you left with? I will not accept that less than 20% of the world population (white) have contributed so largely to the sum of all human knowledge that this would warrant these proportion of our curriculum and wider society.

With the wider media also being whitewashed, through poor representation and the white saviour and magical negro tropes. All of these factors lead to those racialised as white expecting they are the norm.

This was called out by Star Wars actor John Boyega,

“There are no black people on Game of Thrones,”

“You don’t see one black person in Lord of the Rings.”

With the same argument with a fan, George RR Martin responded with.

This is fiction, if you can write about ice zombies, resurrections and red witches. I’m sure you can write about people of colour. Unless you’re saying that in your made-up world with your made-up population you’ve chosen to make it wildly white supremacist. It also begs the question of the inclusion of people of colour at all, who are, as usual, depicted as rape loving savages. The Dothraki are portrayed as a savage uncivilised horde who need to rescued and civilised by a saviour.

So, the #NotMyAriel hashtag trended, with the most ridiculous arguments around melanin and exposure to sunlight, etc. This is the problem, if you see your face in everything, you will ‘other’ everybody else and when presented with alternatives to your truth and the knowledge you are taught. People may reject them as out of hand because of course, they’re superior in their knowledge and truth. Superior.

if you see your face in everything, you will 'other' everybody else and when presented with alternatives to your truth and the knowledge you are taught. People may reject them as out of hand because of course, they're superior in their… Click To Tweet

I’m going to leave you with a little bit about mermaids (and their like). This is a picture of the Matsya Bhagwaan the first avatar of Vishnu. Who appears in the Matsya Purana (as well as various other text) which was written around 2000 years ago.