The whole gender-specific pronouns of English really started to bother me once I got used to gender-neutrals in Mandarin, and IIRC, also in Korean and Japanese, too. And several others, I think -- I want to say Thai and Vietnamese, but I could be wrong on those. My point is that once you get away from gender-specific pronouns, it really opens up things, because it introduces an ambiguity. Or just makes you more sensitive to what you're spelling out, without even thinking, that in other languages is left inexplicit until intentionally spelled out. And it's not that hard to avoid the conflict between the two ways of seeing pronouns. Over the past few stories I've written, I've found it informing my own stories even when the characters are from a culture with gender-specific pronouns. Like saying "the boy" instead of "he", or calling someone by a gender-specific title (ie "lord" or "mistress" or whatever).
As for exotic... yeah. I think the only time I've seen that done tolerably (even if the word still bugged the hell out of me) was Jeanne Lin's first Tang-dynasty romance. Yes, it drove me bonkers that the hero was a blond-haired European. Something I couldn't quite put my finger on about it, especially since the story was through the (chinese) heroine's eyes. It just felt... odd, although it made sense within context that he'd be incredibly exotic to her. But he'd also be a massive barbarian who didn't bathe regularly and couldn't read and spoke with a lot of grunting. Heh.
Sometimes I get the sense that editors are in there, somewhere, inserting "exotic" because to them, it is, and they think it'll sell more books or something, and it doesn't matter that to the characters, things exotic and unfamiliar -- like fried okra, or tomatoes, or freshwater eels -- are perfectly everyday, nothing to get all het up about, kinds of things. At least, if I blame it on the editors or copy editors, I can give some last smidgen of doubt to the authors. Or else I'd end up even more cynical than I already am... and tripe like this most recent weaboo offering aren't exactly helping me in that attempt. Bleah.
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Date: 13 Sep 2012 09:59 pm (UTC)As for exotic... yeah. I think the only time I've seen that done tolerably (even if the word still bugged the hell out of me) was Jeanne Lin's first Tang-dynasty romance. Yes, it drove me bonkers that the hero was a blond-haired European. Something I couldn't quite put my finger on about it, especially since the story was through the (chinese) heroine's eyes. It just felt... odd, although it made sense within context that he'd be incredibly exotic to her. But he'd also be a massive barbarian who didn't bathe regularly and couldn't read and spoke with a lot of grunting. Heh.
Sometimes I get the sense that editors are in there, somewhere, inserting "exotic" because to them, it is, and they think it'll sell more books or something, and it doesn't matter that to the characters, things exotic and unfamiliar -- like fried okra, or tomatoes, or freshwater eels -- are perfectly everyday, nothing to get all het up about, kinds of things. At least, if I blame it on the editors or copy editors, I can give some last smidgen of doubt to the authors. Or else I'd end up even more cynical than I already am... and tripe like this most recent weaboo offering aren't exactly helping me in that attempt. Bleah.