I have to admit that when Samual Deason and Rhea Kim came into my office to discuss their Cultural Appropriation concert that took place in Marysburg on July 25, I was skeptical about the reason they wanted to have this concert.
However, I did go, I did enjoy the music; Debussy and Tchaikovsky, how could I not, and I did see the message they were trying to get across with the concert itself.
Deason, who is a talented piano player and only featured pieces that did take from other cultures, says that if cultural appropriation laws did come into affect, pieces like Tchaikovsky’s Arabian Dance and Chinese Dance from the Nutcracker and Liszt’s Rhapsodie Espagnole would be on the censorship block.
He wanted to start the conversation. He wanted to discuss the issue.
However, these are not the pieces of art that we should be worried about.
Companies are making money off the parts of culture, aboriginal especially, that are sacred; headdresses on the Paris runway is one example, and that is the biggest part of cultural misappropriation. Those involved are making money off misrepresenting other cultures.
Stores that market to teens and 20-somethings are capitalizing on indigenous trends by creating their own fashion items.
In current talks with the United Nations and indigenous advocates, Urban Outfitters’ “Navajo hipster panties”, “Navajo print flask” and “peace treaty feather necklaces” is sited as one of many examples of cultural misappropriation.
This current call to action has stemmed quite a debate. Writers’ Union of Canada, Hal Niedzviecki, penned an editorial called “Winning the Appropriation Prize,” and supported the notion that writers should be able to write what they do not know.
The editorial can no longer be found online, including on the Writers’ Union of Canada website and it has made Niedzviecki resign his position. Ergo I am hearing secondhand what was actually said in the editorial. (Update Aug. 9: I have been informed a photo of the editorial is available online, so I am incorrect in saying it is not available. What I was looking for was a digital copy of the article which was taken down from the Writers' Union of Canada website. My apologies for misstating the availability of the editorial in question.)
While the author was not wrong in a sense that writers should not be afraid to explore other cultures, I do not know where he stood on the role of research to writers. We research our subject until it is no longer something we do not know.
We get feedback to ensure we are not misrepresenting the culture we are trying to explore and celebrate with our writing; see Joesph Boyden and the work that goes into his writing.
When Dancing Sky Theatre in Meacham performed Popcorn Elder, they took great care in properly portraying and using aboriginal stories and culture. They consulted with elders about how to properly create props and how to care and dispose of them.
Boiling down cultural misappropriation, the question becomes are we offering this culture the respect that it deserves?
This cultural respect is not impossible and Deason admits that misappropriation does happen.
This is what cultures, aboriginal especially, are trying to get across. They just want to be respected.
