I'm not disputing but asking because I'm genuinely curious, but in terms of film/TV representation, I've never seen a need to separate different white nationalities as different ethnicities.*
*Chekhov gets a pass as a Russian during the 60s.
Bryan Fuller: Diversity is key
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*Chekhov gets a pass as a Russian during the 60s.
A need? Maybe not.
But considering the historical treatment the Irish? Italians? Anyone a little bit 'too' non-English European or Jewish?
And with 'Historical treatment' including 'within living memory'?
The lines exist anyway. You don't have to embrace them, but they're still there.
I've never considered it before but you make a valid argument for this. I guess because it's all too common for white actors to play white roles with nationality, and often dodgy accents, interchangeably that I often just lump them in together. It's easier to consider Stewart/Picard as white rather than have to decide on English or French.
Ah. Of course. It's been a busy week. Hay fever to.. doh. .... ...
No worries, I've been caught out like that too. Just figured it would be better to let you guys know and stop any potential follow on that wouldn't be relevant.
Even within 'English European' there's a pecking order for character portrayals. And again for Practically every ethnicity under the sun....largely because high profile media has been America dominated for many years. It's far too simplistic to sit there with a Pantone chart, draw a line somewhere and declare everyone with skin tone (a) white and skin tone (b) minority group. Far too ridiculous to decide that every person of x skin tone is the same. And that's what the right and the left in media criticism has got woefully wrong. (We are only twenty or so years out from the era of 'he must be a villain, he has an English accent' and all non US identities basically being interchangeable. Or the trend for the cockney accent to with give you a cheeky working class chap, or action hero in low budget film, which seems oddly reflective of the representation of African Americans in mainstream films. That's not even touching on the treatment of more obvious ethnic or cultural groups. All those Chinese Tiger Moms, Indians with controlling parents and a naive view of the world as they work so hard at their education...)
It's too easy to make little boxes for people, make the differences invisible, and not in a positive way. I could probably see more that I understood and could relate to in Sisko than I did in Picard...and I am White British.
Anyway...Trek has always been extremely diverse, and people who tend to think it wasn't or slag it off for not being diverse are usually not paying attention and trying to serve their own argument. At least as far as racial/ethnic/cultural diversity. Apart from enterprise. That thing was bizarre.
From my tiny corner, it's actually nice seeing Scottish people on TV as more than just the typical argumentative drunk or not hiding their accents. Most of the time when there's a British character on an American show they all have the same BBC English accent.
For some, having a Northern English, Welsh or Scottish character on a show is yet another white guy. But the rest of us get a little tired of people assuming everyone comes from London and the rest of us are a weird novelty or one note joke.
Thats one of the things I found intriguing about DS9. Out of the human main cast, only two were American (and they were family) and I've always found it peculiar that Starfleet was always very "You're either American, British or maybe Canadian." Where's the Polish, Australians, Germans, Dutch and everyone else? It's almost as baffling as why there's barely been any Pakistani or Indians in the fleet - or why there's less of an ethnic mix within those regions in the 23rd century compared to the mix in the 21st).
I guess it depends which way I looked at it. In terms of "diversity" I (as a White Englishman) do prefer it when series have a wider varirty of nationalities, but I've never thought of Scottish, Welsh, etc in terms of "representation" before.
Always happy to have my mind broadened and see these topics from another point of view though, thanks for your comments.
As a German fan I look at Star Trek as a US American product. So I fully understand that the majority of characters is going to be English-speaking North Americans. The only diversity I'm interested in – and the area in which Star Trek tends to not get it right – is with the representation of minority skin-colors, ethnicities, religions, genders and sexes present in the US.
Those of us in London rarely find a standard issue Londoner in there either xD. So yeah, I know what you mean. It's why I like seeing Choudhury in the books, or the slight amping up of Trois fathers family history.
That's very true, but it's been a bit more....open I guess...ever since they put Picard front and centre in TNG. In the era of bigger international audiences, it becomes more of a thing...in the nineties there were a lot of Euro/Americas co productions, (Highlander, Lexx etc.) so I find a diverse mix of accents more pleasing in shows too. This is something I think Trek in particular can really open out, and it would be such a positive. Trek was always supposed to be 'International' ever since Gene stuck Chekhov on the bridge at least. It's not NCIS after all...besides, almost everyone finds some random accent from somewhere sexy, so it just adds to audience appeal. (I am sure a fair chunk of Bashirs more...interested...fans, went for the accent. Probably the same group who went gaga for Giles over in Buffy. It's difficult to find accents on women in Trek mind you...Deanna did that deaf-actress inspired thing on TNG, which was pretty imaginative when she started...and I quite liked Torres, but am not sure her accent was hugely different.)
There is a few things I have always wondered when it comes to casting and diversity.
What exactly is the percentage of actors when it comes to race and gender? I can only imagine that white actors in the 60's proably were overwelming in the 60's when "TOS" was created. How has the numbers gone up over the years? How are those numbers in Canada were many Amercian shows are filmed and thus they use local Canadian actors or actors over in Britian and Europe? Exactly how many working actors are their in these countries?
If the numbers are low with actors of color then in theory wouldn't this mean that the most talented actors of color are more valuable which means when a show casts they might not be able to afford the actor they want or the actor they want has already gotten a role on another show? How many casting choices are based just on race but these kind of business issues and how many of them are based on racism?
With the money "Discovery" has I would think that being able to hire the best wouldn't be a issue but I wonder how money effects shows that don't have alot of money to spend. Is it even possible to figure out the most talented actors in terms of numbers of how it even outs with race and gender or do we asume that unless your Denzel Washington or a Pacino that everyone is basically the same in terms of talent which means the lack of diversity is even more worst because anyone can do almost any role and that it's okay to make race or gender a reason to hire someone because everything is equal in terms of talent.
Jason
What exactly is the percentage of actors when it comes to race and gender? I can only imagine that white actors in the 60's proably were overwelming in the 60's when "TOS" was created. How has the numbers gone up over the years? How are those numbers in Canada were many Amercian shows are filmed and thus they use local Canadian actors or actors over in Britian and Europe? Exactly how many working actors are their in these countries?
If the numbers are low with actors of color then in theory wouldn't this mean that the most talented actors of color are more valuable which means when a show casts they might not be able to afford the actor they want or the actor they want has already gotten a role on another show? How many casting choices are based just on race but these kind of business issues and how many of them are based on racism?
With the money "Discovery" has I would think that being able to hire the best wouldn't be a issue but I wonder how money effects shows that don't have alot of money to spend. Is it even possible to figure out the most talented actors in terms of numbers of how it even outs with race and gender or do we asume that unless your Denzel Washington or a Pacino that everyone is basically the same in terms of talent which means the lack of diversity is even more worst because anyone can do almost any role and that it's okay to make race or gender a reason to hire someone because everything is equal in terms of talent.
Jason
Don't forget the impact of unions. Can't act without a membership card, and can't get a membership card unless you act....
I've heard that unions in the past could be really racist when it came to allowing people of color to join in but is that more of a working class style of union like at a Factory as oposed to something going on in Hollywood.
Jason
I get where you're coming from, but the point is the whole business is racist; numbers of actors of colour are low becuse they don't get the oppurtunities to make a name for themselves, or even the training to make the most of their talent in the first place.
But don't you think that is evidence of privilege? You are part of a group that never lacks representation.
I consider myself to be generic boring white so I'm not really dying to see myself represented but I do notice that Italians hardly ever get positive representation in American media. In general it's never Italians anyway but Italian-American caricatures (and apparently Italy=Sicily). That you personally don't see a need for non-English white representation means that you haven't noticed the bizarre way Italians are represented in much of American media? What about German representation?
Do you think it's fair to just take all these different cultures and say "they're represented just fine by white Englishmen" while ignoring the many cases of negative representation of said cultures? Can you not see why groups of people that are constantly portrayed as (often negative) caricatures might want some positive representation instead of just being told "Hey, when it's about positive representation, just consider yourself part of the Anglo-Saxon world" which we're not.
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Yes I do.
No, I don't
Even within the diversity of predominantly white nationalities, being English I'm still at the top and so haven't had the experience of being lower down and needing representation. I also live in such a white area that if you see anyone of an Asian ethnicity it's almost certain that they work in a restaurant, so as much as I realise I am privileged, it's discussions like the ones here on TrekBBS which help me realise exactly how privileged, and my initial question and post you quoted are me trying to understand to what extent that privilege has helped shape my distorted view of both diversity and representation
Apologies if my posts didn't properly explain the difference between how I had generally seen things in the past and where I am coming from, compared to now.
It's worse when you're told that you should be happy with the terrible representation that you're currently getting.
Watch Hidden Figures even tho it suffers from White Saviour syndrome.
Its why I prefer the novelverse, (especially Vanguard/Seekers series - an Iranian female captain, Spanish male commodore, English female captain of Indian descent, Japanese captain, Vietnamese male nurse as well as the usual smattering of Caucasian humans) much more diverse, all human nations are represented and a lot of Federation characters who are neither human or humanoid
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