Wednesday, February 26, 2020
Roundtable: Yolanda Bonnell requested that only people of colour review her work. Why the outcry?
Exeunt Magazine: On Friday 21st February, The Guardian published an article which asked three of their critics (Lanre Bakare, Catherine Shoard and Arifa Akbar) to respond to the fact that a theatremaker in Toronto, who is Ojibwe and South Asian, had asked that her show bug, about “women of an Indigenous family navigating addiction and inter-generational trauma”, be only reviewed by people of colour. The article was pretty baffling to a lot of us.
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2 comments:
I think it is totally understable and respectable that this playwright would ask the reviews to come from people of color. I read the guardian article, and it is so frustrating and disgusting some of the incredibly racist and kind of scary responses she has received from her work. This is exactly why she didn't want white people to initially respond to her work because they say things like that! Especially when the topic at hand is that of indigenous culture. I think it is important that minorities have opportunities to be in solidarity with one another and not have to worry about what the white people think? Because although everybody’s opinion is valid, to be real, sometimes we just don't need white people’s opinion on topics regarding experiences of POC. And in the end, it is her decision because it is her play and her stories. Publishing a play regarding such personal topics is hard enough, in my opinion.
I believe that Yolanda Bonnell's request for her play about women of an Indigenous family navigating addiction and inter-generational trauma written for women of an Indigenous family navigating addiction and inter-generational trauma to not be critiqued by white critics is perfectly valid and respectable. I feel like it's fairly reasonable for productions written by, about, and for people of color to be critiqued only by people of color. I think that writing a play about your culture and about your own personal experiences is brave to begin with. I feel as though it's a way to be able to connect with an audience that shares the same culture as you, and for a white person to critique it without properly being able to connect with the story can be demeaning on many levels. Bonnell did not write Bug for a white audience. She never said white people cannot see the play, but it was not written for a white audience. Therefore, a white person should now be critiquing a play that is not for them. I just don't think they would be able to connect with the story enough to write a fair critique of what is being presented.
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