Cover judgment: Clever or offensive?

When images of the cover of  Monday's issue of the trade magazine Publishers Weekly began circulating around the Internet, Twitter burst into a heated discussion, using the hash tag #afropw.

The magazine -- which posted the cover image, as it does every week, on its own website -- dedicates an issue annually to African American publishing. But something about the picture and the phrasing got on people's nerves. A sample of the complaints:

Baratunde Thurston, a comedian and editor at the Onion, tweeted: "could've been beautiful on mosaicmagazine.org or bibookreview.com but PW lacks community credibility"

The Root, a website focused on black perspectives, tweeted: "Let's be clear: Picture = Pretty Cool. Cover context = Entirely less stupendous." And "Straight up, this could've flown as a GREAT cover. On Ebony. In 1976."

Authors Virginia DeBerry and Donna Grant tweeted: "It's like the NYTimes article last wk about 'Of Color' gifts. Stupid. Like we only want black stuff. No iPods for us!"

Senior editor Calvin Reid, who did not respond to Jacket Copy's request for comment (which, unfortunately, arrived after hours New York time), wrote on Twitter that since the magazine picks recommended books in the issue, going to picks -- as in picks for Afros -- seemed like a funny leap. Publishers Weekly later tweeted, "I admit that I love afro picks! In the 1970s I had many just like them also stuck in my massive afro."

Putting African Americans on covers -- or not -- has been a big issue this fall. In this Sunday's Off the Shelf, Lizzie Skurnick looked at the dust-up over Justine Larbalestier's "Liar." Although it features an African American protagonist, the original cover design featured the face of a Caucasian girl instead, and such whitewashing had antecedents in young adult fiction.

As publishing struggles to reach readers, we aren't sure what to think of this cover. Is it funny and winking? Or does its use of "Afro" with the image of Black Power picks strike the wrong note?

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Image of PW cover via Harper Studio

Comments

[Harrietinthecity]

As art, the photo is provocative. But as the cover for a painful article about how difficult it is for authors of color to make headway in a market filled with gatekeepers who think our books aren't marketable (and often reinforced by small buys on the part of Barnes and Nobles and Borders) the cover becomes highly offensive.

When authors of color write mainstream literary works, we're told by non-AA editors that our voices don't sound authentic. So - apparently - the only "authentic" vision of a contemporary person of color is one mired in stereotypes - hence we get movies such as Precious (abused overweight girl) or Blind Side (homeless, less articulate athlete taken in by rich white family). What we don't get are stories in which race is not a factor in the conflict.

And the world is not better for it when my children go in the work speaking mainstream vernacular and getting ridiculed for not sounding "black enough."

What the article did NOT address is that white authors, such as James Patterson (whose book is listed), can write the Detective Cross series and be considered mainstream. But if an AA author wrote a similar series it would be considered "black interest" and rejected - or worse - acquired and stuck in the AA section of the bookstore where it will get no broad visibility. That is the warning I got from editors and agents off the record when I first started my career more than a decade ago.

Sorry - PW - you just made a bad situation even worse for us.

[AaronG]

Harrietinthecity has just described my life's story to a T. And the sad irony is, a more respectful, less flippant PW cover would not have changed a thing about the institutionalized racism she refers to. Most PW readers could not care less about the magazine's handling of AA subject matter because they view AA readers as an insignificant aside to the book business. "We gave them a section of their own in the stores and stock it with all the vulgar urban teen lit they could ever ask for. What more do they want?"

Pathetic.

[Keryl McCord]

What part of context aren't they getting? The cover as a photo in an exhibit on a gallery wall, great. By itself the photo tells a story; the photo is the subject for our exploration and interpretation. In the context of the magazine, the photo is now no longer subject but rather object. That is the problem we have with it. The original intent of the artist is completely lost, overwhelmed.

Yes it was cute and clever, ha ha. (It didn't make me even smile.) Yes Deborah Willis is a brilliant scholar, writer, but having given permission for its inclusion in the project, doesn't mean that she would or would not have chosen that particular photograph to illustrate the point PW was trying to make.

Is the cover offensive or insensitive? Offensive no, at least not to me. But insensitive, absolutely. PW probably thought they were making a cute and clever artistic statement. Well, okay but they got it wrong. Accept it, learn from it, and don't make the same mistake again.

[Karen]

I understand that African American writers don't want to be pigeoned hole into writing about stereotypical African American experience (precious). I also understand that the image of the afro and afro pick have been used to poke fun of black 'authenticity' by mainstream America. Do some of us believe that in choosing the cover WP is playing a cruel joke on us or putting us/keeping us in our authentic space/category? Are they showing their comfort in addressing African American writers in only there authentic form?

The picture itself is quite beautiful and not offensive. As a poster wrote, once it's placed on a cover of a magazine and represents a story about an African American experience, the picture becomes loaded.

The subject of the African American experience(s) is loaded within itself. There have been so many misrepresentations in the media in society, so many stereotypes and layers of injustice placed upon us. When American institutions, such as WP, decide to tackle the subject they are often placed under a microscope and their intentions are questioned. Rightly so.

The truth is if this picture was featured in the Essence magazine this month, there would be no controversy. We would have understood the editor’s motive in choosing the picture.