dark_administrator: Katara from Avatar: the Last Airbender looking fierce with the text "Racebending Revenge" (racebending revenge)
dark_administrator ([personal profile] dark_administrator) wrote in [community profile] dark_agenda2010-06-04 11:04 pm

Announcement: the Racebending Revenge Ficathon

Four weeks from today, on the 2nd of July, 2010, a live action movie will be opening that replaced the entirely chromatic cast of its animated TV version with all white main leads except for a brown villain. The show is Avatar: the Last Airbender, and [livejournal.com profile] racebending has been a fandom-motivated protest against it that has led to a wider organisation against whitewashing in Western media.

In support of the cause, we would like to announce a challenge ficathon:

Re-write one or more white characters in the fandom(s) of your choice as chromatic/non-white/PoC, in a story of at least 500 words, with some acknowledgment of how the racial difference would make a difference to the story being told.

ETA Gender-bending and Alternate Universe (AU) stories are permitted, though we ask that you focus on the racial implications of the difference between canonical character and the reenvisioned one.

For inspiration, you can turn to the chromatic re/casting posts masterlist, as well as collaborate with fanartists or vidders who might wish to participate.

Stories posted to the challenge collection at AO3 will be revealed on the 2nd of July, 2010; if you wish to post them elsewhere, we ask that you do so on the same date, and link to them at the dreamwidth community journal.

Some critics of the chromatic recasting meme pointed out that racial identity was integral to the characters because whiteness was not in fact a blank slate. We agree. We want to know how a man called Sherlock Holmes in Victorian England would function if his skin was the colour of soot, or what Latino Dean and Sam Winchester would do to convince people to trust them, and if Buffy the Vampire Slayer can be Asian and still save the world (a lot).

Please comment to this post in order to sign-up. You may mention the fandom(s) and/or character(s) you plan to racebend if you wish to let other people know that someone is doing them, but it is not necessary, and we welcome multiple takes on a character or fandom.

If anyone would like to help out with graphics for headers and icons for this comm here and over at A03, we would be delighted!

ETA: Our challenge is live, but we still welcome submissions! Our master list of fanworks is available at Racebending Revenge Challenge Fanworks & Resources, and links to fanworks for the challenge may be made there. We also welcome fanworks at Racebending Revenge Archive of Our Own Collection.
kangeiko: (SQUEE!)

[personal profile] kangeiko 2010-06-21 12:52 pm (UTC)(link)
I am absolutely petrified about this, having been battling writer's block this year, but it is too awesome for me not to sign up. Um, hold my hand, someone??

I'm going to do something for Ashes to Ashes, I think, and have a black Alex Drake.
tourniquette: A victorian schoolteacher canes a naughty boy. (Default)

My birthday is going to be SO AWESOME!

[personal profile] tourniquette 2010-06-22 12:24 am (UTC)(link)
I will be so happy (as opposed to depressed) on my b-day, because there will be lots of fic to read instead of a whitewashed film at the cinema to watch. (They always open big films on the 2nd - how I hate that they slated Avatar for then. AUGH.)

I will write either a an Arthurian original fic (Merlin?) or a Vampire Diaries fic.
bluflamingo: half orange with segments in rainbow colours (canal under bridge)

[personal profile] bluflamingo 2010-06-23 09:21 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm in - Neal Caffrey from White Collar

[identity profile] captanddeastar.livejournal.com 2010-06-25 03:37 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm in! (If a little late to the party...) Sherlock Holmes 2009, Watson. Can't wait to see what everyone else has been working on!
beckyh2112: (Dresden Files: Summer Knight)

[personal profile] beckyh2112 2010-06-25 06:10 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm going to give this a try. *rolls up her sleeves, goes to find the Dresden Files Chromatic Recasting for inspiration*

[personal profile] azicrow 2010-06-25 10:41 pm (UTC)(link)
Hi, I wonder if I'm too late at all but I was hoping I could sign up?

This seems like an amazing idea and I'd love to write a fic for it if possible.

[personal profile] azicrow 2010-06-25 10:47 pm (UTC)(link)
Ah actually noticing the date I may not have enough time to have it written and beta'd so I can't realistically take part - sorry about that, that's a shame I wish I'd seen this earlier.

Do you plan on repeating it at all or making it an annual event?

Something like this is very much needed in my opinion. At least I think so.

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[personal profile] azicrow - 2010-06-26 08:37 (UTC) - Expand

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[personal profile] azicrow - 2010-06-26 08:46 (UTC) - Expand
akamine_chan: Created by me; please don't take (dS - F/K - holding hands)

[personal profile] akamine_chan 2010-06-26 12:44 am (UTC)(link)
Um, I'd like to try my hand at this - fandom = due South, Benton Fraser as an Inuit RCMP officer...telling Inuit stories. The irony burns.

[identity profile] shantirosa.livejournal.com 2010-06-26 10:57 am (UTC)(link)
The whole idea of this challenge just fills with me GLEE. I get to write characters who look like me! /geek out

I'd like to jump onto the SPN bandwagon, rewriting most of the cast as South Asian/Desi. Just to check, would it be acceptable to change the names of characters to reflect their revised ethnic/cultural background?

[personal profile] deafnotdumb 2010-06-26 11:20 am (UTC)(link)
I'd definitely be interested in this. I presume it has to be a fandom character that you racebend, instead of subverting a genre? Because if the latter is allowed then I've got a 1930's detective story for you.

Either way, I've a few other ideas in mind. I'll come back when I've done something concrete.
rallamajoop: (Ky)

[personal profile] rallamajoop 2010-06-28 06:30 am (UTC)(link)
I would love to take part in this challenge, though I'm a little unsure whether the idea I've got would fit with the spirit of the ficathon. It would involve writing one of the leads from a Japanese game series (Ky from Guilty Gear) as being Japanese rather than French. Given the setting of the game itself, this would definitely have changed his life history, how others treated him, etc, but mostly in ways which are pretty specific to the fantasy setting (Japan has been all but devastated by war, the few survivors have been mostly forced into an isolated colony - officially for their own protection, but with certain hints that the 'real' reason is more sinister and involves the whole race having dangerous magical powers). So, definite racial issues involved, but possibly not in a way with much real world relevance, and I'm not certain if that's appropriate.

I also like the idea of writing for an Asian version of Cable from Marvel comics, but I've yet to figure out how to turn the idea into a story and I don't know that that's going to crystalise into anything more before July 2nd.
snow: Image: Ashika Chandiramani from Party Animals, looking determined as the sun shines in through the window.  (damn right my future's bright)

[personal profile] snow 2010-06-30 03:19 am (UTC)(link)
This is me, signing up, having already written what I wanted to write (I wasn't sure it would work until I tried). I hope that's okay.

RPF: Adam Lambert as African American.

And me!

[identity profile] reading-is-in.livejournal.com 2010-07-05 12:34 pm (UTC)(link)
What an awesome idea! I want to do a short or maybe drabble set wherin Jo's family (From SPN) are Iraqi, but Jo was born in the US. 5 dra
objectivelypink: Canon Error: Apply Fanfic Yes/No? (apply fanfic)

[personal profile] objectivelypink 2010-07-09 06:29 am (UTC)(link)
Would it be at all possible to make art along these lines rather than write? I'm terrible at finishing what I write...

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[personal profile] objectivelypink - 2010-07-12 20:16 (UTC) - Expand
ramblin_rosie: (Default)

[personal profile] ramblin_rosie 2010-07-16 06:20 am (UTC)(link)
I've been wibbling about signing up, but I don't think the idea's going to leave me alone now that I'm closing in on 15k words with glossary and notes, and it doesn't look like anyone else is tackling this sort of angle, so here goes: SPN AU in which Mary is white but John is Diné (Navajo). Provided I can find a beta--and I'm off to the beta-requesting post now.

[personal profile] ravenous215 2010-09-01 09:44 pm (UTC)(link)
The last airbender was a good movie and just because many dont think so doesnt mean its true. OPINIONS ARE LIKE ASSHOLEs. call me a troll and what not but the last airbender is still making elephant dollar so fuck off

[identity profile] riverkwago.livejournal.com 2010-12-31 09:17 pm (UTC)(link)
Saw this challenge while following a bunch of links (I sort of lost track of where I'd started). Um... Reeeeeally late sign-up?

I mean, I know this is wayyyy past the due-date, but I just want to let you know that this thread inspired me to write fan fic again, after almost three years.

I'm posting a short Covert Affairs fic (http://riverkwago.livejournal.com/28022.html) where Annie Walker is a naturalized Asian-American.
seashadows: (Default)

[personal profile] seashadows 2011-01-04 12:17 am (UTC)(link)
Would it be all right to submit a fic in which one character is made an ethnicity that wasn't considered white at the time (Greek in the late 1800s-early 1900s)? I have two fics I'd like to submit for The Music Man. :)

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gehayi: (zoesmile (dodo31))

[personal profile] gehayi 2011-01-10 11:40 pm (UTC)(link)
Er...I've kind of got an idea for one you're still taking signups. I'd be switching the following characters:

Harry Dresden – mixed race (Margaret Gwendolyn McCoy was the child of a Scottish immigrant and a Native American woman, Malcolm Dresden was a black man who was a professional magician).

Karrin Murphy -- black woman.

Charity Carpenter -- a Latina woman named Caritas.

Lara Raith -- a vampire named Laranya, offspring of a Caucasian vampire and a woman from India. (The offspring bit is feasible, as Lara and Thomas are White Court vampires--living people who feed on the emotions and souls of others, rather than being undead.)

Thomas Raith -- Laranya's vampire half-brother, the offspring of a Caucasian vampire and Margaret McCoy, mentioned above. He looks like his Native American relatives.

Ivy (the Archive, living repository of all recorded human knowledge from the time of cave paintings on) -- Yao Fu, a Chinese child born in Singapore.

I don't actually have a plot yet, but...I would like to try this, if I may. Though I know I'm starting horribly horribly late.
thebespectaclednerd: (Default)

[personal profile] thebespectaclednerd 2013-05-18 08:16 pm (UTC)(link)
Are you guys still taking signups for this? I'm kicking around some ideas for a racebent Buffy the Vampire Slayer fic.

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