fic writers i promise you–on my life–that readers remember that finn’s skin is dark brown.
i promise that if you use a descriptor besides “the darker skinned man” in relation to all the characters around him, people will know who he is in your sentence.
e.g. the sun’s golden rays made his dark amber skin glow as it slid lower in the sky.
e.g. the harsh white light surrounding his body roughened the soft lines of his face and made his skin appear greyish as though he were a wraith.
e.g. the only imperfection marring his skin was the raised brown scar that slashed jaggedly across his back. (finn’s skin’s rich with melanin, so even if his fresh scar’s initially raw and pink, eventually it’ll heal to a brown shade–either slightly lighter, same tone, or slightly darker)
i promise that you can describe him as you do rey or poe and your readers won’t forget that it’s finn you’re talking about.
i promise you, you can describe poe without making him sound like a white dude.
n.k. jemisin’s a master at writing her characters, who are predominantly people of colour. for this reason, she usually describes them in relation to each other and doesn’t rely on their skin tones. she explicitly describes her white characters’ skin tones to flip the dominant perspective that assumes white as default. here are some of her tips:
describing characters of color
describing characters of color pt. 2 (some of her rowling thoughts are ehhh, because rowling does otherise her characters of colour, but this is an old post)
describing characters of color: other people’s poc
other resources:
7 offensive mistakes writers make
writing with color: poc and food comparisons (john boyega can call himself chocolate and black people might describe him as such, but you probably shouldn’t)
writing with color: words for skin tone
words to describe hair (i’ve read a couple fics where y’all are clueless about finn’s hair)
describing natural hair
writing with color’s colorful critiques
describing poc and avoiding caricatures
writing authentic characters of colour in first person pov
in depth guide to drawing different ethnicities
thank you so much for this post. it is so important and so helpful.
Heads up for all my writers out there.
