4 ms·

Yeah, this is a pretty conventional list. Unfortunately unless one puts in an active effort, it's hard to break out of reading the canon, which is inevitably do

Yeah, this is a pretty conventional list. Unfortunately unless one puts in an active effort, it's hard to break out of reading the canon, which is inevitably dominated by white men. For one, most of these books are in the standard nerd culture lexicon. Reading them allows entry into an in-crowd of sci-fi references. Plus these books are recommended constantly. The author likely chose their reading material from the top recommended sci-fi books. There's also this odd phenomenon that I'd call "the diverse undiverse". Sure, a lot of these books are written by white men. But when you're reading them, they come from an incredible spectrum of styles, politics, world views, settings, etc. that they feel diverse. By going from Asimov to Gibson, it's quite easy to get the illusion that you're reading a wide variety of fiction. However you're still reading white men, just a particularly diverse set of white men. If you were to ask a film buff whether they watch a diverse set of movies, they'd probably say yes. I'd also bet that the majority of the movies they cite were directed by white or maybe Asian men (Kurosawa, Ozu, Kobayashi maaaybe). Not excusing the list, but it's not surprising that it's strictly conventional and therefore undiverse.

morelisp 6y ago
> a particularly diverse set of white men. I don't even really agree here - there are a few that stand out, but I'm reminded of something I read in an interview with Samuel R. Delaney recently: > Understand that, since the late ’30s, that community, that world had been largely Jewish, highly liberal, and with notable exceptions leaned well to the left. Even its right-wing mavens, Robert Heinlein or Poul Anderson (or, indeed, Campbell), would have far preferred to go to a leftist party and have a friendly argument with some smart socialists than actually to hang out with the right-wing and libertarian organizations which they may well have supported on principle and, in Heinlein’s case, with donations. (from "Discourse in an Older Sense" included in "The Atheist in the Attic".) SF writers up through basically the New Wave (and the context of Delaney's quote is Pohl's infamous excoriation of the New Wave) were a largely insular social and philosophical group, even though they had strident political differences. And even some the more modern authors in this list - e.g. Crichton, Howey - still fit firmly within that world view. Regardless of whether they lean left or right they're positivist, technocratic, Enlightenment-focused, often leaning towards scientism, etc. That's why something like "Dangerous Visions" was such a provocative title - the idea that the future would be maybe not great and advanced technology probably wouldn't help was a "dangerous" idea for the sf culture at the time.
- hardwaregeek 6y ago
  Fair. That was partially a Michael Che joke :D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37G0D6s0J8s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37G0D6s0J8s I don't disagree that the writers are not indeed diverse. The phrasing of "diverse set of white men" was purposefully oxymoronic. It's just that the selection of writing gives the illusion of diversity which can be quite dangerous.

morelisp 6y ago

> a particularly diverse set of white men. I don't even really agree here - there are a few that stand out, but I'm reminded of something I read in an interview with Samuel R. Delaney recently: > Understand that, since the late ’30s, that community, that world had been largely Jewish, highly liberal, and with notable exceptions leaned well to the left. Even its right-wing mavens, Robert Heinlein or Poul Anderson (or, indeed, Campbell), would have far preferred to go to a leftist party and have a friendly argument with some smart socialists than actually to hang out with the right-wing and libertarian organizations which they may well have supported on principle and, in Heinlein’s case, with donations. (from "Discourse in an Older Sense" included in "The Atheist in the Attic".) SF writers up through basically the New Wave (and the context of Delaney's quote is Pohl's infamous excoriation of the New Wave) were a largely insular social and philosophical group, even though they had strident political differences. And even some the more modern authors in this list - e.g. Crichton, Howey - still fit firmly within that world view. Regardless of whether they lean left or right they're positivist, technocratic, Enlightenment-focused, often leaning towards scientism, etc. That's why something like "Dangerous Visions" was such a provocative title - the idea that the future would be maybe not great and advanced technology probably wouldn't help was a "dangerous" idea for the sf culture at the time.

hardwaregeek 6y ago
Fair. That was partially a Michael Che joke :D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37G0D6s0J8s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37G0D6s0J8s I don't disagree that the writers are not indeed diverse. The phrasing of "diverse set of white men" was purposefully oxymoronic. It's just that the selection of writing gives the illusion of diversity which can be quite dangerous.