Unsettling "Exotic" Character Descriptons

First & foremost, all of you have been lovely and no one has come across hostile, demeaning, or offensive in anyway. This is one of the most collected & civil discussions I've read or been apart of. Usually it nearly immediately spirals to one extreme or both, with suddenly people crying patriarchy, cultural appropriation, microaggressions, and whathaveyou & if you don't acknowledge our plight then you're one of the misogynist, racial fetishists (and usually stronger & much more vulgar words), and then the other side saying you're blowing smoke out your ass & who would exoticize a dark fat cow anyway, and you people~ (et cetera, et cetera, et cetera).

I was actually really stressed about articulating these feelings 'cause I was afraid of stirring up either side to vehemently aggressive attacks. You all have been so lovely & thoughful, and pose brilliant ideas.

Now I've never heard not to compare skin tones to food or beverages (haven't done it myself) but I suppose I understand why that may come across as offensive to persons of colour. They are being compared to a consumable commodity, which brings to mind objectification, in that they are again in description being shown as a passive item for others' enjoyment, they are there to be acted upon & not active agents themselves. While it may be perfectly innocent & ignorant of itself, it's much too close to the regular forms POCs experience of being made desirable or consumable objects for them to not instinctively respond to negatively.

Interestingly enough, I have a friend (quarter black, quarter white, and half Filipino) who brought me to a concert of & primarily aimed at an African American audience, of which the vocalist on stage called out "Where are my mocha girls at? My dark chocolates?" and went on into numerous food & beverage descriptions of the myriads of shades & tones of the colour of his audience's skin; no one there was offended and everyone was jumping and screaming back excitedly when their shade was called. But this may be because those on stage were also persons of colour, and therefore the insecurities of these sorts of comparisons aren't present. And to be fair, he did finish with "How about my vanillas?" at which there was a very subdued cheer of a handful of women.

Regarding Jane Eyre excerpt, I fully agree that it is not an accurate example and said as much, as it is a first person account & reflects the character's fascination with most things foreign. And often she uses comparisons to the "oriental" to character's who are "other" or "outsiders." In the beginning, all by herself she says she sits cross legged "like a Turk" and Mr. Rochester has "oriental" eyes (which I think based on the description is middle eastern rather than Asian) and during the game of charades is described as “costumed in shawls, with a turban on his head" that his "dark eyes and swarthy skin and Paynim features suited the costume exactly: he looked the very model of an Eastern emir" and honestly numerous instances throughout the text beyond my immediate memories.

What I propose in my interpretation is that Jane, always as an "outsider" and the "other" in nearly all environments she is placed early on romanticized these exotic peoples who also are seen as "outsiders" and "other." She herself sees these exotic features as "beautiful" and "desirable," even when they are not by society. While Mr. Rochester is not found handsome among his peers, and admittedly by Jane upfront, his initially problematic features are compared in increasing frequency to exotic peoples by Jane as she increasingly more desires Rochester. So my interpretation of when Jane takes Mrs. Fairfax' description of the renowned beauty of Miss Ingram, she filters it through her own ideas of beauty or desirability by going from "good bust" and "long, graceful neck" immediately to "Grecian neck & bust, and "eyes rather like Mr. Rochester's: large and black" right to "oriental." If memory serves (and I very well could be mistaken), I believe Bronte's contemporary Greece had only just had its war of independence & come out of 400 years of being part of the Ottoman Empire sometime within her own lifetime. So I do concede that while quite often Grecian features in English literature are call backs to the ideals of Ancient Greek art & statues, I think Miss Ingram, with her "olive" complexion "dark and clear" (as Mrs. Fairfax depicts) and Jane describing her in the same game of charades while “attired in oriental fashion” that “her cast of form and feature, her complexion” is like an Israeli princess, is being compared to the contemporary Middle Eastern features rather than the Classical Ideals. And it is Jane, with her infatuation with the exotic, that lends these comparisons to others as determining their beauty & desirability in her personal assessment. But I'm sure there are various ways to interpret, and could be responded to or formulated in multitudes of in-depth essays & papers.

As to my view of Orientalism, I'm not going to spend any length discussing it, but it quite frankly posed individuals as both inferior & fascinating, and their cultures as pretty baubles to decorate homes with or to better solidify their sense of self by the juxtaposition of other.

I think everyone here is brilliant & makes wonderful points to consider. I also feel like most actually do understand my point of view, even though they seem to be uncertain if they do. I'm so grateful to everyone contributing ideas & interpretations

 

It will be set somewhere in the north-midlands, east coast.

 

Behave ye sen @Mouse ...

I've done plenty of cow stories - that is true.

There's one I need to find - my documentary - details the intense rapidity of the cow herd's switch of bottle under udder, something like 1000 bottles an hour. The great rural craft/skill.