The rise (or fall) of sensitivity readers
Sensitivity reading, sometimes called diversity reading, is when someone with lived experience of marginalisation reads a manuscript to provide feedback on representation. Just as an author writing about crime may refer to a detective for advice, a heterosexual author writing about coming out may refer to a sensitivity reader from the LGBTQ+ community.
The aim of sensitivity reading is to avoid reinforcing negative tropes and achieve accurate and authentic representation. Ideally, any problematic language and stereotypes can then be addressed before printing. Sensitivity reads are commissioned with all manner of representation in mind, including race, gender identity, sexuality and disability.
I sincerely hope that most of you have had the Yes! moment while reading a book. The Yes! moment is when a detail chimes with you so wholly, so completely and utterly, that it’s as if the pages are giving your soul a hug.
Why was Bridget Jones’s Diary so successful? Because Helen Fielding, a 30-something single woman living in London and stressing about her appearance and life choices, wrote as Bridget Jones, a 30-something single woman…. You get the point. Crucial details, like the massive pants and pointed remarks from Bridget’s mother, mark the story with an authenticity that makes it so beloved.
As a white, heterosexual, able-bodied cis woman, the percentage of authors writing from a familiar perspective means I am ludicrously lucky enough to have experienced the sheer joy of the Yes! moment multiple times. So, any process giving more people that sense of timeless connection must be a good thing - right?
Unfortunately, it’s not that straightforward. A practice born of intentions to diversify the publishing world has been accused of enabling the status quo to remain very much unchanged. Want to improve the diversity of your publications and readership? Don’t worry about actively seeking out and making space for under-represented talent – with sensitivity reading, you can simply contract out the job of ‘being diverse’ without making genuine change.
It’s argued that sensitivity reading is usually brought in too late in the process to effect anything other than minor changes anyway. Slotted in somewhere just before the proof-reading stage, sensitivity reads are often seen as a quick win rather than an opportunity to consider structural or thematic issues.
In fact, the action of commissioning a sensitivity read can be used as a pre-emptive defence against criticism, something authors and publishing houses are more and more afraid of amid today’s so called ‘cancel culture’. So, you found an aspect of the text offensive? Well, it was checked by someone from X community so don’t look at us (though, crucially, the specific detail of what sensitivity readers suggest compared to what is actually taken on board is never revealed).
Indeed, can asking one or even a handful of individuals from a community for their opinion ever be anything other than tokenistic? Expecting a few people with visual impairments to represent the whole blind community is reductive, and ignores the way intersectionality may impact people’s experiences. It could be even more damaging to pay marginalised individuals a few pence a word to edit potentially triggering or traumatic content before asking them to confront the person who wrote it.
Moreover, does the concept of sensitivity readers suggest that we can, or should, only write from our own direct experience? Some authors, like Lionel Shriver, have argued vociferously against the ‘gagging,’ ‘professionally offended’ approach of the ‘sensitivity police.’ Whilst I’m less inclined to bemoan the ‘left’s sensitivity run amok’, it’s possible that this practice stifles creativity and imagination.
A recent read of mine, Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng, is powerful precisely because of its exploration of different perspectives, and JK Rowling is neither an 11 year old boy nor, I’m pretty sure, a wizard. Could it be that sensitivity reads limit what all writers, including those from marginalised communities, write about?
As with many polarising topics, the answer lies somewhere in the middle. If involved early on, with a genuine open mind, working with sensitivity readers is about empathy, healthy challenge and inclusivity. A sensitivity reader I spoke to described a positive experience: she was sent the manuscript chapter by chapter, while her line edits praised authenticity and teased out what could be improved. It wasn’t about censorship and humiliation, but listening and growth.
Writers are always striving to avoid lazy, clichéd tropes and having their work edited and proof-read by others – with that in mind, are sensitivity reads really that peculiar?
But there are a multitude of challenges that led Justina Ireland, one of the key American proponents of sensitivity reads, to take a step back. In 2016, responding to an outcry against Keira Drake’s young adult novel The Continent and its white saviour narrative, Ireland introduced a database of sensitivity readers called Writing in the Margins. Just two years later, however, Ireland announced that she would no longer be maintaining the database, having become disillusioned by how the process was working out in practice.
The UK seems to be tracking slightly behind the States on this issue. A Twitter storm erupted in August this year about ableist and racist tropes in Kate Clanchy’s memoir Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me and how it could be reworked with the help of sensitivity readers.
Meanwhile, Inclusive Minds, a collective committed to improving diversity and inclusion in children’s literature, has already moved firmly away from the concept of sensitivity readers, promoting instead their network of ambassadors who get involved at the development stage.
This and Ireland’s experience, suggests that, contrary to a recent Spectator article entitled The Rise of the Sensitivity Reader, we’re actually witnessing its fall instead. The question is, what’s next in our quest for a more diverse, inclusive publishing industry – and will it be more successful?
Title image by Rachel Phelps.
Katherine works in heritage outreach and is based in Bristol. When she’s not busy re-examining history from a female perspective, she lives the 19th-century high-life: embroidering, wild swimming and spending far too much money on gin. Find her on Instagram: @_kgwrites_.
