Representation and Production from Culler

While reading Culler’s chapter on Race theory and writing a paper analyzing a story through the lens of both Post Colonialism and Race theory, I have come across an interesting quote. “Does discourse represent identities that already exist, or does it produce them?” What is true representation and what is the creation of a queer, race, or ability diverse character/story for the sake of fanfare? What is the line between equal true representation, and the act of writing in “hollow” diverse characters for the sake of diversity? Should these characters face adversity or be presented without it? If these characters are always written with struggles of adversity do we as a society perpetuate the oppression that they feel as a group? What is a piece of text that seems to have a diverse character without any real “characterization”.

 

Pictured: Something someone that says they "just don't see color" speaking on diversity

(Source: https://media1.giphy.com/media/3ogsjUeIUkMzM5qIta/giphy.gif)