Report on the dismal state of black sf/f writers in the short fiction markets

Paolo Defendini writes, "Fireside Fiction Company has released a report detailing the dismal stateof representation of black writers in the science fiction and fantasy shortfiction market .Despite increasing efforts to boost representation of people of colorgenerally, the prospects for black writers, specifically, have not beenimproving. According to the data (which is available in a publiclyaccessible Google spreadsheet),out of 2,039 stories published in 2015, only 38 were written by blackauthors. The report is accompanied by a series of essays in reaction to thereport by Nisi Shawl , TroyL. Wiggins , MikkiKendall , JustinaIreland ,and TobiasBuckell ; aswell as an interview with N.K. Jemisin.Fireside's editor, Brian White, has also written an editorialdetailingsome steps that Fireside is committed to taking to counter our own biasesand help fix this huge problem." (more…)