Are there any post-apocalyptic stories focused on minorities?
March 15, 2015 12:09 PM Subscribe
Are there any "civilization is ruined, zombies/marauders/robots are killing the survivors, we must rebuild/get to the final refuge" stories in any medium where the main characters are not mainly caucasian people?
Yes, Octavia Butler's Lilith's Brood and Parable novels (Parables being more straightforward in terms of your criteria, Lilith's Brood more complicated).
posted by jammy at 12:17 PM on March 15, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by jammy at 12:17 PM on March 15, 2015 [2 favorites]
Vampire Hunter D?
Post-Apocalypse is a popular theme in contemporary Japanese literature, manga, and film. And most of them tend to just treat Japanese as the default race in much the same way that Western media treats White as the default race.
posted by 256 at 12:22 PM on March 15, 2015
Post-Apocalypse is a popular theme in contemporary Japanese literature, manga, and film. And most of them tend to just treat Japanese as the default race in much the same way that Western media treats White as the default race.
posted by 256 at 12:22 PM on March 15, 2015
Brown Girl in the Ring by Nalo Hopkinson is dystopian, though not explicitly post-apocalyptic--Toronto has become a slum run by organized crime, and Lake Ontario has dried up.
posted by pullayup at 12:23 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by pullayup at 12:23 PM on March 15, 2015
Actually it looks like we're on out way to recapitulating this list.
posted by pullayup at 12:26 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by pullayup at 12:26 PM on March 15, 2015
Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita. Kirkus Reviews called it "an ambitious but cluttered, apocalyptic riff on immigration, the homeless, and NAFTA as the Tropic of Cancer moves north."
posted by elisse at 12:27 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by elisse at 12:27 PM on March 15, 2015
The protagonist of Colson Whitehead's Zone One is black.
posted by UncleBoomee at 12:30 PM on March 15, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by UncleBoomee at 12:30 PM on March 15, 2015 [6 favorites]
I'm several chapters into Panther in the Hive and so far it qualifies beautifully. And it's also just really good.
posted by Stacey at 1:11 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by Stacey at 1:11 PM on March 15, 2015
The original Night of the Living Dead deals heavily with race.
posted by munchingzombie at 1:11 PM on March 15, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by munchingzombie at 1:11 PM on March 15, 2015 [4 favorites]
The protagonist of Colson Whitehead's Zone One is black.
The guy's race isn't revealed until near the end of the book. Whitehead withholds that detail and then drops it in a slyly deliberate way. It's a bit of a spoiler to know that up front.
posted by fuse theorem at 2:02 PM on March 15, 2015
The guy's race isn't revealed until near the end of the book. Whitehead withholds that detail and then drops it in a slyly deliberate way. It's a bit of a spoiler to know that up front.
posted by fuse theorem at 2:02 PM on March 15, 2015
Janelle Monáe has a series of conceptual albums dealing with a dystopian future populated by androids and a severely socially stratified society. The protagonist, Cindi Mayweather, is a messianic figure to the Others in society and ends up leading the resistance. There is also time travel.
posted by chainsofreedom at 2:08 PM on March 15, 2015 [8 favorites]
posted by chainsofreedom at 2:08 PM on March 15, 2015 [8 favorites]
Jeremiah has non-whites in strong roles, but it only survived two seasons. It also has Luke Perry though and I don't think you can get much whiter.
posted by cjorgensen at 2:16 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by cjorgensen at 2:16 PM on March 15, 2015
Very different from your usual post-apocalyptic story, but The Flame Alphabet by Ben Marcus.
posted by Behemoth at 2:39 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by Behemoth at 2:39 PM on March 15, 2015
The very recently released The Country of Ice Cream Star by Sandra Newman fits this exactly. The majority of people who survive the apocalypse are children/teenagers of colour. I've read it, and I thought it was quite good, but you have to be OK with the book being written entirely in a dialect/creole:
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 2:43 PM on March 15, 2015 [3 favorites]
My mother and my grands and my great-grands been Sengle pure. Our people be a tarry night sort, and we skinny and long. My brother Driver climb a tree with only hands, because our bones so light, our muscles fortey strong. We flee like a dragonfly over water, we fight like ten guns, and we be bell to see. Other children go deranged and unpredictable for our love.(From Chapter 1)
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 2:43 PM on March 15, 2015 [3 favorites]
Partials. The author makes it a point to detail everyone's race; I'm pretty sure most of the characters are POC.
posted by Enchanting Grasshopper at 2:51 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by Enchanting Grasshopper at 2:51 PM on March 15, 2015
(Too late to Octavia Butler this question to all possible extremes, but not for lack of trying!)
So since that card's been played, I'd just like to mention that I made it to the end of Night of the LIving Dead and thought for just a moment that I'd found a zombie movie from the 1960s where The Black Guy survived the tale. For some reason in my head I remembered the ending as "racist cop just shrugs and takes a pot shot at him" but rewatching shows that was partly my own projection.
So yeah, Night of the Living Dead: ultimately a black protagonist/survivor, but that ending needs a quick edit. Alas, it seems the copyright situation for that film was retconned to protect Maximalism. This is why we can't have good 1960s zombie movies, people.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 3:08 PM on March 15, 2015
So since that card's been played, I'd just like to mention that I made it to the end of Night of the LIving Dead and thought for just a moment that I'd found a zombie movie from the 1960s where The Black Guy survived the tale. For some reason in my head I remembered the ending as "racist cop just shrugs and takes a pot shot at him" but rewatching shows that was partly my own projection.
So yeah, Night of the Living Dead: ultimately a black protagonist/survivor, but that ending needs a quick edit. Alas, it seems the copyright situation for that film was retconned to protect Maximalism. This is why we can't have good 1960s zombie movies, people.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 3:08 PM on March 15, 2015
Not a major work, but Ray Bradbury's "The Other Foot".
posted by doctor tough love at 3:58 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by doctor tough love at 3:58 PM on March 15, 2015
Not precisely post-apocalyptic, but several of Tobias Buckell's books have non-white peoples from Earth on other planets who have largely or entirely lost touch with interstellar civilization.
posted by Bruce H. at 5:26 PM on March 15, 2015
posted by Bruce H. at 5:26 PM on March 15, 2015
Along with all these other excellent suggestions, I wanted to give a shout-out to Kate Diamond's "All Our Worlds" database, which allows you to search 841 science fiction and fantasy titles according to the particular kind of diversity you're interested in - "race" is one of those diversity categories.
Here is Kate Diamond's description of the project.
posted by Hellgirl at 5:34 PM on March 15, 2015 [1 favorite]
Here is Kate Diamond's description of the project.
posted by Hellgirl at 5:34 PM on March 15, 2015 [1 favorite]
World War Z is decidedly global in scope, with characters from just about every corner of the earth. I'd go so far as to say there are no "main characters," beyond the unseen narrator.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 7:39 PM on March 15, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 7:39 PM on March 15, 2015 [2 favorites]
I Am Legend, with Will Smith as the only remaining living person - along with a bunch of zombie-vampire like monsters.
posted by kbar1 at 8:08 PM on March 15, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by kbar1 at 8:08 PM on March 15, 2015 [2 favorites]
Several of Jack Womack's Ambient series (Terraplane and Elvissy) star a black female antagonist; in one, she undergoes a procedure to "pass" in an alternative 1950s America where black people were subjected to a genocide. The Ambient series is set in a post-apocalyptic world that has recovered sufficiently to be dystopian.
posted by digitalprimate at 12:53 AM on March 16, 2015
posted by digitalprimate at 12:53 AM on March 16, 2015
Resident Evil 5 (video game) place in Africa. It's not post-apocalyptic, however.
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 4:01 AM on March 16, 2015
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 4:01 AM on March 16, 2015
Key and Peele did a nice little alien invasion sketch.
posted by matildaben at 6:52 AM on March 16, 2015
posted by matildaben at 6:52 AM on March 16, 2015
Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, kind of.
A fair stretch of Akira, though more the comic than the film.
posted by Artw at 10:40 AM on March 18, 2015
A fair stretch of Akira, though more the comic than the film.
posted by Artw at 10:40 AM on March 18, 2015
(There's a fair few more traditionally Mad-Maxy anime, but the examples I can think of there are mostly kind of dumb)
posted by Artw at 10:41 AM on March 18, 2015
posted by Artw at 10:41 AM on March 18, 2015
Not post-apocalyptic, but I will pass this on.
posted by stumblingthroughitall at 1:11 AM on April 14, 2015
posted by stumblingthroughitall at 1:11 AM on April 14, 2015
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by tchemgrrl at 12:17 PM on March 15, 2015 [2 favorites]