Black and white pictures - Anne Rooney

Only pink people have anatomy

This will be a short post, or a short grumble, as this issue is taking a lot of my time at the moment.

I write a lot of non-fiction which is illustrated from picture libraries, as well as a lot which is illustrated with commissioned artwork and some that combines the two. At the moment, I'm working on a series that combines the two. The publisher has an aim of at least 25% non-Caucasian people in images and a 50:50 gender split, which is fine. With commissioned illustrations it's easy to achieve, obviously. With images sourced from picture libraries, whether photos or artwork, it's incredibly difficult. The (cheap) picture libraries don't have a good diverse mix of images. It's a little easier with photos, often (but not always), but virtually impossible for anything but the most generic and anodyne illustrations.

For example: search on Shutterstock for 'geologist'. It displays 100 images per page. Not all have people in, but at least half do. Of those, one is clearly female and one is possibly not-Caucasian (but could be Mediterranean or tanned). These are photos. Search for 'baby'; five out of the first 100 are non-Caucasian.

'Baby' is about as generic as you can get. Search toenails (don't — it's not a pretty sight) and they are all on white feet.

 Illustrations are just as bad, with some subjects completely unrepresented by non-white characters. One of the books I'm working on is about the human body and will use vector artwork. Body parts, organs, activities—all seem to be almost exclusively white concerns in picture-library-land. You'd think people of other ethnicities didn't have bones, brains or babies if you went by the pictures you can buy to show these things.

An obvious solution is to be more precise, but that brings up other problems. Specifying 'black' often just brings up black and white images rather than images of black people. 'People of color' delivers images in color with people in. Of course, it should be unnecessary to specify; there should be no massive default to Caucasian. Most alarming of all, 'black' sometimes delivers a completely different type of image. A search for 'black fetus' (sorry, but you have to use American spellings on these sites to get anywhere) brings up foetuses with guns (how is that even a thing?) and miscarried or aborted foetuses. This is truly disturbing and clearly symptomatic of some far deeper malaise than just an absence of diverse photographers or artists putting their material on Shutterstock.

Our budget will go largely on creating images that redress the balance of diversity in the book, making up for the short-fallings of the picture libraries. That's not how it should be. Next time you see a book that doesn't have enough diversity in the photos or library artwork, don't blame the publisher or author—blame the picture libraries.

Anne Rooney
Out now: Dinosaur Atlas
Lonely Planet

Not just black and white - Anne Rooney

Photo: DIAC Images

Increasing diversity in children's books is harder than it looks. It's not just a matter of a diverse range of writers and illustrators creating a diverse range of characters. For one thing, not all books even have characters. That's a recipe (or a partial one) for increasing diversity in fiction. But even then, it's only one end of the line. We need to take a step back and look at the whole publishing picture.

Of course it's vital to encourage people from a diverse range of backgrounds to consider that they could be writers, illustrators or editors, and to encourage publishers to employ editors and commission authors from a more diverse mix of backgrounds. That's clearly a good start, but we all know editors don't get to choose which books are published or promoted - that decision lies largely with sales and marketing. Has anyone looked at diversity in sales and marketing? And the sales and marketing people talk to booksellers and distributors. What's the mix there, with the people who are deciding which books will get into shops? If sales and marketing aren't allowing the commissioning of diverse books, or aren't putting publicity budget behind them, the efforts of writers, illustrators and editors is not enough. Witness the recent argument about whether Marvel Comics has annoyed, alienated or bored its audience by extending its mix of characters. Everyone has to be on board for it to work.

In fiction, it's quite easy to include a diverse mix of characters in illustrations. In non-fiction, it can be much harder because the illustrations are often photos. And photos aren't taken specifically for the book - they are bought from picture libraries. It is very, very difficult to find photos in picture libraries that show a diverse mix of children or adults doing specific activities. If you need children climbing a mountain or mending a bicycle, the vast majority of photos are of white, able-bodied children. I just searched a picture library one of my publishers uses a lot for 'children climbing a mountain' and of the 96 images on the first page, there were only two non-white children, one in a photo with two white children and the other alone. The one with the white children wasn't playing and was facing away from the camera; the white children were in the front of the picture, climbing. It's like this at every turn - easy to find generic children-in-a-playground or children-in-a-family but very difficult to find the sort of photo most books actually need. If the photos aren't there, we can't use them.

Lots of publishers use the cheapest picture libraries, such as Shutterstock and iStock. These don't use professional photographers. Anyone can submit photos and receive a (very) small payment when they are used. There are separate issues with the undermining of professional photography, but they do provide a way for photographers of any background to make their pictures commercially available. We don't have to wait for social change that enables a wider range of people to become professional photographers, which is just as well as it will be a long wait.


Anne Rooney
Latest books: