Cultural Appropriation By Lionel Shriver

Novelist, Lionel Shriver, in her speech “I hope the concept of cultural appropriation is a passing fad”, examines the relationship between fiction and cultural appropriation. Shriver’s purpose is both to urge fiction writers to employ different perspectives in order to create compelling writing and criticize those who lambast writers on the grounds of cultural appropriation. Shriver does this using a forthright tone with her audience of writers and employs a satiric tone when addressing her naysayers.

Shriver begins by comparing herself as “a renowned iconoclast” to a great white shark (1). This comparison vilifies Shriver. By vilifying herself she has erased the ability of her critics to do so and sets the tone for the remainder of her speech. Shriver continues to address those who feel cultural appropriation in writing: “You’re not supposed to try on other people’s hats. Yet that’s what we’re paid to do”(2). She underscores the contradiction of what fiction writing is and what people who are sensitive to cultural appropriation claim it should be through her use of the phrase: “we’re paid to do”(2). Shriver is paid to write she is an authority on what fiction writing is, because no one understands a profession better than a person in that profession. This phrase also acts to create a sense of community between Shriver and her audience of writers because she implements the word “we’re” this

Shriver alludes to writers who have committed cultural appropriation in