This is my first serious cosplay. I loved her character so much, I think I decided I was going to cosplay her within the first few pages of the comic. She’s just that kickass,
and I did enjoy being able to wear my hair all natural for this 🙂
Tony Hansberry II was a ninth-grader. The new sewing technique he has developed helps to to reduce the risk of complications and simplifies the hysterectomy procedure for less seasoned surgeons.
His goal is to attend medical school and become a neurosurgeon. For Tony, it all began in school. He attends Darnell-Cookman School of the Medical Arts, a medical magnet school for middle and high schoolstudents. As part of its integrated medical curriculum, students receive medical instruction, but are also exposed to medical professionals who demonstrate advanced surgical techniques with specialized equipment. His lead medical teacher, Angela TenBroeck, told the Florida Times-Union that Hansberry is a typical student, but is way ahead of his classmates when it comes to surgical skills “I would put him up against a first year medical student. He is an outstanding young man,” she said.
During his summer break, Tony volunteered at the University of Florida’s Center for Simulation Education and Safety Research (CSESaR) at Shands Jacksonville Hospital. He was supervised by Dr. Brent Siebel, a urogynecologist, and Bruce Nappi, the administrative director. Together they worked with Tony exploring the mannequins and simulation equipment that physicians and nurses use in training. He became quite interested in invasive surgery and using laparoscopic instruments. As the story goes, one day an obstetrics and gynecology professor asked the group to help him figure out why no one was using a particular surgical device, called an endostitch for hysterectomy suturing procedures. This long medical device has clamps on the end, but Tony used the instrument in a new way allowing for vertical suturing, instead of the traditional horizontal method. After two days, Tony had perfected and tested his new technique. He soon developed a science fair project comparing the suturing times of the vertical endostitch closures vs the horizontal closures using a conventional needle driver instrument.
His results showed he was able to stitch three times faster using this new method. Use of this inventive technique may lead to shorter surgical times and improved patient treatment.
By golly gee! I keep forgetting that Black people didn’t exist until the Fresh Prince of Bel Air came on television! Or that Black people existed in anywhere else than Africa even with slavery going on 🙂 My apologies.
Anyway, here’s proof that Beethoven was Black:
“… Said directly, Beethoven was a black man. Specifically, his mother was a Moor, that group of Muslim Northern Africans who conquered parts of Europe—making Spain their capital—for some 800 years.
In order to make such a substantial statement, presentation of verifiable evidence is compulsory. Let’s start with what some of Beethoven’s contemporaries and biographers say about his brown complexion:
"Frederick Hertz, German anthropologist, used these terms to describe him: ‘Negroid traits, dark skin, flat, thick nose.’
Emil Ludwig, in his book ‘Beethoven,’ says: ‘His face reveals no trace of the German. He was so dark that people dubbed him Spagnol [dark-skinned].’
Fanny Giannatasio del Rio, in her book ‘An Unrequited Love: An Episode in the Life of Beethoven,’ wrote ‘His somewhat flat broad nose and rather wide mouth, his small piercing eyes and swarthy [dark] complexion, pockmarked into the bargain, gave him a strong resemblance to a mulatto.’
Beethoven’s death mask: profile and full face
C. Czerny stated, ‘His beard—he had not shaved for several days—made the lower part of his already brown face still darker.’
Following are one word descriptions of Beethoven from various writers: Grillparzer, ‘dark’; Bettina von Armin, ‘brown’; Schindler, ‘red and brown’; Rellstab, ‘brownish’; Gelinek, ‘short, dark.’
In Alexander Thayer’s Life of Beethoven, vol.1, p. 134, the author states, “there is none of that obscurity which exalts one to write history as he would have it and not as it really was. The facts are too patent.” On this same page, he states that the German composer Franz Josef Haydn was referred to as a “Moor” by Prince Esterhazy, and Beethoven had “even more of the Moor in his looks.’ On p. 72, a Beethoven contemporary, Gottfried Fischer, describes him as round-nosed and of dark complexion. Also, he was called ‘der Spagnol’ (the Spaniard).
Other “patent” sources, of which there are many, include, but are not limited to, Beethoven by Maynard Solomon, p.78. He is described as having “thick, bristly coal-black hair” (in today’s parlance, we proudly call it ‘kinky’) and a ‘ruddy-complexioned face.’ In Beethoven: His Life and Times by Artes Orga, p.72, Beethoven’s pupil, Carl Czerny of the ‘School of Velocity’ fame, recalls that Beethoven’s ‘coal-black hair, cut a la Titus, stood up around his head [sounds almost like an Afro]. His black beard…darkened the lower part of his dark-complexioned face.’
Engraving by Blasius Hofel, Beethoven, 1814, color facsimile of engraving after a pencil drawing by Louis Letronne. This engraving was regarded in Beethoven’s circle as particularly lifelike. Beethoven himself thought highly of it, and gave several copies to his friends.
India’s Academy of Sorcery boasts an impressive display of flashy colours, from enchanted saris that shift colours sporadically throughout the day, to the lavishly painted exterior of the academy which is situated in a nondescript location along Ganges River. Due to the frightening rate at which the school’s ancient mango tree (jokingly nicknamed “Mammoth Mango Machine”) produces mangoes, students have to endure the perpetually evolving art of mango cuisine at least five days a week. Every year, to the students’ great enjoyment, classes are halted for Diwali to make time for various competitions that take place: firework flourishes and charms for upper-year students (bonus points if it doesn’t set any part of the school on fire), and lantern designing for lower-year students (use of animals, alive or dead, is forbidden).
While I do love that whoever made this did a good job matching actors to characters, the one issue I have is that Hogwarts is in England and what founded several centuries ago. I’m not saying that there wouldn’t have been blacks or asians in England at the time, but it’s still a historical inaccuracy to depict them as anything other than white Englishmen, since the culture of England at the time wouldn’t have had room for blacks and asians as anything other than slaves or traders.
Please don’t take this as me being racist, this is just me with a debilitating and incurable need for historical accuracy.
So let’s see. The Sorting claims it’s origins about a thousand or so years ago in it’s song, which implies the 1000s. JK Rowling described them as “medieval,“ which is about 500 to 1500, again agreeing with our 1000 date. So let’s work with that. We’ve got a pretty decent timeline to work with here.
There have been black people in Scotland since “classical times,” and black moors present in James IV’s royal court in the 1500s, plus there’s St. Deiniol in Wales in the 500s, implying black people were also in the religious court instead of all just slaves and servants. Therefore, could a strong and fearless future-Gryffindor have ancestry native to the Isles? Hmmm.
Hannibal of Carthage was definitely not white (at least not in the modern sense). As a matter of fact, many Mediterranean descended people are mixed with Central Asians, South Asians, and North Africans so… But anyway, in 1555, black men were learning to be interpreters in London to help with trading in the Ghanian region. Here’s a coat of arms with black people on it dated 1616. Also, literally how do you not know about Dido Elizabeth Belle, an aristocratic lady of Scotland from the 1700s???
The Romani migrated out what is now modern day India and Pakistan in about the 1000s, so add in that they’re wizards who can fly and all that jazz, they could’ve easily gotten there within a year or two and settled in Scotland once they learned white people weren’t treating them very kindly. There you go, that’s how a South Asian Slytherin made it to Scotland just in time to found Hogwarts.
Here’s desi people of color from the Indian subcontinent, called Lascars, who had been sailing in Europe from as early as the 1400s, possibly earlier, still fitting that there could’ve been wizards in the British Isles about a hundred or so years earlier. Art from the 1600s showing brown men in turbans. Here’s an Indian man who in the 1700s ran a successful restaurant in England and taught white people to shampoo their hair lol.
Japanese emissaries came to Europe as early as 1584 and observed there were already Chinese and Japanese slaves among the overwhelmingly black slaves, something blamed on Christianity, which was part of the reason why Japan vehemently became isolated from that point.
Also about East Asia, Mongolian Genghis Khan made it to about Poland-ish in the 1200s, so it’s not a far bet to say the Chinese (who were also conquered by Khan on his way to Europe) could’ve found their way to Scotland around that time or a few hundred years earlier. Along with a smart cookie who would go on to be the founder of Ravenclaw.
Native Americans, of course, have been present in Europe for a while. In the 1500s, Manteo and Wanchese arrived in London. There’s evidence the Vikings and Indigenous Americans werefriendlylongbeforewhen Columbus blah blah, and there’s even evidence of Native Americans in Holland that’s like 2000 years old. Could a kind and loyal future Hufflepuff be one of those mixed race indigenous American-Africans?
ALSO considering the fact that Binns (the history professor at Hogwarts) specifically stated that witches and wizards were being persecuted and Hogwarts was built out of sight of Muggle eyes, it’s completely possible that POC came to Scotland and built the castle happily for other magical humans to have a safe place. Since HP universe is a fantasy anyway, readthesearticlewhile you’re at it.
So yeah, I understand your implication that you don’t want to be racist or anything like that (bc being called racist is ofc so much worse than actually being ignorant), but POC were not just traders and slaves in the British Isles, they were a fuckton of other things your history books aren’t telling you (or trying to intentionally steer you away from). So me having an all-brown cast for a location in a dominantly-white place I’m sure is irking the fuck out of you, and that makes me so glad to see you confronted with that “incurable” need for historical accuracy you have.
And check out this rad blog: Racebending Harry Potter.
how come the only time people mention the enslavement of black people in Europe is when they want to deny our presence in fantasy fiction?
And that’s what it really boils down to pretty much every time.
Because someone couldn’t deal with a single photoset with characters of color in a FANTASY setting. None of the “fact checking” is really necessary, because that isn’t really the issue. Fantasy fiction isn’t something that should be subject to “proof”, but when it comes to racial diversity, it invariably is every time.
It’s my hope that with Medievalpoc, this endless quibbling about what is and is not “historically accurate” can be done away with, and Toni Morrison’s quote here can become creative people of color’s realities:
When I saw the first comment I was going “Oh, I hope medievalpoc will tackle this!”
[on diversity in media] I think its social responsibility. I think it’s our responsibility to stand up and say what we want. It think if you look at television in the past two years, it’s becoming the decade of the female. Like, all these new shows with female leads. Even if you look at television, as well as cable, as well as films, there’s been a resurgence, as far as the leading woman in Hollywood, which is great. And I think we’re also at the point now…you know, it’s interesting…x
“Are you sure that’s a real spell?” said the girl. “Well, it’s not very good, is it? I’ve tried a few simple spells just for practice and it’s all worked for me. Nobody in my family’s magic at all, it was ever such a surprise when I got my letter, but I was ever so pleased, of course, I mean, it’s the very best school of witchcraft there is, I’ve heard—I’ve learned all our course books by heart, of course, I just hope it will be enough—I’m Hermione Granger, by the way, who are you?”
having grown up with the HP series, i have said on multiple occasions that i am hermione granger. it’s no coincidence that we’ve never been in the same room, and i too am a magical bossy know-it-all with big hair who’s smart in school.
but now…now it’s OFFICIAL. and here are the pics to prove it~
photos taken/edited by ArtsyRaccoon, it was my first time working with her and she did an AMAZING job and was so sweet, please go check her out ;-;
knitting in the dark 