INTERMISSION

A WRITER TAKES PAUSE TO CONSIDER…

@ASHANTIOMKAR

As a South Asian child, I grew up thinking Brown people existed only in Indian cinema with storylines I struggled to relate to. I loved superheroes and comics but couldn’t see myself in them – my favourites. I loved superheroes like Superman and Batman and comics like and , but they were all white male leads created by, well, white males. OK, so I’d seen some diversity in TV show and yes, she was celebratory, brave and motivated – but she was a one-off for a very long time. And despite Asians being the largest diaspora in the world, we remained largely underserved in mainstream media, too often depicted as marginalised immigrants or magical minorities. IT nerds, store keepers, taxi drivers, terrorists…