Remember Us

Archive
Name:	Remember Us (earlier title: "Remember Us?")
Date(s):	2002, last updated in 2009
Archivist:	Te and Hope, serena kitt
Founder:	Te
Type:
Fandom:	multifandom
URL:	http://www.dreaming-in-color.net/ http://teland.com/remember/ http://teland.com/remember/index2.html (old archive), http://strangeplaces.net/remember/ (older archive) intro page
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Remember Us (originally titled Remember Us?) is a multifandom fanwork archive. It is "The long, long, *long* overdue central archive for fiction, art, and links featuring characters of color." The archive hosts links to works from over 40 fandoms. Remember Us also contains links to similar sites, banners, fanart, and the site's manifesto.

some banners; the site asks fans to "advertise us, baby"

The site was created in 2002 by Te, and its original URL was dreaming-in-color.net. serena kitt became maintainer on June 19, 2004. The original site was last updated July 21, 2007. The site redone at an unknown date, and last updated in 2009.

Remember Us was widely linked and reasonably well known in fannish spaces. It was included in zvi_likes_tv's Pro-Character of Color/Anti-Racism Guide at newbieguide. The archive has been described as "a safe harbor in a sea of fandom whiteness".

Remember Us remains online, but many of the fanfiction and fanvid links on the site are now defunct - linking to personal websites or journals that are no longer online.

Intro

do not adjust your monitors.

The color is just fine.

Color is just fine -- and if you don't believe that by the time you're through with the stories in this archive?

There's no help for you.

Remember Us is an archive dedicated to bringing you fan fiction about characters of color. Whether it's slash, het, or gen, whether the fandom's Buffy, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Oz, or something else altogether. Does that mean 'no White characters allowed?' Not quite! It means: in this archive, the stories will either *focus* on characters of color, or characters of color will be a significant part of a given story's ensemble cast.

We've brought the stories here. Your job? Reading it, and feeding the authors.

Fandoms

Fandoms include: Alias, Andromeda, Angel the Series, The Authority, Battlestar Galactica (1978), Battlestar Galactica (2003), Blade, Blake's 7, Bring It On, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, CSI, Dark Angel, DC Comics, Due South, Early Edition, E.R., Fast and the Furious, Fastlane, Firefly, Good vs. Evil, Harry Potter, Homicide, I Spy, Jeremiah, Law & Order, The Lone Gunmen, Magnificent Seven, Marvel Comics, The Matrix, Miami Vice, Oz, Pitch Black, Red Dwarf, SeaQuest, The Sentinel, Shanghai Noon, Sliders, Smallville, Stargate, Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space 9, Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Enterprise, Star Wars, The West Wing, X-Files, X-Men.

The Manifesto

Remember Us Manifesto, v. 1.0 was written by Te, with "great thanks to Dawn Sharon and the ebonbird." It was to have been updated with the site update but was not.

Excerpt:

So, we're here. A lot of you are happy about that, more of you don't care either way, and some of you are wondering why.

Well, you know, that's a valid question.

I've heard the phrase 'reverse racism' bandied about. People asking about how we would feel if there were archives and mailing lists devoted to all *White* characters and pairings.

The snarky response to that is that there already *are*, but yes, I know that's not what you mean.

The fact is, most of us will probably be old and grey -- if not dead and dust -- before race is anything but a hideously uncomfortable issue. Most of us look to Black people for the final word on 'Black issues,' Asians on 'Asian issues,' and so on, and so forth. Ignorance informs fear of being considered racist, if not racism in and of itself. It's understandable.

Does it make you feel better that I'm Black?

Would the discontented mutterings have been louder if so many people didn't know who I was *and* that I was Black? It's an interesting question.

But I'm digressing.

What constitutes a character of color? Well, it's easier to talk about what, for the purposes of this archive, at the time of this writing, does not. We are not accepting stories, art, or other media that feature characters like Worf, even though Michael Dorn is a Black man.

Why? Because he's simply too alien. His character is not of color *and* as a Klingon it's damned hard to see the Human face. Which is why we *do* accept stories about Tuvok, who as a 'Black Vulcan,' is both noticeably humanoid and quite different from, say, Spock. There was an interview some years back where Tim Russ speculated on the racial makeup of Vulcan quite interestingly. If someone can find a link, I'd be vastly appreciative.

In any event, is this policy shallow? Quite. But in order to produce an archive like this, some rules must be established. I understand that some people feel that there's a deep inconsistency here, and I do understand the points being made, but...

Once Russ began speaking about the potential racial breakdown of Vulcan, Tuvok became not just a Vulcan, but a *Black* Vulcan. Supertextual canon, in this case, counts.

[For the record, there have been vague plans ever since the Remember Us mailing list was set up some time ago about making a list and archive for the more alien/visibly demonic/whatever characters, but as yet it has not gotten off the ground.

Submission Guidelines (2002)

You asked for 'em, you got 'em! The submission guidelines for Remember Us are pretty simple, and they include two different but equally important parts (insert Law & Order BUMBUM! here.)

Fiction Guidelines:

Content: Does your story feature a Character of Color in a lead role? Then we want it! Does your story feature a Character of Color as an equal part of an ensemble? Then we want it! A two line appearance, by the way, does not count as an equal part of an ensemble. And now the sticky portion: for the purposes of this archive, a CoC is defined as any non-caucasian character- we are not accepting ethnic caucasians not because they're not "of-color," but because 1) ethnic caucasians are heavily represented in popular media, and 2) it would put us in the uncomfortable position of creating a "brown enough" scale, and we just don't want to go there. Special rules regarding aliens- if the alien race supercedes the "of color," then we aren't accepting them. (For example, Tuvok is a Black Vulcan, whereas Worf is just a Klingon. We'll take Tuvok stories, but not Worf stories.) Any fandom, any pairing (or no pairing at all,) any genre- those possibilities are limitless. We accept gen, het and slash, but at this time, we are only accepting fiction. Sorry, no poetry or filk at this time!

Format: Okay, so you know you definitely have a story we want to include. We're happy to archive your story in one of two ways- the first is simple, if you already have the story online, we'll be happy to link to it. In that case, please drop us a note with the name of the story, the fandom, a summary and rating, and the URL of your story, and we'll add it right away. If you'd prefer that we house your story locally (traditional archiving) please send us a TEXT ONLY file (that's .txt or .rtf) with your name, the fandom, a summary, a rating, and, of course, your story. Do NOT send Word or Word Perfect Documents, we will not open them. (Viruses, y'know.) In the body of the story, if you really love us, you'll make sure to put a line space between each paragraph. Please love us, we love you.

FanArt Guidelines:

Hey, we want your fan art too, and we're happy to house it here. If you'd like to submit manips, wallpapers, etc., featuring Characters of Color in all their graphical glory, please e-mail us your JPG or GIF file, the title of the piece (if any,) the fandom, and the name you prefer to be credited by.

All submissions (fiction and fan art) should be sent to no_absolutes for archiving.

Thank you for your interest and support in Remember Us, without your contributions, we'd be a big, pretty website with nothin' on it! - Te & Hope (via no_absolutes)

Submission Guidelines (2009)

You asked for 'em, you got 'em! The submission guidelines for Remember Us are pretty simple, and they include two different but equally important parts: content and format. First, the fanfic.

Fiction Guidelines

Does your story feature a character of color in a lead role? Then we want it! Does your story feature a character of color as an equal part of an ensemble? Then we want it! A two line appearance, by the way, does not count as an equal part of an ensemble.

And now the sticky portion: for the purposes of this archive, a CoC is defined as any non-caucasian character- we are not accepting ethnic caucasians not because they're not "of-color," but because 1) ethnic caucasians are heavily represented in popular media, and 2) it would put us in the uncomfortable position of creating a "brown enough" scale, and we just don't want to go there.

Special rules regarding aliens- if the alien race supercedes the "of color," then we aren't accepting them. (For example, Tuvok is a Black Vulcan, whereas Worf is just a Klingon. We'll take Tuvok stories, but not Worf stories.) Any fandom, any pairing (or no pairing at all,) any genre- those possibilities are limitless. We accept gen, het and slash, but at this time, we are only accepting fiction. Sorry, no poetry or filk at this time!

Formats

Okay, so you know you definitely have a story we want to include. We're happy to archive your story in one of two ways- the first is simple, if you already have the story online, we'll be happy to link to it. In that case, please drop us a note with the name of the story, the fandom, a summary and rating, and the URL of your story, and we'll add it right away. If you'd prefer that we house your story locally (traditional archiving) please send us a TEXT ONLY file (that's .txt or .rtf) with your name, the fandom, a summary, a rating, and, of course, your story. Do NOT send Word or Word Perfect Documents, we will not open them. (Viruses, y'know.)

FanArt Guidelines

Hey, we want your fanart too, and we're happy to house it here. If you'd like to submit manips, wallpapers, etc., featuring characters of color in all their graphical glory, please e-mail us your JPG or GIF file, the title of the piece (if any,) the fandom, and the name you prefer to be credited by. If your fanart is NSFW, say so!

Vidding guidelines

Vids featuring characters of color are welcome here, and you work hard at making them. For now, please make it simple for us by posting your video on a page of your own (your blog, YouTube page, journal, etc.) and just email the URL so that we can link to that page from here. Any format is OK; we've included some tips for your throngs of viewers. Include some info with the link: the title of the vid, the fandom and characters of color involved, the song title and artist, and a description, if you like. We'll include a nifty black-and-white thumbnail image from a screen capture along with the link. If your vid is NSFW, say so!

Thank you for your interest in and support of Remember Us, without your contributions, we'd be a big, pretty website with nothin' on it!