A nice factlet about Julie Murphy. Around 2010, she was a librarian who did the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) thing that happens every November. The YA novel she wrote was Side Effects May Vary. Which eventually got published and became a NYT bestseller. So ha ha, world.

Her most recent novel is Dumplin’, a YA about teenagers in a Texas town that makes a big deal about a beauty pageant, Miss Teen Blue Bonnet. It deals with crazy-making parents, death, the secret lives of others, romance, working at a fast-food joint, Dolly Parton, finding yourself in a band of outsiders, body image, and the uplifting power of accidentally attending a drag show in Odessa.

Which, look, also a best seller, Disney wants it. Murphy is pleased. But she has a big regret about Dumplin’, something she has now apologized for.

Here’s what she wrote, in a Tumblr post, (stuff in brackets added by me):

When You Don’t Get It Right (or That Time I Appropriated Spirit Animal)

…As we’re coming up on one year since publication and with Dumplin’ still on shelves, I must tell you that I have one deep regret.

There is a line written into one of the final scenes of Dumplin’ that I didn’t think twice about when I was approving my final pass pages. Blame it on pop culture if you want. I blame it on my own ignorance, which doesn’t make it any less of a mistake.

In one of the final scenes of the book, Ellen, Willowdean’s BFF, has this line: “Oh my God,” says El, “I think you might be my spirit animal.” (page 361)

Since the publication of Dumplin’, I’ve watched lots of great and smart conversations take place about how this phrase is blatant cultural appropriation, and there is no denying that I messed up. I assumed that all I could do was own up to this any time a reader brought it to my attention.

I was reminded of this when I saw a script for Dumplin’ and the phrase popped up again and I asked that it be removed. I felt it was the least I could do. Then last week, a person I was following on Twitter was reading Dumplin’ and said something about the line. [Tweet: ‘98% done with Dumplin’, by Julie Murphy. There’s the “spirit animal” line. Ugh!’] I normally don’t interact with reader commentary if I have not been tagged, but I figured HTH since Jeanne and I follow each other and are fairly friendly. Angie Manfredi, a librarian I greatly admire, jumped in and asked if I thought about asking Harper to change the line in future reprints. Debbie Reese also reached out and shared with me an experience she had with an author who had changes made to future prints.

I have to be honest and tell you that this hadn’t even occurred to me as a possibility… So I thought about how I would rewrite that line if I could and I reached out to my editor. My editor, y’all. Alessandra Balzer. She’s amazing. She and her assistant acted immediately and I am so happy to tell you that the line will be changed in future hardback reprintings and in every paperback.

I am ecstatic and thankful. It would be great if I hadn’t messed up in the first place, but that isn’t the case.

The gist: The phrase “spirit animal” is not mine to use. I deeply regret having used it in Dumplin’ and I apologize to anyone I have hurt or belittled in doing so. I can’t say I won’t ever screw up again, but I can say that I’m listening and aware and willing to own my mistakes. Thank you to everyone who has helped me talk through this and has helped me correct this mistake.

This is a very good apology. It’s sort of long, but there wasn’t much I felt I could cut. She apologizes. She spells out what she’s apologizing for. (Though she doesn’t say that the inspiration for the “spirit animal” remark is a successful Dolly Parton impersonation.) She flirts with the idea of blaming pop culture, but rejects it.

She describes what she’s doing to fix the problem. (I’m curious to see the rewrite, but wasn’t able to find out.) The venue seems suitably public.

And the wording is delicate. “The phrase ‘spirit animal’ is not mine to use.” She doesn’t go into whose it is. Which is smart, because that’s a can of spirit worms.

For example, is it really cultural appropriation? Which culture?

Some vague concept of “spirit animal” is wafting around pop culture. It’s supposed to be Native American – which Native Americans? No one says. People engage with it on a jokey/oh-cool-I-want-one level. It’s like the notion of having an “Indian name.” (I knew a white someone who made a big deal of having an “Indian name” and awarding “Indian names” to others. He shut up about it when he met a white someone with an Indian name given by actual Oglala Lakota Indians after he ran supplies to Wounded Knee in 1973.)

There are people who make money designating spirit animals for other white people. Workshops! There are incessant Buzzfeed quizzes to pick spirit animals. Spirit animal, porn name, which Pokemon are you?

These spirit animals are like past lives – everyone was Cleopatra, never an illiterate wife-beating garlic farmer with a botched tattoo. Everyone’s spirit animal is cool like a wolf, eagle, buffalo, or otter, never a groundhog, skunk, or mudpuppy.

But check out Debbie Reese’s great post about spirit animals (Reese is tribally enrolled at Nambe Owingeh) on her blog about American Indians in children’s literature.

Reese writes about spirit animals, using the technical term “so freaking bogus.” She notes there are over 500 distinct Indian nations in the U.S. “Some of us have clans associated with animals but not all of us, and, frankly, I know a lot of Native people from a lot of different Native Nations, and nobody has ever said to me ‘my spirit animal is…’

“I think that ‘spirit animal’ thing is the White Man’s Indian.”

There are totem animals, power animals, animals that symbolize clans, etc. Probably there are Indians somewhere who have something like the White Man’s spirit animal, in which case that would be cultural appropriation. “Hi! I know your spiritual beliefs and I’ve adopted one I think is cool!” But mostly it’s like thinking all Indians wear Plains war bonnets.

“Are you Christian? That’s awesome. Christianity really speaks to me! I just chose my patron saint. I signed up for a workshop on snake handling and speaking in tongues. Do you like my wimple?”

If you really love the concept of a tie between you and some admirable animal species, there’s no need to go faux-Indian. Go science fiction and pick a Patronus. Or a daemon.

Or go to a furry convention. They won’t sneer and talk about appropriation. They will welcome you.

Also? Consider doing NaNoWriMo next November.