Does it make any sense to include an author's gender or race in the definition of a literary genre?

[Pedro]

I find it very odd when an author's gender or race is included in the definition of a literary genre, like for instance Amazon has a genre like

"African American > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense"

So I assume we also have Slavic Mystery, Portuguese Mystery, Eskimo Mystery and so on.

It's ridiculous.

[Sumiko]

The purpose of genre labels is solely to help the reader find something he or she has an interest in reading. There wouldn't be such a thing as gay fiction or black fiction if mainstream fiction regularly contained gay or black writers in leading roles. These types of genre labels are assigned by the book stores and distributors (like Amazon) in order to sell more books.

Of course there are Portuguese Mysteries! There are also Spanish soap operas.

[Sumiko]

Every writer wants to make it in the mainstream, but writers are often pigeonholed into genre categories such as those you mention due to the marketability factor.

[Pedro]

I know it serves a purpose. Still to me it's ridiculous.