@marinerofthestars​ asked:

I’m working on a series of fantasy books set on nine different worlds mirroring the Nine Realms of Norse cosmology, which are broadly inspired in terms of magic systems and themes by the Elder Futhark (the world with the rune for “justice” has a magic system that require you to abide by certain guidelines, the world with the rune for “death” has a magic system that lets you interact with spirits and the afterlife, and so forth). However, in terms of how these broad themes are expressed in individual worlds, as well as the minutiae of how magic systems operate, I plan to draw inspiration from various non-European sources, such as Hinduism, Māori culture, and Japanese Buddhism.

I’m going to do extensive research on these cultures beforehand to avoid handling these topics in a way that could be offensive to real-world minority groups (while Japanese people technically don’t exist in this universe, there are people on one world with similar cultural elements and physical features to Japanese people, and I’ll make sure to avoid writing them as characters from this ethnic groups as stereotypes) and I’m going to strictly avoid using specific elements from closed cultures. For instance, although one of my magic systems revolves around a series of focal points for energy throughout your body, these points aren’t called chakras, and they don’t have the same symbolism as chakras do in Hinduism. The only similarity is that there’s a network of energy nexuses in your body, but would even this similarity be acceptable for me to use? Or is even the broad concept without any of the specific elements forbidden to outsiders?

Also, I know that having a fantasy world inspired by elements of different cultures (ex: Avatar the Last Airbender) that portrays them respectfully is fine, but is doing the same thing with cultures that aren’t from the same geographic region (ex: merging aspects of Norse and Hindu magic) acceptable? I read an ask from 12/13 where you said having a Sikh protagonist fight Greek gods would make the story inherently Eurocentric, but I’m unsure whether the same standard applies here since I’m writing an original world inspired by IRL religion and magic rather than our world with those actual religious and magical systems. (Note that in the few instances where I do have POC protagonists interacting with more specific European-inspired supernatural entities, I do want to explicitly acknowledge how race and culture factors into things. For instance, one of my planned books has a character from a nation inspired by Bihar culture and Hinduism fighting European-inspired faeries, which is meant to parallel India’s history with colonialism.)

Is AtLA a Useful World-building Reference?

I should inform you that AtLA does not enjoy the unanimous acclaim here at WWC as assumed by many non-Asian writers. This post explains why. For the purposes of world-building with disparate cultures, I believe many of the problems described in the linked post will help you determine what world-building assumptions to avoid. Personally, as an Asian Buddhist who has done martial arts, I thought AtLA succeeded in its presentation of Chinese martial arts, but I didn’t find its portrayal of Buddhist philosophy or coding of Asian Buddhist cultures to be especially compelling.

- Marika

Christian Supremacy and Norse Mythology

I feel like it is very important to keep in mind that Norse mythology only exists in a Christianized form. We literally have no idea what pre-Christian Norse myths were, because it was only the Christians who wrote them down multiple hundreds of years after the Christianization of Scandinavia. 

As a result, a lot of myths were almost certainly shoehorned into being Biblical allegories of some sort. When you strip them down to their bare bones, you get a lot of Jesus stories. For example:

1. The old gods were painted as terrible people

2. The result of Ragnarok was the cleansing the earth of such old evils and replacing them with good, new gods.

3. Loki and Baldur as Jesus figures: Loki as the cleanser and Baldur as the perfectly good new head god.

There was a political agenda to writing this down — to unify all Viking-settled places under a single king, while appealing to their old heritage and new religious beliefs.

One does not need an advanced degree to see the inherent bias of this situation.

I’d suggest looking at any video Overly Sarcastic Productions has made on Norse mythology where Red yells very loudly about how we’ll never know what Norse mythology was like before the Norse became Christian, unless someone invents a time machine, because all the old oral records around what the myths used to be are long, long gone*. She has done videos on Loki and The Poetic Edda, along with a handful of others. The two I linked are the loudest on how Christianized and politically-motivated Norse mythology’s original written records were.

You can’t separate out Christianity from the Norse myths like you can with a lot of other ancient religions, because unlike those ancient religions, none of the original pagan traditions left records. There’s nothing pre-Christian to go back to. Thus, even if the setting is using Norse gods, the way those beliefs are structured is inextricably and irrevocably Christian.

Indirect Christian Colonialism

I bring up the above for an important reason: Norse mythology’s Christianization and Christian parallels mean that forcing other, non-Christian religions into a framework of what is, and always has been since its writing down, only a Christianized framework, is pagan-rebranded Christian colonialism.  By placing non-Christian beliefs within that framework, you reinforce Christian supremacy and recreate Christian colonialism.

This means the story doesn’t exactly play well with any culture that hasn’t been Christianized willingly. Which means it doesn’t play well with most cultures, especially religions that have experienced missionary trauma at the hands of Christians, like the Maori and most Indigenous peoples. You’re basically limited to Europe, some West African kingdoms like Ethiopia (so long as their historical Christianity isn’t too wildly different from European Christianity), as well as pockets of cultures dotted around the rest of the world with localized traditions that haven’t been soaked in blood in the past 200 years.

I would very strongly suggest reading the world-building tag as part of your research. Many concepts you’ve presented here are addressed in the pages of that tag, up to and including how far apart cultures have to be in order to safely influence each other (hint: it’s not very far, and is limited to direct trading partners/neighbours), and cautions against making Fae, an Indigenous-coded fantasy concept that comes from colonized cultures (Gaelic, primarily), as colonizers.

~Mod Lesya

*There’s some etymology breadcrumbs for Loki in particular, but they aren’t enough crumbs to know what the loaf used to be, just that it was probably made of this stuff.

Further Issues with Fae versus Hinduism as a Colonialism Allegory

Echoing Lesya, I think the biggest issue with your proposed conflict between fae and Hindu supernatural figures as an allegory for colonization is it doesn’t fit with what happened historically.

• Firstly, elements of Gaelic culture in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and other parts of Europe were either co-opted or quashed by Christian forces, much like how Muslim and Christian forces, respectively, tried to eliminate aspects of Hindu culture in South Asia from the Delhi Sultanate through the Mughal Empire through British and Portuguese colonization to Christian evangelical groups in the present day. I can sort of see the logic of West versus East as the basis for a colonization narrative, but given the above histories, it feels erroneous when neither mythology is based on a monotheist religion.

• Secondly, as Jaya has pointed out before (see here), conceptions of morality and capacity for morality differ for Hindu supernatural entities and the fae. The former play by the same rules as humans. The latter don’t. Colonization is an economic choice often backed by maximalist beliefs of superiority. I have difficulty believing creatures from two mythologies that don’t even view humans the same way would have any reasons to compete over resources. To that effect, here is an old post by me and Mod Lydie (see here) where we discuss why colonization is not often necessary to depict conflict between opposing groups in fantasy settings.

Concluding Thoughts

Overall, like Lesya, I anticipate problems in trying to adapt Norse cosmology to sources that are removed from each other. See this post on blending mythos successfully. You are better off coming back to us after you have done your initial research and have a sense of which mythologies work together and which don’t. As I’ve iterated before, WWC is better consulted towards the end of the research process rather than at the start as there are multiple ways one could go with this. You are telling us much of what you plan to do. I’d much rather hear your ideas when you are in a position to tell us what you have already done, how you’ve done it and why you made the choices you did.

- Marika.

@mistystarshine said:

I am considering writing a novel that takes place in a fantasy setting, and while I am content with most of my characters, there are two where I keep hitting a snag in regards to cultural context. They are a pair of step-sisters with parents who are hell bound to climb the social and economic ladder no matter the cost. They do genuinely care about each other, but are also very jealous of each other. The older sister wants to be a refined, pampered, and adored lady who is married off to a loving husband, but after inadvertently revealing herself to be a prodigy at taming (and later fighting) magical beasts, her parents milked her for all she was worth while she could still be considered a “child prodigy” before pressuring her into more or less joining a militia. (After all, they may have been the ones to push her in that direction, but having a daughter as rough and tumble as her around was unsightly.) She and her parents also happen to be playing a long-con in that while they are passing her off as a human with gifts that are normally seen in fae, she is actually a (even rarer, but also seen as highly distrustful) fae with the ability to lie. The younger sister is a normal human who is very beautiful and pretty dim on an intellectual level, but also incredibly emotionally intelligent. She does value knowledge (and admires how well her sister can memorize facts) and enjoys learning, but is a slow learner by traditional methods. She desperately wants to feel useful and like she is capable of making a difference in the world, but their parents only value her for her appearance, try to keep her from doing anything that might “jeopardize” it, and want her to marry into a nobleman and become a beautiful and obedient wife. She’s grown up being told that it doesn’t matter that she isn’t intelligent because girls like her don’t need to think, and really, it’s better if she stay quiet anyway. This has caused her to be skittish, distrusting, and even cynical despite her kind nature. It’s also given her a ton of self-esteem issues, made her deeply uncomfortable with her appearance, and adverse to comments regarding it. The sisters both want what the other has and feels a little resentful of the fact that /they/ don’t want it.

My question is this. I haven’t come up with physical designs yet and am thinking that I want them to have south asian characteristics. However, I’m not certain if the cultural context would fit well with the issues they face in regards to gender, expectations, and societal stereotypes. (I will note that I haven’t designed the in-universe cultures yet, since aside from some initial character concepts, I’m largely going to be writing by the seat of my pants. But I also figure that regardless of in-universe context, the audience will inevitably connect characters to real-world cultures and want to be sensitive and understanding in that regard.) How do I make sure it all clicks together, when I am largely only familiar with the experiences of American (primarily white) women in that regard? Or is this a situation where it would be better to just make them white rather than making them PoC and risk making a mistake?

(My apologies if this is a rubber stamp question. I don’t think so, but I’m not entirely sure either. But on the chance that it isn’t, I figured that in the time it would take me to ask if it’s a rubber stamp, I might as well go ahead and send it in. Do me a favor and message me if it does count as one, so I know for future reference?)

What Are “South Asian Characteristics”?

Thank you for taking the time to flesh out your story so thoroughly. I think this ask will benefit from you doing some more initial research as to what kind of background you want these characters to have. As I hope recent WWC posts on South Asia have made clear, South Asia is a very large, diverse place, so saying you plan to code your characters as physically South Asian doesn’t help us. Pick any human being on the planet. Now look at South Asia. You will probably find people who resemble that individual physically somewhere within the subcontinent. Similarly, from a cultural perspective, South Asia is very broad. It is home to over 1.5 billion people, 70 distinct ethnic groups, several hundred languages, and all major world religions. If this is not you have come across in your research, I would say your research is very much in the premature stage.

WWC has a great guide for describing skin tones and facial features of non-white individuals. If you have no South Asian cultural coding you wish to impart to these characters, I think your first order of business is deciding on the setting of your universe and what kind of world-building you wish to engage in. Don’t let the theoretical assumptions and biases of your readers trip you up. I look forward to hearing from you again after your world-building has progressed. There are many religions in South Asia with a wide variety of folklore involving otherworldly beings, but not all of them are can be viewed as equivalent to fae. Jaya has some great comments for you on Hindu-specific dimensions of cultural coding if you plan to use the fae in your story, which I think are important to keep in mind should you plan to culturally code your characters using any South Asian culture that draws on Hindu influences.

- Marika.

Cultural Dimensions: Fae versus Hinduism

I can say that we South Indian Hindus don’t necessarily have fae. (That hasn’t stopped me from adding them to some stories with Indian protagonists.) We have otherworldly beings like Gandharvas and apsaras. You may want to do more research if mixing the fae with Hindu mythology, assuming you’re going with that. 

To elaborate, the fae in European society have their own rules and codes of morality separate from ours. This is attributed to the fact that the Folk lack souls. Ergo, they lack the means to realize that a decision is morally wrong. That is why the Folk steal babies and replace them with mischievous changelings, or try to trick humans into eating Fairy food when the latter are visitors to mounds under the hill or fantastic castles. It’s all for entertainment, and laughs.

That doesn’t mean the fae are bad or will always harm people. You can ward them away by getting cold iron bars for your house, and holly for protection in the winter. Some Celtic folklore advises that you accept a fairy gift if you receive one, even if it’s feeding milk to your cows. Other lore says NEVER accept a gift, because you will be expected to do a great favor in turn. For the same reason, you don’t say “thank-you” or offer nice clothes to them, since it may insult them. Everyone agrees, however, that you never give your full name to the fae, because one of them will use it to lord power over you. 

In contrast, most magical beings in Hindu mythology abide by the same codes of honor and dharma. Everyone has a soul, thus the right to earn their way to either heaven, a good reincarnation, or nirvana. This means you can reason with them, and they are responsible for their actions. The asura and rakshasa demons have co-existed with the gods despite dethroning them a few times, while the humanoid monkeys say they’ll ally with the humans to fight important battles. Everyone agrees to a social contract where a king protects his people, the sages regardless of their shape pray for the common good, and you try not to be murderous or rude. Even if you are a tyrant, like Duryodhana or Ravana, you can still go to heaven if you’ve fulfilled your life duties, which is also called dharma, and remained honorable. Or if you are a bastard father like Hiranyakashipu, you may at least get purification in death if your son vouches for you and begs for your soul from the gods.  

Are there cases where the beings break this rule? Heck yes; there are always going to be a few demons, humans, and even a monkey or two that let the power trip get to their head. That’s when the gods intervene by sending a special human or reincarnation to handle the lack of honor. The new warrior restores the balance and gets rid of that dangerous bit of ego, usually by killing the would-be tyrant in question. 

The fair folk have none of this honor. If you put any being from Hindu mythology and a member of the Fair Folk in the same room, they would get into an argument of wills for hours. Few beings in Hindu mythology would steal a baby for laughs, and the fae would likely not understand the concept of sacred duty. Your story may not work for that reason so I’d advise figuring out how much Hindu mythology you want to add.

- Jaya 

reyourspleen asked:

So I’m writing a contemporary fantasy story. In this world, there’s a parallel plane where most of the fae/magical people live. We’re running with the idea that the US was never colonised by Britain, and therefore the Native American fae/spirits still run the area that would be considered the US on Earth. As I’m a white writer, I’m kind of worried (…petrified) about potentially doing something wrong. 

Would it be a good guideline to use a map like this as a basic outline of where to draw the areas of what fae control what areas?

Other than reading through the appropriate tags on this blog, and doing research, research, research - are there any potential issues I’m going to run into by doing this?

It might also be worth noting that this won’t be a large part of the story, it’s largely background information, but I like to have solid worldbuilding before moving ahead with making any references (and therefore having to retcon at a later point).

I can’t speak to the Native American aspect of the story, but I can comment on the worldbuilding. I don’t see why having a map would a bad idea. Many books, especially fantasy, tend to have maps in them so I don’t see why this wouldn’t be a good idea. Though, I don’t necessarily understand how that ties into your issue of using Native American fae/spirits in your story.

I think the main issue would be your world building and having a map doesn’t really solve the issue. I don’t think you can have Native American spirits and fae and not have Native American people in your story, so keep that in mind. You don’t want to fall into the Magical Indian trope by having all your Native American characters be the only ones with magic. You would need to research the different nations and their locations, their mythologies and legends, and then really do some deep thinking about what the United States would be like if it was never colonized by Britain. Was it never colonized at all or was it colonized by another group of people?  If you change a major part of history, you need to think of all the implications it could have on your current story. It might not be a huge part of your story, but it has to make logical sense in terms of your world. You might need to answer these questions first or just write some drafts as you go along and discover more of your world. Here’s the world building tag if you want more info. 

~Mod Najela

As Najela pointed out, Native Americans don’t have “fae”. There are spirits, yes, but they take on a much different form than what the Europeans think of as “fae”. If you want to respectfully do this, you should start by learning about Native American spirituality in specific detail and erase the Eurocentric ideals of what fae are.

The map doesn’t solve your issue for another reason. Native American spirituality cannot be broken down into strokes that broad. If you look at the creation myths of neighbouring tribes in one area you’ve selected— Ojibway and Huron, around the Great Lakes region— both call North America “turtle island” but have very different ways of how it got there. In the Ojibway, Muskrat is the animal that brought the earth up to create the world. In the Huron, Toad is the animal that brought up that earth. Both of these tribes would be in the “Eastern Woodlands” part of the map, but they would have different revered animals because of their creation story. Therefore you can’t say either spirit is the dominant spirit in the area. Turtle might be a possible “overreaching spirit”, but still, that’s dicey considering the star of the story (as I understand it) is the animal that brought up the earth.

Another thing that bothers me is how you’re equating modern borders where they don’t exist; many tribes were actually split up as colonialism happened (the Huron come to mind, seeing as there is a major US branch and a major Canadian branch, but there are dozens if not hundreds of others). Instead of thinking about “this is a US tribe”, think of the general geographic region and determine how it was pre-contact.

On the “changing parts of history” thing, Native populations aren’t static— the pre-contact regions could be much different. Now, this is not an excuse to go and merge everything together, but you should probably think at least a little for how borders and alliances have shifted. For example, the Huron and Iroquois alternated between being enemies and trading allies, just like alliances in Europe changed over history. Just because something used to be that way doesn’t mean it always will be.

Overall, this seems like there’s potential there, but you need to learn enough about specific indigenous peoples to get out of the Western approach to how the world works. You’re looking to apply certain concepts that don’t fit, and you need to treat Native spirituality on its own terms instead of finding the parallels to Europe in order to do this respectfully.

When in doubt, ask Natives.

~Mod Lesya