The Problem With Creating Cultures

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  • Опубликовано: 14 янв 2024
  • This is a topic I've wanted to talk about for a long time, but knew that doing so would be rather tricky:
    the idea of creating cultures, both human and humanoid in nature, and the issues that arise with this.
    Interview
    • George R.R. Martin on ...
    Music
    • 'Aurora' [Uplifting Am...
    • Civilization 4 Soundtr...
    • Doodle Let Me Go (Yall...
    • The Entertainer
    • SINO - Lets Get It (No...
    • 林英哲 / 海の豊饒(和太鼓アンサンブル) ...
    • Civilization V OST | T...
    • 'Electric Dreams' [Syn...
    • 'Shadows and Dust' [Ci...
    • Christopher Tin - Baba...
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Комментарии • 38

  • @Apollo9898LP
    @Apollo9898LP 4 месяца назад +24

    Having finished the video, gotta say it's really great stuff. A lot worthwhile to think about when creating cultures. Also your section talking about orcs really connected a lot of thoughts I've been having recently being in the middle of rereading the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. His orc replacement, the Urgles, are basically treated as inherently evil monsters during the first book, but then he spends the rest of the books attempting to show more nuance to their culture as the Urgles side with the heroes against the empire that was mind-controlling them during the events of the first book. But even in its attempts to humanize and add nuance to the Urgles, it still falls back on a lot of exoticizing tropes about warrior cultures and indigenous groups. It's a mixed back all around, but I think it's an interesting case study in how even when you try to create nuance if you're not careful you will just reinforce a different set of problematic tropes and cliches.

  • @concibar4267
    @concibar4267 4 месяца назад +8

    0:00 - Introduction
    1:35 - Coding vs Unrelatability (problem 1)
    4:57 - No Represantation vs Misrepresentation (problem 2)
    8:22 - Kitchen Sink vs Monoculture (problem 3)
    11:02 - Safety vs Allegory (problem 4)
    12:59 - Conclusion

  • @sleithsaerish7954
    @sleithsaerish7954 4 месяца назад +5

    Your videos always make me think and redo a lot of my worldbuilding, but in that case, this one helps to identify problems and difficulties in a very much already known obstacle. I try to ask descendants and representative of different cultures when writing, I try to never portray a culture as "alien" if it's formed of human rituals. In tabletop rpg, it's possible to talk about familiarity when witnessing a religious ceremony foreign to all my players, or insist on the weird alien way of this specie to engage with mundane activity; but in writing, it's incredibly difficult. I thank you for the thinking piece and for the four categories of mistake which does a nice check-list to keep in mind while creating.
    Thank you, the only thing I don't enjoy about your work is the delay between two great videos ^^

  • @anyalazor7978
    @anyalazor7978 4 месяца назад +3

    Im happy you're back and making videos again!
    As a disabled person i wanted to say that I'm ok with a fictional world having ableism but if it's clear that the author and the characters think that it's bad.

  • @katzekaiserin
    @katzekaiserin 4 месяца назад +3

    I'm struggling with this exact issue in my new setting! Great video

  • @Apollo9898LP
    @Apollo9898LP 4 месяца назад +3

    Yesss! New video from one of my favorite channels

  • @theskeletonposse6432
    @theskeletonposse6432 4 месяца назад +6

    wake up honey, another banger just dropped

  • @mirien7277
    @mirien7277 4 месяца назад +3

    You're back!

  • @Sajuuk
    @Sajuuk 4 месяца назад +1

    Good to see you back again making videos 👍

  • @ryanratchford2530
    @ryanratchford2530 4 месяца назад +4

    I’m really interested in world Philosohy and religion and history so I have fairly strong coding because I like to explore different culture’s philosophies and practices. So I think about how to best handle this a lot.
    I decided to have all Earth coded cultures as humans with the ability for metamorphosis as part of the magic system.
    So I still have rock people and cat people but they are like the top 1% of most powerful mages. But usually creating a stereotype for their entire culture because they are the most recognisable & influential people in power so come to be symbolic and often seen as lessor gods.
    Examples I took are like the animal nature of Egyptian gods and the multi-armed and divine skin colour of Hindu gods.

  • @cheesypoohalo
    @cheesypoohalo 4 месяца назад +7

    This started interesting, but I felt like it didn't really go anywhere. I'd love to see a follow-up video where you discuss how best to introduce fantasy cultures in a story and give examples of when this has been done well. You've established what not to do, but criticism is always easier than creation; some clear-cut examples of how to do it well would be great to see.

    • @worldsunreal2046
      @worldsunreal2046  4 месяца назад +6

      Totally fair. Unfortunately I'm simply not the best person to provide a "solution" to what I've outlined. What I present are a set of dilemmas more than anything, some of which I've never actually escaped in my own worldbuilding.

    • @cheesypoohalo
      @cheesypoohalo 4 месяца назад +3

      @@worldsunreal2046 And that's something I really wish you emphasised in the video- if you scrutinise hard enough, everything is a problem, and if you aim to avoid being problematic when writing other cultures... you simply won't get any writing done lol
      imo I find it best to not overthink it- be respectful in your portrayal, but don't overthink it to the point of writing paralysis.
      The worst example of this imo is when works of media try to portray a large diverse cast, yet feel forced to portray all the characters as perfect examples of their culture with no negative character traits. This leaves the world having so little conflict to draw on because everyone is so perfect.
      Even basic negative traits, like having an alcoholic character, are avoided. 'We can't make the only Italian in the cast an alcoholic because people will think we're saying ALL Italian's are alcohlics', and so on applied to everyone until every character is boring, except the white male who becomes the antagonist.
      Of course, this issue is avoided with the more characters you introduce, so something like Avatar TLAB fairs better when it shows an entire nation and its people, as opposed to stories that take the 'small cast of characters from all over the world working together' idea; which is a shame because it makes it feel like having a diverse cast often leads to bland writing, which I think is only true if you overthink things and worry a lot about how the audience will judge you.

  • @KipIngram
    @KipIngram 4 месяца назад +3

    I think there's more to it than Martin implies. Many of these stories are set in times without the massive mobility that we enjoy in the world today. Mobility leads to cultures that have representation from across the globe. But generally speaking in the past the people who lived in an area were the children of people who had lived there, who were themselves children of people who had lived there, etc. People just didn't mix geographically in the past to the extent that they do today. So if you want to include a diversity of people in your story, you have to either just "toss them in there without explanation," or "come up with some elaborate explanation." Neither of those things necessarily enhances the story.

    • @legitimatemedicine
      @legitimatemedicine 3 месяца назад +1

      That's a common misconception. Yes, travel took longer and most people lived in the same house as their parents and grandparents, but there have *always* been nomadic people, travelers, refugees, merchants, etc. Especially in any city of regionally large size and its surrounding areas. There were vikings and norse settlers in not just the British Isles, but also in the Al-Andulus controlled Iberian Peninsula, North Africa, Asia Minor, etc. Peoples from the Indian Subcontinent traveled all the way up to Italy and Korea. There were peoples from what is now New England who lived and traveled from there to Oregon and Mexico. Humans have never been completely sedentary, there has always been culture mixing, nomadic populations, and displaced groups.

    • @KipIngram
      @KipIngram 3 месяца назад +1

      @@legitimatemedicine Ok, I guess I could see having a small number of people from other regions in special situations - but it still wouldn't have been like the much more thorough mix that we have in our culture today. Basically these days you find "people from everywhere in all walks of life." Certainly I think that in olden times people from afar would have seemed much more "novel" than we feel today.

  • @LoneCloudHopper
    @LoneCloudHopper 4 месяца назад +1

    Great video. Please make more.

  • @nicecockawesomeballs7805
    @nicecockawesomeballs7805 4 месяца назад +3

    "settings being racist or offensive"
    >shows warhammer clip
    XD

  • @wangyiuwong1958
    @wangyiuwong1958 4 месяца назад +1

    Amazing. Could you please provide the names of films you've referenced in the video.

  • @shzarmai
    @shzarmai 3 дня назад +1

    Good video

  • @danne8797
    @danne8797 4 месяца назад +2

    Excellent video on a subject that isn't covered enough!
    PS. What's the movie this clip 12:00 is from?

    • @worldsunreal2046
      @worldsunreal2046  4 месяца назад +1

      Rainbow Wars! An expo 86 short film. ruclips.net/video/_z8KwGMncog/видео.html

  • @Gromace
    @Gromace 4 месяца назад

    Great Video! Definitely gave form to some feelings ive had about popular media. Also what is that footage from 4:00-4:25 from? looks really interesting.

    • @worldsunreal2046
      @worldsunreal2046  4 месяца назад

      Alien Worlds, its a little documentary series www.netflix.com/ca/title/80221410

  • @jackf41
    @jackf41 4 месяца назад

    Woah you’re back. Welcome back! I really liked you fantasy map video, but I thought you quit RUclips for good

  • @shzarmai
    @shzarmai 28 дней назад +1

    please talk about Indigenism in Scifi in a future video

  • @worldsunreal2046
    @worldsunreal2046  4 месяца назад +1

    A lot of the criticisms of the video's arguments are very similar, mainly coming from the view that symbolism only exists where the author intends it, and any other reading into fantasy/scifi world for representation/coding are "incorrect". I will respond by saying that unintended effects on audiences matter just as much as authorial intent. Is the audience reading into it wrong, or did the author construct their message poorly? As an author, its your job to provide as much clarity as possible, and you cannot simply blame the audience for reading something "incorrectly" whenever it doesn't have the effect you intended. As an example, The film Starship Troopers is a satire of militarism, but was interpreted by many viewers as being a sincere pro-war film. People will see real life problems/conflicts in fantasy stories, whether the author intended it or not, and if it weren't possible to see these kinds of themes within a story/world, then it probably isn't worth consuming.

  • @ARGhostie
    @ARGhostie 4 месяца назад +1

    Amazing video! what's the film/etc shown at 8:55?

  • @brandonmoisesblandonflores1483
    @brandonmoisesblandonflores1483 4 месяца назад

    I do not see the issue with the groups painted with wide brushstrokes
    Say your characters fight an army of a certain race, just as people in reality, from their perspective they are evil, and if you don't want that, simply make a different perspective or leave it at that, your characters wouldn't change their perspective unless shown first hand of something contrasting, but the audience would
    Both are fine ways to present a conflict

  • @Ethereal311
    @Ethereal311 4 месяца назад +1

    "Worldbuilding is inherently political"
    Yeah, how about someone try to make a World where suddenly 30% of the world's calories and a sizeable portion of the world's manastones get cut off? I wonder how a Fantasy world would handle that (because that's what Ukraine is about).

  • @memyselfishness
    @memyselfishness 4 месяца назад

    I think your background music is tuned a bit too loud and distracting.

  • @michaelbirdwell7985
    @michaelbirdwell7985 4 месяца назад +1

    This is nonsense. These issues you’re discussing would be problems in historical fiction. Maybe. They’re definitely not relevant to fantasy or sci-fi. If YOU find these things problematic, it’s YOUR mind that’s making the connection between fictional races/cultures and real ones.
    Orcs, for example, are orcs, which is to say they are not real. It is absurd to connect any creator’s orcs to a real world culture and then be upset at the “representation.” In that case, YOU are the one creating such “representation,” not the creator. Stop it. Problem solved.
    Also, you should understand that inspiration and representation are not the same thing. Y’all like to conflate different things as if they’re the same and then get upset about them being the same. But they were only ever the same in your own mind. Ridiculous.

    • @worldsunreal2046
      @worldsunreal2046  4 месяца назад +2

      The ways in which people are inspired by other's cultures IS what is representational about worldbuilding and other artforms. People are often inspired by perceived otherness, and it is this artistic inspiration that leads to misrepresentation. I would take a look at the Orientalist art tradition to get a sense of what I'm talking about. And as for Orcs... Orcs are never JUST orcs :)

    • @michaelbirdwell7985
      @michaelbirdwell7985 4 месяца назад +1

      @@worldsunreal2046 I know what you’re talking about, and it’s wrongheaded in my view. Inspiration and representation are not the same thing. It’s not useful, in a real sense, to conflate the two. Maybe your orcs are never just orcs, but most people recognize the difference between a fictional culture or species, even one that’s heavily influenced by a real-world culture or species, and an actual representation of that real-world culture or species. If the author/creator hasn’t made that connection explicit, it’s all in your head. It’s your interpretation that’s problematic.
      If I present my Orcs as bloodthirsty raiders concerned primarily with loot and personal glory, then which is it: they are just Orcs whose culture works this way, or they are a harmful misrepresentation of some real world culture? The answer is, they’re just Orcs. That’s true even if they’re inspired, in my own mind, by the popular stereotype of Vikings/norsemen. They cannot be a misrepresentation because I have not represented the Orcs as anything other than Orcs.
      And that’s true even for me in this example. I know they’re not supposed to represent norsemen, they just have some stereotyped cultural hooks in common. They’re just Orcs. If a player (or reader or what have you) thinks that my Orcs represent real norsemen, that’s his or her own issue. Because I’m the author, and if I wanted to use Norsemen I could have chosen to do that. But I chose a fictional species.
      At its core, the problem with your assertion is that I can’t misrepresent something that I haven’t represented in the first place. That would be like misspeaking while remaining silent. It’s nonsense.

  • @bigdawgceg1879
    @bigdawgceg1879 4 месяца назад

    The whole point of fantasy or science fiction is to not be real life. You, as the reader/viewer, are putting your biases on what you are reading/viewing. You can read a book and completely misinterpret what the author is trying to convey due to your perception. Take an Orc, for example. You hear all the time they are representative of black people and their culture. Which i find strange because to me, they are representative of Neanderthals. As writers, we take inspiration from around us and make it our own. If we are worried about hurting people's feelings or offending someone. We'd never write anything but biographies. Just because you think Tolkiens Haradrim are based on the Indian culture doesn't make it so. Lots of cultures rode elephants. Theres multiple cultures within India itself. Just like not all horse archers are Mongolian. Native Americans were avid horse archers. Stop trying to put real life issues into fantasy or science fiction. They are not reality nor should they be. They are an escape from reality and all the political false victim hood.

  • @hexcrawler
    @hexcrawler 4 месяца назад

    2 min in and this video is woke cringe