World-Building, Day Six

Day Six: Races.

(Note: the site I’ve been using seems to be down, but you can get a PDF with the exercises and more here.)

Spend 10 minutes figuring out what people who evolved in each major area of your world would look like. Then spend another 5 minutes asking “what if this group encountered that group?” Would they fight? Trade? Both? Inter-marry and blend their genetic types? Would they remain largely separate, with pure strains of both racial groups co-existing (not necessarily peacefully)? How would that encounter be brought about in the first place?

This one is harder. I have some perfectionist tendencies, and they are stronger in my writing life. They get even stronger when getting it wrong hurts people. In matters of race, I really want to get it Right. That’s really difficult when there is no agreed-upon right, but there are lots of wrongs.

I promise this is not and will not become a whine about how hard it is to be a white writer. 🙄

Flame and Ryahled are white (well, they’re not even human, but you know what I mean.) Anyone I put in the story, whatever their race, will be a secondary character. I don’t like that, but the (worse) alternative is to have no one of color in the stories.

Uh…no.

So, okay. Race.

Hmm. I could go with the “obvious” and just have dark-skinned people near the equator and shading lighter towards the poles, but uhh…Inuit. It doesn’t really hold true. The PDF talks about how a flatter, wider nose would benefit a human in high-temperature areas. I can see that exemplified by the indigenous peoples of Australia–but what about the Middle East? It gets pretty darn hot there, humans have lived there for a very long time, but the oft-seen majestic Arab nose (think Klinger on M*A*S*H) is not flat.

*wanders back from extreme violin videos* Oh, drat, this didn’t do itself while I was gone?

Okay, fine. Writer-person totally lied about the ten minutes, btw.

The good news is, I can totally cheat. That island/continent down at the bottom with Lyalira (I checked the document, and apparently at some point I made it easier to say and type) in the forest? Every human native to it is dark-skinned. The central plateau (that’s what the dark lines are about) is mostly not human-occupied, but there are some there.

In the desert will be handsome Arab-looking people. High up in the mountains around it, I’ll have Nepali-looking people. Those islands leading off the point, and to those two big islands? Those people have more in common with the mountain-living folks than anyone else.

Up around Synto, think Eastern Europe. (I have a thing for noses, what can I say?) That big arse-kicking boot over there? Think India’s natives.

Believe I’ll have me some Norse-type folk on that big long island. The ones from up north work hard to keep fed, but the ones from the south have time to maraud. (No, they don’t wear horned helmets. Neither did the Vikings, from what I hear.)

The population of this world is recovering from an Event that wiped out lots. So except for traders, there is not a lot of interaction between peoples. Most of the cultures will have some inter-marrying going on, but I’m sure some will be isolationist too. I’ll figure it out.

One problem with this world-building is that I take forever to get into it–then I don’t want to stop. But that’s enough for now, so I’m posting. 🙂