#cultural diversity speakers

[languagexs]

Afghanistan Farsi Language: Exploring Dari and LanguageXS Solutions

Dari in Afghanistan: Unraveling the Tapestry of Afghan Persian In the heart of Central Asia lies Afghanistan, a land where ancient traditions and modern realities intertwine, and where language serves as both a mirror and a map of the nation’s rich cultural landscape. At the center of this linguistic mosaic is Dari, one of the two official languages of Afghanistan alongside Pashto. This article…

[writingwithcolor]

Naming International POC Characters: Do Your Research.

This post is part of a double feature for the same ask. First check out Mod Colette's answer to OP's original question at: A Careful Balance: Portraying a Black Character's Relationship with their Hair. Below are notes on character naming from Mod Rina.

~ ~ ~

@writingraccoon said:

My character is black in a dungeons and dragons-like fantasy world. His name is Kazuki Haile (pronounced hay-lee), and his mother is this world's equivalent of Japanese, which is where his first name is from, while his father is this world's equivalent of Ethiopian, which is where his last name is from. He looks much more like his father, and has hair type 4a. [...]

Hold on a sec.

Haile (pronounced hay-lee), [...] [H]is father is this world’s equivalent of Ethiopian, which is where his last name is from. 

OP, where did you get this name? Behindthename.com, perhaps?

Note how it says, “Submitted names are contributed by users of this website. Check marks indicate the level to which a name has been verified.” Do you see any check marks, OP? 

What language is this, by the way? If we only count official languages, Ethiopia has 5: Afar, Amharic, Oromo, Somali, & Tigrinya. If we count everything native to that region? Over 90 languages. And I haven't even mentioned the dormant/extinct ones. Do you know which language this name comes from? Have you determined Kazuki’s father’s ethnic group, religion, and language(s)? Do you know just how ethnically diverse Ethiopia is? 

~ ~ ~

To All Looking for Character Names on the Internet:

Skip the name aggregators and baby name lists. They often do not cite their sources, even if they’re pulling from credible ones, and often copy each other. 

If you still wish to use a name website, find a second source that isn’t a name website. 

Find at least one real life individual, living or dead, who has this given name or surname. Try Wikipedia’s lists of notable individuals under "List of [ethnicity] people." You can even try searching Facebook! Pay attention to when these people were born for chronological accuracy/believability. 

Make sure you know the language the name comes from, and the ethnicity/culture/religion it’s associated with. 

Make sure you understand the naming practices of that culture—how many names, where they come from, name order, and other conventions. 

Make sure you have the correct pronunciation of the name. Don’t always trust Wikipedia or American pronunciation guides on Youtube. Try to find a native speaker or language lesson source, or review the phonology & orthography and parse out the string one phoneme at a time. 

Suggestions for web sources:

Wikipedia! Look for: “List of [language] [masculine/feminine] given names,” “List of most common [language] family names,” “List of most common surnames in [continent],” and "List of [ethnicity] people."  

Census data! Harder to find due to language barriers & what governments make public, but these can really nail period accuracy. This may sound obvious, but look at the year of the character's birth, not the year your story takes place. 

Forums and Reddit. No really. Multicultural couples and expats will often ask around for what to name their children. There’s also r/namenerds, where so many folks have shared names in their language that they now have “International Name Threads.” These are all great first-hand sources for name connotations—what’s trendy vs. old-fashioned, preppy vs. nerdy, or classic vs. overused vs. obscure. 

~ ~ ~

Luckily for OP, I got very curious and did some research. More on Ethiopian & Eritrean naming, plus mixed/intercultural naming and my recommendations for this character, under the cut. It's really interesting, I promise!

Ethiopian and Eritrean Naming Practices

Haile (IPA: /həjlə/ roughly “hy-luh.” Both a & e are /ə/, a central “uh” sound) is a phrase meaning “power of” in Ge’ez, sometimes known as Classical Ethiopic, which is an extinct/dormant Semitic language that is now used as a liturgical language in Ethiopian churches (think of how Latin & Sanskrit are used today). So it's a religious name, and was likely popularized by the regnal name of the last emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie (“Power of the Trinity”). Ironically, for these reasons it is about as nationalistically “Ethiopian” as a name can get.

Haile is one of the most common “surnames” ever in Ethiopia and Eritrea. Why was that in quotes? Because Ethiopians and Eritreans don’t have surnames. Historically, when they needed to distinguish themselves from others with the same given name, they affixed their father’s given name, and then sometimes their grandfather’s. In modern Ethiopia and Eritrea, their given name is followed by a parent’s (usually father’s) name. First-generation diaspora abroad may solidify this name into a legal “surname” which is then consistently passed down to subsequent generations.

Intercultural Marriages and Naming

This means that Kazuki’s parents will have to figure out if there will be a “surname” going forward, and who it applies to. Your easiest and most likely option is that Kazuki’s dad would have chosen to make his second name (Kazuki’s grandpa’s name) the legal “surname.” The mom would have taken this name upon marriage, and Kazuki would inherit it also. Either moving abroad or the circumstances of the intercultural marriage would have motivated this. Thus “Haile” would be grandpa’s name, and Kazuki wouldn’t be taking his “surname” from his dad. This prevents the mom & Kazuki from having different “surnames.” But you will have to understand and explain where the names came from and the decisions dad made to get there. Otherwise, this will ring culturally hollow and indicate a lack of research.

Typically intercultural parents try to

come up with a first name that is pronounceable in both languages,

go with a name that is the dominant language of where they live, or

compromise and pick one parent’s language, depending on the circumstances.

Option 1 and possibly 3 requires figuring out which language is the father’s first language. Unfortunately, because of the aforementioned national ubiquity of Haile, you will have to start from scratch here and figure out his ethnic group, religion (most are Ethiopian Orthodox and some Sunni Muslim), and language(s). 

But then again, writing these characters knowledgeably and respectfully also requires figuring out that information anyway.

~ ~ ~

Names and naming practices are so, so diverse. Do research into the culture and language before picking a name, and never go with only one source.

~ Mod Rina

[useless-catalanfacts]

Sweden saying they'll vote against allowing the use of Catalan, Basque and Galician in the European Union Parliament because "there's lots of minority languages and we can't allow them all" is so funny because CATALAN HAS MORE SPEAKERS THAN SWEDISH

Catalan is the 13th most spoken language in the EU. It has more than 10 million speakers, which means it has more speakers than other languages that are already official EU languages like Maltese (530,000), Estonian (1.2 million), Latvian (1.5 million), Irish (1.6 million), Slovene (2.5 million), Lithuanian (3 million), Slovak (5 million), Finnish (5.8 million), Danish (6 million), Swedish (10 million), and Bulgarian (10 million).

Neither Galician (3 million) nor Basque (750,000) would still be the least spoken languages to be allowed in the EU representative bodies.

But even if any of them did, so what? Why do speakers of smaller languages deserve less rights than those of bigger languages? How are we supposed to feel represented by the EU Parliament when our representatives aren't even allowed to speak our language, but the dominant groups can speak theirs?

It all comes down to the hatred of language/cultural diversity and the belief that it's an inconvenience, that only the languages of independent countries have any kind of value while the rest should be killed off. After all, isn't that what Sweden has been trying to do to the indigenous Sami people for centuries?

[theverticalwoman]

https://www.midnightnotebook.com

[elbiotipo]

I'm not a linguist and I find the whole excercise of conlanging, while I love it and respect it, beyond my abilities, but I do have one thing or two to say about linguistic diversity and how boring is to have a "common" or "basic" language in fantasy or science fiction without exploring the implications.

Being a bilingual speaker of Spanish and English, and someone that because of work reasons and entertaiment tastes interacts a lot with English, I tend to see English as the equivalent of those "common" or "basic" languages of speculative fantasy. As a useful tool for communication, science technology and commerce. In real life, however, as you are aware, the expansion of English tends to undermine local languages, it's considered more valuable to know English that to know the language of your grandparents, or learn any other language you just feel curious about.

The experiences of every multilingual person are different, but in mine I know English, I write and read and listen to English a lot. But I don't consider myself an English *speaker*, I speak Spanish and more to the point Argentine Spanish, that's the culture I identify with, and it's the language I use to express my feelings and inner thoughts. I can't imagine saying "I love you" to anyone in English, to me it's just a tool I use to access to knowledge or communicate through language barriers ("basic", "common"). But interestingly, by both writing and participating in the wider English-speaker internet culture, isn't it part of my own culture, as an individual, too?

The fact is that English also has a culture(s) and a history and a corpus of literature. So when we write about "Common" or "Basic" languages in fiction we need to ask ourselves: where did they come from? How did they become the standard? Is there a literature, a canon, a culture of "Common" in your fantasy world? What about other languages, other cultures that aren't raised learning it and see it just as a tool? Because no matter the strenght of Anglophone cultural imperialism and the social value of learning English, I don't see Argentines, or for that matter Chinese, Italians or Russians abandoning their first language. And yet even in English and in all other languages (ESPECIALLY other languages, English is remarkably uniform) there is a variety of dialects. And we need to remember, once Latin was spoken only in a village in central Italy, and English in a rather remote rainy island. They weren't destined to have their future roles, history drives language.

So, when an author goes for the "universal language" explanation to avoid linguistic misunderstandings, for me, it raises more questions that I believe are worth exploring.

[bookshelfdreams]

Favourite german colloquialisms and idioms

Ein Freund zum Pferdestehlen (lit: a friend to steal horses with) A reliable, loyal, and trustworthy friend, someone you can depend on 100%

Mit jemandem ein Hühnchen zu rupfen haben (lit: to have a chicken to pluck with someone) to have an unfinished argument/dispute/disagreement with someone that one will finish as soon as they see the person again, who will then probably "experience their blue miracle" (sein/ihr blaues Wunder erleben): get their ass handed to them.

Die Sau rauslassen (lit: to let the sow loose) To throw down at a party

Sows are generally an intensifier. Either in wie Sau (as fuck), the adverb saumäßig, or just add the prefix sau- to an adjective of your choice.

Auf dem Teppich bleiben (lit: to stay on the carpet) to quit being overdramatic, to stay grounded in reality and not let emotions take over a debate. Same meaning: Die Kirche im Dorf lassen (lit: to leave the church in the village)

Das geflügelte Wort (lit: the winged word) Figure of speech, idiom

Sich etwas ans Bein binden (lit: to tie something to one’s leg) To burden oneself with something that’s more trouble than it’s worth

Das Leben ist kein Ponyhof (lit: life is no pony farm) Life isn’t all sunshine and rainbows

Jemandem den Marsch blasen (lit: to blow the march for someone) to scold someone very harshly. Also: jemandem die Meinung geigen (to play someone one’s opinion on the violin), jemanden anscheißen (to shit on someone)

Auch ein blindes Huhn findet mal ein Korn (lit: even a blind chicken  sometimes finds a seed) A stopped clock is right twice a day

Backfisch (m.) (lit: baked fish) teenage girl; this one's a bit old-fashioned

Nicht alle Tassen im Schrank haben (lit: to miss some cups from the cupboard) To be crazy, insane, idiotic. The things people can miss to express this sentiment are quite diverse (and this is something people really like to get creative with): needles from the fir tree, battens from the fence, lightbulbs from the chandelier, cookies from the jar…

Die Radieschen von unten ansehen (lit: to view radishes from below) To be dead. Variations exist with almost any plant imaginable, most notably tulips and grass

Was die Sonne nicht heilt, deckt die Erde zu (lit: what the sun can’t heal, the earth shall cover) This health problem will either resolve itself or the speaker will die from it, in any case it will be over eventually

Da warst du noch Quark im Schaufenster (lit: Back then you were curd in the shop window) Back then, you weren’t even conceived

Eine (neue) Sau durchs Dorf treiben (lit: to drive a (new) sow through the village) to manufacture short-lived public outrage that will soon be replaced by a new scandal

Hanswurst (m) (lit: Hans Sausage) a ridiculous, funny person, fool, clown (but not an actual clown from the circus)

Man hat schon Pferde (vor der Apotheke) kotzen sehen (lit: horses have been seen vomiting (in front of the pharmacy)) stranger things have happened

wilde Ehe (lit: wild marriage) to live together/have a family together without being actually married

Bauernfänger (m.) (lit: farmer catcher) Conman. Not to be confused with:

Rattenfänger (m.) (lit: rat catcher) political agitator, demagogue

Noch feucht hinter den Ohren sein (lit: to be still wet behind the ears) to be inexperienced/a newbie

Du hast wohl den Schuss nicht gehört (lit: Have you not heard the shot?) Are you out of your fucking mind?

Da sind Hopfen und Malz verloren (lit: hops and malt are lost here) A hopeless case

Völkerverständigung (f.) (lit: understanding between peoples/nations) Getting to know people from other nations, making an effort to understand their culture and showing them yours in turn. The building of international relationships based on mutual respect and equality. Diplomacy. Also: Völkerfreundschaft (friendship between peoples/nations)

Sich den Arsch aufreißen (lit: to rip one’s ass open) to work very hard

Es ist noch kein Meister vom Himmel gefallen (lit: no master has fallen from the sky yet) nobody is born an expert; keep trying and you’ll get there!

Mach mal die Augen zu, dann siehst du was deine ist (lit: close your eyes then you’ll see what’s yours) I heard this a lot as a child and now I never feel entitled to anything, ever

Da geht mir das Messer in der Tasche auf (lit: this opens the knife in my pocket) I think this is infuriating and I’m about to figuratively stab you (loads of expressions for this sentiment but this is my fave)

Kinderstube (f) (lit: children’s chamber) upbringing, education. Someone who doesn’t have Kinderstube has no manners

Waisenknabe / Chorknabe (m) (lit: orphan boy / choir boy) someone who is innocent, virtuous, well-behaved and an all-around lovely person. Often used ironically.

Maulaffen feilhalten (lit: to sell mouth monkeys) to stand around gaping with your mouth open instead of doing something useful

Ach du grüne Neune/liebes Lieschen (lit: oh you green nine/dear Lieschen) oh my!

Käseblatt (n) (lit: cheese sheet) a newspaper of very poor journalistic quality

Jemandem ein X für ein U vormachen (lit: to try to sell an X as a U) To scam or trick someone. Same meaning: Jemanden über den Tisch ziehen (to drag someone over the table). Not to be confused with:

Jemanden/etwas durch den Kakao ziehen - (lit: to drag someone/something through the cocoa) To make fun of or parody someone/something

Steckenpferd (m.) (lit: stick horse) hobby

Da will man nicht tot überm Zaun hängen (lit:  where one doesn’t want to hang dead over the fence) Just to make sure you know exactly how awful this town/village and its inhabitants are

Schnapsidee (f) (lit: schnapps idea) an idea that only a very drunk person would conceive of or consider good

Held im Erdbeerfeld (lit: hero in the strawberry field) Someone who sees themself as a great hero without any real skills/achievements to back this up

Leben wie Gott in Frankreich (lit: to live like God in France) to live the high life

[go-learn-esperanto]

You know what would be cool? If the Trafficblr community organised a little event or zine where people only wrote in a language that isn't English. It could be your mother tongue or not, I think multilingual native English speakers would be cool too.

It would be a lovely way to promote the diversity of languages and cultures.

[mapsontheweb]

Indoeuropean languages in Europe

Historical Roots: The Indo-European language family is believed to have originated in the Eurasian Steppe around 4000-2500 BCE. From there, groups of speakers migrated to various parts of Europe, contributing to the linguistic diversity of the continent.

by hunmapper

Language Diversification: Indo-European languages in Europe have evolved into numerous branches and sub-branches. Some of the major branches include:

Romance Languages: Descendants of Latin, including French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Romanian.

Germanic Languages: Including English, German, Dutch, Swedish, and others. Slavic Languages: Such as Russian, Polish, Czech, and Bulgarian. Celtic Languages: Including Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Welsh. Hellenic Languages: Mainly Greek. Baltic Languages: Such as Lithuanian and Latvian. Indo-Iranian Languages: Including Hindi, Bengali, and Persian. Cultural Significance: Indo-European languages have played a pivotal role in shaping European culture, history, and literature. Greek and Latin, for instance, have had a profound influence on science, philosophy, and the development of the Roman Empire.

Language Revival: Some Indo-European languages in Europe, such as Irish and Welsh, have experienced language revival efforts in recent decades. These efforts aim to preserve and revitalize languages that were declining in usage.

Language Contact: Due to centuries of contact and migration, many Indo-European languages have borrowed words and phrases from each other. This phenomenon, known as linguistic borrowing, has enriched the vocabulary and expressions of these languages.

[whencyclopedia]

Romani

Romani is an umbrella term used to describe a diverse ethnolinguistic group of people with a historical presence in Europe and West Asia. The historically common term 'Gypsy' is based on the myth that they came from Egypt. In reality, the ancestors of the Romani migrated out of India in the 1st millennium CE.

During the European colonization of the New World, the first Romani arrived in the Americas as a result of slavery or deportation by European colonial powers. Romani immigrants began to voluntarily settle in North and South America in the 19th century. In the present, Romani communities are found throughout the world. Romani people share language and certain cultural similarities but encompass a wide range of social, cultural, and ethnic diversity.

Names & Identity

For most of history, there was no universal name for the Romani in their own language; different groups of Romani speakers and their descendants used different names for themselves and each other. The closest thing to an endonym in the Romani language is the word Rom/Romni, meaning a man or woman. In the present day, 'Romani' and 'Roma' are the most widely accepted umbrella terms for groups who speak or historically spoke Romani and have a common origin in the Indian subcontinent.

However, the Romani label is a modern invention intended to make it easier to discuss the overlapping history and experience of these groups and was not used this way prior to the 20th century. For most of history, there was no unified Romani identity or nation. The label is applied by historians to more conveniently refer to a number of communities which shared language and some cultural habits, but it should not be taken to mean that these groups were unified or homogenous. Contrary to the stereotype of Romani keeping themselves separate from society at large, European Romani were intimately connected to their neighbours and possessed a flexible cultural identity.

Different groups of Romani speakers have historically used their own endonyms. 'Roma' is widely used among Romani originating in Central and Eastern Europe. The Finnish Kaale and the Calé of the Iberian peninsula use names derived from kalo (meaning "black" in Romani). Other notable peoples include the Sinti of northwestern Europe, the Manouche of France and Belgium, and the Romanichal found in English-speaking countries. Many Romani clans and subgroups have been known by their historical professions, such as the Kalderash (lit. "coppersmiths").

Several names have been given to the Romani by outsiders, often based on misconceptions about them. The English word 'Gypsy' comes from the myth that the Romani originated in Egypt. Over time, it came to be used broadly for many nomadic or semi-nomadic groups in Eurasia. In the modern day, the term 'Gypsy' is often considered offensive, although it is used by some Romani. Gypsy is often used academically as an umbrella term to include both Romani and other nomadic peoples historically labeled 'Gypsies.'

Numerous European languages use words derived from the Greek word Atsingani or Athingani to describe Romani, such as the French Tzigane or Portuguese Cigano. The original Greek likely derives from Athinganoi, the name of a heretical Christian sect in the Byzantine Empire, and may have been applied to the Romani due to their foreign religious practices or association with fortune-telling.

The history of the Romani is intertwined with that of other minority groups, particularly nomadic peoples of Europe and the Middle East. The Lom of Armenia and the Dom found throughout North Africa and the Middle East share commonalities with Romani and likely share an Indian origin. The Romani, Domari, and Lomavren languages are thought to have originated from the same group of Central Indian languages. The term Gypsy has historically also been applied to other European nomadic peoples such as Irish Travellers and the Yenish of Western Europe, who have different origins than the Romani.

Continue reading...

[languagexs]

Translate English to Afrikaans Translation: Instant Online Translators

Unlock the Power of English to Afrikaans Translation: A Gateway to South African Culture Delving into the rich tapestry of Afrikaans, one of South Africa’s official languages, is an exhilarating journey that unveils a world of cultural diversity and linguistic nuances. This comprehensive article serves as a guide to mastering the art of English to Afrikaans translation, empowering you to bridge…

[pass1mian]

Not to say anything, but as a transmasc queer POC, seeing ppl claim that "Buying Black Myth: Wukong inherently makes u a misogynist" is not only very stupid, but I also realized something abt this:

Most of the people claiming this are not only white, but when actual chinese people talk about how this is not sexism or anything like that and most of the claims it is are based on erroneous translations from westerners, they just, silence them.

There's a lot of medias with these same issues, with ACTUAL RELIABLE PROOF, from Japanese or American medias, yet nobody says these kinds of shit abt them and let's them pass. Oh, but when it's a Chinese media, made by a Chinese developer that is specially directed towards Chinese people, it is BAD, IRREDEEMABLE and YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED FOR LIKING IT

Things being lost in translation is a real thing that happens, and it can specially happen when u take the word from someone who is not a native speaker of that language. They can easily twist the meaning of languages to their liking and people will just take their word.

I also wanna talk about how you all are telling a Chinese developer to modify a classic and very popular story of THEIR OWN CULTURE for ur liking, I 100% agree that diversity in media is important, but the story of Wukong & Journey to the West in general is a classical Chinese story that has been there for CENTURIES, It comes from ancient China, OF COURSE MOST IF NOT ALL CHARACTERS ARE GOING TO BE CHINESE.

You just hate Chinese people and IT SHOWS

[writingwithcolor]

Not all Second-Language Speakers are Made Equal.

@waltzshouldbewriting asked:

Hello! I’m writing a story that features a character who’s first language is not English. He’s East African, specifically from Nairobi, Kenya, and is pretty fluent in English but it’s not his primary language, and he grew up speaking Swahili first. I’m struggling to figure out if it’s appropriate or in character to show him forgetting English words or grammar. From what I’ve researched, English is commonly spoken in Nairobi, but it wouldn’t be what was most spoken in his home. For context, this is an action/superhero type story, so he (and other characters) are often getting tired, stressed, and emotional. He also speaks more than two languages, so it makes sense to me that it would be easier to get confused, especially in a language that wasn’t his first. But I’m worried about ending up into stereotypes or tropes. For additional context: I’m monolingual, I’ve tried to learn a second language and it’s hard. A lot of how I’m approaching this comes from my own challenges correctly speaking my own, first and only language.

Diversity in Second-Language English

You seem to have an underlying assumption that second language acquisition happens the same for everyone. 

The way your character speaks English depends on so many unknown factors: 

Where does your story take place? You mention other characters; are they also Kenyan, or are they all from different countries?

Assuming the setting is not Kenya, is English the dominant language of your setting? 

How long has your character lived in Kenya vs. where he is now? 

What are his parents’ occupations? 

What level of schooling did he reach in Nairobi before emigrating? 

What type of school(s) did he go to, public or private? Private is more likely than you think. 

Did his schooling follow the national curriculum structure or a British one? Depends on school type and time period. 

Does he have familiarity with Kenyan English, or only the British English taught in school? 

Is this a contemporary setting with internet and social media?

I bring up this list not with the expectation that you should have had all of this in your ask, but to show you that second language acquisition of English, postcolonial global English acquisition in particular, is complex. 

My wording is also intentional: the way your character speaks English. To me, exploring how his background affects what his English specifically looks like is far more culturally interesting to me than deciding whether it makes him Good or Bad at the language. 

L2 Acquisition and Fluency

But let’s talk about fluency anyway: how expressive the individual is in this language, and adherence to fundamental structural rules of the language.

Fun fact: Japanese is my first language. The language I’m more fluent in today? English. Don’t assume that an ESL individual will be less fluent in English compared to their L1 counterparts on the basis that 1) it’s their second language, or 2) they don’t speak English at home. 

There’s even a word for this—circumstantial bilingualism, where a second language is acquired by necessity due to an individual’s environment. The mechanisms of learning and outcomes are completely different. 

You said you tried learning a second language and it was hard. You cannot compare circumstantial bilingualism to a monolingual speaker’s attempts to electively learn a second language. 

Motivations?

I understand that your motivation for giving this character difficulties with English is your own personal experience. However, there are completely different social factors at play.

The judgments made towards a native speaker forgetting words or using grammar differently are rooted in ableism and classism (that the speaker must be poor, uneducated, or unintelligent). That alone is a hefty subject to cover. And I trust you to be able to cover that!

But on top of that, for a second language speaker, it’s racism and xenophobia, which often lend themselves to their own ableist or classist assumptions (that those of the speaker’s race/ethnicity must be collectively unintelligent, that they are uneducated or low class due to the occupations where they could find work, or conversely that they are snobby and isolationist and can't be bothered to learn a new language). Intersections, intersections.

If you want to explore your experiences in your writing, give a monolingual English speaker in your cast a learning disability or some other difficulty learning language, whatever you most relate with. And sure, multilingual folks can occasionally forget words like anyone else does, or think of a word in one language and take a second to come up with it in the other language. But do not assume that multilinguals, immigrants, or multiethnic individuals inherently struggle with English or with multiple languages just because you do.

~ Rina

[useless-catalanfacts]

Translation:

El Español (newspaper): The victory of parents like Sonia: 107 schools switch Valencian for Spanish because of the Mazón law.

Response: Is it possible that Spain is the only country where it's considered a victory the fact that your children will be only monolingual instead of bilingual?

Surely not the only one (imperialist countries very often try to exterminate the languages of the countries they occupy, which also means not allowing their children to learn the language of the place they move to), but Spain and France are particularly aggressive against the local languages that aren't Spanish and French, respectively.

Schools in the Valencian Country and the Balearic Islands (where the local language is Catalan or Valencian, two historical names for the same language) are being pressured to remove the local language from the school and to teach only in Spanish. In fact, the Spanish nationalist and far right-wing government of the Balearic Islands has announced that Catalan-speaking children and Spanish-speaking children will be segregated in schools from now on (parents will choose which school to send them to, accompanied with the propaganda pushing them to choose Spanish schools), with the purpose of reducing every time more and more who gets to speak and learn the islands' language, imposing Spanish instead.

Everyone learns Spanish regardless because it's the government's language and it's everywhere (TV, radio, netflix, social media, etc), plus we study it in school as a first language anyway. It's impossible to grow up here and not learn Spanish naturally as you grow up. But the same is not true the other way around. If children from Spanish-speaking families, immigrant families, and those families who have believed the decades of being told "speaking Catalan makes you sound uneducated/rural/stupid/rude, only Spanish is good for your children's future and makes you normal", if their children are only exposed to Spanish at home and on media, and because Catalan speakers are already bilingual and have an inferiority complex so will always switch to Spanish when talking to a Spanish-speaker, these children will never learn the language of the place they live in, and they will be monolingual Spanish speakers. When the number of monolingual Spanish speakers grow, Catalan speakers will be even more marginalized and won't be able to access healthcare in our language (though we already don't half of the time), won't be able to go to the shops and talk in our language, won't be able to have services in our language, etc. And, thus, they will have made our language almost useless for our everyday life. We will disappear from public spaces, and people will stop passing down the language to their children. And the language will die, and with it our way of understanding the world, the words that describe our culture, or our ability to read what our ancestors wrote, our country's literature, or to understand the names of the places we live in.

The point was always to exterminate our language and culture, to create their made-up dream of a unified Spain where everyone is the same, which has never existed. As Franco used to say, "we want an absolute unit. With one language: Spanish. And one personality: the Spanish one".

Cultural diversity is a richness and beauty of the world, and every language has an equal right to exist. Don't let anyone convince you that your language and your people don't deserve to live.

[fanhackers]

Platforms and Fan Experiences

This week, I’ve been thinking a lot about platforms and the way in which they influence fan experiences. As a consistent lurker, I have been on Tumblr for more than a decade, and more recently on Twitter for the past few months, and have been reflecting on my experiences of fandom on both platforms.

In a roundtable discussion published in a tumblr book: platform and cultures, speakers Flourish Klink, Rukmini Pande, Zina Hutton, Lori Morimoto and Allison McCracken discuss the ways in which Tumblr is a very visual platform:

Klink: Tumblr fandoms tend to be much more visual than other fandoms. I often find that this  is the most difficult part of Tumblr for people who are not familiar with it. The visual languages in play on Tumblr are as meaningful and complex as any slang or textual interactions on Twitter… Klink, Flourish, Rukmini Pande, Zina Hutton, Lori Morimoto, and Allison McCracken. “A Roundtable Discussion about the Cultures of Fandom on Tumblr.” In A Tumblr Book: Platform and Cultures, edited by Allison McCracken, Alexander Cho, Louisa Stein, and Indira Neill Hoch, 167–80. University of Michigan Press, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3998/mpub.11537055.23.

I find this particularly interesting—and also ironic, in some ways—given that to me, as both a lurker, and a Fandom Old, the draw of Tumblr is that, while it may be a visual platform, it is not necessarily a visible platform, particularly in comparison to Twitter. There’s little chance of the celebrity you’re writing RPF about coming across your racy post or interacting with you directly.

In the same discussion, they go on to talk about the ways in which Tumblr’s visual culture has often led to progressive politics and practices, like race/genderbending.

Hutton: …One of my favorite things about being on Tumblr is seeing the way that members of the fandoms I’ve been in— primarily the DC and Marvel fandoms—reimagine their favorite characters as characters of color and give them queer and gender identities that match theirs. You can see photosets reimagining the Batman family group as more visibly diverse, and fancasts ( fans re-casting roles with actors of their choosing) of Marvel superheroes where they’re portrayed as women of color. And these fancasts generally push back against the idea of whiteness as a perpetual default. Klink, Flourish, Rukmini Pande, Zina Hutton, Lori Morimoto, and Allison McCracken. “A Roundtable Discussion about the Cultures of Fandom on Tumblr.” In A Tumblr Book: Platform and Cultures, edited by Allison McCracken, Alexander Cho, Louisa Stein, and Indira Neill Hoch, 167–80. University of Michigan Press, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3998/mpub.11537055.23.

While Hutton also points out the ways in which a lot of it can turn into clickbait activism, later on in the discussion, without truly engaging with what it means to racebend a character beyond simply making a visual edit, it’s Pande’s comment about interacting with white fans that echoes my own experience:

Pande: When I first came on Tumblr for instance, I mainly followed people I knew from LiveJournal and “Big Name Fans” whose writing I had followed in previous fandoms. This resulted in my Dashboard being filled with almost exclusively white-dude content. In retrospect this is not surprising, but the visual-ness of Tumblr made it particularly apparent, especially post-Racefail at a moment in fandom in 2009–10, when POC fans had started becoming more vocal about this whiteness. Klink, Flourish, Rukmini Pande, Zina Hutton, Lori Morimoto, and Allison McCracken. “A Roundtable Discussion about the Cultures of Fandom on Tumblr.” In A Tumblr Book: Platform and Cultures, edited by Allison McCracken, Alexander Cho, Louisa Stein, and Indira Neill Hoch, 167–80. University of Michigan Press, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3998/mpub.11537055.23.

As a PoC fan myself from the Global South, particularly one that does more lurking than posting, I often find that Tumblr does not always have the kind of linguistic inclusivity or even fandom inclusivity I am looking for. Perhaps it’s that I am a lurker, or perhaps I am not looking in the right spaces. Whatever the reason, I find Twitter has more of that inclusivity; whether I am looking for a fellow Hindi-soap opera fan, or a Supernatural fan, I can find both. And depending on which platform I choose, the content I make/consume differs—not just in form, but also in language and meaning.

What do you think? How has your platform shaped your fandom experience?

[god-blog]

Ok, idea that I'm really excited about

Everyone is always talking abt an in-person temple for pagans but what if instead of a temple-temple, there was a museum-temple?

Hear me out bc I think this would be really cool.

Things the temple-museum would have:

Permanent exhibits including:

Outside land art similar to Sun Tunnels by Nancy Holt that line up with the solstices/constellations

Inside sky art for meditating similar to Skyspace by James Turrell (PLS look this one up, it's so pretty. The picture in the article doesn't do it justice)

A wall of prayers/manifestations/affirmations. Visitors write them on a post it or note card and pin it to the wall to make a collaborative exhibition like Post Secret at the Museum of Us

A small gallery with general overviews of popular pagan pantheons: Hellenic, Celtic, etc. This will include artifacts from those time periods either depicting the deities or how people worshiped them

A small gallery with historical witchcraft artifacts. This will include medieval European poppets, Copic love spell manuscripts, Chinese oracle bones, etc.

Rotating temporary exhibits including:

Witch trials from around the world (1400-present, bc they do still happen)

Paleolithic cultures: Venus of Wellendorf, Stonehenge, Cave paintings/music, the Lion-man ivory, etc

Did Christianity Steal From Paganism: yes… no… it’s complicated (basically the overlap between early Christianity and Roman paganism) This will include villa mosaics, sarcophaguses, layouts of early churches, etc

The Rise of Modern Occultism: Hilma af Klint, Carl Jung, surrealism, spiritualism, Wicca, etc

A series of exhibits celebrating closed practices: different indigenous religions, Voodoo, Hoodoo, etc (Very important: these will not be teaching those crafts, just giving them the same public platform/attention as open practices. Key word here is "celebrating." People who practice in those closed communities will be consulted)

How paganism is incorporated into Abrahamic religions: Judaism and paganism, Catholicism and paganism, etc (People who practice in those communities will be consulted)

Modern witchcraft, good or bad? So that would be New Age, the rise of consumerism, witchtok, etc

More in-depth focuses on different pantheons: Celtic, Slavic, Mesopotamian, Hellenic, etc

Historical witchcraft accusations and race: Mary Lewis, the New York City Panic of 1741, Ann Glover, etc

Regular people's (like you!) devotional art. The public will be encouraged to donate/create devotional art pieces. Be that visual media, performance art, video art, music, sculpture, photography, writing, etc. It'll really highlight all the different ways people are worshiping, the diversity in deities being worshiped, and how big our community is

An auditorium. This would be for concerts, festivals/ceremonies that are done inside, and guest speakers. Guest speakers would include academics like Malcolm Gaskill (English historian and author), Katherine Howe (American author), etc. as well as big name practicing witches/pagans.

A garden. I haven’t decided yet what kind but I’m debating between a rooftop garden like the MET, one behind the building but open to visitors, or an atrium like medieval European cloisters/monasteries (bc I love those). The garden would be for meditating, connecting to nature/the gods, feeding pollinators, protecting "creepy" insects like spiders or burrowing bugs (bug hotel?), and potentially -depending on what type of garden it is- housing wild birds in bird houses or bats in bat boxes. Also, it could be a good place for festivals/ceremonies that are done outside, concerts, or general get-togethers like altar piece swaps!

And an altar/worship space. Obviously. It wouldn't be a temple without it. I'm thinking it would be mostly a big empty room with chairs and rugs scattered about and an alcove in one wall for the altar. Inside the alcove will mostly be nonspecific religious objects like candles, nice fabrics, flowers, incense, etc . Visitors will be encouraged to bring their own small personal devotional tools (except candles/incense for fire safety reasons). That way they can pray to, appreciate, and connect to their own gods and the main altar doesn't leave anybody out; the main altar is more for ambience than specific worship.

Giftshop? I'm not sure about this one yet bc it feels wrong to have a gift shop in a temple, but most museums, even small ones, have gift shops. It could have fresh herbs from the garden, candles, and local artists' art like prints, stickers, jewelry, etc. All at a reasonable price ofc (I hate overpriced museum giftshops more than anything else in the world... except overpriced museum tickets)

In terms of funding, museums get more government funding than churches, but they do have to pay taxes churches don't. I was thinking of generally modeling it after the Museum of Us in San Deigo; they let their employees pick the holidays they take off so they can each adhere to their personal religious practice, start paying them at $22 an hour with built in raises each year, and good insurance. They have done an amazing job, way better than any big museum, at collaborating with communities from all over the world to either give back artifacts in their collections or closely work with them to reframe how the artifact is presented/stored. They also don't charge for tickets, memberships, school trips, or basically anything except the giftshop. But that means they rely heavily on donations which may not work as well for a museum that's just starting out. Idk, this is all hypothetical rn.

The pillars the museum-temple would stand on are worship, education, and community.

I feel like teaching people about the history of these practices is super important and isn't smth that everybody bothers to learn or has correct information about. (And I'm a huge history/museum nerd if you can't tell lol)

I'm actually really excited about this lol