Defining culture

[Midgardsormr]

There are a few traits of culture that I try to define in my world-building.

Language, religion, subsistence pattern, social/political organization, kinship, art, economics, and it seems like there are more, but I don't have my worksheet handy.

For the purposes of mapping, many of these elements are relevant.

Subsistence: Where does the community's food come from? What percentage of the community is involved in food gathering? How is the food distributed? Is any food imported or exported? Related to this is water supply: Where does the water come from? How is it distributed? Do any members of the community have special rights over the water?

Does the community's food or water supply force it into a nomadic lifestyle, following herd animals or hunting or moving to new fields?

Religion: Are religious services communal, requiring temples or other meeting places? Or are they individual, such that each household will have it's own shrine, and public shrines tend to be smaller affairs? Are there monuments to gods or kings? Are these monuments holy places, or do the people treat them casually? Does religion have any influence over where or how people build their homes?

Kinship: How do people consider themselves related to other people? Do men go to live with their wives' families, or women to their husbands'? Do families live in large extended households, or do they break off into nuclear families, building a new home? Who helps in the building of new homes?

Social/Political Organization: Who rules, and how is that decided? Does the ruler have a designated dwelling place, and is it distinctive from other buildings? Are there distinct social classes? Is there some kind of economic leveling system that keeps most people at similar levels of wealth? What mechanisms exist for dealing with abnormal people or the mentally ill?

Economics: How do goods move into and out of the community? Other than food, what goods does the community produce, and how does it produce them? Who receives the benefits of trade? Is there taxation, and how is it administered? What physical spaces are necessary to support this economic system?

Class has started now, so I don't have time to continue, but I hope that gives you some things to think about. If you're getting into some heavy world-building, then a worksheet where you can keep track of details like these is very handy. Also, bear in mind that many of these qualities will be heavily influenced by the culture's environment.

[Ascension]

I start with how the environment affects the race....you'd never find Vikings in Zimbabwe and vice-versa (dark skin evolved for a reason). Right there you can see that I use real-world examples to draw upon. Similarly, you'd never find a race of lizardmen in a cold area because lizards are cold-blooded...they could evolve into something human-like in a hotter place, though, like a swamp, jungle, or desert. You could have bearmen or elkmen in the north, though.

Placing cultures like Japanese right next to a culture of Greeks doesn't work too well because of the racial spread throughout a region...both sides will affect one another so things will tend to bleed together a bit but if there is a giant desert or big mountains in the way then there is less blending. Here, the environment affects culture.

I also think about what sort of resources are available to a region. A region that is loaded with herbs and berries will produce a different kind of being (in terms of evolution) than an area where one has to overpower others for food. In terms of culture a race based around mining is going to favor strength and a culture based around picking spices is going to favor agility or intelligence. Consequently, an agile race is going to be better at something like music and art because their fingers are nimble whereas a strong race is going to get big and throw their weight around.

As far as changing things up, say like Viking architecture with nomadic clothing, it can work but people will automatically draw a real-world correlation no matter what you do so I try to keep things consistent across the board...Vikings wear fur and live in thatched huts and nomads live in tents and follow camels around. There is one caveat, though...this only applies to human cultures. Your elves and dwarves and cat-people can be anything you want them to be and that's where the fun and fantasy starts for me. For example, my dwarves are almost always like Vikings so I don't need to have any Vikings in my world. Since they're short anything tall could be a giant or a troll so that's the sort of monsters I put there...certainly no djinni or efreeti.

It's the blending of the mundane with the fantastical that sets fire to the imagination. If I'm doing a swamp then the things that live there are the things that will evolve...like frogmen or lizardmen or snakemen or even dragonflymen and mosquitomen. A race of mosquitomen ravaging their neighbors for blood would be truly terrifying but they could also trade the herbs and spices they have for human slaves to drain of blood. Sounds like an idea...hrmmm

[Meridius]

Do you draw out examples or descriptions of those 'cultural features'? I'm mainly wondering how to keep things consistent. For example: if people see an Ancient Egyptian styled building, they immediately associate it with the pyramids etcetera. That's because the style is consistent. I'm struggling to keep that kind of consistency.

Perhaps I think too much about it, but I like to give people at least a graphical description in a game (the current world-building project is for a D&D campaign). So the players get a good feel for the world.