Hello everyone! My name is Kianna Arroyo (she/her). Here, you'll find lots of writing advice from other people, writing memes, and (of course) some of my own projects! Please, stay a while!
Note: This master post will update as I add more content about my stories and such.
WIPs: An overview of all my projects can be found here!
Tessa's Very Average School Year
Ashes
A Normal Story
Inside
Samantha & Yuki
About my writing:
I write mainly fantasy. My other genres include sci-fi, thriller, mystery, and action/adventure.
Specifically my works revolve around stuff like magical realism, dark fantasy, superheroes and villains, superpowers, non-human POVs, dimension-hopping, mythologies, deities, "minor" fourth-wall breaking, and lots of shenanigans involving my OCs.
Most of my projects are geared toward the middle-grade and young adult audiences, but I have some adult projects as well.
I'm not a fan of romance so the majority of the relationships in my stories are either familial or platonic.
Things I won't be posting about:
Anything NSFW
Anything political or pertaining to current world events
WIP Tags: A list of all the tags for my WIPs and OC coming soon!
I am ask/tag game OK! I love getting asks about my projects (it gives me an excuse to ramble about them lol)! If you want to stay up-to-date on any of my WIPs, you can be added to a tag list! Anyway, that's enough about me. Hope you're having a great day! ^_^
Hi! Do you have any like, bare-bone list of resources for a beginner looking to dip into writing their first novel? I'm at the 'I have a vague premise and character ideas, but no plot' stage, so I spent a significant amount of time browsing through this blog and other writing blogs to see where to go from there, but quickly found myself overwhelmed by the sheer amount of resources and advice available.
I completely understand! When you're at that stage, everything is overwhelming. What I recommend is narrowing your focus on outlining. (I have a whole Outlining tag here!) Sometimes the only way to get idea to plot is following an established structure. You may not keep to your initial outline, but building it will help generate ideas on how to move forward.
There's many different approaches to outlining. I like the Save The Cat method the most, but finding the right outlining approach is also important. If you are more solid on your characters than your possible plot, you might try the character forward approach that The Right Advice for Writers lays out here. Often, if you can figure out what your character's inner struggle is, you'll be able to build a plot centered on having them confront and overcome (or be overwhelmed by) that struggle.
Find an outline process that works for you. Experiment with other forms if it doesn't. I really find writing it down and using flashcards to lay out ideas so that I can move them around is great for crafting a first draft. Good luck!
Show your characters gearing up, readying themselves.
The pace is slow, the suspense is high (use suspense techniques)
Provide information about terrain, numbers, equipment, weapons, weather.
May have dialogue as the opponents taunt each other, hurl accusations, or make one final effort to avoid the slaughter.
Don't start too early - we don't need to see the hero getting out of bed, taking a shower and having tea.
2. Start
Fighters get into fight stance: knees slightly bent, one leg forward, abdominal muscles tensing, body turned diagonally, weapons at the ready.
Each side will usually try to be the first to strike, as this will give them advantage.
The movements in this section need to be specific and technically correct.
3. Action
This section may be quick or prolonged. If prolonged, no blow-by-blow descriptions are needed.
Focus on the overall direction of the fight
Make use of the location to make characters jump, leap, duck, hide, fall, etc.
Mention sounds of weapons
4. Surprise
Something unexpected happens: building catches fire, a downpour, relief force arrives, staircase collapses, bullet smashes into the only lightbulb and everything goes dark, hero losses his weapon, etc.
Add excitement, raise the stakes.
5. Climax
Both sides are tired and wounded
The hero is close to giving up, but is revived with passion
Move to the terrain's most dangerous spot: narrow swining rope-bridge, a roof-edge, sinking ship, etc.
Don't rush the climax! Hold the tension
6. Aftermath
The fight is over: bes buddies lying dead, bandaging, reverberating pain, etc.
Use sense of sight and smell
The hero may experience nausea, shaking, tearfulness or get sexually horny
Violence: A Writerâs Guide:Â This is not about writing technique. It is an introduction to the world of violence. To the parts that people donât understand. The parts that books and movies get wrong. Not just the mechanics, but how people who live in a violent world think and feel about what they do and what they see done.
Hurting Your Characters: HURTING YOUR CHARACTERS discusses the immediate effect of trauma on the body, its physiologic response, including the types of nerve fibers and the sensations they convey, and how injuries feel to the character. This book also presents a simplified overview of the expected recovery times for the injuries discussed in young, otherwise healthy individuals.
Body Trauma: A writerâs guide to wounds and injuries. Body Trauma explains what happens to body organs and bones maimed by accident or intent and the small window of opportunity for emergency treatment. Research what happens in a hospital operating room and the personnel who initiate treatment. Use these facts to bring added realism to your stories and novels.
Maim Your Characters: How Injuries Work in Fiction: Increase Realism. Raise the Stakes. Tell Better Stories. Maim Your Characters is the definitive guide to using wounds and injuries to their greatest effect in your story. Learn not only the six critical parts of an injury plot, but more importantly, how to make sure that the injury youâre inflicting matters.Â
Blood on the Page: This handy resource is a must-have guide for writers whose characters live on the edge of danger. If you like easy-to-follow tools, expert opinions from someone with firsthand knowledge, and you donât mind a bit of fictional bodily harm, then youâll love Samantha Keelâs invaluable handbook
A small collection of terms from the 18th - early 20th century that were and probably still are known among sailors.
Admiralty Ham - Royal Navy canned fish
Batten your hatch - shut up
Beachcomber - a good-for-nothing
Cape Horn Fever - feigned illness
Cheeseparer - a cheat
Claw off - to avoid an embarrassing question or argument
Cockbilled - drunk
Cumshaw - small craft - Chinese version of scrimshaw
Dead Marine - empty liquor bottle
Donkey's Breakfast - mattress filled with straw
Dunnage - personal equipment of a sailor
Flying Fish sailor - sailor stationed in Asian waters
Galley yarn - rumour, story
Hog yoke- sextant
Holy Joe - ship's chaplain
Irish hurricane- dead calm
Irish pennant - frayed line or piece of clothing
Jamaican discipline - unruly behaviour
Knock galley west - to knock a person out
Leatherneck - a marine
Limey - a British sailor
Liverpool pennant - a piece of string used to replace a lost button
Loaded to the guards - drunk
Old Man - captain of the ship
One and only - the sailor's best girl
On the beach - ashore without a berth
Pale Ale - drinking water
Quarterdeck voice - the voice of authority
Railroad Pants - uniform trousers with braid on the outer leg seam
Railway tracks - badge of a first lieutenant
Round bottomed chest - sea bag
Schooner on the rocks - roast beef and roast potatoes
Show a leg - rise and shine
Sling it over - pass it to me
Slip his cable - die
Sundowner - unreasonable tough officer
Swallow the anchor - retire
Sweat the glass - shake the hour glass to make the time on watch pass quickly - strictly forbidden !
Tops'l buster - strong gale
Trim the dish - balance the ship so that it sails on an even keel
Turnpike sailor - beggar ashore, a landlubber claiming to be an old sailor in distress
Water bewitched - weak tea
White rat - sailor who curries favor with the officers
I have likely not added many that I've reblogged to this list. Please feel free to roam my blog and/or ask/message me to add something you'd like to see on this list!
Synonym Lists
Look by @writers-potion
Descriptors
Voices by @saraswritingtipps
Show, Don't Tell by @lyralit
Tips & Tricks
5 Tips for Creating Intimidating Antagonists by @writingwithfolklore
How To (Realistically) Make a Habit of Writing by @byoldervine
Let's Talk About Misdirection by @deception-united
Tips to Improve Character Voice by @tanaor
Stephen King's Top 20 Rules for Writers posted by @toocoolformedschool
Fun Things to Add to a Fight Scene (Hand to Hand Edition) by @illarian-rambling
Questions I Ask My Beta Readers by @burntoutdaydreamer
Skip Google for Research by @s-n-arly
Breaking Writing Rules Right: Don't Write Direct Dialogue by @septemberercfawkes
Databases/Resources
International Clothing
Advice/Uplifting
Too Ashamed of Writing To Write by @writingquestionsanswered
A Guide to Historically Accurate Regency-Era Names
I recently received a message from a historical romance writer asking if I knew any good resources for finding historically accurate Regency-era names for their characters.
Not knowing any off the top of my head, I dug around online a bit and found there really isnât much out there. The vast majority of search results were Buzzfeed-style listicles which range from accurate-adjacent to really, really, really bad.
I did find a few blog posts with fairly decent name lists, but noticed that even these have very little indication as to each nameâs relative popularity as those statistical breakdowns really don't exist.
I began writing up a response with this information, but then I (being a research addict who was currently snowed in after a blizzard) thought hey - if there arenât any good resources out there why not make one myself?
As I lacked any compiled data to work from, I had to do my own data wrangling on this project. Due to this fact, I limited the scope to what I thought would be the most useful for writers who focus on this era, namely - people of a marriageable age living in the wealthiest areas of London.
So with this in mind - I went through period records and compiled the names of 25,000 couples who were married in the City of Westminster (which includes Mayfair, St. James and Hyde Park) between 1804 to 1821.
So letâs see what all that data tells usâŠ
To begin - I think itâs hard for us in the modern world with our wide and varied abundance of first names to conceive of just how POPULAR popular names of the past were.
If you were to take a modern sample of 25-year-old (born in 1998) American women, the most common name would be Emily with 1.35% of the total population. If you were to add the next four most popular names (Hannah, Samantha, Sarah and Ashley) these top five names would bring you to 5.5% of the total population. (source: Social Security Administration)
If you were to do the same survey in Regency London - the most common name would be Mary with 19.2% of the population. Add the next four most popular names (Elizabeth, Ann, Sarah and Jane) and with just 5 names you would have covered 62% of all women.
To hit 62% of the population in the modern survey it would take the top 400 names.
The top five Regency menâs names (John, William, Thomas, James and George) have nearly identical statistics as the womenâs names.
I struggled for the better part of a week with how to present my findings, as a big list in alphabetical order really fails to get across the popularity factor and also isnât the most tumblr-compatible format. And then my YouTube homepage recommended a random video of someone ranking all the books theyâd read last year - and so I presentâŠ
The Regency Name Popularity Tier List
The Tiers
S+ - 10% of the population or greater. There is no modern equivalent to this level of popularity. 52% of the population had one of these 7 names.
S - 2-10%. There is still no modern equivalent to this level of popularity. Names in this percentage range in the past have included Mary and William in the 1880s and Jennifer in the late 1970s (topped out at 4%).
A - 1-2%. The top five modern names usually fall in this range. Kids with these names would probably include their last initial in class to avoid confusion. (1998 examples: Emily, Sarah, Ashley, Michael, Christopher, Brandon.)
B - .3-1%. Very common names. Would fall in the top 50 modern names. You would most likely know at least 1 person with these names. (1998 examples: Jessica, Megan, Allison, Justin, Ryan, Eric)
C - .17-.3%. Common names. Would fall in the modern top 100. You would probably know someone with these names, or at least know of them. (1998 examples: Chloe, Grace, Vanessa, Sean, Spencer, Seth)
D - .06-.17%. Less common names. In the modern top 250. You may not personally know someone with these names, but youâre aware of them. (1998 examples: Faith, Cassidy, Summer, Griffin, Dustin, Colby)
E - .02-.06%. Uncommon names. Youâre aware these are names, but they are not common. Unusual enough they may be remarked upon. (1998 examples: Calista, Skye, Precious, Fabian, Justice, Lorenzo)
F - .01-.02%. Rare names. You may have heard of these names, but you probably donât know anyone with one. Extremely unusual, and would likely be remarked upon. (1998 examples: Emerald, Lourdes, Serenity, Dario, Tavian, Adonis)
G - Very rare names. There are only a handful of people with these names in the entire country. Youâve never met anyone with this name.
H - Virtually non-existent. Names that theoretically could have existed in the Regency period (their original source pre-dates the early 19th century) but I found fewer than five (and often no) period examples of them being used in Regency England. (Example names taken from romance novels and online Regency name lists.)
Just to once again reinforce how POPULAR popular names were before we get to the tier lists - statistically, in a ballroom of 100 people in Regency London: 80 would have names from tiers S+/S. An additional 15 people would have names from tiers A/B and C. 4 of the remaining 5 would have names from D/E. Only one would have a name from below tier E.
Women's Names
S+ Mary, Elizabeth, Ann, Sarah     Â
S - Jane, Mary Ann+, Hannah, Susannah, Margaret, Catherine, Martha, Charlotte, Maria
A - Frances, Harriet, Sophia, Eleanor, Rebecca
B - Alice, Amelia, Bridget~, Caroline, Eliza, Esther, Isabella, Louisa, Lucy, Lydia, Phoebe, Rachel, Susan
C - Ellen, Fanny*, Grace, Henrietta, Hester, Jemima, Matilda, Priscilla
# Men were sometimes given a family surname (most often their mother's or grandmother's maiden name) as their first name - the most famous example of this being Fitzwilliam Darcy. If you were to combine all surname-based first names as a single 'name' this is where the practice would rank.
*Rank as a given name, not a nickname
+If you count Mary Ann as a separate name from Mary - Mary would remain in S+ even without the Mary Anns included
~Primarily used by people of Irish descent
^Primarily used by people of Scottish descent
>Primarily used by people of Welsh descent
I was going to continue on and write about why Regency-era first names were so uniform, discuss historically accurate surnames, nicknames, and include a little guide to finding 'unique' names that are still historically accurate - but this post is already very, very long, so that will have to wait for a later date.
If anyone has any questions/comments/clarifications in the meantime feel free to message me.
Methodology notes: All data is from marriage records covering six parishes in the City of Westminster between 1804 and 1821. The total sample size was 50,950 individuals.
I chose marriage records rather than births/baptisms as I wanted to focus on individuals who were adults during the Regency era rather than newborns. I think many people make the mistake when researching historical names by using baby name data for the year their story takes place rather than 20 to 30 years prior, and I wanted to avoid that. If you are writing a story that takes place in 1930 you donât want to research the top names for 1930, you need to be looking at 1910 or earlier if you are naming adult characters.
I combined (for my own sanity) names that are pronounced identically but have minor spelling differences: i.e. the data for Catherine also includes Catharines and Katherines, Susannah includes Susannas, Phoebe includes Phebes, etc.
The compound 'Mother's/Grandmother's maiden name used as first name' designation is an educated guesstimate based on what I recognized as known surnames, as I do not hate myself enough to go through 25,000+ individuals and confirm their mother's maiden names. So if the tally includes any individuals who just happened to be named Fitzroy/Hastings/Townsend/etc. because their parents liked the sound of it and not due to any familial relations - my bad.
I did a small comparative survey of 5,000 individuals in several rural communities in Rutland and Staffordshire (chosen because they had the cleanest data I could find and I was lazy) to see if there were any significant differences between urban and rural naming practices and found the results to be very similar. The most noticeable difference I observed was that the S+ tier names were even MORE popular in rural areas than in London. In Rutland between 1810 and 1820 Elizabeths comprised 21.4% of all brides vs. 15.3% in the London survey. All other S+ names also saw increases of between 1% and 6%. I also observed that the rural communities I surveyed saw a small, but noticeable and fairly consistent, increase in the use of names with Biblical origins.
Sources of the records I used for my survey:Â
Ancestry.com. England & Wales Marriages, 1538-1988 [database on-line].
Ancestry.com. Westminster, London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754-1935 [database on-line].
If you give a character a handicap, be consistent. Odds are, a blind character is not going to know the color of the car that hit them. A character whoâs lost their sense of smell to Covid may think theyâve run into fog, until their eyes start stinging and they hear the crackle of flames. A lame character is not going to be running from zombies - or if they are, theyâre going to pay for it later, in extreme pain at the very least. No amount of Heroic Willpower gets you past muscles and tendons shredded and gone. The body is a physical thing, and has physical limits.
The same goes for mental handicaps. You can form habits to get around some weak spots. You can find ways to jury-rig some responses and reactions other people take for granted. In some cases there are medicines that can help with faulty brain chemistry. Sometimes.
But if, for example, youâre autistic, not all the will in the world can rev your mirror neurons up to speed so you automatically smile back when someone smiles at you. Thereâs always that mental hitch of, âWhat am I supposed to be-? Oh, right. Move the lips, open the eyes more, ow thatâs bright....â
Meaning the expression on some level looks calculated and false. And that does an already shaky social situation no good whatsoever.
Yes, Iâm mentioning this on purpose. I had to dump a Kindle sample the other day before I walled it. A Regency romance where the heroine is supposed to be, from our modern perspective, autistic; though at the time such a person would have instead been thought of as odd, eccentric, willful, or fey. Fine. But what the author had the character doing, and unable to do, spoke of a lack of research into both autism and Regency society. The combo snapped suspension of disbelief like an elephant trying to bungee-jump.
Things the character is shown as having a problem with: Dancing. Knowing when to speak and what to say to people. Keeping paint off her fingers from her paintings. Sometimes fiddling with a bracelet.
Things she is not shown having any problem with: Lights, sudden noises, crowds, odd food textures, remembering faces....
(Not all autistics are face-blind. But it is very, very common.)
Hereâs where what I know about autism and the Regency social game intersects, painfully. The heroineâs mother is a wealthy would-be social climber whose silk merchant husband has a knighthood; an honorable title, but not an inherited one. She wants her daughters to marry well, and that means a lot more than just dressing them in silk and shoving them at the nearest Social Occasion. They need accomplishments. Their jobs as wives are not to merely spend money and look pretty. They have to organize households, hire and fire servants, make social connections, arrange Events, perform at said Events, and know how to both pick good performers and carefully work around the limitations of bad ones, so you never offend your guests. Accidentally, at least.
They need to know about, and if possible be able to do, things like embroider, sing, dance, and yes, paint. Aspiring parents would get their daughters not just manuals on what is the Proper Thing To Say on every occasion (such manuals existed!), but tutors for all of these. One good dance-master would have drilled the heroine in what each dance is, and how to do them by rote. One afternoon with a painting instructor would have covered, wear some work gloves just for painting, so you never stain your dress gloves. These are solvable problems.
Trying to figure out who you need to give the cut direct and who you must flatter when you are very bad with faces and all of them have a new outfit almost every night? That is a potential social catastrophe, and could let a writer get in all kinds of drama and tension as our heroine puts schemes into motion to try and keep track of whoâs who and why it matters. It would be a major part of the plot.
...Because in real life, handicaps affect how you have to scramble over hurdles everyone else sails over without even noticing. Thatâs why theyâre called handicaps.
Donât shortchange your charactersâ grit or intelligence. Show the readers how they do it!
okay so youâve talked about mentioning modern day items, products or media in books before, but i wanted to ask about those same things but outside the US or the such as products from (insert third world country here) that ppl in the UK or The US would probably never hear of, because they arenât locals who grew up in the area like someone like myself has.
Mentioning Less Familiar Products or Media
I'm not sure about the context you're referring to, because I've talked about it in a few different contexts in the past:
Timelessness - Specific products, businesses, services, and media have a tendency to "date" your story, meaning that they act as a timestamp that lets the reader know when your story takes place. For some stories that's not an issue, because you want the story to be rooted in a particular time period. For example, maybe you wrote a coming of age story set in the 1980s, so you mention products, media, businesses, etc. that were popular in the 80s. But let's say you want readers to feel like the story is current, whether they read it in a year or ten years from now. In that case, you wouldn't want to mention products and media popular today, because ten years from now those things will no longer be popular. This is true regardless of your story's setting, where you're from, or where your target audience is from.
Legalities - You generally want to avoid portraying real businesses, services, products, and people in a negative light, because although the likelihood is probably slim, there's always a chance they could sue you for harming their image and negatively impacting their income. This is true regardless of your story's setting, where you're from, or where your target audience is from.
Relevance - The products, businesses, services, and media should generally reflect the setting of your story, regardless of where you--the writer--are from, regardless of where the target reader is from. If you're Nigerian and writing for a Nigerian audience, and you set a story in New York City, the products, businesses, services, and media mentioned in your story should reflect the NYC setting. If your story is set in Nigeria and is written for a western audience, the products, businesses, services, and media should reflect your Nigerian setting. Even if most westerners won't be familiar with those goods and services.
While it's important to approach writing with creativity and imagination, it's crucial to prioritize responsible and ethical storytelling. That being said, if you're looking for information on poisons for the purpose of writing fiction, it's essential to handle the subject matter with care and accuracy. Here is a list of some common poisons that you can use in your stories:
Hemlock: Hemlock is a highly poisonous plant that has been used as a poison in various works of literature. It can cause paralysis and respiratory failure.
Arsenic: Arsenic is a toxic element that has been historically used as a poison. It can be lethal in high doses and can cause symptoms such as vomiting, abdominal pain, and organ failure.
Cyanide: Cyanide is a fast-acting poison that affects the body's ability to use oxygen. It can cause rapid loss of consciousness and cardiac arrest.
Nightshade: Nightshade plants, such as Belladonna or Deadly Nightshade, contain toxic compounds that can cause hallucinations, respiratory distress, blurred vision, dizziness, an increased heart rate, and even death when ingested.
Ricin: Ricin is a potent poison derived from the castor bean plant. It can cause organ failure and has been used as a plot device in various fictional works.
Strychnine: Strychnine is a highly toxic alkaloid that affects the nervous system, leading to muscle spasms, convulsions, and respiratory failure.
Snake Venom: Various snake venoms can be used in fiction as deadly poisons. Different snake species have different types of venom, each with its own effects on the body.
Digitalis: Digitalis, derived from the foxglove plant, contains cardiac glycosides. It has been historically used to treat heart conditions, but in high doses, it can be toxic. Overdosing on digitalis can cause irregular heart rhythms, nausea, vomiting, and visual disturbances.
Lead: Lead poisoning, often resulting from the ingestion or inhalation of lead-based substances, has been a concern throughout history. Lead is a heavy metal that can affect the nervous system, leading to symptoms such as abdominal pain, cognitive impairment, anemia, and developmental issues, particularly in children.
Mercury: Mercury is a toxic heavy metal that has been used in various forms throughout history. Ingesting or inhaling mercury vapors can lead to mercury poisoning, causing symptoms like neurological impairment, kidney damage, respiratory issues, and gastrointestinal problems.
Aconite: Also known as Wolfsbane or Monkshood, aconite is a highly toxic plant. Its roots and leaves contain aconitine alkaloids, which can affect the heart and nervous system. Ingesting aconite can lead to symptoms like numbness, tingling, paralysis, cardiac arrhythmias, and respiratory failure.
Thallium: Thallium is a toxic heavy metal that can cause severe poisoning. It has been used as a poison due to its tastelessness and ability to mimic other substances. Thallium poisoning can lead to symptoms like hair loss, neurological issues, gastrointestinal disturbances, and damage to the kidneys and liver.
When incorporating poisons into your writing, it is essential to research and accurately portray the effects and symptoms associated with them. Additionally, be mindful of the potential impact your writing may have on readers and the importance of providing appropriate context and warnings if necessary.
If you want to read more posts about writing, please click here and give me a follow!
i know hearing people on this website love to pass around those posts with links to free sign language lessons but you know you need to actually put effort into learning about Deaf culture, too, right?
resources for other Deaf cultures include, but are not limited to:
Black Deaf Culture Through the Lens of History (BASL and ASL-centric)
Understanding Deaf Culture by Paddy Ladd (which can also be found on archive.org)
Many Ways to Be Deaf: International Variation in Deaf Communities
the British Deaf Association website
directory for Deaf Australiaâs âOur Deaf Waysâ video podcast (presented in Auslan with audio from an interpreter and accurate closed captioning for all episodes)
The Irish Deaf Community by Patrick A. Matthews
Breaking the Silence: The Education of the Deaf in Ireland, 1816-1996
the Canadian Deaf Culture Center website
History of Hawai'i Sign Language and Hawai'i Deaf People by Barbara Earth, with Linda Lambrecht
âWe did it ourselvesâ: The Deaf Social Movement and the Quest for the Legal Recognition of the Libras Sign Language in Brazil
Hey, guys! I've been reading a lot of DC Batfamily fanfiction lately, and in doing so I realized how little I see of ASL being represented in written text (love you, Cass!). I wanted to briefly talk about tactics to writing American Sign Language (ASL), and ways that these techniques can help improve your writing in more general contexts!
SOME THINGS BEFORE WE GET STARTED
I will be discussing everything in terms of ASL! If you have a character who uses Chinese Sign Language or even British Sign Language, the same rules will not necessarily apply! Don't be afraid to do some extra research on them.
Do not let this dissuade you from writing a character who signs ASL! This is by no means the end-all be-all to writing ASL dialogue, and I do not intend this post to insinuate that by writing ASL the same way you write English you are deeply offending the Deaf community. If this is something you're interested in though, I highly recommend experimenting with the way you write it! Above all, have fun with your writing.
Related to 2nd rule, but still very important: not everyone will agree that sign language should be treated/written any differently than English. This is a totally valid and understandable stance to take! I do not hope to invalidate this stance by making this post, but rather to introduce an interested audience to how ASL operates in the modern world, and how that can be translated into text.
ADDRESSING SOME MISCONCEPTIONS
ASL is the same as English, just with gestures instead of words.
Actually, no! There is a language that exists that is like that: it's called Signing Exact English, and it's an artificial language; i.e., it did not come about naturally. All languages came from a need to communicate with others, and ASL is no different! It is a language all on it's own, and there is no perfect 1:1 way to translate it to English, just as any spoken language.
2. But everyone who signs ASL knows how to read English, don't they?
No, actually! Because it's a completely different language, people who sign ASL and read English can be considered bilingual: they now know two languages. In fact, fingerspelling a word to a Deaf person in search for the correct sign does not usually work, and is far from the preferred method of conversing with Deaf people.
3. Because ASL does not use as many signs as we do words to articulate a point, it must be an inferior language.
Nope! ASL utilizes 5 complex parameters in order to conversate with others: hand shape, palm orientation, movement, location, and expression. English relies on words to get these points across: while we may say "He's very cute," ASL will sign, "He cute!" with repeated hand movement and an exaggerated facial expression to do what the "very" accomplishes in the English version: add emphasis. Using only ASL gloss can seem infantilizing because words are unable to portray what the other four parameters are doing in a signed sentence.
4. Being deaf is just a medical disability. There's nothing more to it.
Fun fact: there is a difference between being deaf and being Deaf. You just said the same thing twice? But I didn't! To be deaf with a lowercase 'd' is to be unable to hear, while being Deaf with an uppercase is to be heavily involved in the Deaf community and culture. Deaf people are often born deaf, or they become deaf at a young age. Because of this, they attend schools for the Deaf, where they are immersed in an entirely different culture from our own. While your family may mourn the loss of your grandfather's hearing, Deaf parents often celebrate discovering that their newborn is also deaf; they get to share and enjoy their unique culture with their loved one, which is a wonderful thing!
YOU MENTIONED ASL GLOSS. WHAT IS THAT?
ASL gloss is the written approximation of ASL, using English words as "labels" for each sign. ASL IS NOT A WRITTEN LANGUAGE, so this is not the correct way to write it (there is no correct way!): rather, it is a tool used most commonly in classrooms to help students remember signs, and to help with sentence structure.
IF THERE'S NO CORRECT WAY TO WRITE IN ASL, THEN HOW DO I DO IT?
A most astute observation! The short answer: it's up to you. There is no right or wrong way to do it. The longer answer? Researching the culture and history, understanding sign structure, and experimenting with description of the 5 parameters are all fun ways you can take your ASL dialogue to the next level. Here are 3 easy ways you can utilize immediately to make dialogue more similar to the way your character is signing:
Sign languages are never as wordy as spoken ones. Here's an example: "Sign languages are never wordy. Spoken? Wordy." Experiment with how much you can get rid of without the meaning of the sentence being lost (and without making ASL sound goo-goo-ga-ga-y; that is to say, infantilizing).
Emotion is your friend. ASL is a very emotive language! If we were to take that sentence and get rid of the unnecessary, we could get something like "ASL emotive!" The way we add emphasis is by increasing the hand motion, opening the mouth, and maybe even moving the eyebrows. It can be rather intuitive: if you mean to say very easy, you would sign EASY in a flippant manner; if you mean to say so handsome, you would sign handsome and open your mouth or fan your face as if you were hot. Think about a game of Charades: how do you move your mouth and eyebrows to "act out" the word? How are you moving your body as your teammates get closer? There are grammar rules you can certainly look up if you would like to be more technical, too, but this is a good place to start!
Practice describing gestures and action. ASL utilizes three dimensional space in a lot of fun and interesting ways. Even without knowing what a specific sign is, describing body language can be a big help in deciphering the "mood" of a sentence. Are they signing fluidly (calm) or sharply (angry)? Are their signs big (excited) or small (timid)? Are they signing rushedly (impatient) or slowly? Messily (sad) or pointedly (annoyed)? Consider what you can make come across without directly addressing it in dialogue! Something ese about ASL is that English speakers who are learning it tend to think the speakers a little nosy: they are more than able to pick up on the unsaid, and they aren't afraid to ask about it.
Above all, don't be afraid to ask questions, do research or accept advice! New languages can be big and scary things, but don't let that make you shy away. Again, there is nothing wrong with deciding to write ASL the same as you write your English. I've personally found that experimenting with ASL dialogue in stories has aided me in becoming more aware of how to describe everything, from sappy emotional moments to action-packed fighting scenes. Writing ASL has helped me think about new ways to improve my description in more everyday contexts, and I hope it can be a big help to you as well, both in learning about Deaf culture and in pursuing your future writing endeavors. :)
P.S: I am quite literally only dipping my toes into the language and culture. I cannot emphasize how important it is to do your own research if it's someting you're interested in!
P.P.S: I want to apologize for my earlier P.S! What I meant by âI am ⊠dipping my toes into the language and cultureâ was in direct regards to the post; what I should have said is âthis post is only dipping its toes into the language and culture.â While I am not Deaf myself, I am a sophomore in college minoring in ASL and Deaf Culture, and I am steadily losing my hearing. Of course, that does not make me an authority figure on the topic, which is why I strongly encourage you to do your own research, ask your own questions, and consult any Deaf friends, family, or online peers you may have.
When inventing a fantasy religion a lot of people a) make the mistake of assuming that everyone in fantasy world would worship the same gods and b) assume that polytheistic religions see all of their gods as morally good
Some types of religions for your world building (any of these ideas can stand alone or be combined with each other):
One god, donât play with any others.
Everything is God
One big god or small group of gods made everything but that doesnât mean there arenât other smaller ones that work for the big one(s)
Thereâs one god but all of these hundreds of gods are aspects of that one god and the aspects of the one god can absolutely marry each other and have marital squabbles
Individuality is an illusion and the universe is a series of vibes experiencing itself
The world used to be an egg but then that egg became a god and then that god made some other gods and then those gods became bored and made the universe and then they got to screwing each other to make even more gods and now thereâs hundreds of them and exactly what gods are worshiped changes on who you ask in a particular region
Everything has a soul. Act like it.
Someone or something spoke the world into existence and weâve been stealing other peopleâs stories ever since weâll take whatever gods you have
A bunch of regional gods got smushed together and now thereâs a state mandated religion thatâs trying to make this smaller pantheon more popular than local folk religion
The difference between a god, a nature spirit, and a legendary person is extremely unclear even to worshipers but thereâs shrines to all of them
A god chose these people to be their special guys and their special guys are gonna have a tough time. That god may be the only god or it may be one of many those people believe exist
Humans were kinda stupid until this one spirit or person showed up and taught them how to do stuff so now we do stuff to thank the person or thing that taught us how to do stuff
The world will keep on ending and being rebuilt it just does that sometimes nobody knows when it started or if it ever did
You can learn a lot from talking animals.
People were made to do work the god(s) donât wanna do
People were made because the god(s) were lonely/bored/drunk
This river in particular is the most important thing in the whole universe
You need to get better philosophy. This guy was good at philosophy. Read his book.
This rant is brought to you by the sasquatch program I was listening to on the way home from work and how glibly it insisted that scientists were suppressing the evidence. While the theories that the sasquatch advocate threw out there were interesting in terms of story potential, they reminded me how few writers have a science background.
Personally, I have a BS in environmental science, i.e. being shuffled between the geography, biology, and chemistry departments for four years, and Iâm currently employed as a microbiologist, so I do have that background. Have 10 (yes, 10) of my pet peeves.
1. The Omnidisciplinary Scientist, or as I like to call it, the comic book scientist. Scientists specialize heavily. You will get a grounding beyond the laypersonâs high school coverage of fields related to yours if you go into a science, but it wonât be ALL fields of science. I have a less than high school level grasp of physics due to the fact that it was never required in my field. When you get really deep into technical stuff, however, two people in the same broad field might not know much about the otherâs specialty. A particle physicist and an astrophysicist might only have a very basic grounding in each otherâs experiments, though theyâve got a leg up on me in explaining them to each other.Â
A physicist telling a neuroscientist that theyâve discovered consciousness doesnât read as good science, nor should you cite a dentist as a âscientistâ in your argument about global warming.
2. Instant Results. CSI and other police procedurals are the primary culprits here, but also scifi tends to give people instant confirmation of what something is. Whether thatâs germ identification, a blood test, or a chemical reaction, all experiments require setup time, controlled conditions, correct equipment, and analysis. If the machine does all the work in a few minutes, you donât need a scientist.
For example: pregnancy tests used to take weeks, because urine samples from the potentially pregnant person had to be shipped to a lab, injected into frogs, and then the frogs had to be monitored to see if they released eggs. Now, you pee on a stick, because scientists spent years finding a quick chemical reaction (actually a change of reactions) that gave you a simple visible sign that specific hormones were present in your pee.Â
The frogs, presumably, are very relieved.
3. The insanely well-funded science lab. All experiments take money. Whether itâs for materials, equipment, or to pay an undergrad to count fruit flies every six hours, itâs just not plausible for most scientists to have every single piece of equipment they could ever need - and not all of the tools are publicly purchasable to begin with. My brother works with a biologist who has had to design a program to do statistics on bone shapes from almost scratch - when itâs done and theyâve published a paper on it, it will be publicly available, but until that happens, anyone who has to do the same analysis has to put years into developing the protocol themselves.
Also, as an example Iâve actually worked with, a Gas Chromatography Mass Spectrometer (a relatively common, if fancy, instrument in chemistry that can identify most chemicals with the right person running it,) can cost a hundred thousand dollars used. Routine maitenance (replacing a consumable part like the coil,) can cost hundreds of dollars, and if you use the machine more frequently you have to do it more frequently. And god forbid something goes wrong with the mechanical parts or the programming - itâs hardwired to a computer as old as your undergrad, and the last time they manufactured any replacement parts for the thing was 1986.
(If you want to hack one of these investment pieces of equipment by the way, forget about it - even something with a modern OS probably isnât internet-enabled, as there is nothing that researchers hate more than waiting for an OS update before they can finish an experiment. Even relatively cheap instruments that run off a cheap modern laptop are pretty routinely debugged by having the wifi disabled, as nine times out of ten your program being messed up is because Windows updated. You have to physically go to the machine, put the files on a jump drive IF they are readable outside the program, and transfer them to something else. Or you can screenshot them and export the pics onto the jump file. Or copy them into excel and transfer the excel file.)
Addendum: hacking does not work like that. If youâve seen it in a movie, it is either outdated in terms of computer science, or excessively dumbed down.
4. The Work dies with the scientist. If your work will be lost if you should meet with an unhappy fate, you are a supremely shitty scientist. First - very few fields that arenât pure mathematics or computing can be undertaken solo. Academics have postdocs to do the analysis, grad students to do the specialized lab work, and undergrads to do the prep work. Businesses have PhDâs to do the final analysis, junior scientists to design and run experiments, and lab techs to clean up after them, and provide explanation for why the GCMS is disabled while windows updates. (Full disclosure: the reason Iâm harping on this is because it happened to me with a spectrophotometer and Iâm still not over whoever re-enabled the wifi.)
Also, though a company or secret shady government agency will not release your work for peer review the way an academic institution will, they will need the documentation of your work to file patents, or replicate it with the rest of their researchers.
If the field has merit and enough funding that other people will actually spend time on the same experiment, no one lone genius is the only person who could ever make a discovery. In fact, discoveries are independently replicated all the time, because most of them are enabled by other discoveries or new technology.Â
5. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Science is a delicate balance between admitting that something *could* be happening and pointing out that just because I havenât proven you wrong yet doesnât mean that youâre right.
A plausible use of the absence of evidence:Â âWe havenât found any Higgs Bosons yet, but that does not mean that they donât exist.â (As of 2013 they found some.) Itâs plausible because all evidence suggested that the HB was possible, its existence strengthened longstanding theories that hundreds of people had failed to disprove and dozens of people had discovered supporting evidence of, and because it was something they could test for with the available technology.
An implausible use âWe havenât found any conclusive evidence of Sasquatches, but that doesnât mean they donât exist.â Itâs implausible because we donât have any credible evidence that they do exist - there is no longstanding theory or model that claims that the pacific northwest can support a significant population of bear sized hominid omnivores, and no plausible physical evidence that such creatures ever existed. It contradicts a whole host of theories in a lot of scientific disciplines: Ecology would posit that we would know about the role of such a large omnivore since theyâd have a similar impact on local resources to an equivalent amount of bears, the recent fossil record and paleoarchaeology have yet to find any evidence that homonids other than anatomically modern humans have lived in north america, statistics would argue that if the creature is common enough and lives close enough to humans for sightings to ever be reported it would leave some evidence more credible than eyewitness testimony behind.Â
6. Contradiction is proof of being wrong. A single data point contradicting a theory is almost never an indication that the theory has been disproven. Science is done by humans, and mistakes are made. Similarly, a single success is not proof that youâre right. You need to do an experiment a lot to have enough data to be certain that what you think is happening is actually happening.
For example, those of you who took a statistics class can attest that just because you flipped a coin ten times and it landed on heads seven times doesnât mean that youâre twice as likely to come up heads. You need to flip it a hundred times or more to have enough data to really do anything with it.
