#metastippus

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Mando Culture Studies✨Pt. 2 - The Bonk (Glasgow and New Zealand)

A Keldabe Kiss is a play on the real-world slang Glasgow Kiss, both meaning the same thing: a headbutt.

Keldabe was the mining and steelworks city on Mandalore; the place where the beskar is from. “Keldabe Kiss” is a joke about how aggressive the Mandalorians are; it’s also a reference to the beskar, like you need a beskar helmet/beskar head to fight there.

We’re familiar with the soft version:

Fandom calls this a Keldabe Kiss, but it’s really a Mando version of the Māori Hongi, a nose/forehead bump used for greetings with a lot of cultural significance. This happened because Daniel Logan and Tem Morrison are both Māori and they brought that into their interpretation of their characters.

There’s some funny crossover now because of the mix up of these two terms, like that a full-on headbutt can still be a romantic kiss gesture between Mandalorians, which I love. But the term Keldabe Kiss really refers first and foremost to a headbutt in a fight, memorializing the famous beskar city with so much cultural significance to the Mandalorians! 😍❤️

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The New Republic subplot in ep3 was explicitly anti-statist. That was the point. As @gffa pointed out, we didn’t see a single friendly or trustworthy face representing the New Republic, and that was the point, because this subplot is saying: the state is not your friend, nor is it trustworthy.

The only person who seemed to be a sympathetic ally turned out to be the O’Brien to Pershing’s Winston Smith. But more than that, the New Republic officers who place so much trust in her were unable to tell the difference between a fascist and one of their own.

At every turn, the idea that “the New Republic isn’t the Empire” is subverted. Pershing is encouraged to touch the mountaintop because “this isn’t the Empire, live a little” - but in fact, touching the mountaintop IS prohibited. At surface level it’s presented as a harmless prank to make Pershing jump, but in fact, his tentative faith that they live in a free world is misplaced. Pershing does not touch the mountaintop.

Pershing acts to continue his research illegally because he has made the error of actually believing in the principles the New Republic promotes for itself. His chatbot therapist social worker says: yes, we should do everything we can to help the New Republic. Pershing is punished for engaging directly with the ethics. Will his research do good? Will the citizens of the New Republic benefit? Will people live better lives as a result? It’s irrelevant for these purposes what the actual answers are; only that asking the question at all is prohibited.

Pershing fails to realize that the New Republic is not its own propaganda, something that the more socially sophisticated people around him all understand. The wealthy man in the opera house says: that’s why I should just keep my mouth shut, like it’s a joke. But it’s not a joke. These people clearly did not recently come into their status. They went to the opera house under the Old Senate, and under the Emperor, and they’ll continue to do so under the New Senate. Pershing attempts to engage with morality on first principles. The New Republic does not, but uses the impression that it does to legitimize itself anyway.

The mind flayer scene is saying this: the state machine is always the same, the only difference is the intensity at which it’s applied. This was so on-the-nose explicit that they depicted a LITERAL machine with a LITERAL Intensity Knob. The mind flayer is a metaphor for the exercise of state power itself. Pershing experiences horror at the sight of the machine. Don’t you know what this is? Don’t you know what it’s done? What it always does? The New Republic officer says: don’t worry, we know how to use it. It’s beneficial in small doses. We’ll exercise restraint. And of course, once the machine is in use and you’re strapped in, there’s nothing you can do if someone stops exercising restraint. The function of the machine is the same.

“Beneficial in small doses” is the mantra of the complacent statist. In a show called THE MANDALORIAN are you that surprised that it’s taking the side of the Mandalorians? We’re on to our third season of Din refusing to cooperate with the police, refusing to do police enforcer’s work, refusing to trust institutions of power to save him, and people still expect the New Republic to come out of this as the good guys? The Jewish subtext of the Mandalorians (hunted to extermination by a state power, breaking all rules to save a life multiple times, orthoprax, lost homeland) is now literally just text (Din bathed in a mikveh and was witnessed by another Jew Mandalorian) and you STILL expect the state to come out of this as the good guys?? Do you think the Nazis were the only government to ever mistreat Jews?

What I loved about Andor - and what I love about the direction mando s3 is moving - is the exploration of regime change. The brutal reality of it, the sense of plus ça change plus c’est la même chose, beyond the propaganda and the things people long for: relief, security, peace. Yeah the delivery is janky as fuck but I’m not delusional enough to expect Quiet Flows The Don here. Regardless of artistic technique, the story being told is about as antifascist as it gets.

So like sorry but if you perceive this subplot to be “Nazi apologism” because it validates the armed and insular pogrom survivors while criticizing the concept of state machinery beyond its branding, you may want to examine your priors. The cure for Nazism is not FDA-approved.

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Mando Culture Studies✨Pt. 1 - English

There are a lot of English influences in Mandalorian culture, from black ale drunk by the helmetful to uj’alaya, the Mandalorian dark fruitcake favored for all the same reasons as the traditional English one: easy storage, high energy, and long-life fruit preservation. Also, the willingness to get wasted and scrap with people anywhere in the Galaxy.

The strongest sign of this influence is in the language. A lot of words in Mando’a are at least derived from English working-class dialect words, especially Geordie dialect, if not just… the same word. I moved to the North-East of England back in 2020 and it’s remarkable how many mando’a words I’ve heard in everyday conversation since coming here.

Here’s a few of the connections I’ve noticed/heard in real life between Geordie/English words and Mando’a:

Chaav’la (adj.): rough, belonging to the criminal underclass

Chav/charva (n.): a rough urban person. I heard this derived from an acronym meaning ‘council-housed and violent’ lol, I don’t know if that’s a true derivation but it’s an accurate description of what the word describes. Chav is used all over England and charva is specifically a Geordie word

Shebs (n.): ass, backside, rear (of person or building etc.)

Chebs (n.): lumps on the body eg. ass, tits (male or female) etc. I heard this one in the wild when a coworker said he was ‘freezing his chebs off’. Geordie dialect

Skran (n.): food

Scran (n., v.): food, or eating. As a noun it can be food of any description but you’d be less likely to use it to describe fancy food. When used as a verb I think it has the connotation of scarfing the food down, eating quickly or in an unrefined way. You can call a food truck a ‘scran van’. Geordie dialect

Yaim (n.): home

Yem: home. ‘I’ll gan yem’ means ‘I’m going home’. Geordie dialect

Skanah (n.): a hated or loathsome thing, an object of dislike

Scunners (n., v.): as a noun, a horror or an object of dislike. As a verb, a strong feeling of aversion. This one is actually Scottish

Wayii: a general exclamation, like ‘good grief’

Way aye: an exclamation indicating affirmation or agreement. This one is more of a stretch, but since there are already Geordie words in Mando’a and Way aye is one of the most well-known Geordie phrases there is, I think it’s impossible the connection wasn’t made

Kando (n.): importance, weight

Kandosii: nice one! Wicked! Well done!

Canny (adv., adj.): as an adverb, canny means ‘very’ or ‘extremely’. Something can be canny good or canny bad. As an adjective, it’s always positive. ‘That’s canny’ or ‘he’s canny’ means good, reliable, sound, positive. He’s a stand-up guy. It’s a good outcome. Like wayii this one is more of a stretch, but it immediately stood out to me and I doubt I’m the only one. Geordie dialect

Mhi (pr.): us

Us (pr.): me. LOL. It’s common in a lot of working-class English dialects to say ‘us’ for ‘me’, but especially so in the North-East. “Can you give us that” means “can you give me that”. I’m absolutely positive this is an intentional reversal and it’s also hilarious

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I've been very highkey, LOVING the concept floating around of Zabrak!Armorer not gonna lie. Have you seen it? I also saw that somebody suggested Mirad as a name for the armorer in a concept. It means "child of wisdom." God Zabrak!Armor slaps tho 🔥 🥵 👏

I have, i think it’s a popular concept because of the horns on her helmet! And yes, my best girl @kevystel came up with Mirad! She uses it in her amazing fic The Wanderer And The Seer. I LOVE it as a name for her. And Zabrak armorer is sooooo cool!

A lesser-known consequence of her being a Zabrak with horns is that that would also make her trans; female zabraks don’t have horns, only male ones do! Combined with her high status position amongst Mandalorians I always thought that would be a fascinating take on her, given the huge gender-based power disparity in Dathomir culture. And then to still display her horns on her helmet! I haven’t written it but I love to think about it.

(My personal favorite faceclaim for the armorer is a buff Sonoya Mizuno which was ALSO kevystel’s idea lmaoooo. ZABRAK SONOYA MIZUNO??? It could happen!)