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We’ve progressed past the point of Greek mythology retellings, now its time for Welsh mythology retellings

#waves generally #its true #the path rolls on

Ok so a dilemma I have.

Whilst yes, I do technically agree with the one dude on the news who got REALLY irate about Welsh culture / language / folklore being used in fantasy novels without being researched and being used wrongly, and him wanting anyone who isn’t Welsh to outright STOP using Welsh culture.

How many fantasy writers nowadays are actually welsh?

I feel like by telling people NOT to include Welsh language / folklore / culture in their fantasy books, that kind of actually erases some of our culture.

And that’s *because* we are so engrained in the fantasy genre. I feel strongly attached to elves and the fae because of it (and also because autism but)

Honestly. LOTR did it well. The Witcher had some lovely little surprises that made me squeak - I remember hearing witcher-elven for the first time and it flicked that internal switch of “ooh, I kind of understand this and its scritching the good part of my brain” and also because the Witcher elves are fucking awesome. Dragon Age!! All the Welsh Dalish elves and their song ‘once we were’ incorporating our hiraeth into the game was something really heartfelt to me.

HOWEVER.

And this is a big however. I feel very uncomfortable when all this welsh folklore / language / culture is used… only for the characters to be given ENGLISH accents.

It’s a huge kick in the gut. If you know anything about Welsh history, you’ll instantly know why. And not only that, but I don’t know if anyone else has noticed, but where British TV is concerned…

Filming in Wales? Check. Talking about Welsh things? Check. Welsh person being interviewed? ❌❌ incorrect buzzer.

English reporters literally go to a celtic country and find another English person to put on the TV. And it’s the same with Scotland.

BBC reporter goes to a scottish university to ask the students what they think of something. You’d think they’d ask one of the actual Scottish students, right? Wrong! They pulled up the most rahh wheres my baccy daddy’s trust fund middle to upper class English kids they could, and actually spoke OVER and deleted footage of an interview with a Scottish student who had genuine concerns.

I dare say Northern Ireland gets the same shitty treatment.

So when there’s a fantasy book using all these celtic components, and ALL THE FUCKING CHARACTERS ARE ENGLISH, I GET A BIT IRATE. 👹👹👹👹👹👹

Not to mention that they never pronounce anything right.

I read a book where there is a beautiful incorporation of the welsh language, blended with Irish gaelic, a little peppering kiss of Scots in there too, and I hear it in my head as the fucking gods intended

And then I see the film / series adaptation and there’s English people butchering it. Especially when attempts are made at Welsh letters they don’t have in their alphabets or they try to speak (what’s essentially welsh c’mon) ‘correctly’ with received pronunciation. It makes me want to turn myself inside out.

It’s like being in Rivendell and hearing black speech

Tolkien had good intentions. I know that mfer LOVED my home. Tolkien gets a pass.

Andrej Sapkowski also gets a pass.

The writers of Dragon Age who worked on the Dalish and Solas DEFINITELY get a pass.

… but Acotar. Acotar.

Do not. If you have any sort of love for me, do not.

And that’s my take on it, as an actual Welsh person who was born and raised in Wales.

Whilst I won’t rip your heads off like the dude on the news. I beg of you. I beg; please do your research. And if you are going to use the welsh language, please at least have the decency to give the character a matching accent.

Also desperately begging film studios and series creators to hire actual fucking celtic actors. PLEASE.

If I get excited over one more mfer with a name like Rhys or Llewellyn or Morgana or Gwyn and they rock up like “aha rahhh I’m CkLeweCklyn” I’m going to pull a Solas and find and rip open our equivalent of the veil before putting myself into a millennia long godsleep.

rrcraft-and-lore

Once upon a time

Everyone knows once upon a time, but did you know that countless cultures have their variation of how classic stories begin, and one one from Welsh is, "A long time ago," similar to a few others from other cultures that go, "A long long time ago."

But, some, like Lithuanian go: "Beyond nine seas, beyond nine lagoons," similar to the Czech, "Beyond seven mountain ranges, beyond seven rivers."

These are some variations from Arab texts: This happened or maybe it did not. The time is long past and much is forgot.

There was or there was not—is anything sure or certain but the greatness of Allah?—a king so powerful that man and Djinn bowed before him.

This is how many Hausa tales are begun “A story, a story. Let it go, let it come.”

And of course, we have one that is a combination and modern invention that has become part of media culture and storied greatness: "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away." <3

These are just some. But it's been among the most wonderful part of my research before I began putting down the first words for Tales of Tremaine. But the art of storytelling is one of the most human things there is. It's central to us, and it has passed long and far by tongue and time over lands and through cultures. Some beginnings are so similar to each other, some not so much.

But then you see the threads between them in the stories, the themes, tropes, archetypes, motifs. But the traditions span the world. They are old. They are cool. And they are beautiful.

And storytelling is one of the gifts that connects us all, like music, and other arts.

cosmonautroger

Dan Wood, Aberthaw, Wales, 2025

modernbritain

synticity

fuck yeah linguistics surveys!!

the team that did the Scots Syntax Atlas (incredible tool!!!!) is collecting data in Ireland and Wales!! Please share these links around!

Republic of Ireland: speakforyersel.ac.uk/roi/ Northern Ireland: speakforyersel.ac.uk/ni/ Wales: speakforyersel.ac.uk/wales/

ironpsalm

Otherwise disappointing electoral news aside, the largest party in Scotland is pro independence, the largest party in Wales is pro independence, and the largest party in Northern Ireland is pro independence.

Our ancestors smile in their graves

creekfiend

I understand that there is discussion of masking by autistic people that is much more honest and in-depth, but so much of the stuff I see sort of leans on the assumption that masking is something one chooses to do in order to appear "normal"

In reality, I think the behavior pattern that we name as "masking" is the natural behavioral and psychological result of being consistently punished for attempting to acknowledge your own reality during formative developmental periods. And I'm not sure that "masking" is a clarifying word to use for this

creekfiend

OK OK OK, someone in the tags said that they don't know the degree to which they are masking, bc they don't know what is normal/expected and therefore have no way of knowing how much they're altering themselves to fit into that expectation (thank you for articulating that!!) and I think that clarified a lot for me about my problems with the framing of masking.

Because that method of trying to "unmask" will always fail, bc it hinges on the assumption that there is a core underlying Self that is being Covered Up with the mask.

In reality, one does not have a chance to develop a true "self" due to the circumstances of their development. this is broadly true for almost all humans (SHOW ME AN UNALTERED TRUE HUMAN SELF,) because of the heavily social nature of how our selfhood intersects with other people's perception of us, but in some people it is much more marked and detrimental than others. What I think is the issue at hand is not the Self, but rather the internal experience. The Self is a construction we build to understand ourselves as beings, and it is heavily informed by our understanding of our own experiencs. understanding of those experiences is the actual issue. Being able to identify and name the effects that moving thru the world have on you. And teasing out how those acknowledgements of one's internal experience have been punished out of us.

The "recovering from burnout as a high masking person" post does use this framework, but I think that referring to people whose sense of their own internal reality has been so warped and shattered that they have to completely learn from scratch as "high masking" is just not intuitive and that it communicates what is being discussed... Poorly. I understand that that is the language that is used by the community broadly rn, and I don't object to individual instances of its use, but I do think that we would be better served in these conversations by framing it differently than "masking"

grison-in-space

I also see people framing even the most basic social skills (things like "tolerating mild discomfort" and "avoiding offensive phrasing of desires") as masking. At a certain point I think we have to be aware that there is a degree of curtailing one's personal self expression inherent in existing within a society, and that autistic people are not the only people who have to be aware of societal norms and contort selves to exist within them as part of experiencing that society. The difference is of course in the degree of contortion required to fit neatly into the society, not the phenomenon of having to contort in the first place.

It bugs me! And I think it creates unnecessary friction among communities of people first discovering autism and is susceptible to a weird kind of reverse curb cut effect where unmasking (== "stretching out and de-contorting from the society in which you live into a more comfortable shape") is set aside as something Just For Autistics, as if there aren't lots of groups of people whose existence is policed and shaped and bonsai-trimmed into painfully stunted or twisted shapes. Which, of course there are, and not all of them are groups where a mental health framework is remotely appropriate (e.g. constraints on the acceptable behavior of black people especially in gendered contexts), so why are we framing so much advocacy this way?

creekfiend

YESSSSSS

creekfiend

so many ppl are tagging this "ik not autistic but-" or "i havent been diagnosed but-" and then describing the exact thing i am talking about. which i think illustrates in real time why the framing of this as "autistic masking" is not serving a lot of people well. its bonsai kitten shit. its cptsd shit

forfuckssakejim

Yeah quiet quitting is great and all but have you tried chaotic working?

Like. I remember back in my grocery store cashier days I did so much crazy shit.

When WIC (Women, infants, and children voucher program to help low income mothers/families with children) people were in my line I would pretty much know who they were. Before the cards they had to tell us upfront they were WIC and show us their vouchers for what they were allowed to get (it was awful some times. Like. 2 gallons of milk. $4 worth of vegetables etc etc). They’d always have items hanging back, waiting to see what the total was and if they would have to take it off the belt.

I began to place the fruits/vegetables a certain way on the register scale so that like 1/2lbs of grapes read as like .28lbs or something. Then act shocked when I said that they still had X amount of lbs left. They got all their fruit and vegetables.

I think it started to kinda? Catch on to the women? Because I would have the same moms in my line month after month. And even after they switched to the cards (they worked like food stamp cards?) I’d still do the same thing. They were able to get more produce for whatever shitty max amount Indiana gave them.

Anyways. Be chaotic. It’s more fun that way.

bshmatthews

scififantasystuff

Reminder that you do this VERY QUIETLY (the way OP did), or under the protection of a union as in the image cut above.

Doing this openly on your own, or with just fellow members of staff and no union protections, will get you all fired. It will also cause crackdowns amongst employees who were doing quiet things like this, forcing them to stop until things ease up or they get investigated/fired as well.

pigswithwings

wtf are borders anyway. like yeah u were born on this beautiful earth buuuuut 😊 u cant go here. or here either

celebrinienjoyer

i need to show you all something that made me crylaugh last night. just fucking look at them.

thesylverlining

It's fine they just went a little nuts with the character creation face sliders

wgm-beautiful-world

ART NOUVEAU PORTES

z0ruastudyblr

The most revolutionary thing I've learned about Blackness is that our English is not at all "broken"

It was 2012 and I was a "white washed" (not real but you know what that means) junior in undergrad and an entire chapter included in this textbook was dedicated to our pidgin/dialect whichever your argument. 14 years later and the amount of borrowing with and without permission of rest of English is truly a marvel to the point where things I know damn well are just AAVE are attributed to wide ranging sources such as "Gen Z/Alpha slang" and "gay lingo" and "internet speak" in general. Our range

These are just a few of our many common grammatical rules:

Habitual "Be": In Standard English "He is working" means right now or generally. In AAVE "He be working" specifically means he works regularly or habitually, a distinction that Standard English can't make without adding extra words.

Copula Deletion: Dropping forms of the verb "to be" in places where Standard English requires them ("She tired" instead of "She is tired" or "They going" instead of "They are going")

Double Negatives: In Standard English, two negatives make a positive. In AAVE, using multiple negatives ("She ain't never going") simply adds emphasis to the negation, a common feature in many of the world's languages.

Metathesis: switching sounds within a word, the most famous example being "ask" as "aks," a pronunciation that has roots in Old English.

Remote "Been": When you say "I been knew that" the stressed "been" means you've known it for a long time, remotely in the past, which doesn't exist in Standard English without adding extra words.

Completive "Done": "I done told you already" is a way of saying the action is finished and the matter is settled with an emphasis on finality or frustration.

Subject-Verb Disagreement: In AAVE verbs are often uninflected for the third person ("She walk" instead of "She walks") to simplify conjugation.

I love being Black, we're so smart! We been developed our slice of language despite the slavery and diaspora

black--stars

Hey, when you talk to children, you know you can explain things to them right? thats theyre capable of comprehension? In fact you should be explaining things so they understand comprehension better?

Earlier my little sister slammed her closet and room door-- not out of ange as far as im aware, she just pushed them too hard. I yelled at her to stop it.

she said she would, but it was clear from her tone she just said so out of obligation and was annoyed. i tell her to stop making loud noises a lot, so she probably assumed this was just another example of that.

realizing this, i explained her the reason: our rooms are right next to each other. When she slams doors, the wall shakes. When the wall shakes, my mirror shakes, and if it shakes too hard it can fall and break

after the explanation, she apologized genuinely and actually understood the reason instead of just thinking im nagging her or just want quiet. the fact that she knows the reason means shes more likely to remember, and she can apply the knowledge in different ways: "even if my older sibling isnt home, their mirror could still break, so i still shouldnt slam the door." She knows im not just trying to annoy her or assert dominance over her like a lot of rules and demands we give to children do- i just dont want my mirror to break. It helps her understand cause and effect.

Would this result be the same if i had just screamed at her or spanked her? Or did it make more sense to just explain? After all, it was a simple mistake. I could see my parents doing the same thing-- when you close a door, youre not usually thinking about the walls in the other room.

Children are humans, humans use logic. Use logic with children. Its simple.

gatheringbones

[“I often describe my childhood as a labyrinth of confusion, requiring years of adulthood to untangle its intricacies. I recall the moment I seemingly emerged into consciousness, finding myself alongside my mother, our roles magically clear: she the caretaker, and I the cared for.

The rules of my role were etched into me. I reluctantly and fearfully followed. Where am I? What is my purpose? What should I do? I never had much time to answer the questions. The responses were already waiting for me. Life was seamlessly thought up by the adults around me. My role involved order, paying attention, and following rules. My siblings and I were told to follow the rules, oftentimes with no explanation. There was little reason beyond “I am your mother” or father or other adult in charge of keeping me safe. Safe from what, I never quite understood, but keeping me safe was apparently one of their most important goals.

I suppose my parents were confused as well. Desperate to fit in, learn the language, provide, and survive. My parents navigated the welfare system, police surveillance, and the medical industrial complex with fear at the steering wheel. Fear of losing us to the state. Fear of getting cut off of welfare. Fear that my mother’s disability would lead others to deem her an unstable mother. My parents carried this weight, and it spilled over often. I had been deep in the vision of my own pain, but I hadn’t yet seen the well-formulated keloids my parents carried.

Systems like family policing reinforce and justify parenting from a place of authority. The very systems that have punished parents become the tools we use to punish our children.

For years, my focus on healing revolved around the psychological and sexual violence inflicted by my sister during my childhood and teenage years. It wasn’t until some five years ago that I began to delve into the influence of my upbringing. As I persist in my mission to prevent and eradicate childhood sexual abuse and all forms of sexual violence, I’ve gained profound insights. The trauma I endured continues to haunt me, permeating every aspect of my life. I’ve come to understand its impact on my failed relationships, lack of boundaries, and sexual issues. Initially, I failed to recognize how the strictness of my upbringing contributed to my survival of child sexual abuse. The grooming, boundary violations, and uncomfortable encounters were facilitated by the family’s controlling environment. My mother’s absolute authority over my life—dictating my attire, hygiene, social circle, and even emotions—laid the groundwork for dynamics of control, stifled curiosity, and suppressed instincts. This rigid parent-child dichotomy echoes the legacy of colonialism, prioritizing efficiency and order over our innate humanity.”]

Ignacio G. Hutía Xeiti Rivera from abolish the family, from how to end family policing: from outrage to action, edited by erin miles cloud, erica r. meiners, and shannon perez darby, 2025

kaijudove

happy make a terrible comic day!!! i haven't stopped thinking about this post since i saw it. in 2018 a common merganser was spotted with 76 (SEVENTY SIX!!!) chicks!! that's SOOOO many baby. so much success.

xenthosss

Heres a picture btw

beemovieerotica

hey so this is the first time i've ever actually seen a demo of how phalloplasty implants work

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