Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ham_Slaad" data-source="post: 981584" data-attributes="member: 6595">Well, as someone mentioned above, Dune had some interesting cultural features, arising from the central premise that water is universally scarce (at least on Arrakis) and is therefore precious...wealth is measured in water, etc. Using a central theme like that and taking it to the logical extreme for a society is a good way to come up with some cultural norms.In the dim past I was an anthropology major, so I'll give you some made up examples based on some memory fragments.A culture where height = status. Taller people are assumed to be of high status, those who are naturally born shorter walk on specially made stilts to indicate their actual status. In conversation, the person with more status stands while others sit to show they recognize their place -- it is considered an affront to stand while someone of importance is speaking to you. It is considered rude to be tall and not have a commensurate position that warrants it (i.e. visiting PC's could be considered "uppity" if they are tall and have no station; could even get challenged to a duel if they insist on not making the proper changes in their attitude and posture).Amazons of Greek mythology reputedly cut off their right breast so it wouldn't interfere with their archery (i.e. drawing a bow across their chest was made "easier").A culture which uses leaves from a particularly rare tree as currency. Thus money is both transient (it only lasts as long as the leaf retains its integrity, eventually it will crumble into dust) and dependent on a particular season (fall) -- it could be illegal to take leaves from the tree before it falls naturally. There could be a festival centered around the leaves falling where new millionaires are made, etc. etc. etc.There are all sorts of things that can be made up if you start from a central premise and work from there. Somewhat 2 dimensional, but can make for some strange customs to outsiders.</blockquote>

Verification