Tag Archives: New Worlds

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) Content note: by dint of the subject matter, this post is going to contain a number of offensive words. You can learn a lot about a society by looking at … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) Last month we talked a lot about etiquette and how different cultures convey respect, or at least convey the expectation that respect will be given. But sometimes, what you really … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) One of the funding milestones for this Patreon is a fifth essay in the months that have five Fridays. Since we cleared that milestone right off the bat (woot!), here’s … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) We all know that status has its benefits. Rather a lot of them, in fact, and the lack of it is rarely a good thing. But it also brings burdens. … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) Any society that has ways of marking certain people out as having power and authority — which is most of them — will also have ways of restricting those signs … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) Riffing off last week’s discussion of how we show respect to one another, let’s talk about the things that signal HEY, YOU SHOULD SHOW RESPECT TO ME. There are a … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) Much like the etiquette of names, the etiquette of greeting and showing respect has massively atrophied in the United States. In a society where everyone is equal (at least in … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) This week’s post is brought to you by a patron request! The topic suggestion had to do with conveying historical complexity, which is itself complex enough that it can’t be … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) Possibly the most unrealistic thing about money in fantasy is that it almost always just works. Early in the novel Quicksilver, Neal Stephenson — who has a gift for turning … Continue reading →

(This post is part of my Patreon-supported New Worlds series.) If you go into a store today and buy something, you’re almost certainly doing it one of two ways: either you’re handing over one or more pieces of paper with … Continue reading →