So recently I had two things collide to influence my ideas about making worlds and cultures in them. One was a YouTube video, a conlang talk[1] demonstrating the rapid sketching out of a language and its rules. Part of the talk was about gender as a grammatical term and what it can refer to other than female, male and neuter.
The other was a twitter thread about gender as play, xenogenders[2]. The author talked about the symbolic associations attached to mythic creatures and how these might become a referent for one's gender ( an example given, "vampires are viewed in the modern era as sexy, androgynous, and hypersexual" ) attaching it to a narrative about yourself, as well as part of an effective project decoupling gender from biological sex.
In combination these have inspired me to consider worldbuilding that does not contain the categories of 'man' or 'woman' at all, and what kind of gender categories a society might have if it doesn't have to refer to that binary whatsoever. Perhaps gender might refer to your social role. Or to your favoured approach to situations, or some other organising scheme ( or contingent fusion of a couple of relic schemes ).
[1] Peterson, D. J. (2020, May 24). Create a Language in Just One Hour [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StcSHmBZj2k
[2] Jessica & Zena of TGT (Camarilla Arc) [![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
tgirltherapist]. (2022, May 5). Got this comment and wanted to share it and my responses in a thread. I think this is the perfect [Image attached] [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/TGirlTherapist/status/1521893056529772545
The other was a twitter thread about gender as play, xenogenders[2]. The author talked about the symbolic associations attached to mythic creatures and how these might become a referent for one's gender ( an example given, "vampires are viewed in the modern era as sexy, androgynous, and hypersexual" ) attaching it to a narrative about yourself, as well as part of an effective project decoupling gender from biological sex.
In combination these have inspired me to consider worldbuilding that does not contain the categories of 'man' or 'woman' at all, and what kind of gender categories a society might have if it doesn't have to refer to that binary whatsoever. Perhaps gender might refer to your social role. Or to your favoured approach to situations, or some other organising scheme ( or contingent fusion of a couple of relic schemes ).
[1] Peterson, D. J. (2020, May 24). Create a Language in Just One Hour [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StcSHmBZj2k
[2] Jessica & Zena of TGT (Camarilla Arc) [
tgirltherapist]. (2022, May 5). Got this comment and wanted to share it and my responses in a thread. I think this is the perfect [Image attached] [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/TGirlTherapist/status/1521893056529772545
