Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

vampyre_smiles — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 10:36:50 -0500

This is really in reference to a made up culture in my case, but maybe we can also talk about writing romance set in real world cultures that have different social mores as well... I've decided that while my Nano has been a failure I might as well work on my MMC's origins. This starts with him going through a test to be considered a man, and I figured while doing this he can meet his first to-be wife, who is going through a similar test into womanhood. I don't mention how old they are in the story, but it can be assumed they'd be young from details I leave in. I don't plan on going into details at all, but I might make reference to them deciding to have their first experience together since they're in similar situations, and their culture isn't so negative about two almost-adults fooling around together. But what about later when they meet again within the next year and decide they'll get married? In their culture they are considered adults, but wouldn't be in the West. It seems weird if I gave details of what's going on after they would be adults here, but not before despite them being married. But putting details in before I could claim that they COULD possibly be adults by our standards, since ages wouldn't be exactly known, that could get me in a lot of trouble if I try to publish. I might not even include anything that would make it erotica anyway. I would like to hear other thoughts on including characters who end up in (consensual) sexual relationships after what would be acceptable in their own culture or world, but before they'd be adults wherever you plan to publish.

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

Coffeedrinker — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 16:30:00 -0500

Are they of legal age of consent? I'm myself writing about an adult in a consensual sexual relationship with a minor who is of legal age of consent in the culture they are described in. The story is no erotica, but the sex is quite explicit and not negative. The minor may sleep with whoever she wishes at that age (legally), she may even take up residence wherever she wants, but she may not marry yet (for that she has to be adult). The sex in that story is not "prurient", nor specifically titillating, though emotionally moving (the characters as well as the reader). I've read quite a few similar stories, recently written ones, both for the UK and for the USA. As long as you do not write it for pure titillation a lot goes, even published by normal publishing houses. You might want to read e.g. Melvin Burgess' "Doing It". That one has helped me a lot.

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

vampyre_smiles — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 19:41:35 -0500

As far as their society has a concept like that, yes they are. So I won't worry about it until I need to. I didn't know about too many books that involve this gray area, so I wasn't really sure about this...

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

Coffeedrinker — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 02:09:15 -0500

I wouldn't know it is a gray area, teenage sex is not a rare topic in both YA and general fiction. It's just lately that we get keyed into thinking everything even tangentially sexual has to be looked at with the childporn axe. Or am I missing something?

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

vampyre_smiles — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 03:56:34 -0500

I was pretty sure you're not supposed to have underage characters (as defined by US law if it is in the US) engaged in sex that is actually there to be erotic. Even if they would be adults in their culture. Sex is ok as long as it isn't there to tantalize. I was going to go with that, even though it seems weird to me to be like "They've been adults in their culture and married for years, but now they're adults by our arbitrary standards, so enjoys teh sexy, people." That was my main thing: Do we go by the character's culture or the one in which we're getting published, where there is a major difference in what counts as an adult? I know there is some leeway when a character's exact age is not known and we can assume that they are old enough here for purposes of the story. I also sort of wanted to hear about other possible situations besides age restrictions that would cause issues in erotica specifically, not just mentioning them or including them in non-erotic circumstances. Or I wouldn't have posted this here.

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

Coffeedrinker — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 05:49:31 -0500

I guess the question is what you mean by "erotic." There are a gazillion YA novels out there which are nothing else but erotic romances between teens, any sexual orientation even, and yes, they do have sex, and the sex is not nasty, instead it is nice and the characters like it. There's kissing, and making out, and masturbation and whatnot. Is it written the way explicit erotica are written? No. Is it erotic per se? Some of it very much so. Does it belong to the genre erotica? No. If I were to classify then I'd say "romantic YA for 16+". You said: "I might not even include anything that would make it erotica anyway." and then detailed characters who are not adult, but sounded above age of consent. So that's what I went by from. To give it some definition: there are (romantic) YA novels where e.g. one British character is 16 and the other 18 (or for that matter 28) and you have explicitly and nicely described sex which isn't used as a negative example or something. Sex which is emotional and reads nicely as well. So this exists, and yep, it gets published. But the books do not qualify as erotica per se. At the most they are simply fiction.

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

aurora17 — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 23:17:07 -0500

I'm writing a romance between a forensic artist in near-future Germany and a resurrected teenage sacrifice from the Iron Age. She's 35, he's (nominally) 17. I have only scratched the surface of the cultural differences. The one that stands out at the moment has nothing to do with sex: he's amazed at the number of modern daily rituals that have no spiritual significance, everything from the morning shower forward. The challenge is to avoid either sentimentalizing or demonizing the vastly alien cultural landscape of the first century C.E. I'm interested in what it looks like from an insider's perspective, including such outré practices as human sacrifice. (Not so outré as all that, it turns out: after he explains it, she has modern warfare for a comparison.)

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

Maydeleh — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 00:44:22 -0500

I write historical fiction, and sometimes I do need to think through differences between their perspective about age and sex and mine. My last-year NANO novel is set in a medieval city, and the protagonist's fourteen-year-old daughter is married and pregnant. Her mother, my MFC, is thrilled. At the end of the novel another character, a thirteen-year-old girl, marries the MFC's son. These are little girls, by my standard, much too young to be having sex, let alone getting married, but they're not in my century, but in their own. I think we get too rigid about insisting that everyone has to be over eighteen (although I know some publishers of erotica have rules about it), especially if it doesn't make sense in their time and place that they would be. It sounds like you're talking about two teenagers becoming sexual with each other in a culture in which this is an appropriate time for them to do so. I have a hard time thinking of that as icky or squicky.

Re: Writing characters with differing cultural mores?

Maydeleh — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 00:44:41 -0500

This sounds really fascinating, BTW.