Today on medievalpoc we brainstormed historically accurate Asian women as Robin Hood in Medieval England, with possible Trotula the Medieval gynecologist as a Merry Woman, touched on 30 ways to become An Immortal from a non-Western perspective (including eating mermaid meat!), revisited the accurately diverse demographics of the Caribbean and possibilities thereof (including LGBT pirates), saw some average peasants of color from the Renaissance doing their peasant thing, learned about the legendary beauty of an enslaved man named Paul in Pre-Revolutionary France, attempted to clarify the sociopolitical nuances of terminology, religion and race in 16th century Spain and Portugal, and called out Gilgamesh for being a raging tryhard.
^ In one day. Which is kinda the point here-and why I can be pretty critical of how we see the same things over and over and over in Medieval style fantasy media.
No writer or creator is limited by history or “historical accuracy”.
Anything you can possibly imagine has a historical precedent.
I find that prospect absolutely thrilling, and I hope you do, too.
I want to reblog this again for Fiction Week, because I think many artists, writers, and other creators limit themselves because of assumptions they hold about the past, what is “believable”, what is “true”, what is “historically accurate”.
Too much of what we think we know boils down to assumptions we’ve made, or things we have been told by others and believed, internalized, and replicated through our art. Or ideals and aesthetics are shaped by our culture, but we are also the shapers of culture, and we can break the loop.
I really do believe the possibilities are limitless.
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