Resources
For a variety of resources to help people interested in history or creative pursuits.
You can click on the following list to go direct to the associated part of the guide:
Culture and Society|History|Language|Miscellaneous|Long-Lasting Reviews
Culture and Society
The emphasis for this section is on contemporary society or recent history.
Open Encyclopedia of Anthropology
Formerly the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Anthropology, this consists of articles written by academics to introduce and provide overviews of concepts used in anthropology and sociology. These involve concepts that we think of as both basic and complex, as they are ubiquitous and are part of everyday life, but what is much more complicated is how they exist and why they exist the way they do. Entries are on subjects such as money, silence and literacy and these articles detail cultural differences and how the field of anthropology has developed. The focus is on a general overview, useful as an introduction to the field, but the examples of studies and articles which have been selected are well-chosen, being important evolutions in the fields or exemplifying contestations of theoretical simplifications. For those with an interest in worldbuilding, these overviews are themselves useful for case studies and raising questions which can help to develop worlds where things are different.
On average, about 1-3 articles are added per month. There are some more specific articles, like on prefigurative politics, medical pluralism and emic and etic (which relates to a debate in linguistics and anthropology).
Articles can be searched for in multple ways: alphabetically, recency, topic area or by keywords via a search box. The topic areas are of Economics, Health, Kinship, Politics, Region, Religion and Theory. All articles are written by scholars who specialise in the field they write about. The articles are more like essays than the kinds of articles or entries found in Wikipedia or in the Wikias of various fandoms. They start with an abstract, followed by an introduction. There is a more fluid flow from paragraph to paragraph, ending in a conclusion. Compared to Wikipedia, reading an article all in one go than be harder, due to both the length and because the different sections and more interwoven together.
The Open Encyclopedia of Anthropology is open-access and accepts donations to help support the website (and likely, to pay for future articles to be written).
History
The emphasis for this section is on ancient, medieval, or pre-modern history.
Early Collaborative Games Of Fantasy And Imagination (WobbuPalooza)
If you're interested in tabletop gaming or medieval or early modern parlour games, be it for historical fiction or as a basis for original games, this site is an excellent find!
It is mostly a collection of links to actual sources presented in the form of an overview, so this is recommended for more serious research (the sources vary in terms of how accessible they are), although the overview itself is suitable for casual browsing. The sources, including links to other websites and excerpts from books on Google Books. There are also a few translations of French sources hosted on the page. While there are a lot of outgoing links, a lot of the stuff would not be easy to find if you didn't already know the parlour games to search for.
Internet Sacred Text Archive (John B. Hare)
Compiled by John B. Hare, a computer programmer and entrepreneur, this is an resource for public domain texts related to belief systems past and present. Belief systems is the best way to put it, as the site includes coverage beyond organised religions.
The Internet Sacred Text Archive is an excellent way to find folktales from around the world, as well more scholarly texts analysing and comparing belief systems, either those considered religions or those now termed as within the realm of mythology. There are philsophical texts that deal with metaphysics and works dealings with symbolism. Some pages and texts deal with more esotoric beliefs, but without entering the territory of conspiracy theories.
The texts are organised by topic and present translations in English where available. When it comes to the belief systems of First Nations peoples in America, there is a focus on more ethically sourced texts where the information was gathered with the consent of the communities involved and in a respectful manner.
The texts on the belief systems of the Australian Aboriginal peoples are acknowledged to be problematic. For almost all intents and purposes, other sources should be used instead.
The site has one page that is written like an essay, that being the 'LGBT' page that argues against religious condemnations of homosexuality and looks at multiple belief systems.
Language
The focus here is are resources which relate to linguistics, including sociolinguistics, which relate to cultural elements embedded in language and the environment of language use.
The Collective Noun Catalog (Daniel E. Meyers)
The largest known compilation of collective nouns in English, past and present. The PDF comes to 153 pages at time of writing and spans 7306 collective nouns. It was compiled by Daniel Meyers and is an extension of his work as a long-time Director of the Interactive Language Resource Centre of Miami University.
The collective nouns are organised by both category and subject. There is a table on the right that is initially confusing, but on closer inspection it is clear it refers to the 40 primary source references used for this compilation. These references have been organised into a timeline, from the earliest sources to the latest, so the Collective Noun Catalog can be used to help give a sense of the historical usage of collective nouns. The first number of the sources refers to the list of sources given on either the main site or a separate tab of the Google Document spreadsheet.
It would have been more intuitive for the sources to have been chronologically arranged, but this has not been done. Additionally, some of the primary sources are not actually primary sources, but just main secondary sources which have been used, i.e. Wikipedia pages or other various blogs and websites. Another limitation is that the data is current only up until 2018, so any more recent collective nouns which may have entered into use, or just added since then to included source pages, would not have been included.
The Micropedia of Microaggression (The Micropedia)
This is a collection of statements that represent microaggressions, as maintained by a Canadian organisation supported by individuals and Canadian community organisations.
Microaggressions are statements and questions which reflect implicit bias. They can reflect widespread assumptions made as a result of marginalised groups being less visible in their diversity, or from being portrayed in relatively limited ways in media and the news.
Microaggressions marginalise. They reflect expectations that can reinforce stereotypes rather than reality. The weight of these expectatons can make those who receive them feel less accepted and less safe due to the anticipation of or reminded or more explicit hostility, which include anti-migrant attitudes, racism, sexism, homophobia and transphobia among others.
The Micropedia of Microaggressions is searchable and covers the main microaggressions which are encountered. There are also links to useful articles about microaggressions from several angles.
Awareness of microaggressions helps writers to be more informed about the characterisation choices that are made and be more authentic when it comes to dialogue and portrayals.
Diversity Style Guide (Rachele Kanigel, Ed.)
This is a resource to help professional writers, academics and journalists to write in a more inclusive and accurate manner.
This style guide is searchable and easy-to-use. It also has a printed version available if desired, which was published in 2019. This style guide is widely used in American classrooms and organisations and is perhaps the best current style guide to use for writing aimed at an American audience.
While an excellent general resource, it is primarily informed by American perspectives and when explanatory notes are given, they are focused on the American context including Arab-Americans and Asian-Americans. When it comes to inclusive writing as it relates to groups which are not prominent in America, there is limited to no coverage. So, for example, there is no guidance as to inclusive writing and reporting when it comes to caste, or other national contexts where inclusive language and reporting involves different choices. For example, in Australia and New Zealand, choices have to be made regarding the extent to use Aboriginal/Maori place names. In some contexts, they may be jointly used (usage conventions have shifted over time), while in other contexts, the English place name continues to be solely used.
This style guide should not be relied upon exclusively is writing involves characters and/or cultures that are non-American, but it is a strong resource overall, especially for terms involving sexuality, gender identity and to a lesser extent religion.
This Diversity Style Guide is informed by multiple other style guides, generally those created and used by American journalists. It emerged from a project by the Center for Integration and Improvement of Journalism at San Francisco State University and has been funded by grants from the College of Liberal and Creative Arts at San Francisco State University and by the Sigma Delta Phi Foundation of the Society of Professional Journalists. It is edited by Professor Rachele Kanigel, a professor of journalism and research and writing involved several contributors.
German Idiom Glossary (Matterhorn Languages)
Susanne Lewis is a German-English translator, trainer, proofreader and writer who is behind Matterhorn Languages.
Lewis has collated together a comprehensive collection of over 700 German idioms, all of them having two varieties of English translations: a literal translation and a more accurate translation.
Idioms can make for an excellent source of phrases to be adapted for use for fictional worlds and characters. Sometimes they express interesting concepts which may inspire.
Obviously, a reference for idioms is also great when writing German characters. They also provide a way to explore Germanic language and culture. The included idioms are not necessarily used in Germany alone but may be used in other countries which speak German, such as Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg and Luxembourg. German is one of the most widely-used languages and so this collection of idioms can also be used to bear in mind if wishing to use idioms, jokes or craft metaphors which will be easier to translate between English and German. Some German idioms are directly equivalent with English idioms, while others are completely different.
None of these idioms involve explicit language.
Spanish Slang Dictionary and Spanish Proverb Dictionary (The Language Realm)
The Language Realm is a site focused on translation resources and also hosts articles submitted to it. It hosts some resources amongst the best of its kind.
There is an alphabetised collection of Spanish proverbs with both literal and more accurate translations given. There is also a similar collection for slang, idioms and expressions, with literal meanings generally also given where different from the understood meaning.
For the Spanish Slang Dictionary, each entry is noted according to grammatical category. For monolingual English speakers, this may be a bit confusing at times. The terms 'n.m.' and 'n.f.' refer to the gender of the noun as either masculine or feminine. While English does not assign give genders to nouns, some other languages do and depending on whether a noun is masculine or feminine this affects the form of various grammatical words which have to agree with the gender of the noun.
Obviously, this reference source can be handy when writing Spanish-speaking characters or other characters referring Spanish expressions, as happens in parts of America with a heavier influence of Spanish culture. They also provide a way to explore Spanish language and culture. Notes are given as to usage.
Spanish is one of the most widely-used languages in the world. Being aware of the idioms, sayings and slang used in Spanish can help if wanting to select or create idioms, jokes and metaphors which will be easier to translate between English and Spanish. Some have direct equivalents in English, while others do not.
French Slang, French Proverbs and French Idioms (The Language Realm)
The Language Realm is a site focused on translation resources and also hosts articles submitted to it. It hosts some resources amongst the best of its kind.
Just as with Spanish, here are alphabetised collections of French Slang, Proverbs and Idioms. It is more comprehensive than various other online sources and also generally includes literal translations when this varies for the understood meaning. That is often not done on these kinds of pages and yet can be an excellent source of inspiration for writers, as the literal meanings can be adapted to create original expressions for a fictional world or character.
The proverbs at times has some explanatory notes about usage. This is also true for slang and idioms, where some entries provide example sentences of how the slang would be used.
Late Proto-Indo-European Dictionary Translator and Pokorny's Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Translator (Academia Prisca)
Academia Prisca is a non-profit organisation involved in research of Proto-Indo-European, which is the best understood proto-language, or partially attested, reconstructed languages. Proto-languages predate the recorded languages we know about, but as they influenced modern languages, it is possible to find elements that are consistently common across languages (this is the comparative method). The idea is that if certain elements are common beyond a certain point, this is not due to coincidence but is evidence of a common ancestor language, especially since other language groups show that language can and has gone in many different directions.
Proto-Indo-European can make for an excellent source for creating new words and names. It is preferable to use the first link, as that translator is not only more updated but also is easier to use. The second one provides multiple options for a given word. The best thing about using Proto-Indo-European to create words is that it makes it easy to create words that are not already in use by companies or may otherwise be used in pre-existing fictional works.
Academia Prisca has made available two free dictionary/translators, each with a word list which can also be directly accessed. The first one linked is based on Academia Prisca's work on North-West Late Proto-Indo-European and was last updated in 2021.
There is a second translator, although aside from the URL the text of the page itself does not change aside from the number of included word pairs. More importantly, the translator still works and returns different results with a separate word list also being available. This other translator is based on the outdated work of Julius Pokorny, as published in 1959.
Most work on Proto-Indo-European, including that of Pokorny, is focused on Middle Proto-Indo-European, while the first translator here is focused more on a later period not particularly covered by the other Proto-Indo-European resources out there which have to be paid for. These two translators have been adapted by a number of sites into other languages, where instead of searching in English the search is done in other languages such as German.
Academia Prisca now aims to develop and promote a reconstructed Late Proto-Indo-European language which could be used to write new texts. The group is based in Extremadura, Spain and has been endorsed by the University of Extremadura and supported by the Extremaduran government and financially by Academia Biblos, a private academy in Extremadura.
The actual research work is anchored around the work of classical scholar Fernando López-Menchero. Carlos Quilles, who is involved in ancient languages and anthropology, while being a professional orthopedic surgeon and Mayte Batalla, the CEO of Biblos Idiomas Language Schools and Academia Biblos, who is more focused on promotion and second-language acquisition, are also part of the group.
Miscellaneous
The section deals with useful resources of a very specific, niche or esotoric nature, including resources which may relate to specific subcultures/lifestyles.
Spike's Calculators (VMNet)
Originally intended to be a personal site for a dog by an experienced construction worker with 40 years working in in residential, light commercial and institutional projects, it has developed into a repository of various calculators related to construction and agriculture. Although there are various sites with such calculators, this site is easy-to-use and collects together calculators of a more niche nature harder to find elsewhere.
The calculators are of course of direct use for thsoe in the construction industry and for farmers but it is also useful for worldbuilding and dialogue for writers. Additionally, some of the calculators are of more general use, such as one of calculating the Percent of a Percent, or for calculating the final price after a surcharge or a discount when only the initial price is known.
My Golf Ball Collection (Gobaco)
If you ever needed to see the diversity of golf balls that exist, say for added customisation in a golf game, or for added characterisation of a golfer in a story, the quickest way to look at a wide range of golf balls is by using this Neocities web site. Gobaco is a golfer who has, for whatever reason, decided to take photos of the lost golf balls Gobaco has come across, used and then replaced at various golf courses in Mallorca, Spain.
There is a wide variety of golf balls which have been photographed, spanning both the standard available brands and the more exclusive golf balls associated with sponsorships, business and specific golf clubs (actual clubs of people who play golf, not the equipment. Not all are fully identified and some are the worse for wear, but it is a surprisingly extensive collection which is also reflective of how many golfers travel, for business or pleasure, across the world.
Golf is as much a lifestyle as it is an activity (some people deem it a sport, while others do not). This site gives insight into that lifestyle by showing, especially with the customised golf balls with logos, the kinds of companies that have them. This in turn makes it a resource for seeing the kinds of companies that have gone to the trouble of getting branded golf balls, which is suggestive of involvement in the corporate culture associated with golf. So, while initially this site is only a superficial resource for a specific use, there is potential to use it to inform depictions of corporate culture and of networks of privilege and power.
Writing Platforms & Applications
Long-Lasting Reviews
You'd be hard-pressed to find more comprehensive reviews than these. These reviews go into considerable detail about the features and feel of these platforms and applications, to help creatives and potential creatives to better find what meets their needs. Short reviews are often too vague to provide real answers ... this is a particular issue it comes to the more commercial stuff. These reviews are done by Trajecient.
These reviews will come out over time and when enough of them are done the plan is to do eventually use the findings to create a 'Compatibility Test' to help match you with the best options to consider without the need to wade through reviews.
13 02 2023: yWriter (Spacejock Software)