World Building 101- part 4- Dehumanizing the races in your writing.

One of the things that can be found in fantasy and science fiction stories besides the struggle with or against technology as it affects the protagonist are a multitude of alien races. Elves, Dwarfs, Trolls are some of the mythic races found in fantasy writing. Klingons, Romulons, Zabrak and Wookies are some of the science fiction iconic races.

All of these races are generally human in form and in thinking. This is understandable because as human writers we are the ones infusing thoughts, emotions and motives to these races. There is a tendency to use anthropomorphism, (the attribution of human form or other characteristics to anything other than a human being) with our races.

At the writers meeting I attended last month, one of the writers brought up something that I always have taken for granted. When he was describing his character and setting during our world building exercise, I continually asked questions about the choices he made regarding what he presented. He said that my questioning made him think more, because these things were questions he had not thought of.

What he presented was a space opera setting, with a human hero, on an alien world. Yet his alien world where a conglomerate of alien and humans lived, a space age Tortuga if you will, was clearly driven by humanizing the aliens.

Now I understand that a majority of aliens were a backdrop for the story, used to make the city “feel” alien and exotic. Yet when we see the aliens and their shops, where the hero wanders, is nothing more than New York City or any large modern city. However, there was nothing uniquely alien when the hero entered a store.

I asked about the store, if it owned and operated by an alien species, is the atmosphere inside different than outside? Is the gravity the same? How does communication occur? Can the human make the required sounds or conversely can the alien make the sounds to form human words?

What does the store smell like? Why do the aliens smoke cigarettes? Why are drugs usable by both humans and the various aliens that inhabit this world? Why in face did all the aliens seem like human beings with funny colored skin?

It is not just writers who do this, those who claim to have been contacted by aliens from other worlds clearly apply anthropomorphism to these other worldly beings. There are according to ufo theorists who know such things, that 51 to 57 different alien species have and are currently visiting the planet earth.

Yep, 51-57 different species from presumably 57 different worlds, many light years from our little planet. Yet all of them, every single one, from the reptilians to the grays to the multitude that resemble humans, either Nordic or Mediterranean, and the various offshoots that seemingly populate the nearly all planets possible. Oddly enough, they all breathe the exact mixture of our atmosphere, the 78.09% nitrogen, 20.95% oxygen, 0.93% argon, 0.039% carbon dioxide, and small amounts of other gasses with nary a gasp or wheeze. They also deal with our gravity with little to no ill effects and more importantly are anthropomorphically human. 

You know, one head, two arms, two legs. They also have a tendency to get freaky with our women, because somehow to these other species, human woman are more desirable than their own females. I am aware that there are a great number of human-like races, even so there would be biological differences from a planetary perspective that might inhibit a mixing of DNA through purely physical means.

To get back to the discussion at the meeting, I suggested that instead of dismissing the “alien-ness” of the species, actually work at it, to get in-depth with the development of the species from their planet to their religion to their wants and needs. I was asked if this was something that the reader needed to know. Perhaps not all of it, but enough to give the aliens or elves or dwarfs or what every race you are writing about a feeling of uniqueness. The one question I posed that seemed to be one that was hard to answer, “Why would species ‘X’ find a human woman a fitting sexual partner?”

So if you are writing about aliens races, and Dwarfs and Elves are just as alien to humans as a Zabrak or Wookie are, consider the whys of the races. Consider if you making them human. Why do they have the same concepts of loyalty, honor or why are they cruel and devious the way humans are? What makes them this way? Why do they have the same concepts of religion and deities as humans? If you can only answer it with because they are, you are doing a huge disservice to the race of creatures you are making. You are not making anything uniquely alien, only a human with pointy ears or green skin and a funny name.