1. Simon Price

    Simon Price Active Member

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    Important things to keep in mind while writing a British ex-Muslim Arab girl?

    Discussion in 'Research' started by Simon Price, Dec 31, 2017.

    So, I've had this character idea for a while now for one of the main characters of my urban fantasy story to be an Arab ex-Muslim girl who's a runaway after the circumstances of the untimely death of her father caused her to become estranged from her family and community. In her current incarnation the plan is to have her be originally from the UK, in England, before making her way (most likely as a stowaway) to America and winding up bumping into the main character and striking up a friendship after cooperating in a crisis early on.

    Obviously I'm going to have to do research regarding the speech differences like word use and sayings and phrases, but what I'm more concerned about is the more fundamental and yet subtle things like how her culture would shape the way she views the world and should influence her personality, the general sort of things she'd see differently from Americans. I was wondering if anyone had any good general advice for the cultural differences I should keep in mind. This is mostly regarding the differences between American and British people, though any advice on how British Arab culture in particular might have influenced her, or any residual influence Islam might have on her (she parted with the faith on fairly bad terms, but even when you grow to hate something, I know it can really get its hooks in you if you've been submerged in it long enough) would also be appreciated.
     
  2. badgerjelly

    badgerjelly Contributor Contributor

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    There are huge differences between the UK and the US. There are also huge differences across the US from state to state.

    Culturally, in my experience (and speaking generally), Americans are the most different in terms of culture compared to all other English speaking countries. You'd have to expose yourself to several different kinds of people from the US in order to appreciate this yourself. I have found, repeatedly, that often someone from the US often comes out with something that most Europeans, Australians or Canadians simply frown at in astonishment. I think this is generally due to the insular nature of Americans.

    Just to be clear I am being general here. There are people from all nations that are different. Age range is another think to consider. Many people regard people from the US as friendly, and in opposition to that sometimes false (eg. "Have a nice day.")

    I would recommend posting something online saying you'd like to meet some people from the US and sit down and chat with them. One-on-one people are generally very reasonable and finding differences of culture can be quite hard. The differences tend to reveal themselves in a group dynamic more obviously (so I've found.)

    Also, note the country this girls parents were from. The "Muslim" part may involve very different parental attitudes depending on the country of origin - Indonesia, Malaysia, Turkey, Pakistan, India, Saudi Arabia, Somalia. The "Muslim" part can be significantly different in attitude if her parents were immigrants from Somalia as opposed to somewhere like Indonesia or even Albania. All of these could be used to explore a considerable amount of contrast between UK and US immigration culture at large.

    Good luck. Try and do as much hands on research as you can and tell the story of the world we live in as true to life as you can.
     

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