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Re: [EK] Operation Renaissance Persona




Poster: Tom Rettie <tom@his.com>

At 01:39 PM 12/17/97 -0500, Karen Lyons-McGann wrote:

>I vote that it is but then  I've heard hardly anyone with a Universal 
>Translator so far.  

Ah, then you didn't hear me 15 years ago.  When I first showed up in the
SCA, I was told, "you should develop a persona."  I was interested in
Scottish history, so I decided to have a Scottish persona.  So how does an
11th century Scot speak and act?  I had no idea.  So I made it up as I
went.    It wasn't pretty.

I didn't mean to imply that trying to speak forsoothly and observe SCA
customs was a bad thing, or that overkill was a problem.  I just meant to
point out that what we (okay, I) choose to characterize as being "in
persona" is somewhat arbitrary based on popular notions of how medieval
people behaved.  To our modern sensibility, anyone speaking in vaguely
Elizabethean English can be associated with a thousand years of world
culture.  A sprinkling here and there certainly adds to the atmosphere.
But it doesn't bother me when folks speak less than forsoothly if that is
what they're comfortable with.  Hearing a good ol' American southern drawl
or midwestern twang bothers me less than hearing cars referred to as
"dragons," privies as "porta-castles," or head cooks as "feastocrats."   

Now I fear I have beaten this poor dead horse of a subject long enough.

Your obedient servant,

Findlaech



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Tom Rettie                                       tom@his.com
Heather Bryden                               bryden@hers.com
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