Welcome back to another article of the Worldbuilding Chronicles! In today's post, we will learn how to worldbuild cultures in a Fantasy world and how to do it the right way. We hope that by the end of it, you will have learned how to worldbuild fashion, politics, religion, and much more! So sit back and relax because this is going to be a long one...

Politics? Of Course Politics!

Governments and politicians love them or hate them but it is rather unavoidable as all places have them. Now you might want to consider how a government in your Fantasy story runs and there are loads of questions to get you started! Like -

Is it a kingdom?

How is it run?

Are there royal families and if so, who is the leader?

Does the royal family have all the power or do they have people working with them, like factions?

These are the questions you have to think about when writing about the government of your world! Now what you might be asking is, how do I do that?

Well, dear reader, you're in luck because we are here to help you out with that! Firstly, as mentioned earlier, what kind of government do you want to rule your Fantasy world? There are quite a few types of government and here is a very brief list to get you started.

- the type of government where the power is in the people! So the people chose the leaders

Dictatorship - Where one person has all the power and control without limitations

Monarchy - This is one of the most beloved government systems in the Fantasy genre! A government run by one person, like a king or queen

Theocracy - A government run by priests; essentially a religious government

Totalitarian - the government where those in charge try to have control over everything in the lives of the people

Republic - Similar to a democracy but run by the people and not those voted in has representatives

Anarchy - No government at all!

Since we have got that cleared out, now you just need to pick one and build it up from there. Once you have a government, you now have to think about what are the policies or what mode of methods your government use to maintain peace/order in your Fantasy world.

Are there laws? E.g. What are the values deemed worthy in your fantasy world? Perhaps there is a law that everyone must not tell lies.

If so, how do they work and what are the punishments for breaking them? E.g. if anyone were to go against the government, what are the consequences they face?

Is there a police or military force? And how does that work? E.g. how does the government go about enforcing their laws on the people of your world?

Once you figure that out, you can go ahead with building your own laws and the system of law enforcement!

The next step after that is to keep in mind the rights of the citizens! You have laws, you know what they can't do, and now time to think about what they can do.

Are the things they can do restricted in some way?

Can they vote? (Only consider this if voting is a thing in your world).

Can certain people do things that others can't?

What the people can and can't do is a lot more important than you'd expect as you can use this to get your characters in trouble for breaking certain laws and causing tension!

Money Money Money!

Now that you have politics figured out it is time to consider the economy and revenue systems! Money is very important in a story for quite a few reasons, some of them being - the need of people to get supplies and the things required for their survival. Here, you'll learn how to do that.

For starters, you might want to consider the jobs that are available in your fantasy world. You can figure that out by the location of your story's kingdom or town(s). If the place is located near water, a lot of their jobs would be related to fishing or seafood hunting. Meaning? Seafood would be their main export. In the same way, if the location is near a forest, activities like hunting and gathering would be jobs that would be essential. Once you consider their main jobs you can also think of the other important professions , like factory workers, medical professionals, teachers etcetera. Of course, you could always make the town have jobs only related to their export, if the kingdom or town allows it. But, that might make things difficult as the town's needs such as medical care and education would have to be obtained by other means which you have to make clear in your story.

So now you have jobs! Good job (pun intended). What's next? Well, now it's onto the money itself! What's interesting is you don't even need actual money like coins, it can be anything at all. Thinking about history, many communities and civilizations used trade as their economy. Trading things they had for what they needed and that was how they survived. You could go for that route instead of money. This can work for a lot of different communities, so if it works go for it!

Now if trading is not up your alley, money might work! There are different kinds of money you can use. For example paper money (like dollars), coins, gems and other valuable stones, and much more, you can make up the currency any time you want. With that, you assign everything a value like how 1 US dollar is equal well...1 dollar and so forth. .

Values and Taboos!

You have the structure of the government. So what's next? Values! Everyone has values and communities can have group values; it's the values shared among the communities you want to worldbuild.

Figuring out what everyone considers good and bad is rather simple. What is considered taboo? Some conversations or topics are thought to be bad or inappropriate. If you have no idea about the taboos of the community, here are some ideas you can use for inspiration.

Discussing the government E.g. any talk of the government is forbidden by the ruling party and offenders who are caught will be executed.

Current wars or infighting E.g. Fighting among the same village is looked down upon and anyone who breaks this unsaid rule will be expelled from the village.

Politics E.g. Talks about politics can only happen in designated areas and times.

Magic or lack thereof E.g. Magic is a taboo or vice versa no-magic is a taboo topic in a world where everyone has magic.

And there are many more things you could consider taboo in the world! The values are also VERY important to finding the taboos in a world.

Communities have values, what's good and bad? What should people consider good jobs and what aren't? These are some examples of values that a community can have. When it comes to the values of a community keep in mind that not everyone shares the same values and it's just the majority. If you need some examples of more values here are some now.

Certain jobs are good and some aren't

Some people are good and some are bad

Magic is good or bad

A certain political party is better than the other

You can also tie in the taboos with this. For example, maybe people are afraid of magic thinking that it's dangerous and in turn, fear those with it.

The E's of the society!

Yes, we are referring to the education system and the means of entertainment. People don't like to be bored and people want an education! And that's the same concept with coming up with different entertainment. You just need to consider two things: location and accessibility.

First, consider location. You can decide what kind of entertainment like games are common given the setting of your world.So for example, if your story is focused on a place that is near water, then water games are common and so on. Another example is if your story is set in a place that is surrounded by the forest, there could be games such as hunting hosted every solstice. Whereas the education system, would be influenced by the location of your story too. For example, living near the port, a robust education system might require the best students to be fluent in all the languages as trading would be the main occupation.

Second, consider accessibility. Accessibility refers to how easy it is to obtain an education or how easy it is to get the materials needed for the types of entertainment available in your world. Consider how easy or difficult it will be for someone in your story world to enter a school and eventually graduate. Are there high entrance fees or maybe will there be an arduous test to see the student's abilities? Is education readily available for everyone living in your story world or is it only covered by a few who have what it takes to get it? The same concept goes for entertainment. Do the rich in the society engage in certain types of entertainment while the poor in another set? Consider the commodities provided. An example will be if fabric is commonly available then you can imagine the people making puppets or playing dress-up! Or if wood is readily available you can make wooden toys that can be used for games.

Games aren't the only way to keep entertained, the Arts are also another way to build on the future of your story world. Singing, dancing, and painting all of these form an enriching culture that you might want to consider incorporating into your story world's culture. With all of these suggestions, the next thing you might want to mull over is the views of the society or individuals towards your story world's culture. This part of the brainstorming or plotting process ties in with the values of your community and the political system. What does this mean? Well, you have to consider the public's view towards the culture that you have created. Do the majority have a biased view about certain cultural norms and who are the minority who disagree with that? This is the key to plot turning points in your story or possibly plot twists.

More info about Education

Education is very important in your story world as you can use it for many things such as politics. However, it should be written in a way that forms part of the background and should not be explained in detail such as the structure etcetera to avoid info dumps. Unless, you're planning to write a fantasy novel situated in a school for example how Harry Potter learnt his magic in Hogwarts and met Malfoy, his archenemy.

Before we get into the uses of education, let's decide on the type of education system aka how students will be taught in your story world:

Homeschool (E.g. private etiquette tutors, sword tutors, horse riding etc)

Public school (E.g. martial arts sects, magic academy, prestigious universities etc)

Special institutions (E.g. knighthood, assassin guilds, martial arts sects, undercover agent programs, a school for the gifted, school of good and evil etc)

Martial arts sects can be both a public and special institution, depending on the criteria to enter it. Homeschool education largely depends on the wealth and influence of the family. It is most commonly found in stories set in the English historical era, where different families hold different influences related to their standing with the monarchy. Thus, the quality of tutors will increase the higher one's standing. Public schools are common in today's society and would be the easiest to relate to or grasp. Lastly, special institutions will be the easiest to write about as there is little information, so as authors, we can make it up as we go along given the degree of flexibility.

These are a few different ways one can receive education as they grow up. Consider how the learning process goes about. Do they read books? Do experiments? Perhaps even doing activities to learn naturally? You can decide this at the same time you have decided your political system. Let's take some examples from The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. In the trilogy, the districts learn in different ways. In District 12 for example, the kids go to school until age 18 while in District 11 the kids go to school for a small bit of the day and then work to harvest crops the rest of the day. No matter the district, they always learn their main export alongside reading and math. Knowing this you can consider the following.

How long does one go to school?

Do they have school all day or have to work after?

What do they learn in school?

Looping back to our Hunger Games example we also learn that school is used as an indoctrination practice by the Capitol using it to make sure the Districts know how much they need the Capitol and why they are indebted to them. As you plot your story, you could make the education system something the government uses to control the population.

Now knowing all of this, bear in mind there is much more to consider but this is the groundwork of plotting and building your story's culture and a government! Thank you for reading the Worldbuilding Chronicles ❤️ We hope the article will be a great help to you as we put a lot of thought behind it ✨.

Stay tuned for the next article and we wish you guys a Merry Christmas 🎄