Writing from the Female POV

[T.Allen.Smith]

Instead of focusing on a comparison of vulgarities and societal viewpoints on those words, please keep focus on the topic at hand which is "Writing from the Female POV".

If we are discussing characterization with uses of particular words (like in the example use with the character Brienne), then it is fitting within the context of the main discussion. Once we delve into contemporary cultural perspectives on the use of vulgarities, we are stretching the boundaries of our family friendly guidelines. Please remain mindful.

Thank you.

 

[ThinkerX]

Some real life things I keep in mind to help differentiate between male and female outlooks:

When I was in high school (not quite back when dinosaurs roamed the earth, but back there anyhow), I typically climbed out of bed about half an hour before I had to catch the bus - just enough time to shower, get dressed, and eat.

When my daughter was in high school (I have no sisters), she would typically get out of bed an hour or more before it was time to catch the bus. She didn't bother with breakfast; that time was to make her 'look presentable'.

Presentable for a teenage boy is clean skin, clean clothes, and combed hair.

Presentable for a teenage girl apparently involves being really clean, fashionable clothes, plus styled hair and makeup.

When I commented on this to my daughter, she patiently explained that by the standards of the girls at school, she skimped a lot on these things; her friends apparently spent two hours or so 'prepping' before heading off to school.

More recent incident from work:

Bossette came in and said she'd be taking photo's for new ID badges.

Reaction of the six or eight (mostly middle aged) men: 'Grunt.' 'Whatever'.

Reaction of the six or eight (mostly middle aged) women: 'We need time to put our warpaint on!' 'I left my makeup at home!'
followed by a general female stampede to the rest room.

When it comes to story writing, this tells me that female characters are going to care a great deal more about their appearance than male ones.

Years ago, I knew a struggling local merchant, who out of sheer desperation, put up a rack full of cheap jewelry, sunglasses, ect in his shop. The teenage boys that frequented his shop barely knew it existed. The teenage girls that came in almost invariably checked it out and bought merchandise from it.

So for story writing, a male character will likely walk right by the stall selling ointments and combs, while a female character might spend quite a bit of time inspecting the wares.

Another item: I spent years delivering pizza in my younger days, mostly for the same outfit. (desperation at first, followed by the realization that a fair pile of cash could be made with the right shifts). I was far from the only pizza driver at this place; there were quite a few others, usually male ranging from competent and reliable to...well the exact opposite. Far fewer females put in for the job. The ones that did either quit or became waitresses in short order, even though the money was substantially less. Reason: they hated (delivery) driving. For whatever reason, this was near universal, be they 18 or 38.

After that, I drove a passenger van for a while. 90% of the riders were female; many used it on a regular basis to get back and forth to work or school. Males used it only if they had a plane to catch, issues with their drivers license, or something of the sort.

So...story writing: women probably won't mind being 'passengers' nearly as much as men. Hence, you see a man and a woman in a cart together, the one holding the reigns will likely be male.

 

[Steerpike]

ThinkerX - it might tell you that on average women care more about that, but you can create a female character that doesn't give a damn about her appearance

 

[ThinkerX]

ThinkerX - it might tell you that on average women care more about that, but you can create a female character that doesn't give a damn about her appearance

Still a place to start.

And there's more than mere appearances, its attitude as well.

 

[wordwalker]

ThinkerX - it might tell you that on average women care more about that, but you can create a female character that doesn't give a damn about her appearance

And there's more than mere appearances, its attitude as well.

Remembering, of course, there's also attitude of the people around someone. Do women care more about their appearance, or do men (and some women too) care more about treating them like --well, like Brienne-- whenever they don't bother?

 

[Ophiucha]

Though considering the stereotypes and cultural standards is important, I don't think you can just apply the modern American standard to most fantasy settings. Many things which are considered feminine, or at least gender neutral, in our society were masculine at some point, somewhere. For instance, in Heian Japan, the soft arts - poetry, calligraphy, etc. - were a masculine trait because women were not taught to write. Romance was the same; all the great romances until the 1800s with Austen onward were written by men with masculine ideals of love and courtship. Fashion, though I don't know of a time or place when it was exclusively masculine, was not always something regarded as inherently feminine, but rather inherently elite. As nobody but the wealthy could afford to consider such things. Certainly even after Western views turned care for appearance into a feminine trait, there were your fops and dandies who cared deeply about it and were not always viewed negatively. Lord Byron is practically the poster boy for dandy-ism, and many loved (and still love) him for it.

Given the potential range of a fantasy setting, the possibilities for society's idea of a woman are basically endless. You could write about a matriarchal society, where women are 'natural leaders' (quote, unquote) and 'born to take charge'. There is nothing about those traits that are inherently masculine, and there have been a handful of such societies. Plus, it's easy to twist the language. Women are leaders of the household, taking care of the children and making sure things run smoothly while the men are out doing the manual and dangerous labour, and what is the queen but the mother of a country? But regardless of whether your society has values essentially identical to modern America's or if it is completely different, it is always important to know how it views its people, since those people are going to be your characters.

 

[Alex Beecroft]

Exactly. In the 18th Century a high born man would also have rolled out of bed and then spent several hours dressing with a small army of servants to paint his face, pluck his eyebrows, apply beauty spots, style and powder his hair or help him choose his wig and outfit for the day. Society's idea of what was 'manly' changed, so men stopped doing that stuff. These days it's changing back, so some men now moisturize and spend hours clipping their beards into odd shapes and use guyliner. This kind of gender behaviour is entirely mutable depending on cultural pressures. So why not try writing a culture which is not identical to 21st Century America, and make your own rules about what is 'manly' and what's 'feminine?'

 

[saellys]

ThinkerX, the deliver drivers at my Dominos store were an even split between male and female. Just because your limited experiences align with an arbitrary stereotype you have accepted as truth doesn't mean your writing has to follow suit.