Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Cultural Mash

Cultural Mash – Time, Place, & Characterization Details (Writing Exercise)

  • Think of your teen years. Brainstorm a list of all of the specific things that you find as culturally relevant to the times. Nouns (people, events), short speech phrases, and appropriate adjectives that describe the era.

  • Example:     

1980s    Shoulder Pads   Short shorts      Bowl Haircuts   Synthesizers       Reagan
                       
            LA Looks    leotards      Goonies                       Yugo    Flowbee    Michael Keaton        Dude
                            
Cocaine     Richard Simmons   B-horror films   John Cusack      Exxon Valdez   Hairbands

·       The key to the exercise to try to get out culturally associated details that you can integrate into a story to help create solid verisimilitude without having to try too hard …


o   Adding such specific details helps with various elements, especially: setting, character, dialogue, and plot.

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