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  1.  

    This turns up often enough in fantasy, especially with elves. (Funnily enough, I’ve never seen a half-dwarf or a half-orc.) I guess you could even consider Eragon to be a half-elf, considering the something-or-other-ceremony he underwent in Eldest.

    I view half-breeds as having tremendous potential, even if CP didn’t milk it, which is why I’m including one in my current story. Depending on whether she’s associating with witches or humans, she’s referred to as half-witch or half-human. I’m making it rare enough, because of traditional enmity between the two and other things, but in some cases it is biologically possible.

    Anyway, the issue I wanted to discuss: how to balance powers and weaknesses in an anomaly like a half-breed? Also, the psychological effect of not really belonging in either group is something I plan to bring out in what I’m writing. In many cases, I find that the half-blood gets more advantage out of their mixed parentage than anything, but I would like it to be a mixed blessing to my character.

    So discuss- anything about weird fantasy combos, the children that result, tropes and whatever else.

  2.  

    This turns up often enough in fantasy, especially with elves. (Funnily enough, I’ve never seen a half-dwarf or a half-orc.)

    Actually, D&D 3.5 rules did have “half-orc” as a race. (play mor RPGS!! lol)

    As for NM… well you’ll just have to wait and see.

    As for my WIP, there’s only 1 half breed (because intermingling is impossible in my world) and she’s very important & special so forgive me for not spoiling it. ;-)

  3.  

    I think to look at this fully, you need to ground it in a human reality; for example, the half-Aboriginal, half-white people in Australia in the early 1900s (Googling the ‘stolen generation’ of Australia might help somewhere here, even though it’s tangentially related to the topic: this was when the whitest Aboriginal children were taken away from their parents and brought up to be ‘white’ and then interbred with white people to eventually breed the Aboriginal race out of existence. Didn’t work, thank goodness), the Maori people mixing with the white settlers, and their treatment of these kids.

    There’s an interesting thing with the Aboriginal people where they still have ‘skin groups’ that show who can get married to whom. I think this is because their tribes were so segregated that inbreeding was likely to happen if they didn’t sort it out. So it turned out that if you were a Y group, you could marry an X group, and your child would be a Z group. Then that Z child might marry a W group, to produce a Y group, etc etc. It’s so complicated, I don’t know how it works. Anyway, upshot is, half-breeds would disturb the marriage policies, too.

    I’m not quite sure if this would relate, but you did ask for anything, so…

    Of course, these are just Australasian ones because I don’t know enough about other ones.

    If you’re a half-breed, people might swear at you in the street, call you names like ‘coconut’ (eg brown on the outside, white on the inside), look down on you no matter which company you were in. The half-breed (is there a more polite term?) would be paranoid about being accepted in society, would see insults where there were none, feel inferior. You could get a good subplot going about having your character realise that they aren’t inferior after all because they’ve done something important, etc.

    You’ll need to try hard to keep it from being wangst, though.

    •  
      CommentAuthorAdamPottle
    • CommentTimeNov 26th 2009
     
    http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HalfBreed
  4.  
  5.  

    The half-breed (is there a more polite term?) would be paranoid about being accepted in society, would see insults where there were none, feel inferior.

    Yeah, I plan on playing with this a bit.

    •  
      CommentAuthorTakuGifian
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009
     

    One of my best onlne friends is writing about a technical halfbreed, a genetically-enhanced fox/human. The biggest sissue that comes up in his stories is simply trying to qwork out who he is as a person. Where he stands in society, how he fits in, struggling to accept the ways he’s different from the other kids, and dealing with the emotional and physical harrassment from people who pick on him simply because he’s different to a far greater degree than usual.

    These are real-world issues that resonate with large groups of people, simply taken to their logical extremes with a creature who is so different from others as to be almost alien, but same enough to not be entirely shunned. For me personally, that’s how I’d like to see a half-breed written: conflicted, self-conscious, low self-esteem, trying to find thir place in the world… of course, avoiding both cheese and narm would be the difficult bit.

    •  
      CommentAuthorPuppet
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009
     

    I’m working with a “half-breed” in a way. He was born human, but his mind and body are slowly being taken over by a Alien when a magical experiment went wrong. The people start to get suspicious of him and he slowly loses control and pretty much gets less and less human, resulting in him being banished and after a while, hunted down.

  6.  

    conflicted, self-conscious, low-self esteem, trying to find their place in the world…

    I plan on using ‘conflicted’ and ‘trying to find their place in the world’. The self-esteem issue, I’m working out. As I’ve written her so far, this character is a confident, self-assured young woman, for better or worse, and I don’t think that I want that to change, at least when she’s among humans.

    I did come up with a rather interesting development last night that I want to incorporate more fully in later edits, in that the magic that she can do, and can’t quite fully control, frightens her, and she tries very hard to bury this fear. Instead, she tries extremely hard to blend in and cancel out her ‘other part’, whether she’s with other witches or other humans. The witches think that humans are inferior, so perhaps the self-consciousness and less self-confidence will go more into play there, as the witches would think the fact of having a human parent makes her weaker or whatever.

    The witches and the humans are fighting, so often the half-blood’s allegiance is called into question, and she doesn’t really know to whom she owes her loyalty and where she really belongs, as the humans shun her and the witches view her as inferior. Eventually, though, I think that she’s going to get fed up of both of them and just go off and do her own thing.

    •  
      CommentAuthorKyllorac
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009
     

    conflicted, self-conscious, low self-esteem, trying to find thir place in the world

    And why can’t half-breeds be self-confident, content with what they have, at peace with who they are, and fully at home in the society they live in? Sure, society at large may not approve of or accept their existence, but there are certainly at least some individuals (in particular parents and siblings) that would be supportive and encourage the half-breed to take pride in what they are, or the half-breed could be strong willed and decisive enough to make their own way through life.

    I think a half-breed of that variety would be more interesting to read and write about than the stereotypical wangster and make for a pretty dynamic character.

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009
     

    That would be interesting… a half-breed who is initially perhaps a little angsty, but soon decides “eh, I am who I am. Screw the people who have a problem with me, that’s their issue. I can’t help my heritage, so I may as well be proud of it.”

    •  
      CommentAuthorKyllorac
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009
     

    They don’t even have to be angsty. They could start out confused why, even when they’re doing things as good or better than their peers, they’re still not accepted. That could then develop into frustration which would then lead to their deciding to go their own way despite all the others.

    Really, it annoys me that half-breeds always equal angst, especially since I’m the product of a mixed marriage and loathe angsty characters in general.

  7.  

    a half-breed who is initially perhaps a little angsty, but soon decides “eh, I am who I am. Screw the people who have a problem with me, that’s their issue. I can’t help my heritage, so I may as well be proud of it.”

    Yes, exactly. That’s what I want to do with my half-blood. There are advantages and disadvantages to her position, so she just accepts them and moves on and lives her own life.

  8.  

    I agree with Kyllorac. If you want to go into the difficulties of really belonging in neither half of their respective societies, use a light touch. Lazy authors too often use it to go BAWWWWWWWWWW I DON’T FIT ANYWHERE BAWWWWWWWWW ANGSTANGSTANGST and base it off their own social deficiencies rather than the sort of alienation a mixed-race person would actually have to deal with.

    •  
      CommentAuthorTakuGifian
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009 edited
     

    as I said, avoiding ‘narm’ is the hardest bit about writing internally conflicted characters.

    That said, I suppose I should have clarified that my friend is writing about a teenaged half-breed. That probabklymakes a difference to the emotions involved.

    •  
      CommentAuthorswenson
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009
     

    With the whole “I don’t fit in anywhere, BAWWWWW” thing… well, why can’t they? I know it’s a great metaphor for angst and being left out, blah blah blah, and undoubtedly if other sentient species/races existed, some halfbloods would indeed be angsty about it. But a significant percentage of them would most likely go “OK, so I’m not a human and I’m not a <whatever>, but I can’t do anything about it, so I might as well just make the most of the situation.” Probably most would simply settle down with one side or the other (unless their mixed parentage means they have unusual features/powers unlike either of their parent species/races) and deal with it. If there were enough around, they might even start their own communities, where they would have a place to fit in.

    Maybe I’m just naive because I’ve never actually been in this “BAWWWWW, I don’t fit in anywhere” situation, but it seems faintly ridiculous to assume all halfbloods/halfbreeds are going to be angsty emo crybabies simply because they’re half human and half <whatever> (or half-slime monster, half-halfling, I dunno). Maybe the teenagers would be angsty (goodness knows we are enough anyway), but by the time you get to, oh, 25, you’re mostly past that, even if you do have things to be angsty about.

    •  
      CommentAuthorKyllorac
    • CommentTimeNov 27th 2009
     

    That said, I suppose I should have clarified that my friend is writing about a teenaged half-breed. That probabklymakes a difference to the emotions involved.

    Not really. Sure, teenagers are less emotionally mature than adults, but one would think they’re at least slightly more mature than children. Angst is a really childish emotion if you think about it. Essentially, it’s “things didn’t go exactly how I wanted them, so I’m going to sit around and cry like a baby.” Generally, being the target of pressure, societal or situational, results in the person being pressured becoming acutely aware of the results of their actions. If you consider that half-breeds (and people of mixed-race) face the disapproval of society in general, you’d think the half-breed would have realized by the time they’re a teenager that sulking about things won’t change them.

    Depression, I can definitely see happening. Angst, no. The latter is too shallow an emotion and one only spoiled and/or ignorant people indulge in. Of course, if the half-breed were sheltered for practically their entire lives, it’s an entirely different can of worms…

  9.  

    I would think determination would also be a factor. If you’re neither and both, then you’d want to prove yourself to everyone who sees you as ‘unnatural’ or whatever else.

    •  
      CommentAuthorJeni
    • CommentTimeNov 28th 2009 edited
     

    Steph’s post is the best here. I think, guys, that despite it being fantasy, you really do need to look to RL for sources on how to deal with this sort of thing.

    You call it angst, but, if one side of your family doesn’t accept you, it can have more of an impact than you realise. You feel like you’re constantly on the outskirts of the other species(?), trying, but never being truly accepted. Oftentimes you can just feel like a fake, like one side of your family is on paper, and that’s how it stays.

    It’s a bit disempowering, too, knowing whatever you do, you can’t change anything, maybe because of your appearance. That could be a form of acceptance, and getting over it, but it can not be. That disempowerment is like standing in front of a mountain and being told to move it.

    Sure, you have to learn to accept it, but again, you feel entirely helpless as you’re either forced into one camp or no camp. You don’t get a choice about it if one camp won’t accept you.

    Not really. Sure, teenagers are less emotionally mature than adults, but one would think they’re at least slightly more mature than children.

    Nah, teenagers are the worst. They want their life to be dramatic, their emotions are unstable and realising you can’t move that mountain? Makes you angry, makes you crazy, makes you want to be different. Children can’t comprehend the situation, they don’t know what’s right, what’s wrong. They accept what’s given to them and are happy enough to sit in a box picking their nose. :D

  10.  

    @Swenson: Yes, it’s far more interesting when the mixed character in question is more focused on carving out a place for himself/herself, rather than giving them something to angst about. Some of my good friends in high school were mixed and it wasn’t really a big deal since they didn’t allow it to be a big deal.

    At any rate, the point I was initially trying to make was that if authors are going to write about the struggles of mixed race characters, they should make sure it’s actually about the struggle of mixed race characters, rather than hijacking said struggle to use as a metaphor for how the author didn’t have any friends in high school.

    Oh, and just as a tip to anybody writing these kinds of characters: the character’s appearance is the biggest factor in how people racially classify them. Consider how many people you know who identify Tiger or Obama as being black.

  11.  

    Well, technically, they are, lol.

    Nah, teenagers are the worst. They want their life to be dramatic, their emotions are unstable and realising you can’t move that mountain? Makes you angry, makes you crazy, makes you want to be different. Children can’t comprehend the situation, they don’t know what’s right, what’s wrong. They accept what’s given to them and are happy enough to sit in a box picking their nose. :D

    YES!

    •  
      CommentAuthorswenson
    • CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
     

    Obama’s half black and half white… but that is true, I never considered it in that light before. Technically speaking, he’s as much white as he is black, even if he happens to look more black than white.

    So I can definitely see that happening with mixed-species children- that one particular species or the other would probably have the dominant traits, so they’d end up looking more slime troll than night elf, for example.

    •  
      CommentAuthorJeni
    • CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
     

    so they’d end up looking more slime troll than night elf, for example.

    And the night elves wouldn’t accept the half-breed, because he looked like a slime troll, so he has no option but to be a slime troll. He might be able to dabble in the night elf-side, but never embrace it fully, because he looks like a slime troll.

    (Although I’m sure slime trolls are perfectly lovely compared to silly night elves).

  12.  

    ^^ Exactly.

    The character in question is not from two sides as different as slime trolls and night elves, so it’s not altogether impossible that she should kinda-sorta blend into both worlds, appearance wise, but she definitely has traits of both sides that give her away as half-and-half.

  13.  

    I am so happy to have found this thread.

    I think half – breeds are looked down upon way too much, although I think that is mostly due to the fact that they are not handled very well, as sansafro beautifully explained:P And also, way too often I think they end up turning into Sues. But the second I think can be solved quite easily by balancing advantages and disatvantages of the two species.

    And not belonging somewhere can certainly be used in ways different than “BAAAAAAAAAAW WOE IS ME” – as it was stated in previous discussion, I agree that in case of the many different half – breeds this is a major issue, belonging is a very important part of what contributes to healthy mental development and a balanced psyche.

    My world is ridden with different kinds of half – bloods and they deal with the problems of acceptance differently – one, for example, manages to gain power and create his own social group through political maneuvering. The other is quite indifferent to the fact neither group her different parents were a part of would accept her, she would be okay with that if she could be bothered to care. On the other hand, she is a murdering, maniacal berserker that goes apeshit at the slightest semblance of violence (she got that from daddy:P). That is basically the only thing she hates about being a half – blood. That and the fact she needs to sleep 15 hours a day:P

    But I basically love half – breeds dearly:) Paolini says there is no fun writing fantasy if you cannot use the line “Die, puny human!” I would like to disagree. Fantasy is no fun if you cannot have one of your characters shout “You fucking half – breed!” (heh, I really liked District 9)

    • CommentAuthorDeborah
    • CommentTimeOct 28th 2010
     
    Actually, there were two human-dwarf mixes in Narnia's ''Prince Caspian".
  14.  

    The half-breed (is there a more polite term?) would be paranoid about being accepted in society, would see insults where there were none, feel inferior.

    I did that sort of with my one half-breed that I have. Except half-breeds aren’t really acceptable in my society, but he could pass for one of the races. He may also be exaggerating his plight just a tad because he’s bitter.

    • CommentAuthorDeborah
    • CommentTimeDec 5th 2010
     
    One of my stories has several half-breeds--there's a brother and sister whose mother was a naaid (water nymph), and at least two characters whose mothers were dryads.
    The half-naaids were raised among humans and their mother ran out on them when they were really young. So they mostly tend to act like humans, but with a few odd characteristics, (liking water, being extremely energetic, which is a characteristic of naaids in this particular world, having 'inhuman' beauty, and probably a few other things I haven't thought of yet.)
    One half-dryad is pretty much like that too, except she loves plants instead of water, and is extremely flexible, like a tree. And her mother is presumably still around somewhere.
    The last one is the villainess. Her dryad heritage gives her plant magic, but since the mother was the dryad of a laburnum tree, (which is poisonous), she also has talent with poisons.
  15.  

    and is extremely flexible, like a tree

    I would think it’d be the other way round.

    • CommentAuthorDeborah
    • CommentTimeDec 5th 2010
     
    Well, I was thinking about how trees bend in the wind. Maybe it just means she's graceful. I haven't worked out everything about this world yet.
    •  
      CommentAuthorTakuGifian
    • CommentTimeDec 5th 2010
     

    I would think it’d be the other way round.

    Me too. Also, the idea that because her mother came from a poisonous plant, she’s inherently gifted with poisons is… suspect. Point: all plants are poisonous. Each kind of poisonous plant has a different kind of poison. One species of poison is very different from another, and some plant poisons can actually be digested by humans. Something more like ‘she has a fondness for with a particular kind of poison’ is more like it, in my opinion.

    •  
      CommentAuthorNorthmark
    • CommentTimeDec 5th 2010
     

    I have a unique situation in which my main character doesn’t find out the history of his parentage until he’s in his twenties, so he’s never really felt any kind of discrimination.

    Short version: In vampire society it’s a pretty big faux pas to have a child with a human, because vampire babies kill human mothers. My main character’s mother fled before she could be infected, and after she died giving birth he was adopted by human parents. As a result of his different breeding he’s got a much shorter lifespan (by vampire standards) and weaker powers, but all the traditional weaknesses. Since he’s never been around any vampires growing up, he just assumes his strengths and weaknesses are the norm, and doesn’t think that he’s any different. Once he meets others, though, he realizes he doesn’t fit in with either humans or vampires.

    For the most part I think he’s going to handle it pretty well, apart from being angry at his father for effectively abandoning him.

    • CommentAuthorDeborah
    • CommentTimeDec 5th 2010
     
    The flexlibilty thing would actually make more sense for the half-naaids, come to think of it. Things in water tend to be like that, since I was thinking of the way fish bend. And how some of said naaids, that live in streams, are very energetic... But the half-dryads are graceful, if rather lazy. (how much do trees move, anyway?)
    And perhaps I should go into more detail about the villainous half-dryad. She has magic, which was taught to her by her father, who was thrown out of the mages order for practicing illegal magic (in this case, attempting to resurrect the dead). Because of her dryad heritage, she is good at plant magic, but the poison thing is not caused by who her mother was. It was just the fact that her mother was the dryad of a poisonous tree that gave her the idea of using poisons in the first place. Besides, she's subtle and sneaky, but not much of a fighter, so its an easier way to get rid of people she wants to get rid of.