Snake Featherston
Banned
1) From what I've seen, there aren't an awful lot of TLs that deal with linguistics. Surely in the event of a longer-lasting, say, Roman Empire, the Latin Language would have been in a stronger position or the Germanic languages in a weaker one? If the Romans say, expand to the Vistula and thus establish a foundation to be rebuilt on, might there not be hybrid Latin-Slavic languages or Latin-Germanic ones? I've also not seen the effects of different societies and their strengths and weaknesses on the structures of language itself. With a balkanized China or US scenario, the different dialects present in OTL will get stronger and more like separate languages. If said balkanization goes on long enough, entirely separate languages might evolve, depending on the nature of it. On the other hand, with a scenario like a longer-lived Mongol Empire or a greater-sized Islamic Caliphate under Arab rule, the resulting dialects of Mongolian or Arabic might leave greater influences than IOTL (and with Arabic, that influence can be all out of proportion to the initial number of speakers). There's also a tendency to ignore that just as a modern Anglo can't understand Beowulf, or modern Romance speakers Classical Latin, or what have you, that language changes over millenia from loanwords and from general evolution over time are also ignored.
2) I also don't see in many scenarios that ultimately societies that get hegemony become overconfident, their ruling principles ossify, and then it all goes to hell and the society may or may not be rebuilt. That's the story of China (with rebuilding going on) and the former Roman Empire (without rebuilding it.) It also seems that TLs never take into account things like the OTL 1910s, where a massive social upheaval simultaneously topples multiple societies, such as the Porofiriato, the Chinese Empire, the Russian Empire, the Ottoman Empire (slightly later than the others, but all the same...), the German Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the Taisho Democracy. If Imperial Germany imposes a German domination of Europe, then it goes on and on, and Europeans never get together enough to topple it, or alternately, the German Empire never gets overconfident or stagnant and thus brings itself down. If the Soviets conquer all of Western Europe, same thing. If the Ottomans and Byzantines survive longer, their survival into the 20th Century and beyond is all but assured, never mind that the demands that brought down both OTL Empires never lessened and just continued.
3) The converse of the above. If the US or China or some region IOTL united is divided, it always stays divided, no Qin Shi Huangs come along and impose unity (or Chandragupta Mauryas). The presence of nationalism, as well as the Roman example are often ignored in such TLs. Even if people think that a United US is just like OTL, the nature that such a unification takes, whether peaceful or a military unification like the creation of the Maurya Dynasty and the Qin Empire, will have immense, long-lasting effects on the "new" US. A militarily-united USA might prove to be much more despotic than the OTL one, for instance. A peacefully-united (on the model, perhaps of the Haudenosaunee) one might be more isolationist, but more inclined to trade both with indigenous peoples and neighboring countries and with other continents.
4) In cases of greater success of totalitarianism or other autocratic dictatorships, the process of devolution that occurs in all such cases is often handwaved away. The Qin state devolved to such rapidity that it completely crashed and burned, but the examples of France (turning from the violent Revolutionaries the more peaceful Neo-Bourbons), the USSR (from Stalin to Brezhnev), the PRC (from Mao to Xiaoping), to innumerable instances from dynasties worldwide, they all testify that eventually no matter the nature of a society, that it will sooner or later change and adapt, or collapse, and for totalitarian or repressive states, such change often means collapse.
5) Certain continents are entirely, if not entirely, mostly entirely, ignored in AH. Where are the Oceanian PODs dealing with different layouts of the islands, and different Australias? Why are African PODs so often ignored (I've got a TL in the works about an alternate Bantu spread and the results that has on later African culture, it's in the embryo stage as of present time, but it's my next project after IIFTOS (shameless plug.))? Where are the South American PODs? Or the ones that deal with Native Americans? Or Central Asians? Or, hell, for that matter, alternate religious PODs? I'm religious, been raised an Evangelical and all that, but my first major TL deals with an alternate Judaism and no Christianity (but perhaps a related cultural manifestation), so it doesn't bother me much, religious history is still religious history. Why no TLs, perhaps, on a different nature of paganism, perhaps a world where Western paganism develops theology and intricate natures of societies and the East doesn't, prompting the rise of a syncretic Christian culture in India, and a West that retains a form of polytheism up to the modern age? This is Alternate history, after all.
5.1) Why is finance more or less ignored in most TLs? The reasons for societal collapses when they occur are usually financial or cultural or what have you. The role that financial structure and trade relationships between various cultures plays is virtually ignored, also. If it's done, it's done in Turtledovesque fashion with complete ignorance of what and why except that the events portrayed are a duplicate of OTL. And the role of economic strain in the collapse of Indigenous American and African societies is almost entirely ignored. Marxist history overdoes the role of economics, but that doesn't mean it's irrelevant, for Chrissakes!
and lastly...
6) Cultural intermixing. The Arab Empires of the period from AD 600 onwards have had an immense impact on Christianity, ditto Chinese society on Japan, and of course, the nature of the English and their attitude to colonization in both Canada and the US (but also in the Caribbean) produced radically different situations for Indians. A world where a Neo-Roman Empire comes into contact with the Indians, say, or perhaps a super-China or Japan or even India itself coming into contact with the Indians (sorry Flocc, but this was too delicious a pun to ignore) and the cultural intermixing that produces? Also, this is as good a place as any to note that in most TLs, India plays precious little importance, when IOTL, it was and still is one of the major cultural centers on the planet, and Africa also, for that matter.
Timelines that play some aspects of these up might be more interesting, and dare I say, more like a real world to read. And while I'm at it, I'd like to credit some of the people that convinced me to consider this: Hendryk and Leo, as well as AHP and for negative examples Chris and Admiral Canaris (for the constant dictatorship-wank he liked.)
2) I also don't see in many scenarios that ultimately societies that get hegemony become overconfident, their ruling principles ossify, and then it all goes to hell and the society may or may not be rebuilt. That's the story of China (with rebuilding going on) and the former Roman Empire (without rebuilding it.) It also seems that TLs never take into account things like the OTL 1910s, where a massive social upheaval simultaneously topples multiple societies, such as the Porofiriato, the Chinese Empire, the Russian Empire, the Ottoman Empire (slightly later than the others, but all the same...), the German Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the Taisho Democracy. If Imperial Germany imposes a German domination of Europe, then it goes on and on, and Europeans never get together enough to topple it, or alternately, the German Empire never gets overconfident or stagnant and thus brings itself down. If the Soviets conquer all of Western Europe, same thing. If the Ottomans and Byzantines survive longer, their survival into the 20th Century and beyond is all but assured, never mind that the demands that brought down both OTL Empires never lessened and just continued.
3) The converse of the above. If the US or China or some region IOTL united is divided, it always stays divided, no Qin Shi Huangs come along and impose unity (or Chandragupta Mauryas). The presence of nationalism, as well as the Roman example are often ignored in such TLs. Even if people think that a United US is just like OTL, the nature that such a unification takes, whether peaceful or a military unification like the creation of the Maurya Dynasty and the Qin Empire, will have immense, long-lasting effects on the "new" US. A militarily-united USA might prove to be much more despotic than the OTL one, for instance. A peacefully-united (on the model, perhaps of the Haudenosaunee) one might be more isolationist, but more inclined to trade both with indigenous peoples and neighboring countries and with other continents.
4) In cases of greater success of totalitarianism or other autocratic dictatorships, the process of devolution that occurs in all such cases is often handwaved away. The Qin state devolved to such rapidity that it completely crashed and burned, but the examples of France (turning from the violent Revolutionaries the more peaceful Neo-Bourbons), the USSR (from Stalin to Brezhnev), the PRC (from Mao to Xiaoping), to innumerable instances from dynasties worldwide, they all testify that eventually no matter the nature of a society, that it will sooner or later change and adapt, or collapse, and for totalitarian or repressive states, such change often means collapse.
5) Certain continents are entirely, if not entirely, mostly entirely, ignored in AH. Where are the Oceanian PODs dealing with different layouts of the islands, and different Australias? Why are African PODs so often ignored (I've got a TL in the works about an alternate Bantu spread and the results that has on later African culture, it's in the embryo stage as of present time, but it's my next project after IIFTOS (shameless plug.))? Where are the South American PODs? Or the ones that deal with Native Americans? Or Central Asians? Or, hell, for that matter, alternate religious PODs? I'm religious, been raised an Evangelical and all that, but my first major TL deals with an alternate Judaism and no Christianity (but perhaps a related cultural manifestation), so it doesn't bother me much, religious history is still religious history. Why no TLs, perhaps, on a different nature of paganism, perhaps a world where Western paganism develops theology and intricate natures of societies and the East doesn't, prompting the rise of a syncretic Christian culture in India, and a West that retains a form of polytheism up to the modern age? This is Alternate history, after all.
5.1) Why is finance more or less ignored in most TLs? The reasons for societal collapses when they occur are usually financial or cultural or what have you. The role that financial structure and trade relationships between various cultures plays is virtually ignored, also. If it's done, it's done in Turtledovesque fashion with complete ignorance of what and why except that the events portrayed are a duplicate of OTL. And the role of economic strain in the collapse of Indigenous American and African societies is almost entirely ignored. Marxist history overdoes the role of economics, but that doesn't mean it's irrelevant, for Chrissakes!
and lastly...
6) Cultural intermixing. The Arab Empires of the period from AD 600 onwards have had an immense impact on Christianity, ditto Chinese society on Japan, and of course, the nature of the English and their attitude to colonization in both Canada and the US (but also in the Caribbean) produced radically different situations for Indians. A world where a Neo-Roman Empire comes into contact with the Indians, say, or perhaps a super-China or Japan or even India itself coming into contact with the Indians (sorry Flocc, but this was too delicious a pun to ignore) and the cultural intermixing that produces? Also, this is as good a place as any to note that in most TLs, India plays precious little importance, when IOTL, it was and still is one of the major cultural centers on the planet, and Africa also, for that matter.
Timelines that play some aspects of these up might be more interesting, and dare I say, more like a real world to read. And while I'm at it, I'd like to credit some of the people that convinced me to consider this: Hendryk and Leo, as well as AHP and for negative examples Chris and Admiral Canaris (for the constant dictatorship-wank he liked.)
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