Re: Sha'ahm'ni- Sard Hand Language
Posted: Wed Aug 18, 2021 12:11 am
Was Sha'ahm'ni created as a response specifically to the loss of Zehreik? I don't see anything in the lorebook or rules to clarify whether that's the case or if it predated that event.
If it was created at that time, there are actually three generational experiences here. There's a generation that has used Sha'ahm'ni for their entire lives and for whom it has "always" been part of Sard culture. There's the younger generation that has some members (the Ansha) who don't understand the need for it and are trying to move on. As noted.
But there would also be the older generation that was born before Sha'ahm'ni (starting really with Sard in their mid to late 50's). They would be the ones who made an active, conscious decision to not be "the people of endless mourning" but instead to make their mourning a private thing to be understood only among their own people and those they were close to. All these conversations we are having about how to express X or Y, or what is suitable to express, or what exactly is the intent of this gesture, these would have been the conversations they had in the moment of their sorrow and over the next few years as they developed it further.
I would think there would be some pre-existing practice that flowered into Sha'ahm'ni in that case, rather than appearing completely out of nowhere. Maybe it was very important to be quiet when crystal glass was spun, resulting in a simple set of hand signs that were co-opted, or the gestures are adapted from a famous dance performed in the rainbow light of midday, each motion corresponding to a rainbow color and an emotional moment, that have now been simplified into something anyone can do (sort of the equivalent of humming a familiar tune). Or something entirely different. But Zehreik seems like the sort of event that shapes a society, so the idea that Sha'ahm'ni really crystallized at that point seems to work.
If it was created at that time, there are actually three generational experiences here. There's a generation that has used Sha'ahm'ni for their entire lives and for whom it has "always" been part of Sard culture. There's the younger generation that has some members (the Ansha) who don't understand the need for it and are trying to move on. As noted.
But there would also be the older generation that was born before Sha'ahm'ni (starting really with Sard in their mid to late 50's). They would be the ones who made an active, conscious decision to not be "the people of endless mourning" but instead to make their mourning a private thing to be understood only among their own people and those they were close to. All these conversations we are having about how to express X or Y, or what is suitable to express, or what exactly is the intent of this gesture, these would have been the conversations they had in the moment of their sorrow and over the next few years as they developed it further.
I would think there would be some pre-existing practice that flowered into Sha'ahm'ni in that case, rather than appearing completely out of nowhere. Maybe it was very important to be quiet when crystal glass was spun, resulting in a simple set of hand signs that were co-opted, or the gestures are adapted from a famous dance performed in the rainbow light of midday, each motion corresponding to a rainbow color and an emotional moment, that have now been simplified into something anyone can do (sort of the equivalent of humming a familiar tune). Or something entirely different. But Zehreik seems like the sort of event that shapes a society, so the idea that Sha'ahm'ni really crystallized at that point seems to work.