Shadow Man (Paragons of Queer Speculative Fiction) (47 page)

gran'mesnie
:
social structure intermediate between a
mesnie
and the clan; it is composed of from 3 to 10
mesnie
s
generally claiming a common line of descent.
Gran
'
mesnie
s
are common only in the larger clans.

halving
:
politest, though still potentially insulting, colloquial term for a
herm, and by extension for mems and fems as well; literally means
half-and-half, and implies that one is neither man nor woman.

harvest
:
generic term for the flora collected for export and local use;
delivered to the off-world companies twice a year at Midsummer and
Midwinter.

Important
Man, Important Woman
: a man or woman who has, by virtue
either of a job or by election, been accepted as someone who can
represent or speak for the clan.

ironwood
:
low-growing tree found in the jungle edge; the wood is naturally very
hard, and can, with care, be fire-cured to make it as hard as metal.

jackamie
:
literally "boyfriend"; always a very casual term that can easily
become an insult.

jack,
jack-faitou
: male servant, usually related to his
employer by clan or
mesnie
ties.

jigg
:
a three-wheeled cart used in both city and back country; carries a
driver and one passenger, plus a small cargo.

jillamie
:
literally "girlfriend"; always very casual, and can easily become
an insult.

kittereen
,
kittereens
:
a racing vehicle popular on Hara; essentially a small rocket engine
mounted on a light frame.

land-spiders
:
species of crustacean native to Hara, which spin a silk that forms
the basis of a number of local and export industries.

long-bit
:
local coin, usually glass or wood, worth .10 meg.

luci
:
luminescent colony-dwelling sand flies, once used as a light source.

luciole
:
old-fashioned lamp, usually spherical, designed to house a colony of
luci.

mairaiche
:
farm; source of cultivated crops rather than harvest.

marianj
:
part-time or semi-professional prostitute who plays a passive or
woman's part.

marijak
:
part-time or semi-professional prostitute who plays an active or
man's part.

meg
:
basic unit of Haran currency.

memore
:
wake, memorial gathering.

mesnie
,
mesnie
s
:
basic unit of (traditional) Haran society, a group of households
(i.e., a man, a woman, and their children) living together in a
single compound and usually working together at a profession or
industry; all the households in a
mesnie
are related, and marriage within the
mesnie
is considered incest and forbidden.

Midsummer
:
one of the two major holidays on Hara (the other is Midwinter),
celebrated by nearly everyone; also marks the beginning and end of
most off-world contracts, and clan elections are held then.

mir,
miri
: traditional term of respect for a man of slightly
superior rank; as there is no true generic plural, miri is generally
used for groups of mixed gender.

mirrim,
mirrimi
: traditional term of respect for a woman of
slightly superior rank.

mosstaas
:
literally, "mustache"; Bonemarche's city militia, which also
functions as a kind of police force.

odd-bodied
:
colloquial generic term for herms, mems, and fems.

offetre
:
literally "offering"; an act or object produced by a man or woman
acting as one of the spirits.

pharmaceutical,
pharmaceuticals
: generic term for all off- world companies
doing business on Hara.

player
:
an off-worlder who is involved in trade, or who is willing to pay for
sexual favors; not a common term outside of Bonemarche and
assimilated areas.

presance
:
a danced or sung commentary on political issues; by staging the
comment as a performance, the performers avoid the legal and
customary ban on "frivolous" (i.e., unsanctioned by authority)
discussions of politics in a public place or manner; the technique,
developed out of the rana tradition, has been most commonly used by
groups advocating closer ties with the Concord.

rana
,
ranas
,
also
rana
band
,
rana
dancers
:
a group of men and women who use traditional drum dances to express a
political opinion; rana performances are traditionally protected by
the Trickster, and by custom cannot be stopped unless the ranas make
an explicit request for their audience to take political action.
Ranas traditionally wear multicolored ribbons, a mark of the
Trickster, as a sign of their special status.

rover
:
small, four-seat vehicle used to carry paying passengers around the
urban centers.

sea-harvest
:
generic term for the myriad products gathered from Hara's oceans
and either used locally or sold to off-world buyers.

seraal,
seraals
:
the harvest territory controlled by a
mesnie
;
this may be either a stretch of land with its trails and growing
plants, or a stretch of beach and ocean bottom.

seraaliste,
seraalistes
:
the man or woman within each clan who is primarily responsible for
negotiating with the off-world buyers; he or she is also responsible
for mediating among his or her clan's
mesnie
s.
This is an elective office.

shaal
:
length of fabric, often highly decorated, used to wrap head and
shoulders in traditional Haran clothing.

shay
:
most common cargo vehicle on Hara, with a broad, usually open cargo
platform and a two-seat driver's cab.

the
spirits
: celestial beings that occupy an intermediate
position between God (defined as ineffable, unknowable, and not
terribly interested in human beings) and Man. The spirits inter- cede
for and interact with human beings, and grant favors more willingly,
and as a result, their worship, through services and
offetre
,
is far more important to most Harans than the distant God. Harans
generally believe that a man or woman can take on some of the
characteristics of a spirit, either through dance, concentration, or
sheer serendipity, and when in that state, his or her acts are seen
as the actions of the spirit.

Agede,
the Doorkeeper
: Agede's domain is change, death, birth,
and healing.

the
Captain
: the Captain's domain is that of power, action,
and battle; he is also the patron of sailors and travelers.

Caritan,
the Cripple
: her domain is fate and compassion, and she
both provides charity and punishes the wicked; proverbially "the
Cripple moves slow but she doesn't stumble."

Cousin-Jack,
the Harvester, also Cousin
: Cousin's domain is the land
and its flora, as well as the deep jungle, and he is also the spirit
of hearth and home.

Genevoe,
the Trickster
: he is patron of ranas and other performers,
and the changeable spirit of holiday and weather; his particular
domain is the ocean shallows.

the
Heart-breaker
: she is the spirit of lust, love, and
spring- time; her domain is the deep sea; she is also the protector
of children and fools.

Madansa
of the Markets, also the Marketwoman
: she is the spirit of
the marketplace, and of kitchens and food; she is generally
considered to be Cousin's daughter or wife, and so subservient to
his authority in the
mesnie
.

swetemetes
:
literally, sweetmeats; sexual insult implying prostitution, usually
used of men.

three-up
:
a shay that has been modified to carry at least one more passenger,
at the cost of a reduced passenger area.

tonnere
,
tonnere
-bas
:
the deepest of the traditional drums, and the one that generally
carries the dance rhythm.

trade
:
specifically, the semi-organized business of sex (paid for in money
or favors) between off-worlders and indigenes of either legal gender;
because these transactions take place outside the normal social
systems, and involve unusually large sums of money and/or metal as
inducement, an indigene in trade, whether a man or a woman, is not
necessarily considered to be a prostitute. By extension, the term
also covers indigenes and off-worlders who facilitate the buying and
selling of sexual favors, and the various permits that allow
off-worlders to stay on Hara.

vendee
:
a man or woman who holds customary or legal title to a space in a
recognized market.

vieuvant
:
an "old soul," a man or woman who is recognized as a reliable and
accurate conduit for the will of one or more of the spirits; some
vieuvant
s speak
only for one spirit, others for more than one.

Watch
:
the largest division of Haran society, based on the original
divisions of the ship that brought the first colonists to Hara. There
are five Watches: White (command), Blue (medical/scientific), Black
(engineering), Green (land-trained colonists), and Red (ocean-trained
colonists). Watches retain certain administrative duties, and are
also used to determine marriageability; the larger clans are split
between Watches to help keep the genetic mix stable.

Watch
Council
: the closest thing to a central governing body on
Hara, the Watch Council consists of three representatives from each
of the Watches, elected from the clans within that Watch according to
a complex (and variable) formula based on both population and wealth.

wrangwys
:
literally, "wrong way," generally used to refer to herms, mems,
and fems, and anyone whose sexual preferences don't match the
male/female model; has been adopted by that group as a
self-referential term and is not insulting within the group.

wry-abed
:
the politest colloquial term for men who prefer to have sex with men
and women who prefer to have sex with women.

wyfie
:
literally, "little wife," implying a less-than-satisfactory
substitute; colloquial and offensive term for a fem or a homosexual
man.

About the Author

Scott lived with her
partner, author Lisa A. Barnett, in Portsmouth, New Hampshire for 27
years, until the latter's death of breast cancer on May 2, 2006.