Questions that have popped into my mind
Aug. 20th, 2006 01:30 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conuly
1. In Harry Potter, do the Wizards have a Deaf community? Would their spells be completely different, or would they have to simply adapt to saying things aloud that they couldn't hear? Would they sign "broom for sweeping" differently for "broom for flying" just because? Because, I mean, I totally would.
2. In keeping with that, do very different areas (Asia, Australia, the Americas) separate from Europe have entirely different spells? Maybe spells that only translate partially, not entirely? Like, Summoning Spells in England bring things right to you, but maybe Summoning Spells in Ethiopia drop them five feet away on the ground, and maybe in Japan they hover above your head....
3. How do we know wandless magic is really rare/impossible? It seems logical that wizards had to, at one point, invent wands - and to do that, they must have already had some form of controlled, wandless magic. Perhaps it's simply a lost or mostly-lost art, rather like flint knapping. (I know people have gone through this before, but the question appeared to me now, so now I type it up)
4. Why is that spelled knapping?
5. Why would one want to tickle a sleeping dragon? That seems especially foolhardy and pointless.
6. Why are both Weasley parents redheads? I know there's a high level of inbreeding going on with Purebloods, but still! It doesn't seem to me that we've seen any other redheads in the series....
7. Is it just me, or are Wizards an awful lot like Borrowers, taking things from the rest of the world and then thinking they came up with them themselves?
8. Why is the scoring in Quidditch so messed up? I know JKR sucks at math(s), but this is absurd!
9. What if every book, every story, every stupid fanfic (even the really bad ones) were true in an alternate universe? Is this a scary thought or a fun one?
10. Is Hermione's method of completely and totally assimilating into Wizarding society, to the point where she seems to hardly ever see her parents (much less ever tell them anything about her life) normal? Or do other kids usually have more resistance?
11. Tell me again why Wizards, with their portkeys and floo system and apparation, don't have primary schools...? They really ought to get on that.
12. Tell me again why Hogwarts has no facilities for the mundane aspects of education, like "how to write" and "literature" and "basic mathematics"? Or even "foreign languages"? Most jobs in the Wizarding world seem to be identical to their Muggle counterparts, except that the people involved can use magic. How did Rita Skeeter even learn to write articles? It certainly wasn't at Hogwarts - and I can't imagine entering any form of journalism course with only the education in that respect attained by age eleven (with a few intervening years of practical experience but no direct instruction).
13. How many Squibs, would you say, are killed by their well-meaning (or not) parents? Much like real-life changelings of old, they can't be a desired outcome by most.
14. Why are the Squibs we know so tied to the Wizarding world? If I were a Squib, and I were otherwise me, I'd want to get as far away from the Wizarding world as possible, straight into the culture where my lack of magic was normal, not disabling and pitiful. How self-loathing does Filch have to be to voluntarily spend so much time in a school full of children who hate him and who can do things he can't?
15. Why do Wizards respect current (Muggle) national boundaries? When the Statute of Secrecy was signed, the political map was entirely different! Why are American Wizards not English instead? Or, why did they divide the same way? Maybe, while Muggles were having the Civil War in the US and the North won, Wizards had a similar war and the nation was divided into little bits, each state or region being independent unto itself. Now, that would make for some interesting fics.
2. In keeping with that, do very different areas (Asia, Australia, the Americas) separate from Europe have entirely different spells? Maybe spells that only translate partially, not entirely? Like, Summoning Spells in England bring things right to you, but maybe Summoning Spells in Ethiopia drop them five feet away on the ground, and maybe in Japan they hover above your head....
3. How do we know wandless magic is really rare/impossible? It seems logical that wizards had to, at one point, invent wands - and to do that, they must have already had some form of controlled, wandless magic. Perhaps it's simply a lost or mostly-lost art, rather like flint knapping. (I know people have gone through this before, but the question appeared to me now, so now I type it up)
4. Why is that spelled knapping?
5. Why would one want to tickle a sleeping dragon? That seems especially foolhardy and pointless.
6. Why are both Weasley parents redheads? I know there's a high level of inbreeding going on with Purebloods, but still! It doesn't seem to me that we've seen any other redheads in the series....
7. Is it just me, or are Wizards an awful lot like Borrowers, taking things from the rest of the world and then thinking they came up with them themselves?
8. Why is the scoring in Quidditch so messed up? I know JKR sucks at math(s), but this is absurd!
9. What if every book, every story, every stupid fanfic (even the really bad ones) were true in an alternate universe? Is this a scary thought or a fun one?
10. Is Hermione's method of completely and totally assimilating into Wizarding society, to the point where she seems to hardly ever see her parents (much less ever tell them anything about her life) normal? Or do other kids usually have more resistance?
11. Tell me again why Wizards, with their portkeys and floo system and apparation, don't have primary schools...? They really ought to get on that.
12. Tell me again why Hogwarts has no facilities for the mundane aspects of education, like "how to write" and "literature" and "basic mathematics"? Or even "foreign languages"? Most jobs in the Wizarding world seem to be identical to their Muggle counterparts, except that the people involved can use magic. How did Rita Skeeter even learn to write articles? It certainly wasn't at Hogwarts - and I can't imagine entering any form of journalism course with only the education in that respect attained by age eleven (with a few intervening years of practical experience but no direct instruction).
13. How many Squibs, would you say, are killed by their well-meaning (or not) parents? Much like real-life changelings of old, they can't be a desired outcome by most.
14. Why are the Squibs we know so tied to the Wizarding world? If I were a Squib, and I were otherwise me, I'd want to get as far away from the Wizarding world as possible, straight into the culture where my lack of magic was normal, not disabling and pitiful. How self-loathing does Filch have to be to voluntarily spend so much time in a school full of children who hate him and who can do things he can't?
15. Why do Wizards respect current (Muggle) national boundaries? When the Statute of Secrecy was signed, the political map was entirely different! Why are American Wizards not English instead? Or, why did they divide the same way? Maybe, while Muggles were having the Civil War in the US and the North won, Wizards had a similar war and the nation was divided into little bits, each state or region being independent unto itself. Now, that would make for some interesting fics.
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no subject
Date: 2006-08-20 03:41 pm (UTC)I don't think we know what most of the kids look like, except for Harry, the Weasleys, Draco, and Dean (btw, I don't know if you're one of the people who gets up in arms over the fact that the American Sorceror's Stone says he's black and the British Philosopher's Stone doesn't, but apparently that was a very late change to the British edition after the American edition had already been submitted to Scholastic—just read an interview the other day, yes I have too much time on my hands sometime). I guess we can assume Cho is Chinese and the Patil twins are Indian, but I don't think most of the kids are ever described.
I thought that JK Rowling said in an interview that some kids attend the village/town/city primary schools where they live.
I always assumed the political boundaries are related to the fact that there's a relationship between the Minister of Magic and the Prime Minister (etc.).
no subject
Date: 2006-08-20 03:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-20 05:34 pm (UTC)If Wizarding children attend muggle schools, and this has been happening for years, why on earth are Wizards so very, very ignorant about muggle culture? Doesn't compute - so I chalk it up to JKR not thinking things through. She writes a good story, but she doesn't always put the pieces where they seem to logically fit.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-21 04:59 am (UTC)