Dark Elf Racism

[Didz]

Bit of an odd question, but can anyone with a more detailed knowledge of The Elder Scrolls world provide me with some information of how Dark Elf racism would manifest itself in Skyrim.

I've been reading some of the lore references online, and as I understand it Dark Elves consider themselves superior to all other the other races, and view the lesser races partcularly Khargiit and Argonians as little more than slaves and beasts of burden.

So, how would this manifest itself in their dealings with other races, are there racist taunts or preconceptions of racial stereotyping.

In the Warhammer World, elves in general consider humans to be rash, impulsive, destructive and smelly. The general explanation being that humans have such short lives they never really have time to mature and are too desperate to achieve something before they die to spend the time to understand the true nature of the world they spend so little time in.

The classic complaint being that everything a human creates is dead before he finishes it, a reference to the fact that humans cut down tree's to build their homes and weapons and boats, whereas Elves craft their dwellings and ships from living wood imbued with the spiirits of their ancestors. An elven bow for example is not just a wooden stick, but a living entity bound to the spirit of its owner, which is why no human in warhammer can shoot one.

Elves also find being in close proximity with humans, or spending time in their homes physically demanding due to the smell of their body odour and all their rotting food. By comparison humans note that Elves always seem to smell fragrant, even the males, although they don't seem to bathe any more often than they do. The assumption being that they must have scented sweat.

In Skyrim I don't see any real evidence of these sort of racial differences, in fact there seem to be inconsistencies between what is written, and what is actually depicted in the game.

For example the Grey-Quarter in Windhelm seems to suggest that Dark Elves are inferior to humans, and yet the Dark Elf background suggests that no Dark Elf would ever accept those conditions, and would actually be expecting the human population of Windhelm to be subservient to their demands.

Just wondered if anyone can clarify the logic behind these inconsistencies, and how a Dark Elf character ought to behave and interact with other races in Skyrim.

[Maloy20]

In Skyrim it is different because there THEY are the minority being persecuted, and so they are normally on the defensive.

In TES 3 Morrowind Dark Elves would frequently insult the player regardless of his race calling him all manner of slurs, and even Polite Dark Elves would say racist things unintentionally not even realizing they were being racist.

I think the Dark Elves currently in Skyrim behave appropriately their just isn't much variety to them.

It's almost like each race has its own general personality type which is TRULY racist in my opinion lol

[ChefD]

red mountain exploding caused the dark elves to flee some went to skyrim and solstheim. i think the nord dislike comes from the outcome of the great war and the removal of talos from the pantheon. nords seem to have a blanket hate of elves especially stormcloaks and their allies

[SnowGryph]

while its true that Dark Elves see other races as lesser i whould think that the degree that is to has lessened over time and exposure to the other races. The elves in the grey quarter are treated as inferiors by the nords because they are a minority, the elves accept it because they have no means of leaving or retalliating against the nords.
at least this is how i see it

[sierra_one_]

The wars between mer and men go back into prehistory, back to the Methic era I think. The Nords and the Elves warred over Skyrim when the Companions first came to Skyrim (if I remember the Saarthal lore correctly) and the Elves were beaten back, with the Snow Elves being driven underground. This is completely from memory, but I'm pretty sure it'd cause some kind of engrained racism within the Nords towards the Elves, and vice-versa.

[Jouchebag]

You're mistaking that in TES lore Dark Elves are folk who have been relegated to life in a harsh ashy climate on a volcanic island. You're thinking of the Bosmer, the wood elf.

Additionally, like jabari was saying, the explosion of that volcano caused them to be dislpaced and reduced to refugees.

The Bosmer, however, are the left hand of the Aldmeri Dominion who has Skyrim and the Empire in a vice grip. They have strict codes of how nature is to be handled, their trees walk, and the Bosmer and Altmer (High elf) have at least twice the life span of the average human.

[ChefD]

drove the snow elves into the armes of the dwemer...who turned them into slaves, the bastards!

[Maloy20]

Originally posted by jabarilongboards:

red mountain exploding caused the dark elves to flee some went to skyrim and solstheim. i think the nord dislike comes from the outcome of the great war and the removal of talos from the pantheon. nords seem to have a blanket hate of elves especially stormcloaks and their allies

Actually Nords and Dark Elves have been at war with each other for as long as history goes back with temporary truces and alliances appearing now and again, so the hatred is more than just the Great War

[Jouchebag]

It's implied that Nords are racist against all other races, though. They're just blood-thirsty at the end of the day, pickin fights with everyone because Tiber Septim happened to be a Nord and they got a bit of a "master race" mentality.

[Maloy20]

Originally posted by Jouchebag:

It's implied that Nords are racist against all other races, though. They're just blood-thirsty at the end of the day, pickin fights with everyone because Tiber Septim happened to be a Nord and they got a bit of a "master race" mentality.

They were supposed to be a viking culture, I'd be disappointed if they acted like some ideal culture where everyone is best friends holding hands dancing under rainbows.

I find it all pretty entertaining myself although I really feel like Bethesda completely changed the Nord culture from what it was in Morrowind and even Oblivion

[__-__-__]

The racism of the Dark Elves tends to be perpetrated by their political leaders, the average Dark Elf probably doesn't care too much. Outside of Morrowind Dark Elves are in the minority and usually exiles or refugees (or related to them), meaning they are the people that felt they didn't have a place in the overall Dark Elf society. Most of the Dark Elves living in Skyrim were people (or related to) who fled Morrowind due to the Argonian invasion (they wiped out alot of Morrowind though haven't annexed any lands that I know of) or the eruption of Red Mountain which has rendered quite alot of the Island uninhabitable.

The Dark Elves that you find within Skyrim's borders are just trying to get by in a land where they know they are not really welcome, if you want to see the Dark Elves as they are said to be (racists with a superiority complex) go to Solsthiem, Master Neloth is actually a character from Morrowind.

[Didz]

Thank's for all your feedback, I must admit I had to look up who the Bosmer were as they hadn't featured very prominently in the background I'd read. So, now I know that Bosmer are 'Wood Elves', who are a seperate race in the Warhammer World too. The Elves that currently rule Skyrim are the High Elves aren't they (The Altmer)?

It was they (or rather an elitist sect of their race 'The Thalmor') who founded the Aldmeri Dominion on Summerset Isle and now impose their rule over Skyrim through the Imperial Army amd the justicar. They even supervise the teaching of magic to humans in Skyrim through their adviser Ancano at The College of Winterhold.

So, as I understand it the Altmer are the true dominant race in Skyrim, and the Imperial Nobles are really just puppets of their regime who are allowed to retain their thrones in return for complying with their laws.

But the Dark Elves (Dunmer) are not part of the Aldmeri Dominion. It was their ancestors the Chimer who bretrayed the godess Azura and were cursed by her (or it) and became the Dunmer, but not before that had effectively completed the genocide of the dwarven race from the mortal plane, eradicating all dwarves from mer. (One gets the impression that the game designers had a thing about dwarves.)

So, just to clarify are there no Dunmer left in Morrowwind and on the Vvardenfell, were they all forced to flee and take refuge in other provinces, and if so which race currently rules Morrowind?

Also what is the relationship between the Altmer and the Dunmer?

In Warhammer High Elves and Dark Elves are openly hostile towards each other, mainly because it was a civil war within the High Elf ruling class than led to the sundering and the birth of the Darl Elves in Warhammer. But the background is different in Skyrim. So, do the Dunmer consider themselves betrayed by the Altmer, who seem to have grabbed power over the mortal plane in the wake of their misfortune?

Also changing the subject slightly what would a Dark Elf call the other races?

In my WFRP game, characters tended to use racist slang to refer to other races in the game.

So, for example humans referred to wood elves as 'Twigs', which was both a reference to their tall slender body shape and the fact that they like to live in tree's.

Dwarves were referred to as 'stumps' or 'stumpie' as they looked like they had been cut down to size.

Elves referred to Humans as 'children', or usually 'silly children'; 'dirty children'; or 'smelly children' depending on the circumstances. When Elves visit human area's which is quite rare in Warhammer, they generally interact with humans in the same way as a western tourist might treat the population of a third world country. A sort of mixture of pity and distain, mixed with a barely suppressed desire to avoid being touched by one of them in case they catch something nasty.

No doubt the Dark Elves in warhammer would probably behave more like a bunch of perverts on a sex tour of a third world country, but the Dunmer don't seem to be tainted by the same base urges as warhammer Dark Elves.

However, nothing like that seems to come across in Skyrim, (well not without adding some of the more creative mods anyway). Their seems to be a much higher level of social integration in Skyrim than one would expect from the background material provided.

Elves and dwarves do live in human cities in warhammer but are not just segregated they actually have their own enclaves where their own laws and cultures take precedence. In the free city of Marienburg for example the sea elves occupy 'Sith Rionnasc'naishathir' more commoonly known as 'Elf Town', which is managed by a council of Lords appointed from the eight kindred who occupy the enclave overseen by an Exarch from the court of the Pheonix King. Law in this area and in a similar Dwarven enclave in Nuln is adminstered by a locally recruited law enforcement agency according to local traditions, and players have to be warned that if their characters enter these enclaves their actions will be judged according to local laws.

So, its a much more segregated relationship in Warhammer compared to Skyrim, which makes it much easier to roleplay the racial differences, without running into contraditions.

[Haunt Fox]

Well, if different races weren't different, there'd be little point to having them in a game except for looks.

And I can see Nords being different in the other games - they're not at home in those other provinces; in Skyrim, they are. I can see the various elves, Khajit, and Argonians behaving differently at home than away, too.

[__-__-__]

The Dunmer likely still rule Morrowind, thier nation is much bigger than just the island created by the Red Mountain, they share borders with Skyrim, Cyrodiil and Black Marsh. They would also likely be vehemently opposed to the Thalmor, though more due to the fact that the Thalmor are foreigners than any sort of falling out with the High Elves.

What happened to the dwarves (actually the dwarves are a type of elf, "Dwemer" means deep elf, I think) was thier own doing, they did have a war with the Dark Elves but the disappearance of the Dwarves was a result of them messing around with the heart of a god, they pushed themselves out of existence (not sure if it was an accident or not).

Prior to the rise of the Aldmeri Dominion there was likely no real relationship between the Dark and High Elves, they were simply too far away to care. After, while the Dark Elven lands are in shambles and they would be unlikely to be able to muster the troops needed to defeat the Dominion, the Dominion is likely hoping it will never have to try to tame the Dark Elves. The lands of Morrowind are nasty, either endless swamps, volcanic wastelands or rocky archipelagos, supply lines would be difficult to maintain and it would be unlikely that someone that doesn't know what they were doing would be able to find any suitable food in the wilds, not to mention all the creatures that would likely try to make a meal out of any army trying to invade. There is also an implication that those trying to flee the Thalmor can find refuge in Morrowind.

Dunmer use the words N'wah, S'wit and Outlander to refer to those they don't like, these terms can apply to anyone even other Dunmer (they see a big difference between native Dunmer and outlander Dunmer).

The only place in Skyrim with a particularly noticable Dunmer population is Windhelm, that city is very close to the border with Morrowind, chances aren't bad that it's always had a sizable Dunmer population and the racism is something that, while it was likely always there, grew due to an influx of refugees fleeing the Red Mountain, the loss at the hands of the Dominion and the beginning of Ulfric's rebellion (Skyrim for the Nords).

[Haunt Fox]

Well, as that mouthy guard that I beat up indicated, the Nords seem to be (unfairly!) dumping their hostility of Aldmeri/Altner on the Dark Elves. I find the dark elves in a bad mood to be a lot nicer than those rotten high elves in a good mood, personally.

I switched back to a cat from a lizard, because the lizard _wasn't_ getting racist insults. I wonder why no one tells them they'll make nice luggage? :P

[Didz]

Originally posted by Sesh:

Dunmer use the words N'wah, S'wit and Outlander to refer to those they don't like, these terms can apply to anyone even other Dunmer (they see a big difference between native Dunmer and outlander Dunmer).

Oh! that's useful stuff.

N'Wah means: "Foreigner" or "Slave" - An insult or taunt.
S'Wit I can't find a translation for, the only suggestion is 'Outlander', but I'm not sure that makes sense in every context it gets used.

Sera and Muthsera are Dunmer for 'Sir and Madam' and are terms of respect afforded by Dark Elf NPC's to my Dark Elf character. Though presumably they would never be used to address a N'Wah.

Interestingly, Dunmer don't seem to distinquish between a foriegner (e.g. a non-dunmer) and a slave. The term of address used means the same thing, e.g. all foreigners are by definition slaves.

Originally posted by isengrim:

Well, as that mouthy guard that I beat up indicated, the Nords seem to be (unfairly!) dumping their hostility of Aldmeri/Altner on the Dark Elves.

Yes, there is actually something weird going on there.

From what I've read so far the Dunmer have absolutely no connection at all with the Aldermeri Dominion. The membership of that government and membership of the Thalmor is limited to Altmer (High Elves) and Bosmer (Wood Elves), so the whole 'Let's pick on the Dunmer thing in Windhelm is completely unjustified by the background material' In fact, the Dunmer probably have as much reason to hate the Thalmor as the Nords do.

'Is it cos they is black?' one has to ask.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNi-BB-j0u0
Just in case you don't get the reference.