Is the civ series too eurocentric?

[Kyriakos]

Different scope, given that (eg) greeks, sumerians and maya are all one very distinct culture in a specific region. The celts were literally all over the place, including setting up regions just north of Macedonia (later due to chaos got to migrate to Asia minor as well). They weren't a civ in the same way, much like a collection of villages isn't a civ, regardless if it is 10 or 10.000 villages. You might as well have concurrent-to-celts germanics.

 

[Pangur Bán]

For what it is worth, I don't think the area of Celtic settlement was any broader than that of the Greeks, who were settled across the Mediterranean, Black Sea, and much of the Middle East. The Greeks matter because they monopolized much trade in this region for much of classical antiquity, had a distinctive form of social/military organization and settlement type that was egalitarian and urban--but the civ iv leader's, Alexander's, 'Greek' kingdom wasn't like that, it was much more like an Iron Age Celtic polity than a Greek polis (which probably explains why Macedonians were 'optional extras' in the Greek world).

 

[Kyriakos]

Well, Macedonia was a member of the holy league protecting / "protecting" (more like taking advantage to declare wars against others in the region) Delphi, which is how it got to become a major power in the 3rd holy war of that league. I doubt any entity not seen as greek enough would be allowed there, moreso at the time. And it is not like Mac was that powerful prior, it was a regional northern power able to cause trouble to Athens if it was allied with others and didn't have to face a direct assault (i think Amyntas-?- move to threaten Athens' landing in Amphipolis in the Pelop war was what caused Athens to redirect the troops for that to be sent to Melos, with the known effect...). Iirc Mac didn't even have any port up until the expansion to Thessaly (which, btw, was what gave this city its name, Thessalonike, cause that is why Phillip B' named his daughter this)

 

[Flying Pig]

We've had the 'were the Macedonians Greek?' dispute several times, and I've yet to see it go anything other than extremely badly. It should be noted, though, that Macedonia was only given a seat in the Amphictyonic League after demonstrating, in the Third Sacred War, that it was effectively in control of Thessaly, previously if briefly the major power in Greece, and represented a serious potential threat, if on the wrong side, to the independence and existence of Athens.

 

[Pangur Bán]

'Optional extra' is quite fair and shouldn't be a cause of dispute.

 

[Kyriakos]

Not interested in restarting the Mac topic, no.

BUT ( )

Mac became a threat to Athens only as a result of working a shadowy private deal with the enemies in the third sacred war, ie with Phokis, cause likely that was how a Mac army got to pass the Thermopylae without notice. If the Athenians/others had sent armies to block the passage, Mac would obviously not have been able to attack by sea.

Are you sure they weren't part of the League already? Cause they were obviously part of the war (in fact they were the main rival of Phokis after Thebes sort of thought it was all over and shipped its army for a mercenery gig in Persian satrapies). I think that Mac already had a seat and vote in the League, before the third war. It is just that following the annexation of Thessaly it had more votes (and more land too, with ports this time).

 

[j51]

So the thread on the Eurocentrism in Civ 6 has been moved here. So um, should those of us who do care about the shoddy initial line-up write Firaxis, or something? Not to complain too much, they'll fill it in eventually. I just want to know how long are we going to have to wait for Persia, Mongolia, the Ottomans, the Inca, a SE Asian civ and a native N American civ at minimum? I wanted to pre-order, but now I don't know... If at least 2/3 of those civs aren't going to be released before the Aztecs are freed from their hostage situation, what's the point?

 

[Kyriakos]

Wait-- Poland and Brazil are vanilla civs in Civ VI?

That isn't good. Well, Poland might work, but Brazil should have been Portugal, and in fact that one is a clear case of being deliberately against a euro civ to include a non-euro one.

Aztec/Maya would have been a far better choice.

 

[Mouthwash]

Well, Poland might work, but Brazil should have been Portugal, and in fact that one is a clear case of being deliberately against a euro civ to include a non-euro one.

That actually sounds like a great idea. Portugal was always iffy in my opinion.

 

[thecrazyscot]

I think they also wanted a more contemporary civ, and since Portugal is completely irrelevant now Brazil makes way more sense under that criteria.

So the thread on the Eurocentrism in Civ 6 has been moved here. So um, should those of us who do care about the shoddy initial line-up write Firaxis, or something? Not to complain too much, they'll fill it in eventually. I just want to know how long are we going to have to wait for Persia, Mongolia, the Ottomans, the Inca, a SE Asian civ and a native N American civ at minimum? I wanted to pre-order, but now I don't know... If at least 2/3 of those civs aren't going to be released before the Aztecs are freed from their hostage situation, what's the point?

It might actually be less of a wait with Civ 6 to get additional civs since there will probably be DLC released much more quickly than an expansion pack.

 

[Kyriakos]

Well, they (Portugal) were in most civ games in expansions (iirc civ3-4-5? and they likely will be in some civ6 expansion), and they deserve at least as much imo.

Brazil, on the other hand, was never an actual major power (maybe it can be argued to be now, but this is a game about 4000 BC-now). It is in that respect even worse a choice for the vanilla game than having the US, given the latter at least was a major power since the 19th century.

 

[Traitorfish]

We have 3 civilizations Spain, England and France who represent about the same era (early modern) and similar culture and geographical location. These 3 could just as well be bunched into a single civilization called western europe as India can be bunched into a single civilization.

So early modern western european civilization is overrepresented in my opinion.

My feelings as well. There's a limited to how many variations of "white Christians dudes" you can get through before it becomes a bit repetitive. I'd be quite happy to condense the entirety of post-Classical Europe into "Frankish/Latin" and "Slavic/Orthodox" civs, and while I don't expect a lot of support on going quite that far, I really don't think you'd lose anything much.

Ideally, I'd like much less of a focus on the post-medieval period altogether. It's "Civilization" not "Geopolitics Simulator 3000", so encountering "France" or "America" when I could be encountering the Assyrians or Inca always makes me cringe a little.

But, maybe I'm just bitter because Firaxis seem firmly convinced that the last Celt died in AD61.

The Mughals are a fricking dynasty. It's directly the opposite of the standard used by Civilization.

So are the Ottomans who have given the name to the Ottoman Empire.
Ottoman Empire have been in both civilization III/IV/V.

The Ottomans are there solely to represent the Turks.

The Inca and Zulu were also dynasties. So was Japan, strictly speaking, until 1945. The "Persia" represented in the series is to all intents and purposes the Achaemenids, "Mongolia" the Cingissids and "Ethiopia" the Solomonids. A Mughal civ isn't without precedent, it's simply that in the case of the Mughals, the dynasty is neither conflated with nor subsumed into the broader "civilisation" in the Western imagination, and that's as much because it suited the political ambitions of British imperialists and, later, Indian nationalists, as because it's any substantial way more truthful than the others.

 

[sophie]

The Inca and Zulu were also dynasties. So was Japan, strictly speaking, until 1945. The "Persia" represented in the series is to all intents and purposes the Achaemenids, "Mongolia" the Cingissids and "Ethiopia" the Solomonids. A Mughal civ isn't without precedent, it's simply that in the case of the Mughals, the dynasty is neither conflated with nor subsumed into the broader "civilisation" in the Western imagination, and that's as much because it suited the political ambitions of British imperialists and, later, Indian nationalists, as because it's any substantial way more truthful than the others.

The Romans appear to be just the Julio-Claudian dynasty.

Julius and Augustus in Civ IV, just Augustus in V. No prominent Republican leaders like Cicero, Sulla, Crassus, or Pompey. No later emperors like Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, Constantine, or Diocletian. No legendary figures like Cincinnatus or Aeneus. Not really much of a pan-Roman civ, is it?

Aztecs are a dynasty. Hell, were it not for the presence of Stalin, the Russian civ would just be the Romanov dynasty with Peter and Catherine.

 

[Flying Pig]

But, maybe I'm just bitter because Firaxis seem firmly convinced that the last Celt died in AD61.

The Inca and Zulu were also dynasties. So was Japan, strictly speaking, until 1945. The "Persia" represented in the series is to all intents and purposes the Achaemenids, "Mongolia" the Cingissids and "Ethiopia" the Solomonids. A Mughal civ isn't without precedent, it's simply that in the case of the Mughals, the dynasty is neither conflated with nor subsumed into the broader "civilisation" in the Western imagination, and that's as much because it suited the political ambitions of British imperialists and, later, Indian nationalists, as because it's any substantial way more truthful than the others.

Given the second part of your (now abridged) post, is there not something a little suspect about playing along with the idea of Celtic identity as hijacked by Welsh, Irish and Scottish nationalists in the Victorian period? It may not be true that the last Celt died in exactly AD 61, but there were certainly a great many centuries between the death of the last of the original Celts and the birth of the first of the new ones, and lumping the two together is part of a political project. Admittedly, exactly the same is true of any other civilisation, and it's arguably just as political a project to draw a nice, neat line between (say) the 'England' of Elizabeth I and that of Churchill.

 

[Traitorfish]

The Romans appear to be just the Julio-Claudian dynasty.

Julius and Augustus in Civ IV, just Augustus in V. No prominent Republican leaders like Cicero, Sulla, Crassus, or Pompey. No later emperors like Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, Constantine, or Diocletian. No legendary figures like Cincinnatus or Aeneus. Not really much of a pan-Roman civ, is it?

Aztecs are a dynasty. Hell, were it not for the presence of Stalin, the Russian civ would just be the Romanov dynasty with Peter and Catherine.

Funnily enough, this loops back round to the whole issue of Eurocentricism. Spain is always basically the Trastamaras, Civ 3 England was just the Tudors, and when the Dutch and Portugese appear, they're just the Houses of Orange and Aviz, respectively; it turns out, when you've got to flesh out a dozen different variations of "white Christian dudes", you end up reducing countries to an historical snapshot and that leaves you with the same sort of flattened stereotypes that non-European civs are reduced to, just a little more geographically- and chronologically-specific.

Given the second part of your (now abridged) post, is there not something a little suspect about playing along with the idea of Celtic identity as hijacked by Welsh, Irish and Scottish nationalists in the Victorian period? It may not be true that the last Celt died in exactly AD 61, but there were certainly a great many centuries between the death of the last of the original Celts and the birth of the first of the new ones, and lumping the two together is part of a political project. Admittedly, exactly the same is true of any other civilisation, and it's arguably just as political a project to draw a nice, neat line between (say) the 'England' of Elizabeth I and that of Churchill.

What "death", though? The existence of distinct cultures, langauges and identities in the Western parts of the British Isles isn't a Victorian invention, even if their identification as "Celtic" might be. If there's anything which distinguishes "Celtic-ness" from "Han-ness" or "Hindu-ness", or even from "French-ness" or "German-ness", it's not a lack of historical basis, it's simply the lack of a common body of literature and institutions to give it the sort of day-to-day weight those identities have acquired.

 

[Lexicus]

Julius and Augustus in Civ IV, just Augustus in V. No prominent Republican leaders like Cicero, Sulla, Crassus, or Pompey. No later emperors like Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, Constantine, or Diocletian. No legendary figures like Cincinnatus or Aeneus. Not really much of a pan-Roman civ, is it?

I would love Marcus Cicero of Rome. Pater Patriae and all that.

 

[Flying Pig]

What "death", though? The existence of distinct cultures, langauges and identities in the Western parts of the British Isles isn't a Victorian invention, even if their identification as "Celtic" might be. If there's anything which distinguishes "Celtic-ness" from "Han-ness" or "Hindu-ness", or even from "French-ness" or "German-ness", it's not a lack of historical basis, it's simply the lack of a common body of literature and institutions to give it the sort of day-to-day weight those identities have acquired.

Of course, but the notion that there is something that ties together Welshness, Scottishness and Irishness - as well as sometimes Cornishness - which have always been separate, non-English identities in the British isles, is very much a modern invention, and there was a long period in which it did not exist. Particularly in parts of Scotland, the opposition between 'Celtic' and 'Roman' is very much debatable - look at Shetland, for example, where you have a strong element of Norse heritage, which doesn't fit nicely into a Roman or a Celtic way of picturing ancestry. At best, calling Scotland 'Celtic' limits the meaning of Scotland to a certain kind of Scottishness - which is really what people are doing whenever they talk about modern identities as being built around historical ancestries.

Put another way, it's one thing to say that the Welsh, the Scots and the Irish are not English, and it's another thing to say that being not-English is all that defines them.

 

[Traitorfish]

Not untrue. Not entirely true, mind: that Gaels are Gaels and Brythons are Brythons is not a modern discovery. But it's true that there's nothing in particular that ties the Gaels and Brythons together as "Celts" beyond being not-English, and to a lesser extent not-French.

But, well... So what? The ancient Celts didn't even have a "Celtic" identity, it was imposed on them from outside, but nobody disputes that "Celtic" is an at least occasionally-useful way to describe the ancient Celtic-speaking peoples of North-Western Europe, at least not for purposes of a computer game. So what's so contentious about a modern day, self-identified sense of Celtic-ness?

 

[Mudokon Pop]

Regarding Eurocentrism, I think 18 civs is too small number to have enough variation and arguably leads to Eurocentrism. For example, let's try to limit Europe Civs to just six.

Europe

Greece, Rome, England, France, Germany, Russia *
*(i pulled a CiV and omitted Spain to trim the numbers)

Six civs isn't much right? Well it's still 1/3 of the total. So still Euro-centric by volume right?

Now try to tell my why any of the above Civs should not be in the vanilla 18. Consider the classic, medieval, renaissance, imperial and modern ages. It's not easy to remove one, is it? I only removed Spain because it was already done in previous game.

But there's still 12 more Civs to suggest. And four more continents; Asia, Africa, America and the Middle East. So, three each?

Middle East:

Persia, Arabs, Ottomans (one ancient, medieval and more modern power, and judging by the other threads would be surprising omissions)

Asia:

China, India, Japan (covers all eras, Japan could be replaced because it was isolated but for WW2 scenarios)

America :
Aztec, Inca, United States (again US for WW2 scenarios, no native NA civ)

Africa :
Egypt, Mali, Ethiopia (North, West, East as well as the previous criteria)

And with a full list of 18 civs (1/3 of them Europe+United States) we have absolutely no new Civs. They're all staples at this point. And it's not easy to argue for any of their removal over another civ. We could cut Europe down further or increase the number civs in the base game.

In order to have new civs in each base game, the Devs do have to make tough choices. Simply swapping out some African/Middle Eastern civs makes them seem disposable if they change in every game. And massive areas still unrepresented.

I wouldn't want to be in their shoes. :/

 

[InDubioProReo]

I don't get why people are complaining. Everyone knows the white men did the biggest contribution in the world's history.

On a more serious note, my people (Ottomans/Turks) not being included is annoying. Ottoman Empire had a very prominent role in the history. I hope we get a DLC with a decent UA. Civ V UA was really underwhelming.

Also, Paradox is worse in terms of eurocentrism. In Eu IV there is something called WESTERN tech. You have to WESTERNIZE your country to (more or less) have an equal footing with the Western tech group nations. However, your units are still worse than a western country. There is stupid stuff like "Anatolian Tech", "Muslim Tech" and stuff like that. I mean WTH does that mean, seriously? Other nations pretty much had no chance (except Ottomans who kinda began to fall apart after 18th century).