Often we identify with a specific culture. This impacts how we speak, think, eat and pray.

For example, if you are Hispanic, you might eat a lot of traditional foods, speak Spanish, think in Spanish and attend church services in Spanish.

Then there are people like me that don’t identify with a specific culture. For example, there are relatives in my distant past who came from Germany, Ireland and Prussia, but I don’t consider myself any of those. You could say that I am white European, and I suppose that it does impact a good part of what I do, but I cannot point to any specific activities that define me as European.

When you create a character, you should take cultural background into consideration. It does not have to be a defining characterization and need not be mentioned in the story, but it could be.

Your task is to think of some aspect of yourself that defines you in terms of cultural background. Write about a time when culture influenced an activity in your life.

Have fun with this one.