1. Being dropped 500 years ago into your ancestors’ community.
  2. Being dropped 500 years into the future in your community.

You have a day to source some clothing appropriate to the time period. Unfortunately, that’s not enough time to learn a dialect.

  • Stern
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    91 year ago

    I think the language/dialect barrier would be a huge one in either case. To wit, the historical versions of the lords prayer- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Lord's_Prayer_in_English

    Future would be rough with a near complete lack of knowing current cultural norms, lingo, history, and knowing how the three seashells work. Top that off with all the stuff developed in just the past 100 years vs. the amount of progress we could be making in 5 times that length of time, and I feel like the future would be a lot rougher then the past.

    In the past you could excuse a minor faux pas by saying you didn’t get off the farm much and maybe folks would just think you were a bit slow. Not being socialized in the present or future? Bit less reasonable.

    • Neato
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      fedilink
      11 year ago

      You’ve got it. In 500 years we’ll never advanced so much and there will have been so much current exchange and drift I doubt you could be understood at all.

      In the 1500s you could get by as a foreigner who barely understood the language. You’d have zero cultural norms so most language that wasn’t literal would be unintelligible.