Reading the post ‘The History of Romance (Reprint)‘ as recommended and linked from this months carnival got me thinking, so here’s some off the cuff rambling for this month.
“Romance” comes from a French word meaning “a language derived from Latin”. (“Latin” > “Roman” > “romance” – get it?) At first, it meant the French language, but then it also came to mean French literature. By the time it entered English in the 14th century, the word meant a particular kind of French literature: stories of knights, ladies, and chivalry. These stories had many themes: courage, honour, justice, loyalty, etc., but they also dealt with a particular kind of love, known as “courtly love”.
The History of Romance (Reprint)
What I would have thought of as romantic growing up in the UK has a particular character of high class. A romantic meal has should be fine dining, not a chip butty.
I remember a conversation between two men I knew at work about valentines day, it went roughly like this:
‘I got the wife a nice bunch of flowers’
‘aaww, did it make her cry?’
‘made me cry, they cost 8 quid!’
But its not just about making you spend money, its also about the language used. ‘fancy a shag’ is not a romantic line. There is a way you are ‘supposed’ to treat your partner, a way of asking things, a way of acting, which you just sort of need to know.
This created a bit of a problem for me when it came to the idea of aromanticism. Me and most men i know are not particularly interested in ‘romance’ by that sort of definition. but there is very clearly a difference between me and the married coworker. They want this particular sort of relationship that I have no desire for. So how do i try to understand that difference. What is it that they want and I dont.
I suppose this is the sort of thing that leads to trying to define ‘romantic attraction’ as an idea. there seems to be some sort of inherent desire to pursue some sort of relationship which has various common traits that we call romantic. but even as I type that it seems vague as hell.
Then aromanticism. To be honest as much as it has helped me I really dont like the word. But at the same time I cannot think of anything better.
After two whole years of forum running I find these repeated questioning of ‘am I aro’ that focuses on not being interested in the fluff of romance. not liking valentines day, that sort of thing. Of course, there is also the flipside to this, time to have an identity crisis because you like the idea of romance in fiction or enjoy something seen as romantic. I dont think that is particularly useful.
But, what better word is there than aromanticism. I cant think of and have not heard of a better way to describe this.
Anyhow, cheers to Sildarmillion for the prompt. It was good to get back to putting some of my thoughts into writing.
Aside: one thought i had on the prompt was to be remind me of this song, interesting that ‘romance’ is also shorthand for a sort of poetry, inspiration or higher purpose in a place.
Roboticanary 
Hi there, it’s really good to hear from you after a while! 🙂 Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
You captured very well the difficulty with pinning down what exactly is aromanticism and the limitations of the word.
“After two whole years of forum running I find these repeated questioning of ‘am I aro’ that focuses on not being interested in the fluff of romance. not liking valentines day, that sort of thing. Of course, there is also the flipside to this, time to have an identity crisis because you like the idea of romance in fiction or enjoy something seen as romantic.”
That was a great way of putting it and this was the observation that had inspired one of the prior carnivals I had hosted (on the theme sentimentality), but I may not have explained it very well back then.
So, really glad to read your perspectives!
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Thank you,
Its good to be back to doing these
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