Addressing Religious Influence and Discrimination Through Fiction

Abstract

This project follows the story of Reira Isla, a princess coming of age in an isolationist, and very conservative, kingdom. Her tale explores the expansive effects of religion on society and how it is capable of influencing social norms, relationships, and politics without directly intending to. The goal of writing Reira and the society she inhabits is to deconstruct biases related to religion and analyze how it influences all aspects of life. This, in turn, will bring awareness of these issues in the real world to the audience. The major focus of the story involves closely following characters and their navigation of their identities in relation to the world around them. While religious bias is the main theme, religion also bleeds into social issues related to race, gender, and the LGBT+ community. Reira's story, in particular, focuses on how a queer, mixed race woman in a position of power navigates her identity through social expectation and prejudice.