Gender neutral Lenormand deck?

Yellel, silhouettes are a great idea! Then it is just a person's head, no details.

It wouldn't be a bad idea to use pips instead of face cards for the inserts, like 3-4-5 for J-Q-K. That's if you are going to use inserts at all.

Silhouettes seem like they'd be the easiest solution for an androgynous look for people cards.

Aster Breo said:

However, that raises the question of the card numbers and playing card insets.

Personally, I'd be ok with a deck like this that doesn't have numbers and insets. But they're important to some readers.

Plus, at what point does this deck cease to be an actual Lenormand deck. And do we care?

Click to expand...

I love some of your ideas to be more inclusive and for multi people relationships

I own a few Lenormands which have extra cards! I am sure some classical people would be annoyed by it but the system is not set like tarot, I think you can add cards and it works okay! It doesn't matter. I notice though that those decks don't have playing card inserts and just add extra numbers on the extra cards. I actually prefer lenormand without inserts but some people do like to do cartomancy with them. You can also produce alternative versions of the same card so people pick one that fits, just adding to your ideas

danieljuk said:

I love some of your ideas to be more inclusive and for multi people relationships

I own a few Lenormands which have extra cards! I am sure some classical people would be annoyed by it but the system is not set like tarot, I think you can add cards and it works okay! It doesn't matter. I notice though that those decks don't have playing card inserts and just add extra numbers on the extra cards. I actually prefer lenormand without inserts but some people do like to do cartomancy with them. You can also produce alternative versions of the same card so people pick one that fits, just adding to your ideas

Click to expand...

Thanks! This thread has been very thought provoking.

Right now, I'm leaning toward including 2 Men, 2 Women, and 4 (gender neutral) People. They can be used in any combination.

Do you think the Rider and the Child should gender neutral, as well? Or would it be better to include male, female, and neutral versions of those cards?

I'm thinking of just skipping the numbering and insets. I don't really like the idea of having multiple cards with the same number or inset in a reading. That seems like it would either be too confusing, or defeat the purpose of the numbers or insets.

For extra cards, adding numbers onto the end of the set feels too arbitrary to me. I think it's because I don't know how the existing symbols got numbered and whether how they're numbered is significant in some way. So I'm reluctant to muck about in that.

Similarly, with the insets, I feel like I'd have to know a whole lot more about playing card cartomancy than I do, in order to understand which cards to inset into which extra symbols. Ya know?

But I don't usually use either when I read (despite really, really trying to learn to incorporate the insets...... sigh...), so I'm biased toward excluding them.

I'd love to hear what others think about that.

I know it's a bit late, but just wanted to add - it would be lovely if the Person cards were quite diverse - the kind of "standard" representation of non-binary people is thin, young, DFAB person with cropped hair and "masculine" (but not TOO masculine) clothing (something like a sharp suit or maybe jeans and a button-down shirt, usually - not, like, bike leathers or whatnot). There are plenty of splendid nb folk who fit into that category, but plenty more who don't, whether they're DMAB, intersex, a person of colour, older, fatter, like wearing more "feminine" or just less "put together" styles, have facial hair, etc.

Definitely not too late to give input on this!

You're absolutely right. I haven't yet discussed the details of these cards with the artist, but I'm sure he'll agree that they need to be diverse.

Thank you for this excellent reminder!

Yay! I'd love to see the deck when it's done - I've just got the standard French Cartomancy at the moment, but I'm quietly on the lookout for one that's more gender-inclusive, type thing.

Thank you!

It's going to be a while. The artist I'm working with is doing the art in his very limited free time. But we're both committed to creating something as inclusive as possible.

Selling the deck is not our primary objective. But if there's interest, I'll do my best to make it available for sale (and at a reasonable price).

My daughter and I have been discussing this for our deck as two spirited people are an important part of our community (and one of my kids is 2 spirited). I draw faceless people anyways which helps. We are including 2 cards with just a shoulders up image. All our images have long hair (male and female) but you could use a gender neutral hair do of another sort.

Beth-Anne said:

My daughter and I have been discussing this for our deck as two spirited people are an important part of our community (and one of my kids is 2 spirited). I draw faceless people anyways which helps. We are including 2 cards with just a shoulders up image. All our images have long hair (male and female) but you could use a gender neutral hair do of another sort.

Click to expand...

Faceless people is an interesting idea. I hadn't thought of that. Would you mind if I mention this idea to my artist?