Worldbuilding Hack: Use Values to Better Understand a People

So this is actually based off my messages to two of my alphas from back in August when I was first plotting my current WIP TBP (which stands for The Big One because it is a secret)

BASICALLY, I thought of this way to world build when you develop a people by developing their values and figure out WHY those are their values.

Think about the overall values of a nation and it'll help you better understand the people as a whole. This way, you can further develop the national identity of your main character and how it matches or conflicts with the overall nation or use it as a blanket to help develop nameless minor characters who pop up!

IMPORTANT THINGS TO REMEMBER: 
Do NOT pull of JK Rowling and make one group of people EVIL.Don't think of the people you're developing as evil. 

And yes. It's hard when you're trying to develop the personality of the evil old king, but also developing the personality of his entire kingdom. It's hard, but I believe in you.


 Since that was probably VERY confusing, I have examples! (And yes! These are from TBP. I'm in the middle of midterms. I don't have time for new thoughts. :D

Ex A: Kingdom A

(Called those because of A.) secrecy and B.) I don't have a name yet)

Kingdom A is very military based. There isn't really a rule stating that every young man joins the military for a few years, but basically, all of them do.

There is a lot of honor in scars and injuries because they show a warrior / the trials a person has gone through.

There is a lot of honor in the elderly because they rarely survive during wartime/the ones who survive war are tough and wise.

And mothers because children are important and kind of hard to come by when all the men are dying.

(The country is not currently at war. This is just where the values came from)

Continuing from that:  Women own a lot of businesses because they need to hold down the fort while their husbands are away/support families if their loved ones die, etc
    

Ex B: Kingdom B 
(Such thrilling names!)
Kingdom B is merchant based. Mostly ocean and coastal, but not always. 

They place a lot of value around work ethic, business and such skills that are needed to run it

Their family values (cause everyone has some sort of family values) include more extended family, in kind of a connections way. Hospitality is important (since they're all constantly traveling so they're practically nomads themselves during the trading season and they all know how tough it is to need help far from home.) 
Family is also important in a take over the family business/family duty/everyone pulls their weight in the family kind of way. You do your part to make the family succeed 

See? Just based on this, you can't really tell WHO is going to be the bad guy. And then to make the bad guy, I just corrupt his ideals slightly. Warmongering old king or greedy king who expects impossible things from his family?

 

Another fun thing to do: figure out what would be the worst insult.

For Kingdom A, it would be calling someone a coward.
For Kingdom B, it would be calling someone lazy or worthless.


Use what you know about the real world:

For Kingdom A, there was this African tribe (I don't remember the name, sorry) that placed value in scars and stretch marks. Especially in women, since it showed that you had been pregnant.

For Kingdom B, it's very loosely based on the East Asian ideas of family honor and Middle Eastern cultures.

I also used a little bit of psychology with the whole idea of individualistic and collectivistic cultures.




And just play around with it! You want to have scholarly merchants, go ahead! Or maybe merchants who value adventure and exploration! (Marco Polo, anyone?)




ANYWAY! That was my scrabbled worldbuilding tip! What do you use for worldbuilding?