I had the thought a while ago of creating a generic PAO list with items that would be familiar for anyone (I’m guessing that a lot of the personalities on my actual PAO list would not be familiar to a good proportion of people).
I’m far off a hundred Ps but hopefully by posting here these may be useful for gaps in other people’s PAO’s, or perhaps people can add to this list with their own similar suggestions to make it more useful.
So, we have “generic” Ps that nonetheless should already be associated with a memorable image in anyone’s mind:
Angel
Astronaut
Ballerina
Bishop
Chef
Cowboy
Demon
Diver (Scuba)
Dwarf
Eskimo
Fairy
Fireman
Giant
Indian (Apache)
Judge
Knight
Miner
Mummy (Egyptian)
Ninja
Nurse
Pirate
Policeman
Samurai
Werewolf
Witch (Fairytale)
Wizard
And we have some fictional characters that are so famous, I believe anyone should be familiar with and have an image of them already:
Batman
Count Dracula
King Arthur
Mickey Mouse
Rapunzel
Red Riding Hood
Robin Hood
Ronald McDonald
Santa Claus
Sherlock Holmes
Spiderman
Superman
Tarzan
(I’m confident that all of those are near-universally known, but couldn’t think of others I was sure were so ubiquitous. I’m sure a majority of people would know, say, Darth Vader - but I’m not sure he’s as universal as these are. On the other hand, I’m biased by my western-european background so maybe friends in the Far East wouldn’t immediately recognise characters from fairy tales like Rapunzel).
Any thoughts? Additions? People on the list that you don’t get an immediate mental image for?