Extra Credit Reading Notes: Overview of Mythology Crash Course

(Fountain Pen Writing by Petar Milosevic)

 

For this week's extra reading. I watched the crash course Overview of Mythology videos. 

First Video: What is Myth?

So this episode was a lot of groundwork to lay out how they're going to be talking about myth. Such as how religion and myth can be a blurry distinction. They're going to treat myth as a collection of stories passed down over time. 'Myth' also has a problem as a word because the myth is generally understood as something that is untrue. 'Myth' comes from the word mythos which is a story. 

The actual story discussed was the story of Persephone. She is trapped in hades for 6 months of the year. One month for each pomegranate seed she ate in Hades. This myth explains the seasons because when Persephone is out of Hades there is good weather and growing plants, but otherwise, the world is dying (winter). They want to focus first on creation myths, then pantheons, and finally destruction myths. 

Second Video: Theories of Myth

Mythology is the systematic study of myths. People criticized myths since before even Socrates. Plato said that myths with fantastical things were false, but rational myths were true.

Anthropologists go and do fieldwork to experience a myth in living societies. Freud says that the world is harsh so as a defense mechanism we create mythos to help us cope. Jung thought this was more of a universal thing not just based on the individual. Campbell says that there is one myth that underlies all other stories. They follow a similar structure. 

Third Video: The Hero's Journey and The Monomyth

Campbell showed that there a similar road map for every culture's hero's journey. Heroes tell us something about ourselves. Everyone is struggling and trying to find their place in society. Who are we? Why are we here? 

Monomyth comes from the idea that there is a greater universal experience that authors draw on and that's what makes hero stories similar. 

Heros start with a call and they usually refuse. They then go to change into the hero they're meant to become. there are 6 possible parts. Part 3 is reintegration into society. For mythological heroes, retiring home and being part of society is a challenge.