# data[].attributes.body
I. Definition:
A.) To posit a one-to-one correspondence between mythical “clothing” and the ideas being so clothed.
B.) This approach tends to limit the meaning of a myth, whereas that meaning may in reality be multiple, operating on several levels.

II. Example:
A.) An allegorical interpretation would be that given by an ancient commentator for the Iliad, book 20, verse 67.
a.) Allegorically as an opposition between elements—dry  against wet, hot against cold, light against heavy.
b.) Apollo, Helios, and Hephaestus represent fire.
c.) Poseidon represents river.
d.) Scamander represent water.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Why are we still making myths? Why do we need new myths? And what sort of stories attain this status?

In posing these questions and seeking answers, I shall need to make some bold proposals about the nature of storytelling, the condition of modernity, and the categories of literature. I don't claim that any of these suggestions is new in itself, but the notion of a modern myth can give them some focus and unity. We have been skating around that concept for many years now, and I can't help wondering if some of the reticence to acknowledge and accept it stems from puzzlement, and perhaps too a sense of unease, that Van Helsing is a part of the story. Not just that movie, but also the likes of I Was a Teenage Werewolf and Zombie Apocalypse, as well as children's literature and detective pulp fiction, not to mention queer theory, alien abduction fantasies, videogames, body horror, and artificial intelligence.

In short, there are a great many academic silos, cultural prejudices, and intellectual exclusion zones trammeling an exploration of our mythopoeic impulse. Even in 2019, for example, a celebrated literary novelist dipping his toe into a robot narrative could suppose that real science fiction deals in "traveling at 10 times the speed of light in anti-gravity boots," as opposed to "looking at the human dilemmas of being close up." It is precisely because our modern myths go everywhere that they earn that label, and for this same reason we fail to see (or resist seeing) them for what they are. As classical myths did for the cultures that conceived them, modern myths help us to frame and come to terms with the conditions of our existence.

Evidently, this is not all about literary books. Myths are promiscuous; they were postmodern before the concept existed, infiltrating and being shaped by popular culture. To discern their content, we need to look at comic books and B-movies as well as at Romantic poetry and German Expressionist cinema. We need to peruse the scientific literature, books of psychoanalysis, and made-for-television melodramas. Myths are not choosy about where they inhabit, and I am not going to be choosy about where to find them.

*

The idea of a modern myth, admits literary critic Chris Baldick,

simply should not exist, according to the most influential accounts of what a 'myth' is . . . the consensus in discussion of myths is that they are defined by their exclusive anteriority to literate and especially to modern culture. 'Myth' . . . is a lost world, to which modern writers may distantly and ironically allude, but in which they can no longer directly participate.

Like Baldick, I think this traditional view is entirely the wrong way to understand what a myth is. I will try to explain why.

The word myth is bandied about with dreadful abandon, as if it doesn't much matter what it means. Often now it is used to stigmatize a widely held misconception: the myth that the moon landings were staged in a Hollywood studio, or that Nelson Mandela died in the 1980s, or that eating carrots improves your eyesight. It can mark a clumsy attempt to disguise a franchise as an epic: Star Wars is mythic, right? (We'll see about that.) Or perhaps a story becomes a myth just by being much retold?

Why are we still making myths? Why do we need new myths? And what sort of stories attain this status?

Experts, I fear, aren't much help here. You can collect academic definitions for as long as your patience lasts. "The word myth," as Northrop Frye rightly says, "is used in such a bewildering variety of contexts that anyone talking about it has to say first of all what his chosen context is." Folklorist Liz Locke put it more bluntly in 1998: "such a state of semantic disarray and/or ambiguity is truly extraordinary."

Finnish folklorist Lauri Honko nonetheless gives a definition that kind of sounds like what you'd expect from an expert: a myth is

a story of the gods, a religious account of the beginning of the world, the creation, fundamental events, the exemplary deeds of the gods as a result of which the world, nature and culture were created together with all parts thereof and given their order, which still obtains. A myth expresses and confirms society's religious values and norms, it provides a pattern of behavior to be imitated, testifies to the efficacy of ritual with its practical ends and establishes the sanctity of cult.

This is a fair appraisal of how myth has often been regarded by anthropologists. But it is fraught with dangers and traps. Like the word "anthropology" itself, it seems to offer an invitation to make myth something "other": something belonging to cultures not our own, and most probably to ones that even in the circles of liberal academics retain an air of the "primitive." Gods, creation, ritual, cult: these are surely notions that we in the developed world have left behind and only pick up again with an air of irony. Our "gods" are not real beings or agencies but metaphorical cravings ("he worships money") or celebrities (rock gods and sex goddesses).

Our rituals, not invested with any spiritual content (except in churches, mosques, and temples attended by the devout), are empty or, at best, time-honored habits we indulge for the social sanction they offer-marriages and funerals, say. Our cults are brainwashing sects isolated from regular society. And so likewise, our "myths" are things that many people believe to be true but that aren't really-or, as "urban myths," oft-told tales that likely never happened.

Our popular narrative, then, is that we shed mythology in its traditional sense, probably during the process that began in the Enlightenment, in the course of which the world became "disenchanted" by the advance of science, and that has led since to a secular society on which the old deities have lost their grip. We grew out of gods and myths because we acquired reason and science.

This picture is tenacious, and I suspect it accounts for much of the resistance to the notion (and there is a lot of resistance, believe me) that anything created in modern times might deserve to be called a "myth." To accept that we have never relinquished myths and myth-making might seem to be an admission that we are not quite modern and rational. But all I am asking, with the concept of myth I use in this book, is that we accept that we have not resolved all the dilemmas of human existence, all the questions about our origins or our nature-and that, indeed, modernity has created a few more of them.

Our popular narrative, then, is that we shed mythology in its traditional sense, probably during the process that began in the Enlightenment, in the course of which the world became "disenchanted" by the advance of science.

One objection to the idea of a modern myth is that, to qualify as myth, a story must contain elements and characters that someone somewhere believes literally existed or happened. Surely myths can't emerge from works of fiction! The anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski asserted as much, saying of myth that "it is not of the nature of fiction, such as we read today in a novel, but it is a living reality, believed to have once happened in primeval times, and continuing ever since to influence the world and human destinies."

But this is simply the grand narrative with which Malinowski and his generation framed their study of the myths of "primitive" cultures. It allows us to insist (as they wished to) that we advanced societies have no myth left except religion (and even that is no longer believed in quite the same way as it was a couple of centuries ago). As Baldick puts it, in this view "myth is the quickest way out of the twentieth [and now the 21st] century."

Even in its own terms, however, Malinowski's definition is tendentious. Did the author(s) we know as Homer believe he was merely writing history, right down to, say, Athena's interventions in the Trojan war? To assert this would be to neglect the long and continuing scholarly debate about what Homer was really up to-was he, for instance, a skeptic, or a religious reformer? Worse, it would neglect the even longer and profound debate about what storytelling is up to. It might be unwise to attach any contemporary label to Homer, but one that fits him more comfortably than most is to say he was a poet, and that he used poetic imagination to articulate his myths. Stories like his relate something deemed culturally important and in an important sense "true"-but not as a documentary account of events. Plato admitted as much in the 5th century BCE; are we then to suppose that Greek myth was already "dead" to him?

To ask if ancient people "believed" their mythical stories is to ask a valid but extremely complex question. It is much the same as asking if Christian theologians, past and present, "believe" the Bible. Yes, they generally do-but that belief is complicated, multifaceted, and contentious, and to imagine it amounts to a literal conviction that all the events and peoples described in the holy book occurred as written is to misunderstand the function of religion itself. What's more, while we can adduce a range of interpretations about these beliefs today, it is not clear we can ever truly decide how these correspond (or whether they even need to correspond) to the convictions of the people who created the original text.

Many early anthropologists and scholars of myth (and some still today) thought that myths must be "sacred": they must have the aspect of religious belief, and perhaps have been used in ritual. This was the position taken by Edward Burnett Tylor, one of the 19th-century founders of cultural anthropology, and also by James Frazer in his seminal early work on comparative myth, The Golden Bough (1890). For Tylor, Frazer, and Malinowski, myth was a prescientific way of understanding the world, and thereby of trying to control it. The French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss argued that in fact myth was a kind of primitive science: logical and concrete in its own terms. Philosopher Karl Popper believed that science arose out of efforts to assess the validity of myth through empirical, rational investigation of its effectiveness. The evaluations of all these commentators stemmed largely from a focus on creation myths, which are the easiest to map onto questions about how the physical world is constituted and governed.

One objection to the idea of a modern myth is that, to qualify as myth, a story must contain elements and characters that someone somewhere believes literally existed or happened.

This view of myth as primarily religious and at any rate prescientific is certainly a convenient way of keeping myth at arm's length from today's secular, technologically sophisticated society. But to insist that a religious role is a necessary, defining feature of myth would be an arbitrary stricture that tells us little about the social work myths did. It is a view that mistakes function for process-as if to say that the function of a church service is to enable hymns to be sung. It doesn't even fit with the way (as far as we can say anything at all about this) myth functioned in ancient times. As classicist William Hansen has said, there is "no real evidence that I can see that the Greeks regarded myths as 'sacred stories,' unless you take 'sacred' in a very watered-down sense."

It's undeniable that religion and myth are tightly entwined, however-not least because both address cosmic questions about meaning, which lie outside the domain of scientific cosmology. For religious scholar Mary Mills, myth offers a "cosmic framework .. . which indicates where cosmic power resides, what it is called, and so how it can be used." To which one might reply: sure, sometimes. The world emerging from the body of the giant Ymir, maybe. Theseus's struggles with the Minotaur or Medea, not so much.

The temptation is to suppose that modern myths are today's replacement for religion. That would be to fall for another a category error, however, for religion might be regarded as a particular social and institutional embodiment of myth-and not vice versa. Religion explores some of the same questions-about life and death, meaning, suffering and fate, origins-and so it is not surprising that we will find our modern, secular myths still returning to religious themes, questions, and experiences. Institutional religion tends, however, to crystallize from this exploration codes of conduct, values, and norms. At its worst, it seeks to escape from the ambiguities of myth by imposing a false resolution to irresolvable questions. At its best, it leaves those doors open.

This brings us to the tidy function ascribed to myth by Honko's definition: to express and confirm society's religious values and norms and provide a pattern of behavior to be imitated. This is the sober, objective rationalist's view of myth as normative narrative. But whose behavior exactly is to be imitated among the Titans and Olympians? Cronus the father-castrator? Zeus the sex-pest and rapist? Dionysius the libertine? Heracles with his boneheaded pragmatism? Self-absorbed Narcissus?

No, myth is not tidy. Myth is the opposite of tidy! Was Gong Gong, who caused the Great Flood of China's formation myth, a wicked demon king who broke one of the Pillars of Heaven and made a hole through which the waters poured (as some versions suggest)? Or was he an opportunist human king who simply tried to exploit the catastrophe? Or was he an inept engineer employed by the Emperor Yao to drain the waters? Or was he in fact the father of the engineer-hero Yü who finally resolved the mess? Take your pick. This, I think, is the best answer we can give to such questions based on the conflicting versions of myths that have survived (while no doubt many others have been lost): it depends on the story you want to tell. Gong Gong could represent many influences and agencies, contingent on what the myth-teller wanted the people to believe about flood control and state authority.

A myth is typically not a story but an evolving web of many stories-interweaving, interacting, contradicting each other. Boil it down and the story falls away: there are no characters (which is to say, individuals with histories and psychologies),no location, no denouement-and no unique "meaning." You're left with a rugged, elemental, irreducible kernel charged with the magical power of generating versions of the story.

It's undeniable that religion and myth are tightly entwined, however-not least because both address cosmic questions about meaning, which lie outside the domain of scientific cosmology.

A function of China's flood myth (for example) is thus not simply to give citizens a quasi-religious account of how their nation began, but also-and more importantly-to help them deal with the ever-present fear of massive flooding. It sanctifies the authority of someone who can cope with such a natural disaster, and even proposes a theoretical basis for flood control: carve out channels to let the waters flow, don't dam them up. But more than that: it creates a vehicle for thinking about the problem, without offering either a definitive version of events or an unambiguous solution. When a myth becomes a dogmatic social and ethical code, it has become prescriptive religion or something like it: we have arrived at Daoism or Confucianism, say.

When a myth permits of a resolution-when it indeed succeeds in what Lévi-Strauss describes as its aim, of providing "a logical model capable of overcoming a contradiction" (though how could it, if the contradiction is real?)-it has become a moral fable. But while it retains ambiguity and contradiction, it stays a myth. It acts not as a cultural code but as what cultural historians Amanda Rees and Iwan Rhys Morus call (apropos the kind of modern myths discussed in this book) a "cultural resource."

It's unfair to judge the early anthropologists too harshly for the limited and inadequate picture of myth they presented, which was of course a product of its time. They deserve credit for taking seriously the function it serves; as Malinowski said, myth "is not an idle rhapsody, not an aimless outpouring of vain imaginings, but a hard-working, extremely important cultural force." Yet it wasn't until around the middle of the 20th century that such scholars began to recognize the obvious corollary: that the work demanded of this cultural force does not simply vanish with modernity, and that there is nothing essentially ancient about myth. Philosopher Ernst Cassirer was perfectly happy with the idea that myths are still being produced, especially in the political sphere-he regarded Nazism as an instance. "In all critical moments of man's social life," he wrote, "the rational forces that resist the rise of the old mythical conceptions are no longer sure of themselves. In these moments the time for myth has come again."

Still, for Cassirer, mythmaking remained an atavistic throwback, a strategy necessary only in "desperate situations." It took a theologian to dismantle that idea: the German Rudolf Bultmann, who sought to "demythologize" the Christian New Testament. To seek historical verification of the scriptures or reconciliation of their account of cosmogenesis with science is not, he argued, a meaningful pursuit. Rather, their message is ethical and philosophical. It's the same with all myth, he said: it expresses timeless human experience:

The real purpose of myth is not to present an objective picture of the world as it is, but to express man's understanding of himself in the world in which he lives. Myth should be interpreted not cosmologically, but anthropologically, or better still, existentially.

If this is indeed at least a part of what myth is about, then myth-making can cease only when "the world in which we live" has ceased to change, and when we have solved all of our problems and resolved all of our anxieties. That, I suspect we can agree, will not be any time soon.

___________________________________
Reprinted with permission from The Modern Myths: Adventures in the Machinery of the Popular Imagination by Philip Ball, published by The University of Chicago Press. © 2021 by Philip Ball. All rights reserved.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Why Are We So Resistant to the Idea of a Modern Myth?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Why are we still making myths? Why do we need new myths? And what sort of stories attain this status? In posing these questions and seeking answers, I shall need to make some bold proposals about the nature of storytelling, the condition of modernity, and the categories of literature.

# data[].attributes.body
I. DEFINITION:
A.)  A systematic comparison of myths and mythic themes drawn from a wide variety of cultures.
B.) The prevalence of the comparative approach has meant that since the 19th century
C.) Specialized studies have made generalizations about more than one tradition or at the very least have had to take comparative works by others into account.

Reminder:
For there to be any philosophical inquiry into the nature and function of myth at all, there must exist a body of data about myths across a range of societies. Such data would not exist without a comparative approach.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Wikipedia Commons

Different Approaches to Analyzing Mythology

Origins of Superiority

Largely euhemeristic based views towards mythologies and some of the cultural norms based on them dominated collective societal philosophies up until the end of the Renaissance period. A surge in interest over a distinctive primal language that was thought to be traceable back to the scattering of the races at the Biblical Tower of Babel; the "Ur-language," developed by the "Ur- people," was presumed to be the original language from which all other existing languages were said to have been derived. This philosophy laid the way for a basis of comparison-language form. Belonging to a culture that could trace its linguistic roots back to the original Ur, according to common thought, established one's culture, and therefore, beliefs as superior to those cultures that could not establish links to this prestigious origin. This rather ethnocentric point of view led to several mechanisms for comparisons among cultures and was eventually epitomized in Gottfried Herder's Volk theory; conceptualizing the rural German "Volk" as having retained much of the vigor of their original ancestors; through simple living and close relationship with the land they maintained a purity not possessed by others. Some forwarded the notion of descent from the fabled Aryan Race based on linguistic ties; and therefore, superiority. This particular mindset has culminated in some rather dichotic historical events-most notably the Holocaust and the reaction of the rest of the world to Hitler's Germany. Interpretation of myth and creation by definitive comparative guidelines in the instance of Nazi Germany's version of the development of a national character shook the cultural beliefs of the entire world.

Language, symbols, artwork, folktales, and chronologically ordered histories of events were cataloged and characterized by Giovanni Battista Vico, who claimed to have solved the mysteries and confusion of ancient histories through scientific principles. Comparisons of various aspects of different cultures were by and large used as a basis to establish social and cultural superiority during this period.

The Contextual Importance of Myth Development and Common Societal Patterns

As theories and approaches to discovering the origins or true nature of myths became ever more numerous, it stands to reason that different combinations of thought or hybrids of theory would develop. Wendy Doniger's theories used components like the comparative styles of the Grimm Brothers' (which had their roots in origin based importance of myths) to analyze the context under which certain myths were formed on the individual level, yet asserted the importance of also analyzing the broader social effects that myths have on societies as a whole. Doniger believed that taking into account contextual differences such as who is telling a certain story, what that person's status or point of view may have been, and how they may have perceived themselves as compared to others involved in the scenario, can bring to light possible biases or cultural conditioning that may have influenced storyteller. Comparing many myths and examining the factors involved in their origin can lead to the discovery of discernable patterns and parallels; taking one step a little further back, it may be possible to determine common themes and reactions across cultures while gleaning a deeper understanding of behavioral concepts through the varying individuality of the different characters and situations involved in the story (Leonard & McClure, 2004).

Myths No Longer Exist

Robert Ellenwood's approach to the study of myth suggests that myth, in the sense of Hesiod's poetic "breathing" of the divine, no longer exists. What students, philosophers, and theologians study now is a vast conglomeration of bits and pieces of different kernels of possible truth; a "reconstruction of folklore and legend, artistically put together with an eye for drama and meaning (Leonard & McClure, 2004) ." The possibility of determining one true creation myth or one all-encompassing theory that accounts for all myths of all cultures represented across time does not realistically exist, and as has been argued for centuries, may not even be the most important aspect of myth.

Myths at their most basic level are narratives used by many different individuals, cultures, societies, and nations to illustrate abstract concepts such as love, loyalty, and honor through characters and situations that individuals can identify with. Once a group of individuals identifies and agrees upon certain desirable modes of behavior, derived from shared values and goals, a culture has begun to form.

Creation Myths and Implied Mythological Meaning

Sky Woman and the Significance of Context

Out of the Blue is a beautiful creation story that combines elements of significance from several different analytical approaches to mythology. In this story, a powerful yet strange woman from another world is tricked into jumping into a hole in the ground of her world and consequently creates the human world. The story of Sky Woman, as she is called in some versions of the narrative, illustrates not only a nature origin myth with the coupling of the divine woman and the tree of life, through which Sky Woman bears a daughter that she considers to make her complete; a form of divine origin offering this society identity and legitimacy. (Leonard & McClure, 2004)

This story is primarily an example of Doniger's emphasis on the importance of considering the context under which myths were developed because the story depicts a powerful woman creating the human world within a society that bases many of its structural procedures and political offices on matriarchal bloodlines. The story of Sky Woman illustrates for this society that women are divine, powerful, and wise. When Sky Woman follows the instructions of her dead father instead of listening to her mother, she is paired with a man who deceives her. Thus, men are represented as being unwise and deceitful. In fact, any dealings with any male throughout the story result in a perceived tragedy initially. One of the sons that her daughter bears (Bud) insists on exiting the body of Sky Woman's daughter from a location "nearer her heart, where there was no egress" and "tearing her asunder" changed her into another kind of being.

As Sky Woman forgets her previous existence, elements of significance to psychological analysis of myths emerge. The awareness of the presence of other "intelligent beings" with their "own meanings, their own forms" becomes apparent to Sky Woman and she and the archetypal forms carry out duties they "know" they must perform to allow for the next "uncoiling of the flow of the universe (Leonard & McClure, 2004)."

Additionally, Out of the Blue is also a good example of Ellenwood's assertion that myths are derived from several different pieces of information because different versions of the story exist across the six nations of the Iroquois; within which exist many different versions of the narrative, each reinforcing the concept of a divine feminine and elemental conception of the society and the premise that women are powerful and wise.

The Creation, from The Eddas and Divine Origin

The magnificent story of creation portrayed in the Norse Eddas is a profound example of divine natural origin and descendent perceptions of power, dominance, and superiority. The Vikings were born of the gods themselves and the gods born of nature. "Burning ice, biting flame; that is how life began." Different realms existed in the beginning; Muspell to the south, to the north Niflheim. Between these two realms in the seemingly empty void called Ginnungagap, the interaction of elemental gods created the frost god, Ymir; from whom the first man and woman grew." The epic goes on to recount the birth and creation of the 14 major Norse gods, human society, and the world as a whole. The Viking culture, unsurprisingly, dominated a great deal of Europe for a very long time by asserting their belief in the divine origin of their people. (Leonard & McClure, 2004)

The Edda also illustrates striking elements for consideration in the power of myths over not only the culture that is the originator of the myth but every other culture that it comes in contact with. The belief the Vikings held in their divine origin fueled their conquests and left their mark on other cultures over a vast part of the world, and history itself.

The Creation contained in The Eddas also presents aspects that would definitely be significant to Ellenwood's assertions that no complete myth even exists as it was collected from "thirty-four stories written by different authors at different times." The word "Edda" is most likely derived from an Old Norse poem, and has, therefore, evolved with the telling over long periods of time. (Leonard & McClure, 2004)

Myth and Truth

Truth or Consequences

Many aspects of mythology have been studied over the ages by many intelligent minds. Many more people have felt the effects of the analysis of mythology and the customs and cultures that develop because of them. The main points of contention over the centuries seem to focus on whether or not myths should be considered as true and divinely inspired; worthy of religious station and adherence, or fanciful tales dreamt up by unsophisticated, ignorant ancestors. And further, whether or not the implicit truth is truly as important as the effects myths have on societies as a whole.

Truth, as Ellenwood hypothesized, is sometimes more in the perspective of the reasoning individual than in the actual, verifiable, tangible evidence or even witness, as such scholars as Euhemeros and Tertullian demonstrated. The fact remains that human beings create their own realities every minute of every day. What an individual perceives to be real at any given moment is indeed, to that individual, real. It follows that the effect of myths-what human beings believe individual and collectively- influences our thoughts and perceptions, and therefore our realities.

Human beings must continue trying to make sense of our surroundings; our interactions and our relationships with other people. Narratives illustrating basic cultural norms constructed in a manner that can be understood and identified with by more individuals are going to become reality for that particular culture. As truth is arguably subjective, it follows that the effects or outcomes of the beliefs held by an individual or culture are far more influential than whether or not the myth they are derived from is actually true.

References

Leonard, S. & McClure, M. (2004). Myth &knowing: An introduction to world mythology, Chapter 1. The McGraw-Hill Companies, Ney York. 2004.
© 2010 Sarah White
thevoice from carthage ill on April 08, 2010:

excellent hub write thanks

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Different Approaches to Analyzing Mythology

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Largely euhemeristic based views towards mythologies and some of the cultural norms based on them dominated collective societal philosophies up until the end of the Renaissance period.

# data[].attributes.body
I. Definition:
A.)  The Romantic movement had profound implications for the   study of myth.
B.) Roman antiquity and contemporary folktales—were regarded by the Romantics as repositories of experience

II. Example:
A.) “Auszug aus einem Briefwechsel über Ossian und die Lieder alter Völker” (1773; “Extract from a Correspondence on Ossian and the Songs of Ancient Peoples”).
a.)Herder believed that the more “savage,” that is, the more “alive” and “freedom-loving” a people (ein Volk) was, the
more alive and free its songs would be.
b.) Herder exalted the Kultur des Volkes (“culture of the people”)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Morpheus, the god of dreams and the molder of the dreams of kings, heroes and gods.

In Latin, the name means to shape. This references his ability to fashion or mold dreams because he shaped and formed that which appeared to the dreamer.

Family

His father was Hypnos, the god of sleep with the power to influence any mortal or god to fall into a trance-like sleep through his sheer presence. Hypnos was the calmest and quietest of all the gods and was said to have a thousand sons. Among the many, three remain known to myth: Morpheus, Icelos, and Phanatasos. Their mother was Pasithea, the goddess of rest and relaxation. Morpheus share none of his parents traits and took delight in his powers of manipulating the dreams of men. His parents disapproved of his rebellious nature, urging their powerful son toward stillness and calm, but he hungered for more. It was this ambition that likely drove him to the court of Hades where he was properly appreciated. His grandparents, Nyx and Erebus, were also members of the Court of Hades, and likely drew their grandson to their domain as well.

Dreamworld

Morpheus' command of the dreams of men and gods was unmatched. He was most skilled in mimicking anyone, transforming himself into any guise, including their appearance, speech, habit, gait and bearing. While his brother Icelos was known to take on the transformation of animal and beast, Morpheus chose for his true form that of a winged humanoid, flying silently and swiftly throughout the domain of dreams that he came to think of as his own realm.

Court

As the rift between the Olympians and Chthonians widened, Morpheus' place as the messenger of the gods became more and more entrenched with the command of his master, Hades. In the waking world, he was a member of the court of Hades, and served him as a general serving his king. What event occurred that transferred his loyalty so firmly to the Underworld is unknown, but it is likely the Hades fanned the flames of Morpheus' ego and fed Morpheus' hunger for recognition and authority. The formerly beautiful, angelic being became known in the world of men as a demon as a result of his reputation and alliance with the Lord of the Dead. The bringer of dreams themselves were known as oneiroi, or dream demons. With Morpheus as their leader, he adopted the moniker fully. In the world of dreams, when not taking the form of another, he is a literal winged demon.

Life

Morpheus was one of the busiest of all the gods, as much if not more than any of the Olympians, given his domain of watching and ruling the dreams of kings, heroes and gods. As such, he had little personal life. He never married and it is unknown if he fathered any children.

It was said that Morpheus slept on a bed of poppies and from his name is derived the drug morphine.

He is also known as "The Sandman"

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In Latin, the name means to shape. This references his ability to fashion or mold dreams because he shaped and formed that which appeared to the dreamer. Family His father was Hypnos, the god of sleep with the power to influence any mortal or god to fall into a trance-like sleep through his sheer presence.

# data[].attributes.body
Definition:
Refers to recurring patterns and themes

Examples of the types of action isolated by Vladimir Propp:
a.) “An interdiction is addressed to the hero”;
b.) “The interdiction is violated”;
c.) “The false hero or villain is exposed”; and
d.) “The hero is married and ascends the throne.”

Development of Propp's Approach
Walter Burkert detected certain recurrent patterns to cultural "programs of action".

Example: Burkert's Structure and History in Greek Mythology and Ritual (1979)
a.) Greek myths have a recurring patterns called "the girl's tragedy" - this pattern reflects a basic biologic sequence or “program of action”; puberty, defloration, pregnancy, delivery.
b.) Myths about the driving out of the scapegoat - the persistence of these patterns, according to Burkert, by the fact that they are grounded in basic human needs—above all, the need to survive.

# data[].attributes.body
I. Definition:
A.) Serves as an interpretation of myth as integrated with other aspects of society and as supporting existing social relationships.

II. Example:
A.) Essai sur le don (The Gift) - referred to a system of gift giving to be found in traditional and preindustrial societies.

# data[].attributes.body
I. Definition:
A.) This approach is based on the analogy of myth to language.

II. Goal: Structuralist analysis aims at uncovering what it sees as the logic of myth.

a.) Logic are terms related to items of the everyday world in which the “primitive” culture exists that is usually based on empirical categories or empirical objects.

b.) Claude Levi-Strauss emphasized the same presence of logical patterns called " primitive mentality" which was characterized by the inability to make distinctions, be a sense of "mystic participation" .

# data[].attributes.body
I. Definition:
A.) The collection and classification of mythological themes.
B.)  Considers the traditional beliefs, myths, tales, and practices of a people.

II. Examples:
A.) Collection of Marchen - Deutsche Sagen ("German Legends")- tales that were purported to record actual events and that were ostensibly set in a specific place and period, as opposed to the once-upon-a-time-in the forest" setting characteristics of Marchen.

B.) Classification of Folk Literature - "Motif-Index of Folk Literature" by Stith Thompson

# data[].attributes.body
-The most obvious function of myths is the explanation of facts, whether natural or cultural.

-The function of explanation and the narrative form go together, since the imaginative power of the myth lends credibility to the explanation and crystallizes it into a memorable and enduring form.

-A  myth functions as an explanation, but the narrative form distinguishes it from a straightforward answer to an intellectual question about causes.

Example:

One North American Indian (Abenaki) myth-explains the origin of corn (maize).

# data[].attributes.body
-if taken literally, should refer only to stories about fairies, a class of supernatural and sometimes malevolent beings—often believed to be of diminutive size

-In a broader perspective it is normally used to refer to a much wider class of narrative, namely, stories directed above all at an audience of children about an individual, almost always young, who confronts strange or magical events.

Ex: Jack and the Beanstalk, Cinderella

# data[].attributes.body
-The word fable derives from the Latin word fabula, which originally meant about the same as the Greek mythos.

-it means a fictitious or untrue story.

- features personified animals or natural objects as characters.

-fables almost always end with an explicit moral message.

Ex: The Hare and the Tortoise

# data[].attributes.body
-folktale has its roots in the late 18th century

*Stith Thompson

-Regarded Myth as one type of folktale.

-according to this approach, the characteristic of myth is that its narratives deal with sacred events that happened “in the beginning.”

*Geoffrey S. Kirk

-Says the term folktale denotes stories that reflect simple social situations and play on ordinary fears and desires.

Ex: The Pied Piper, Marchen(“Tales”)

# data[].attributes.body
I. DEFINITION
A.) Saga is often generalized and loose to refer to any extended narrative re-creation of historical events.
B.) Epic composed in poetry

II. RELATION
A.) Myth: set in a semidivine world
Saga:  more realistic and more firmly grounded in a specific historical setting.
Epic: characteristically incorporate mythical events and persons.
B.) Both saga and epic compose of narrative forms look back to an age of heroic endeavor.

III. EXAMPLES
A.) in the ancient world - the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer
B.) Mahabharata
C.) Epic of Gilgamesh

# data[].attributes.body
I. DEFINITION
A.) Usually characterizes a traditional tale thought to have a historical basis.

II. RELATION
A.) Myth: refers to the supernatural and the sacred
Legend: grounded in historical facts
B.) In other cases, boundaries between legends and myths are fluid, and that different writers employ them in quite different ways.

III. EXAMPLES
A.) legends of King Arthur or Robin Hood

# data[].attributes.body
I.DEFINITION
A.) Parable or Illustrative tale is a narrative that has explicit purpose the illustration of a doctrine or standard of conduct.

II.RELATION
A.) The term myth is not normally applied to parables.

III.EXAMPLES
A.) New Testament
B.) Sufism ( Islamic mysticism)
C.) Rabbinic ( Jewish biblical interpretive)
D.) Zen Buddhism

# data[].attributes.body
I. DEFINITION
A.) Explains the origin of a custom, state of affairs, or natural feature in the human divine world.

II. RELATION
A.) Often seems to be added to a mythical narrative as an afterthought.
B.) Etiology is not the distinctive characteristic of myth.

III. EXAMPLES
A.) Hindu narrative ascribing the blue neck of the god Shiva to a poison he drank in primordial times.

# data[].attributes.body
1. Myth comes from the Greek word "mythos"- which means word or, more significantly, story.

2. A myth is a story but it's a special kind of story that can have two primary characteristics: significance and staying power.
a. Significance - The stories have subject matter that is about something important like how the world works or how things came to be.
b. Staying power - These stories have survived for centuries and even a millennia. This means that these stories have a functional importance to people who hear and tell them.

# data[].attributes.body
1. Myths deal with the:
Origin of the world
End of the world
A paradisiacal state
Description of what people can never “see for themselves”

2. Descriptions of myths provide educational value.

3. Before preindustrial societies, mythical descriptions provide a philosophical system of inquiry as an important available model of instruction.

# data[].attributes.body
Creation Myths play a serious role in renewal, inspiration, and healing of the sick.
How:
A. In some cultures, particular works are recited or sung to a person whose life is in jeopardy.
B. Healing can also be done thru the recitation of cosmology. C. Myth is used as a magical incantation.
D. Mythical themes and imagery are used in the artistic endeavor for self-expression.
E. Mythical themes become an aesthetic inspiration for western painting, sculpture, and literature.

Examples of these practices are:

1. Navajo Healing Chant
- The Navajo believe in the use of different chants to restore balance, health, and equilibrium. They are also recited when a person's world or life is in danger. (Click on the video for reference)
2. Icelandic Poets Mead Song
- The "Mead Song" from Old Norse mythology is sung said to celebrate the origins of their own art and, hence, renewing it

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Navajo Healing Song By The Navajo & The Sioux

# data[].attributes.body
GENERALIZATION ACTIVITY:

1. For this activity, you are going to OUTLINE all the important concepts and discussions you have taken from the Britannica article you have read previously. You will work in groups to complete this activity. See your groupings on the PEOPLE PANEL on the left corner of your CANVAS.

2. To comply with this homework, you have to prepare a PADLET link, which will be used several times throughout this course. So make sure to organize properly your Padlet wall. Expect to submit some of your group's activities through PADLET.

3. Be systematic in all your group activities so every member would be aware of his/her tasks. I will be assigning a leader for this group for faster execution of the tasks.

4. For the leader who will be assigned for this activity, please do the following:

a. Make a GC for your group

b. Assign to every member who will be outlining the concepts and discussions.

c. Assign someone to prepare the PADLET.

d. Initiate the planning of this activity.

5. For the PADLET, the following are suggested and expected to be done by each group:

a. Please use a GRID or SHELF format type of PADLET

b. Make use of Headings to clearly understand your notes.

c. Be Creative in your presentation but make sure that the content of your notetaking equally stands out from how you aesthetically arranged your padlet.

d. All members should be added to the PADLET. Every member should give their emails to the main administrator of the padlet so when a member answers his/her assigned task;  the names of the member appear on the padlet. Please see attached pics to be guided further.

# data[].attributes.body
-Many myths explain ritual and cultic customs.

-The myth can be said to validate life itself together with the cultic celebration.

*Comparable myths

-told in a number of societies where the main means of food production is the cultivation of root crops

-the myths reflect the fact that tubers must be cut up and buried in the earth for propagation to take place.

Ritual sacrifices

- typical of traditional peasant cultures.

3 Mythical Themes

1.       Necessity of death (e.g., grain dies and is buried, only to yield a subsequent harvest)

2.       Society's cyclic renewal of itself (e.g., New Year's celebration)

3.       Significance of women and sexuality

Cosmogony(origin of cosmos)

-subject of the central mythology

* Many ceremonies that each society has developed as a symbol of what is necessary to its well-being.

Examples:

-Enthronements of kings wherein some traditions are associated with a creation or re-creation of the world.

-The creation epic “Enuma Elish” which was read each New Year at Babylon, to celebrate the progress of the cosmos from initial anarchy to government by the kingship of Marduk.

*Ruling families in ancient civilizations frequently justified their position by invoking myths.

Examples:

-Known from imperial China

-Pharaonic Egypt

-The Hittite empire

-Polynesia

-The Inca empire

- India

Georges Dumézil

-a French historian of ancient religion who was the pioneer in suggesting that the priestly, warrior, and producing classes in ancient Indo-European societies regarded themselves as having been ordained to particular tasks by virtue of their mythological origins.

Marriage and funerary customs- a very known cultural tradition that exist in some mythological foundation.