fandomhigh | World Mythology, Wednesday, Period Three

Ghanima was sitting on her desk, eating lemon drops as she watched the students arrive, blue-on-blue eyes intently observing them all. Once the last of the students arrived, her face lit up with a smile.

"Good morning,” she said, her voice carrying effortlessly. “I am Lady Ghanima Atreides, and this is World Mythology. You may call me Lady Ghanima or Miss Ghanima, whichever you are more comfortable with. The first person to call me Lady Atreides gets detention.” Ghani grinned wickedly. "Lady Atriedes is my grandmother, and I am nowhere near that old."

"This is a survey class, intended to give you a gentle introduction to various pantheons and mythologies around the world. We will not be covering any country in-depth, instead, consider this a whirlwind tour.”

“During this class, I’m going to ask you to keep in mind that many stories we consider today to be folklore or myths were originally part of a religion. I’m going to ask that you keep an open mind, and try not to let any ethnocentric biases show too badly. Yes, you may consider tales of the Tuatha de Danan or the Morrigan to be nothing more than fairy stories, but to someone else it may be a fundamental truth.”

“Today we will start with the definition of a myth.” Ghanima hopped off the desk and grabbed a stack of handouts, beginning to distribute them around the room.

“In the academic fields of mythology, mythography, or folkloristics, a myth (mythos) is a sacred story concerning the origins of the world or how the world and the creatures in it came to be in their present form. The active beings in myths are generally gods and heroes. Myths often are said to take place before recorded history begins. In saying that a myth is a sacred narrative, what is meant is that a myth is believed to be true by people who attach religious or spiritual significance to it. Use of the term by scholars does not imply that the narrative is either true or false."

"For the purpose of this class, myths are stories that originate in the beliefs of nations and races and present episodes in which supernatural forces operate. Some myths try to make visible and concrete ways that humans see nature, like the division of the year into seasons. Many myths show the ways that humans see the forces that control them, and often explain creation, religion, and divinities; they guess at the meaning of life and death, or at the cause for good and evil."

"Now, it is important to separate myths from other types of stories. Mythology is frequently confused with fiction, legend, fairy tale, folklore, fable, and urban legend, each of which has a distinct meaning in academia. There is also epic poetry, which may retell a myth, but not every epic poem is a myth – many are legends or folklore."

"The effective telling of a myth usually has some sense of dignity or simplicity, even for the entertaining or amusing ones, for it tries to re-create the spirit and intention of the original. When myths are poorly told, they condescend to or even insult the efforts of earlier societies to find meaning in life. When myths are well told, they appeal to something deep within us."

"Instead of doing the typical introductions, I'd like to hear about the myths near and dear to your hearts."

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Name, class, and favorite myth!

Take notes, pass notes, wonder how much candy the teacher has stashed away...

"Most cultures have a mythology of some type, and I'm interested to know what your favorite myth is and why. Give us a basic summary, just a sentence or two, and tell us why it's important to you."

She's around, before and after class!

Packing for CONvergence, and I leave this afternoon. SP for me!

Mabel Pines, Freshman, The Legend of the Gobblewonker!

Hanna Heller, Junior, The Firebird and Princess Vasilisa (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Firebird_and_Princess_Vasilisa)

Hanna hesitated, then started to explain. "The smartest person in the fairy tale is the horse." Well, yes. "And the huntsman just goes along with things, but he perseveres. The king who abuses his power dies. And the princess, I think she must have decided to go along with the huntsman, and set up things with the horse..." Okay that wasn't very clear, was it? "A huntsman finds a phoenix feather, that starts a chain of events beyond his control because his king keeps demanding more ridiculous things. Perhaps he was afraid of the huntsman. But his friend - the magic, talking horse - sees him through." There, that probably made more sense.

Kathy Li, Senior, The Sun and the Moon

"I've always liked the Korean myth of the creation of the sun and the moon," Kathy said. "The story goes that once there was a tiger that ate a poor peasant woman and then decided to eat her children as well. The long version of the myth goes into all the different cunning disguises that the tiger uses to get to the children, a lot like the fairy tale of the seven goat kids. Once he fools them into letting him inside, he chases them around until they pray to the gods to send them a rope so they can climb up into the heavens for There, the daughter, Daisun, become the moon, and the son, Haesik became the sun."

Blue Sargent, the Amazons

Garik Loran, senior, The Little Lost Bantha Cub

Face shrugged. "It comes across as a kid's bedtime story, but it outlines the various types of beings you might find across Tatooine, as well as underlining the relationship between Sand People and banthas since they're the only ones who end up helping," he said. "It also provides an example of introducing for inaccuracy aesthetic effect, since bantha young are actually called calves."

They also couldn't talk, but pointing that out was just quibbling.

World Mythology, Wednesday, Period Three

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