I'm sad this is ending. From the first moment Professor Sexson walked in to the class and asked if this was the anthropology class and (happy to find it wasn't) started talking to us about mythologies being the precedent to every action, I was hooked. I have learned so much from this class about not only myth but life.
I've had so many people tease me about being an English Major (though they say teaching it is a slight improvement) in the last year. To hear Proffessor Sexson speak and make an argument for the arts and speak as if they not only had value, but had more value than business or science, well... it made me feel like I had found somewhere I belong.
I want to teach English because I love the stories and everything they teach you. There is nothing like putting down a book and feeling like you can't possibly be the same person as when you picked it up. Professor Sexson said in class on day "Education is not information; it's transformation. The point is not to fill your heads with facts but to be changed in the twinkling of an eye." This has stuck with me from the moment he said it because thats the feeling I love; the transformation.
Todays is the last day of class. I haven't posted nearly enough of my thoughts from this class online but oh well. Even though it won't be graded I want to add all my class notes on here at some point just to save them somewhere digital. Each time I go back through I notice something I had forgotten, much like how each time we read Ovid we find something we missed.
But back to endings. I keep searching for the perfect way to sum up everything we have talked about over the last semester in the course. I can't seem to find the words but I know at the same time this is ending something new is beginning. I've already signed up for the Honors Mythologies class in the Fall and can't wait to see where that takes me. As for this summer I only hope that I can hone my mythic detective skills a little more and just remember that even though I am sad to see this end something else is starting that might be even better. And if not... Well I'm sure it will transform and change in to something new.
Carol- Mythologies: Precident to My Story
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Monday, April 15, 2013
My Life as a Mythic Detective
Never
an Ordinary Day
My Life as
a Mythic Detective
I used to have many
ordinary days. I would get up, go to class, eat, study, work, spend
time with friends, and then go back to bed to without anything
spectacular ever happening to me. I would grow bored with the
monotony of life and wish to go out on adventures; backpacking with
friends, tubing the Madison, or even just loosing myself in to the
alternate realities of novels. I would grow frustrated with myself
for focusing on work and school without a clear picture of why I was
doing these things and why they were important. I lived a lot of my
life on auto pilot, ignoring all the details that now sparkle at me
like twinkling stars on a cloudless night.
My Friday began
exactly where my Thursday ended; cuddled up in bed dreaming of the
snake my 4th grade classroom kept as a pet. Her name was mini-mac and
in my dream the whole class had been searching for her until my
science teacher found her curled around a broom in the corner of the
classroom. Just as he reached out to untangle her coils from the
handle my alarm went off. “I met you before the fall of Rome. And I
begged you to let me take you home. You were wrong, I was right You
said goodbye, I said goodnight! It's all been done...” The Bare
Naked Ladies song “Its all been done” startles me from the 4th
grade classroom and back to my dorm room. Groaning slightly I get up
and start getting ready for the day.
“It's all been done”
still stuck in my head I find myself singing along before realizing
what I am doing. Smiling, I remember something I once heard; That
there is only one reason for being on Earth and
that is to sing. Letting my mind wander I go back to the snake in my
dream which so resembles the Aesculapius. I never feared snakes as a
child regardless of the bad rap they got in my bible study class. I
was always fascinated to watch mini-mac shed her skin because it
seemed that she left another version of herself behind. It was no
surprise to me to find out that in the story of Gilgamesh snakes are
believed to be immortal. They leave their dead body behind and just
slither away.
Later
on that day while walking to my Education class I pass by a woman who
was obviously pregnant. Her belly, just beginning to become round,
shows evidence of her child. She reminds me suddenly of story of
Bacchus's dual births, first from the mortal woman Semele, and second
from the thigh of Zeus himself. I try to imagine for a moment what
Zeus must have looked like with a baby belly stuck on his thigh. The
image is odd for me until I remember how Zeus had impregnated Leda in
the form of a swan and produced two eggs. I imagine the look of
surprise that would occur on this poor woman's face if she were to
birth egg, even if the most beautiful girl in the world were to hatch
from it.
Class
that day brought about a discussion on the common core standards for
education in Montana and standardized testing. I have never been a
fan of standardized testing and find it frustrating that funding for
schools is liked to success on these tests. Education isn't about the
information that must be know to pass these tests; education is about
transformation. The point is not to fill your heads with facts but to
be changed (as Professor Sexson puts it) in the “twinkling of an
eye.” As I listen to the heated debate now brewing I consider my
choice to be a teacher. I love English and specifically all of the
stories that make up the subject in school, but many of my peers look
down on my choice. They say that there isn't a point to having a high
school English teacher because by that grade level the students know
how to read and write and there isn't anything left to teach. What my
peers don't realize is that I won't be trying to teach them anything;
I just want to help them remember all of the things they already
know. Just like Plato's story of how humanity lost its wings and and
fell to the much and mud of Earth, I and my future students have
forgotten the very things that will let us fly.
Classes
end for the day and I head home, walking around the oval being torn
up for the construction of Suite 3 behind North Hedges. The grass is
torn up, the dirt exposed, and to the far side the mound of earth
lies three trees uprooted. My heart sinks for a moment as I remember
sitting underneath one of them in the shade last year with my
boyfriend Phil talking about nothing and enjoying spring. Now it lies
dead and the transformation of Daphne, undergone to avoid Apollo, is
in vain.
After
finishing the pile of chemistry homework on my desk, I decide to bake
a batch of chocolate chip cookies. While mixing together the flour
and brown sugar I remember Ceres the goddess of grain and other home
related things. Though not as dramatic of a goddess as many others,
her favor was of great importance for growing crops that produced the
flour I use to bake my cookies. Waiting for the cookies to bake, I
glance up at the fire panel on the wall. The panel reads “Cerberus
Productions;” an obvious reference to the three headed dog that
guards the underworld in mythologies. Yet another thing in my day
that reminds me of Ovid. The timer beeps and I take out the cookies
while imagining what it must be like to live in the underworld like
Persephone did.
*Knock.
Knock. Knock* Three times I hear the sound before I realize Phil is
knocking at the kitchen door. The sun is setting behind him in the
glass door, like Apollos chariot ridding out of sight. I let him in
and we sit down for a couple warm cookies and a glass of cold milk
each. “How was your day?” he asks me.
I
smile and think about if for a second. I had dreamed, gotten up, went
to class, done homework, worked, ate, made a batch of cookies, and
these were all normal every day things but somehow my day was
anything but ordinary. I noticed the connections between my life and
the many stories about what has come before me. I saw the
mythologies, the true stories, that precede me. Though I still have
many clues left to discover my own mythological story before I end
this life and begin a new one, I have taken a step towards being a mythic detective.
Finally,
I answer him. “It was anything but ordinary.”
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Just for a laugh...
I'm not usually to post random jokes I found on the Internet anywhere let alone a class blog but I couldn't help but share this. For anyone who isn't as big of a Disney nerd as me this scene is from Hercules when Meg is singing "Won't say I'm in love." And yes I was slightly disappointed.
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Words- "Epic!" and "Myth"
Ever since listening to Fred Turner's presentation in class last week I've been hearing the word "epic" more often. Though I had heard friends and peers use "epic" to describe things that are "cool" or "awesome" I had never made the connection the epic poetry such as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. Now when I hear my peers using, or when I use the word "epic" I smile and remember Turner's presentation.
In my Multicultural Education class I just finished up a presentation on Native American Literature. I had to create lesson plans to be implemented in an 11th grade English class and naturally, after enjoying this class so much, I choose to discuss Native American Creation Myths. I looked at two creation myths from different tribes, the Yupik and the Blackfoot tribes. In my presentation I briefly explained the two myths and what I would do in the lesson. Afterwards I was given written feedback from my peers about my presentation and I was sad to find that someone was severally insulted that I used the word "myth" to describe the creation stories from the Native American tribes. They said that I should not have used the word "myth" because to their culture these stories are what they believe in and see as true. Though initially I was upset that I was perceived as being culturally insensitive in a lesson designed specifically to be culturally sensitive, I realized this shouldn't be an issue. Over an over we have discussed that myths are the president to every action. They are going back to the origins, the beginning, and this is exactly what I was trying to teach my potential students. I wasn't insulting Native American Culture by calling their stories "myth;" I easily could have called the biblical creation story a "myth." I wish whichever of my peers wrote that feedback would take Professor Sexson's Mythologies class and see that the word "myth" has more to it than most people see.
For anyone interested this is a video for part of the Yupik creation my preformed in the oral tradition style by Jack Dalton.
Also click on the picture for a link to the Blackfoot creation story if your interested.
In my Multicultural Education class I just finished up a presentation on Native American Literature. I had to create lesson plans to be implemented in an 11th grade English class and naturally, after enjoying this class so much, I choose to discuss Native American Creation Myths. I looked at two creation myths from different tribes, the Yupik and the Blackfoot tribes. In my presentation I briefly explained the two myths and what I would do in the lesson. Afterwards I was given written feedback from my peers about my presentation and I was sad to find that someone was severally insulted that I used the word "myth" to describe the creation stories from the Native American tribes. They said that I should not have used the word "myth" because to their culture these stories are what they believe in and see as true. Though initially I was upset that I was perceived as being culturally insensitive in a lesson designed specifically to be culturally sensitive, I realized this shouldn't be an issue. Over an over we have discussed that myths are the president to every action. They are going back to the origins, the beginning, and this is exactly what I was trying to teach my potential students. I wasn't insulting Native American Culture by calling their stories "myth;" I easily could have called the biblical creation story a "myth." I wish whichever of my peers wrote that feedback would take Professor Sexson's Mythologies class and see that the word "myth" has more to it than most people see.
For anyone interested this is a video for part of the Yupik creation my preformed in the oral tradition style by Jack Dalton.
Also click on the picture for a link to the Blackfoot creation story if your interested.
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Frederick Turner
Spring Evening
By Frederick Turner
Above the baby-powder clouds
The sky is china blue.
Soon, young and chattering, the crowds
Of stars come pushing through.
And this is the first dispensation,
The setting up of the odds;
This is the eve of creation,
This is the time of the gods.
I had only ever been to one poetry reading before the evening with Frederick Turner so I come in unsure what to expect. The reading I went to before was an awards ceremony of local writers who each got up and read the poem that won them an award and that was it. I enjoyed Turner's poetry a lot more than I did the most of "award winning" poems at the previous poetry event I had attended.
Class last Friday was even better than the mesmerizing spoken poetry. I had never thought about the connection between the gaining of knowledge and a woman's pain in childbirth. I was also interested by the idea that death is intimately connected with knowledge, and that knowledge of death is one of the deepest kinds of knowledge. Overall I wish Turner would have had more time to speak with us.
Oh and apparently Epic hates incest.
Monday, April 8, 2013
Opps! No sex changes!
So in class I mentioned that Hyena's do in fact change gender. Apparently I was wrong on that. I went home and did some research on the subject and that is in fact a myth (yes the use of that word was supposed to be ironic).
The female hyena is very often confused with the male hyena which is what started the idea that they change sex. If you want to read more about this I found a website that I linked below for everyone to read.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/hyena.html
It explains the similarities in about the 9th paragraph down.
Sorry about the misinformation!!
Trees for Phil
It's all about trees.
Though we talked about this a lot earlier in the class I still can't help but notice when trees pop up in my everyday life. This Sunday was my boyfriend's (or significant otter as Dr. Sexson puts it) 20th birthday. At a loss as to what to buy a college age Physics major I recalled how the two of us spent several days working in his back yard in Colorado planting a rose garden together. He enjoys landscaping and gardening so the project was fun despite the hours moving dirt, pulling weeds, and building a retaining wall. I remember a conversation we had while we were planting the roses about how much work his family had put in to their backyard (which by the way is beautiful landscaped). As a bit of a hick from the middle of the woods in Alaska I never realized how much effort people in the lower 48 put in to their yards and how expensive the whole process was. When his family moved in there was nothing but a dirt lot behind the house and since then they have planted numerous trees, bushes, and flower gardens. I was surprised to find out that if they had had this done professionally it would have cost over $100,000. Even doing the work themselves the trees cost a ridiculous amount of money (in my mind) because they grow so slowly. In this memory I found the perfect gift.I decided to buy him a tree, not a full sized tree mind you, but a small one that he can keep it in a pot in his apartment through college. This way by the time he is old enough to buy a house and settle down the tree will be big enough to plant in the ground. This way instead of spending a ton of money on a mature tree he will already have one started. I let him help choose which kind and we decided on a walnut tree. I suggested a Laurel in honor of Daphne but found out they won't grow very well where he has interest in living.
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