Some of y'all know that, when I am not teaching, I like to take classes around the university. Usually I take classes in math and statistics. This year I decided to shake things up a bit: I'm taking a graduate seminar in comparative studies on the theory of mythology.
As the lone professor in these classes I take, I am used to knocking the top off the curve. Of course I have more practical experience in math and statistics than the students, and I only have the one class to worry about, so it usually isn't very hard to ace the homeworks and the exams. The mythology course is filled with (painfully young) MA and MFA students, most of whom are also teaching a few sections of English composition to keep biscuits on the table.
They're kicking my ass. These kids are wicked smart, and far better read than I could ever hope to be. They somehow manage to read the several 100 pages of assigned reading for each class, and also find helpful background material in history and philosophy to supplement class discussions. So far we've read (among other primary sources) Hesiod's Theogony and Works and Days, Snorri's Edda, Plato's Republic (thank Odin I had already read that one), and a selection of writings by Jacob Grimm and Johann Herder. These kids get it, at a level that I can only dimly sense. (I'm still having trouble distinguishing between myth and legend, despite my patient professor's attempts to explain it to me at least three times.)
This winter, when the graduate applications come through, I'm going to look for students who have taken higher-level English, as well as calculus and statistics. Now, please excuse me while I go try and digest some Solar Myth. I may need help later.
Friday, October 10, 2008
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22 comments:
What an interesting blog post! And it illustrates why you went into the field you did. But aren't you glad you're in a more off-field class, pushing your own limits? That's so cool!
I'm very jealous of you right now. I'd love to take a class just for fun, instead of that awful thing known as "professional development." Blech. Not much call for pottery or nalbinding in accounting.
Did the ability to continue your education indefinitely and in arbitrary directions affect your decision to become a professor? Because it's pretty intriguing from my perspective.
Hmmm...I have a Master's degree in Folklore, so I can help you with one basic idea:
In general, although with much scholarly debate, the difference between myth and legend tends to be the following:
Myths tend to take place outside of time/history and involve gods & goddesses (or similar). An example would be The Flood 9In most of its various cultural manifestations) or the Creation of the universe.
Legends, on the other hand, are usually distinctly historical. While the exact time may be inscrutable, it's well-established being within human history, involving human beings, and within the scope of memory.
These definitions were formulated by William Bascom in an article titled "The Forms of Folklore: Prose Narratives." They are Western-centric and thus hotly contested in world mythology circles.
But they function quite well for a starting point.
I found this excellent summary online for you:
http://faculty.gvsu.edu/websterm/MythFAQs.htm
Good luck with the rest of the course!
Oh, and good luck finding students who do both calculus and mythology. We're a rather rare breed. ;-)
AP,
Misstea hits it right on the head. I am so green with envy right now. The last "class" I took was a 4-hour presentation on how to interpret the results of the employee satisfaction survey for our company.
So very cool.
AP is one of the most intelligent women I know. I suspect she's actually whipping the little tykes in the ass.
I'm slightly biased but was not paid nor promised any form of immediate gratification for posting this comment.
-AB
I stand in admiration. You see, as one better-versed and more comfortable in the world of myth, legend, fantasy &c (I write children's oddments for fun - in anticipation of the "profit"), I have to admit, it would be entirely beyond my ability on ANY level to take a class in math or statistics. I am "numerically dyslexic" and believe the the Creator developed those cute little calculators as a personal gift for me. On the other hand, I am advanced in age enough to take anything offered here at UW...for FREE! I mean to peruse the Spring Timetables, believe you me. (PS Isn't the Edda amazing?)
Yeah - there's a reason they want high level English and high level math on the GRE: each brings its own kind of sharpness.
I tend to only take studio art classes at the university and they're hard - but what I *want* to take is math, Econ, and computer science.
I wanted to do some math again, but I can't get my kids to school early enough. Good for you and good luck with the myth!
These kids are wicked smart, and far better read than I could ever hope to be. They somehow manage to read the several 100 pages of assigned reading for each class, and also find helpful background material in history and philosophy to supplement class discussions.
Welcome to the life of the humanities graduate student, AP. Hope you love it.
It may not help much, but as an avid scholar of religion and mythology, a legend points to important underlying ideas of society and social norms; mythology refers to deeper cosmic Truths, often couched in human terms.
Though your professor might disagree.
Which is why learning this stuff is so much fun.
Keep in mind, too, they have the same advantage you have when you take stats classes. They *know* the background info and have been reading this kind of stuff for (probably) two years or more (as undergrads.)
Um, I've taken both. Is that really all that unusual? My dad made me take through Calc II or he wouldn't pay for college (he's an engineer and was horrified that I didn't want to be an engineer like him and my brother), so I did. My first fall at college was filled with calculus study groups and reading my Brit Lit I assignments and trying to decifer Old English. Fun times, fun times.
Legend and myth is often about archetypes and symbols, not so much the details (though, those are fun, too). Think big picture.
"Is that really all that unusual?"
To take graduate level courses in both is unusual.
Indeed, I'm jealous, too! Oh, if only I could take a class now and again.
Seriously, though, that reading list is making my brain hurt. WOW. Must be a good group!
Think of myths as stories about how the world began or where people came from. They don't involve real people - think Adam, Eve, and Zeus. Legends are stories that may or may not have happened about historical figures, who may or may not have actually existed. Think King Arthur or Paul Bunyan.
You are not an idiot. Reading the post tells me you a smart enought to know when you are in the presence of people who are smarter than you. That is the begining of wisdom.
Grad level stuff's unusual? Huh. That makes me sad somehow.
I have to disagree with the definitions of myth commenters are leaving here. I didn't understand what a myth was until I understood the concept "the myth of the American West"
I'm uberjealous because you can do Statistics. I seriously considered getting my masters in Soci, but I suck at that whole interpreting survey results and using whatever computer program it was I took a whole course to apply to society. I also enjoyed my Lit classes even when I didn't always get where the prof was coming from.
Know how to cut them,
know how to read them,
Know how to stain them,
know how to prove them,
Know how to evoke them,
know how to score them,
Know how to send them,
know how to send them?
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