2006-7 Catalogue Description: “An introduction to the development of cultural studies and to the methodology of field research.”
Course Description:
This course surveys world mythology by concentrating on heroic literature, the epic in its oral tradition, and its relationship to types of myths such as foundation myths, creation myths, flood myths, and myths pertaining to geography and a philosophy of space. Emphasizing the myth of the folk and the lore of early societies, the course will draw from similarities among the great mythos of world cultures and the history of the development of hierarchies and civilizations as seen in myth as well as epic. Archetypal, parallel myths will be studied.
Educational Objectives:
By the end of the course, the student should be able to:
- Understand how myth and folk tales functions as spoken word, as history, as ancestor worship, as genres such as epic and modes such as tragedy and romance.
- Be able to relate geographical, environmental, political, and social realities to mythological themes
- Understand the relationship of governmental organizations to mythological themes.
- Trace the development of the nature of deity through mythological development, animism, and early maternal gods.
- Improve writing and analytic skills, particularly the skill of writing literary analyses in essay form, using the conventions of the university academic community.
- Demonstrate how to write cogent, extended literary analyses incorporating critical sources acquired through library research and documented correctly an adequately using the MLA style of documentation.
- Begin to understand, in part, the use of literary theory in dealing with mythological subject matter.
Reasonable Accommodations "UH-Downtown adheres to all applicable federal, state and local laws, regulations and guidelines with respect to providing reasonable accommodations for students with disabilities. Students with disabilities should register with Disabled Student Services and contact their instructors in a timely manner to arrange for appropriate accommodations."
Texts:
- Rosenberg, Donna, World Mythology: An Anthology of the Great Myths and Epics
1998, NTC Publishing. ISBN: 0-8442-5965-9
- Niane, D.T. Sundiata: A Story of Old Mali
- Bierlein, Parallel Myths
Cultural Studies Overview:
One of the ways that I hope that you think about folklore and myth has to do with Foucault’s episteme of an era. For Foucault, the episteme of an era is the relationship between discursive practices, patterns of discourse or forms of interaction and structures of knowledge, which are always intertwined with the organization of power. Episteme exits at the level of the culture, across domains of knowledge and forms of practice. Epistemic frames may represent a similarly tight linkage between practices and ways of knowing, but tat the level of the local cultures developed by individual communities of practice. Storytelling and ritualized story reenactment contribute significantly to a culture’s episteme.
Course Guidelines:
Reasonable Accommodation: UH-Downtown adheres to all applicable federal, state and local laws, regulations and guidelines with respect to providing reasonable accommodations for students with disabilities. Students with disabilities should register with Disabled Student Services and contact their instructor in a timely manner to arrange for appropriate accommodation.
Late Work: All assignments in this class must be submitted on time, even if you are absent. Late assignments are taken only at the discretion of the instructor and carry a minimum penalty of 10% of the grade to be deducted for each and every late assignment.
Individual Needs: I will make every effort to maximize my accessibility to you relating to assignments. I will be available before and after class when it is possible, during office hours, which will be posted on my door and on the internet. If I can, I will see you without an appointment.
Philosophy of the Course: In this course, we will approach mythology with many questions in mind, some of which are articulated in the educational objectives. We are, first and foremost, a learning community, a community of scholars, and as such we will approach world mythologies with a respect for other cultures, and an attitude which will maximize our learning experience as our first purpose.
Attendance and Participation: Mythology is a social, collaborative effort. The study of folklore and mythology require the same socially collaborative effort of the student. Therefore, your absence and tardiness will adversely effect the people with whom you are working and your own grade. This class is deliberately limited in enrollment so that the students can enjoy an upper-level experience close to the seminar model. Group activity will be a regular part of your class work. I take a very dim view of the student who does not participate to his or her best ability in this class and is absent or silent. If you must choose between being late and not coming at all, of course, come to my class late and I will attempt to prevent you from being embarrassed. We are not colonists admiring a primitive people for their purity; we are not even collectors catching something vulnerable; we are strangers in a strange land, invited quests admiring sometimes sacred texts that we have little understanding of. Thus, I ask that you approach these works with respect.
Grading Criteria:
- Appropriateness of response to the topic. If the essay does not address the topic, be it exam question or research paper topic, the grade is 0.
- Appropriate and strengths of proofs.
- Originality and usefulness of essay,
- Rhetorical strengths.
- Grammatical correctness
- Clarity and level of writing style
- Analytic and conceptual sophistication of work
- Adherence to the conventions of academic writing, including thesis, organizations, proofs conclusions.
- Use of correct documentation for secondary and primary sources.
Grades:
900 - 1000 = A = Excellent college-level work
800-899 =B = Good college-level work
700-799 = C = Adequate college-level work
650-699 = D = Poor college-level work
0-649 = F = Failure to do college-level work
Participation, including possible quizzes = 150 points
To be eligible to take a quiz, you must be in class at the time of the quiz, which is usually, but not always, at the beginning of class. Students, who arrive after or leave before I administer a quiz, will not be allowed to take the quiz. There will be no opportunities to make up missed quizzes. Quizzes are the instructor's deliberate attempt to reward those who read the assignment before class and then attend the entire class listening to the pearls of wisdom from one's own mouth, one's colleague's and occasionally even the instructor's. Quizzes are a wonderful way for a student struggling in this course to level the playing field a little, to help his or her cause, and to use determination and perseverance in pursuit of academic victories.
Midterm 200 points
The midterm examination will consist of short answer and short essay questions. Before the exam I will hand you a review sheet and study questions and offer you the opportunity to add and subtract from that guide. Essay responses should be organized clearly with a thesis, clear support for the answer in a variety of relevant, specific references to the reading, and demonstrations of your skills in critical reading, thinking, and analysis.
Annotated Bibliography - 50 points
The annotated bibliography is due 14 days before the research paper and gives an account of your work on that paper in terms of your sources. I will hand out a template, which will self-correct according to the MLA style as well as an example of an annotated bibliography.
The Long Paper - 200 points
An extended study, due towards the end of the semester, the ticket to entrance into the final examination, but due 10 days before the exam, this is a serious piece of scholarship for the course. Some areas of research entrance will be offered the first week of class.
Plagiarism:
"Mine honor is my life; both grow in one;
Take honor from me and my life is done."
King Richard II
You will fail this course if you plagiarize. Plagiarism is the unacknowledged use of ideas (whether paraphrased, summarized or quoted) by a writer who seeks to pass off those ideas as his or her original thought. If you fail to document or attribute a source of the idea, even if you restate another writer's ideas, you have plagiarized. A serious university offence, plagiarism may be punished by failure or expulsion. Students who plagiarize on the research paper will receive an F on the paper.
To avoid plagiarism, you must document your papers using the MLA citation format. We will not cover this format in class, since it was covered in English 1302, but if you do not know how to document you paper, I will be happy to teach you by taking you personally though the system. The library has a handout on MLA citations format and directions on citations are easily found on the web If you do not know how to use CD-ROM databases in the library or in the computer center, I would be happy to help you with those also I will provide you with a template that you can download that self-corrects your bibliography to MLA Bibliographical style.
Library Database Workshops
There will be at least three library database workshops. If you cannot use the library databases, sign up for one.
Oral Report: You don’t have to do an oral report in this class, but, if you want to get an A in this class, you do have to do an oral report. So if a B is just fine with you, then you can skip this assignment, but if you are truly academically ambitious, then I want evidence of it so your name will appear on the doted line in this syllabus and you will be telling me when and where the cameras will be on you.
Theatrical Review 50 points: All students must attend one play and do a theatrical review of that play. Find the accompanying handout on how to write a theatrical review as well as the free selections for this semester. If, for any reasonable reason, you cannot do one of the reviews please see me for the loan of my own private collection called “Movies on Mythology.” Fair warning: These can be films that only a myth prof. could love. You are probably better off at Macbeth or at the Alley for free.
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Foreword: Myth gives a sense of belonging, of being the children of someone of consequence in a culture of consequence, of superiority, or purpose, but in pre-literate societies it also organizes knowledge and distributes rights and responsibilities and reinforces laws and positive and negative behaviors.
SCHEDULE OF ASSIGNMENTS AND EVENTS:
WEEK I
Monday, August 25th. Prehistoric migrations, diasporas, Paleolithic Food Gathering Bands, The Hunter-Artist; Stone Age Women, Beginnings of Art and Religion: Myth and Agriculture, Crops And Flocks before the Good Shepherd. Myths of Sacred Gathering. Life in the Neolithic Village. Intro.Time-Line Handout.
Wednesday, August 27th. . The Literature of the Volk. Folktale and Germanic Philologists. Seth-Thompson Folk Motif Indices; Early European Anthropological studies of the folk; Claude Levi-Straus’s How Natives Think and other racist’s critical analyses. From Bierlein’s Parallel Myths What is myth?: How is myth related to time and history?; Explain Creation myths.; Discuss flood myths.; Discuss the sense of the sacred and its relationship to myth.; Discuss the role of love in myths.; Discuss myths with the journey to the underworld and the path of Death; The Apocalyptic Myths Babylonia: The Enuma elish: - Mesopotamia - Sumeria, World Mythology (WM) pp. 3-12. Bierlein book on reserve. Parallel Myths. . Read Berlein’s book.
WEEK II
Monday, September 1st. Sumer-Babylonian mythology, The Assyro-Babylonian web. Tuft’s University Perseus Project; Limited Search Engine. Myth and Law; Myth and War, Myth and Social Order - WM-pp. 12-21; Osiris, Isis and Horus; Myth, the Temple and Slave Cultures.
Sign up for Sunday afternoon Menil Museum Visit. Egypt
Student Report ___________________________________________________
Wednesday, h. Subject to Fits; Alley Theater 615 Texas Ave. at 6:15; Go to Burger King; Return by 7:15. for play.
Thursday, January 25th. Mythological Differences in Sumerian and Babylonian Myth; Sumerian and Assyrian Myth; Babylonian and Assyrian Myth.; Egyptian and Mesopotamian Myth. The Folk in Mesopotamian; The Folk in Egypt: “King; Pharaoh” Avoiding the disorder of the oligarchy.
WEEK III
Monday, September 6th. More Egypt: Osiris, Isis, and Horus: The Egyptian Holy Family; Egyptian Belief in the Underworld: The Egyptian Pantheon. Discuss Parallel stories: The Two Brothers – Seth and Osiris, Cain and Abel; Romulus and Remus. Hittite: Telepinu P. 22.
Second Meeting: Wednesday, September 8th. . Discuss the nature of deific pantheons; Heliotropic religion.
Summer/Babylonian epic; The Epic and Myth; WM26-57; Gilgamesh: The counterpart: Gods and man; god-man and animal-man; the Lion King.
Student Report _________________________________________________
Sunday, September 11th. . – Extra Credit: Not mandatory: Meet at Menil Collection at 1:00 pm. For tour of Menil and lecture on Myth and the Ancient World.
WEEK IV
First meeting: Monday, September 15th. - Persia - Esfandyar, the Prince Who Would Be King P.58WM
Student Report ______________________________________________
Second Meeting: Wednesday, September 17th. . - Hebrews and Persians, The Cult of Mithras; , The Iliad106-159.
Student Report ______________________________________________
WEEK V
First Meeting: Monday, September 22nd. Hercules as agrarian archaic hero. th. . Greek Myths of the Age of Hesiod, the Bronze Age. The Cult of the Hero. Creation Myths, The Creation of the Titans and the Gods, Ages of Man, Demeter and Percephone, Jason and he Golden Fleese, Medea WM 82- 247.; Love Goddeses (in the spirit of Valentines) and Venus and Adonis; Male Fertility Gods; Female Fertility Goddeses from Tiamet to Nut to Venus Genetrix.
Student Report _______________________________________________
Second Meeting: Wednesday, September 24th. . Creation Myths, The Creation of the Titans and the Gods, Ages of Man, Demeter and Percephone – The Holy Family with the Son’; The Holy Family with the Daughter; , Jason and he Golden Fleese, Medea WM 82- 247.
Student Report _____________________________________
WEEK VI
First Meeting: Monday, September 29th. Pyramus and Thisbe; The Aeneid WM Pp. 247- 289
How is myth related to the civic? Rome- The Aeneid; The Empire and Myth; The Cult of the Empire: Funerary Cults and Roman Women: The Loss of the Old Myths.
Student Report _____________________________________
Second Meeting: Wednesday, October 1st. India: The Creation, Death, and Rebirth of the Universe P. 291; The Ramayana . 296 – 323.
Student Report _____________________________________
WEEK VII
Monday, October 6th. Midterm
Wednesday, October 8th. - Hitchcock Blonde at the Alley Theatre; 615 Texas Ave. at 6:15. If you are still going to these events, you know the drill by now;. China: The Creation of the Universe and Human Beings P. 324 WM; Chi Li Slays the Serpent P. 330 WM.
WEEK VIII
First meeting: Monday, October 13th. - Japan, Amateraser, WM 335; Katan WM 339.
Student Report _____________________________________
Second meeting: Wednesday, October 15th. . Hawaii: Taming of the Sun WM 360. Discuss myths with magic weapons. The Weaponization of objects in myth.
Student Report. ____________________________________
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WEEK IX.
First meeting: Monday, October 20th. . Ireland/Scotland The Ages of the World P. 360 WM.
Dagda the Good P. 378 WM>
Second meeting: Wednesday, October 22nd. – England/Scandinavia – Beowulf P. 381 WM.
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WEEK X
First meeting Monday, October 27th. - New Zealand Creation Myths WM351; After Egypt, Nubia, and Carthage WM507-566'
Student Report _______________________________________________
Second Meeting Wednesday, October 29th. h. Nigerian Creation MythWM509; Yoruba riddles ; African Research Paper Planning Sheet Due.(If you are going to turn it in, then now is the time.)
Student Report _____________________________________
Free workshop at UHD library in Computer Research and Library Data Bases. Meet your instructor in front of printer #4 at 6:00 pm.
WEEK XI
First meeting: Monday, November 3rd. t. Zaire: The Origin of Life and Fire(Boshongo/Bakuba) P. 515. WM – Africa
Student Report ______________________________
Second meeting: Wednesday, November 5th. . Ghana: Gassire: Lute (Soninke) P. 521. .; Bakaridjan Kone (Segu) P. 528 WM.; Diane’s Sundiata: Soccerer Kings: Carpenter Kings; King of Kings.
Student Report ______________________________________
Thursday Evening Literary and Database Workshop: Free workshop on Literary Research and Library Databaases: Meet your instructor at 6:00 pm. in front of printer #4.
WEEK XII
First Meeting: Monday, November 10th. . . British Isles: King Arthur: The once and future king. WM P. 418.
Student Report ______________________________________
Second Meeting: Wednesday, November 16th. . Northern Europe Creation of Balder; Theft of Thor's Hammer; Segurd. P. 475WM.
Student Report ___________________________________________
WEEK XIII
First Meeting: Monday, November 16th. . . The Death of Balder WM P. 467.
Student Report _________________________________
Second Meeting: Wednesday, November 18th. . - Research Paper Due: Myth to the Moon Question discussed
WEEK XIV
First meeting: Monday November 24th. Sigurd the Volsung P. 478. WM>
Student Report _________________________________
Wednesday, November 16th. . Assumptions and Conclusions on Myth
Homo Sapiens and Homo Sapiens Sapiens( A Leaky Theory)
Student Report _____________________________________
WEEK XV
Monday, December 1st. – student reports and choices
Wednesday, December 3rd. student reports and choices
December 6th. last day of class
December 8th and 9th reading days
December 10 – 19 Exams
Final Examination(See Schedule): Myth to the Moon question delivered at beginning of final examination only. |