Story Lab: Crash Course Myth Videos

These notes are from a playlist of Crash Course Myth videos on YouTube  

Video #1: What is a Myth?

• Slurpee of knowledge lol (combines different things--difficult subject)
• Myths are super old and have multiple versions (like I've seen in this class)
• I've written some new versions myself lol
• Myth can be read as a story, not so much about religious beliefs 
• "Stories that people have used in a variety of ways over time"
• Most don't have namable authors
• They used older stories, simply wrote them or told them in another way
• Hard to give it a good definition
• Myth usually means it's not true (story that is false-isn't made to be taken as an actual event or something that really happened)
• However, a lot of times, they are (or were) taken as fact or reality 
• People still question them
• Means "Story"
• "Myth is a story, but it's a special kind of story, that for the purposes of [Crash Course Myth] has two primary characteristics: significance and staying power" 
• Subject matter is important, how things came to be
• Staying power: survived centuries, has been used often over time
•  Persephone and Hades
• Why we have winter
• Explanatory power (origin story)
• Myth as primitive science  
• Creation Myths
• Pantheons 

Video #2: Theories of Myth

• How people think about myth
• Mythology: Study of myth 
• How are they studied?
• Greece
• Study of myth is super old, bro
• Plato: myth= lying
• Fantasy to explain things they didn't understand
• Euhemerism (myths has primitive explanations)
•  Renaissance 
• Used as art inspiration 
• 20th century: Combine with anthropology
• James Frasure 
• Myth is a direct expression of its subject matter
• Belief and morality (found in myth)
•  Myths are version of archetypes (many myths are similar, even though they are separated geographically) 
• Joseph Campbell: Mythology is ultimately and always the vehicle through which the individual finds a sense of identity and place in the world (monomyth)

Video #3: The Hero's Journey and the Monomyth 

• Hero's appear in almost every culture at every age
• What is a hero? 
• Dude centric 
• Events that are told about across cultures
• Hero ventures, challenges, changes, returns home
• Hero's tell us something about ourselves
• Develop and change as humans
• Universal to all humans? 
• Common structure (monomyth) 
• Most hero stories
• Part one: Separation
• Quests 
• The call to adventure 
• Refuses
• help with supernatural guide or other figure
• Crossing threshold
• Part 2: Trials and Victories of Initiation
•  Exciting part!
• Trials and events they have to travel through 
• Psychological struggles 
• women lol (trail or help)
• confrontation with father or monster 
• Enlightenment (hero becoming god--Rama)
• Object/Bon
• Part 3: Return 
• Back to society 
• Home and acceptance
• Do they like returning?
• Do they have to flee? 
• Crossing back into everyday
• Master of two worlds
• Back where they started (circular)  
• Tool for recognizing and comparing stories 
• Story of the 7 girls (queens)

Reflection: 

Most of these theories were familiar to me. I have seen a lot of these things by simply reading the various myths throughout the class. I've taken the myth class and the Indian epics class. I think it's interesting that the stories can have similar elements even though they are from different cultures and locations. Rama and Hercules remind me of each other. Even more modern stories follow these similar patterns. I wonder if some of it is because of how satisfying the form is. It checks off all the boxes. There's an exciting main character, exciting trails, and the nice feeling of growth and a "happily ever after vibe". Most readers seem to crave these elements, so maybe that can attest to why so many different stories follow a similar structure.  

Image Information:

The Dispute of Minerva and Neptune

Rene-Antoine Houasse 

Found on: Wikipedia