Myths Align And Define?

How do the read myths on pages 411-423 align with our definition of Greek Mythology?  What characteristics really distinguish themselves as patterns that we note in other myths?  Reflect, comment, and critique. 

Jason vs. Perseus? Heroics?

Who is more heroic: Jason or Perseus? Please sight at least one example from our text and use the "heroic code" terminology to defend your claims.  Complete this response in class today.

Why Do We Love Those Greek Writers?

“Men seemed to have failed completely tocomprehend the power of Eros, for if they did comprehend it, they would have built to him the greatest altars and temples and offered the greatest sacrifices, whereas he is given none of these honors, although he should have them most of all…”


From Aristophanes’ Speech in the Symposium

Could you use any of the myths we read about love to critique or support this quotation? Please react, evaluate, challenge, or contemplate.  (Please complete this blog response by Tues. Feb. 16, 2010.)

Can You Trust Cupid? Love?

What is your reaction to the Cupid And Psyche myth's proclamation about "trust" within relationships?

Corn?

What are your observations about Demeter's myth, your stickie notes, and how this myth reveals her suffering and alignment with our definition of mythology?  Please reflect complete this blog entry by 1-19-10.

Metacognition? Or Just Thinking?

“We go about our daily lives understanding almost nothing of the world. We give little thought to the machinery that generates the sunlight that makes life possible, to the gravity that glues us to an Earth that would otherwise send us spinning off into space, or to the atoms of which we are made and on whose stability we fundamentally depend. Except for children (who don’t know enough not to ask the important questions), few of us spend much time wondering why nature is the way it is; where the cosmos came from, or whether it is always here; if time will one day flow backward and effects precede causes; or whether there are ultimate limits to what humans can know.”

-Carl Sagan from an introduction to A Brief History of Time By Stephen Hawking

After hearing and reading your peer's reactions during Thursday's class about the listed quotation, what new insight can you add to this quotation analysis? Please respond. (Blog Response Due By Thurs. 1-14-10 at 2:30p.m.)

Finally?

Final Exam: The Iliad Criticism
Reference the epic poem The Iliad and respond to the question below.
Wallace Gray writes that, “The Iliad is not about the Trojan War; that war lasted ten years and the central actions of the poem occupy only a few weeks. War brutalizes men and women, wounds their bodies and minds, enslaves and kills them. This is Homer's message as he focuses on one hero, Achilleus, to demonstrate wrath's destruction of self and others. Achilleus' moral journey in the Iliad brings him face to face with his own humanity, leading him to a startling and essentially unheroic act of generosity toward his enemy. When he gives Priam the dead and mutilated body of Hektor, ...”


Is Achilles a hero? Respond to this criticism by: (1) addressing his heroic qualities/ alignment with studied heroic elements; (2) addressing his unheroic qualities (think of the aspects of heroes we’ve studied in class); and (3) compare him SPECIFICALLY to one of the other heroes/heroines in The Iliad or another myth we have studied. Reaction? Thoughts? This makes me think…? Etc…?