goals

Independent project - My goal is to read my book over the winter break and blog about it. I am hoping to get at least 5 more posts by the end of the two weeks. I am also hoping to make my blog more visually pleasing. I will try to add more pictures to my posts.

Group game board project - We are hoping to get the board game built, but not finished, by mid-febuary. I think we are going to try to get the color and designs on it by the end of Febuary.

Group school problem project - I will work on my speaking skills and try not to ramble on about things.

The need for creation myths

In my studies I have found that the myths that all cultures have are the creation myths. The creation myths are the cultures explaination of how the world first came to be. They usually involve a higher being than a human who started the creations. It also generally starts of talking about birth. Birth is explained to be the start of new life. Even though they start off talking about the creation of our world, the theories are all different. Some believe that the earth started of as just water, then the earth appeared later. Others believe that it started off above or below where we are now. (for a better explaination go to www.dept.cs.edu)

The differences in the creation myths of how the world came to be are believed to be based off of geography. which makes sense because a place that has many lakes and rivers around it would naturally think 'well maybe the water came first' or a place that has alot of open space where you can see the sky for miles would naturally think that the earth originated above them.

The similarity of thinking a greater being started the creation of Earth, is also understandable. As humans i think we all learn that no one can do something as amazing as building the Earth. (well some people in this world think they might be able to, but that's a different story) So I think it would be natural to think someone greater than human is responsible.

The fact that we do have creation myths at all says things about humanity. Humans are naturally curious about things. They like having knowlledge. Knowing where we come from or how we started is just a natural need for humans. Why do you think your children ask the dreadful question of where do babies come from? From a small age we develope a curiousity for the unknown. Mythology is a way to express their theories of how the world came to be

Theseus in english myth studies

In my english class we are also stuying mythology. I was specifically researching Theseus.  Theseus is a greek myth hero, who defeated the beast minotaur, a beast with the head of a bull and the body of a human. He also defeated many other villians with grusome means of killing his victims. My favorite villian is one he met on his travel to Athens to find his father, king Aegeus. The villan sinis, also called the pine bender, tied his victims to two pine tree and pulled the pine trees down so that the victim wouldn't stretch to much yet. Then he would let the pine trees go ripping his victims in half.

However, Theseus is still most commonly known for defeating the minotaur. During my research on the minotaur I stumbled upon some information and I wanted to share it with you. On a website I was on, suite101.com, it provided me some symbolism. It talks about how the bull is the head and not the human because it is a symbol for how humans sometimes give into their instincts, which can cloud reason and discerning. This got me thinking of other myths that i have read. There are other myths that have the main character mess up or do something wrong that resut in consiquences. I believe mythology is a way of sharing virtues and values to others. Even though every country has a different set of values, no one appreciates lying and betrayal, which shows up alot in mythology. Mythology can be similar in all countries because mythology is a way of sharing to others what good virtues are supposed to look like.

myth and diversity

In my school I saw a presentation on diversity. The presentation was very enritching. There was a pannelle of  people who grew up with hard times because of there culture. They shared there experiences and stories. Each and everyone was different and unique. However, every single person had something in common with the person next to them. Understanding, emotion, a need to be themselves, a need to not be judged. This is like mythology. Each and every story has there own twist because of the culture they originated from, but even though the cultures are different they still have similarities as well. People from different countries grow up telling there children horror stories that can end up being myths. for example the lochness monster. It was labled a myth because it has not been proven incorrect or correct. They still tell the story in there culture to scare people. every culture has something different they use to scare. different fears for different people. Yet we are all connected by that fear. though it is a fear of different things, the feeling of fear is no different.

dreams and myth part 2

when you dream you are thinking of your inner most fears and your inner most desires. For example when you have a boyfriend/girlfriend and you dream of them breaking up with you, it's because you are scared of losing him/her. Or if you dream of a pony you might want a pony. <-- that was a joke. But seriously, your dreams are filled with unconscious thoughts, things you might never think of when you are awake. Myth had to have started somewhere. that somewhere is from stories that probably turned into beliefs. When you come up with stories that is your unconscious side coming out. All humans can have hidden desires. alot of the time humans have common desires. humans have an unconcious need to have something to believe in, a reason why things are here. myths explain things like how the sun appears everyday, or why winter comes. so cultures all around the world came up with similar ideas because of those secret needs.

prolouge: myth and dream

I started reading the book "the hero with a thousand faces". What I got from the first part in the prolouge is that mythology can posibly be sub-conscious. Joseph Campbell started off talking about a dream an American youth had. Basically, the dream had to do with him accidently killing his dad, and his mom consoling him with kisses. Then Cambell countinued to talk about how a mother and child have a special psycollogically and also physical relationship. If you didn't know alot of myths deal with mothers having children with their son and fathers having children with their daughters. This could be a result of the special physical and pycollogical bond between child and parent. The portion of the book basically tells that humans have hidden desires or have dreams that make all humans think in generally similar ways. Their for the dreams/disires could be how all different cultures came up with similar ideas

outliers reflection

The book outliers talks about how it is easier for the chinese people to do math because of the Chinese characters. I am not Chinese, but I am good at math.  I don't think the characters have anything to do with it. If we work harder for it, we could be just as good as any other culture. Plus, as some of my classmates that know chinese Americans said, they still count in the American language. It might also have alot to do with the circumstances in our life. how hard our parents push us and what life style we were born in.

In the book it also talks about kipp school. The school isn't in a good neighborhood and there are alot of students in every classroom. Apperently, the best learning situation is a class with less kids. So, really kipp school was kind of a test. The kids were choosen by a lotery pick. They are in school by 7:30 and school ends at 5. they have alot of after school activities. they are all required to be in the orchestra, which is said to make you think better. So inspite of the situation, the kids are getting a good education. this is where I go against what I said earlier about situations influencing your abitlitiy. Even though the students weren't in the best environment, they all worked hard and got good grades. As a public school student, I feel like my school time is to short. We only get fifty minutes to learn a certain topic everyday, and only get 45 minutes of homework. I like the amount of homework, but I don't feel like I have enough time to get our questions out. There has been so many classes where my teachers were in the middle of explaining something, but then the bell rings. Then we have to waste more time the next day to finish explaining something we were supposed to finish the day before.

The ethnic theory of plane crashes is a chapter in the book that is explained greatly. The chapter starts off talking about a captian of a korean air fight. He died in a huge plane crash. There are only .27 per million departures that fail in american airlines. For korean air in 1988 to 1998 4.74 per million departures failed which is more then 17 times higher. The reason for this is because of cultural differences. the koreans where tought that telling the authorities that they did something wrong was disrespectful, so they didn't report problems. Americans weren't tought that way. When there is a problem they went to whoever was in charge and told them exactly what the problem was and that they wanted it fixed. This is interesting to me because i like knowing how different cultures do things differently.

new book chioce

Alright, I know that I haven't written lately. I apologize for that. I came to realize that reading an encyclopidia is very dry, and very boring. I couldn't get interested in it enough to continue reading it and continue researching. So I decided to change my book! My critical thinking teacher, Mr. Leathum, reccommended the book the hero with a thousand faces. I think this book will give me more information on why all kinds of cultures from around the world came up with similar theories of gods and our world. Plus, I'm sure it will be alot more interesting than the encyclopidia!

what I know without to much research

Roman mythology is one of the more commonly known types of mythology. However, there are a few theories as to how it started. what I heard was there were two romans who went to Greece, and they were fascinated by the Greeks religion. They decided to learn everything about the theories. when they returned home, they told everyone they could bout the myths but added different names and a few twists.

Greek Mythology is the one, that I believe, is the most commonly known. What I know is that Zeus had many lovers. He went to the women in many forms man, or animal. Posiden is the god of the sea. Athena is the godess of war and wisdom. she came out of her fathers head and freed her siblings from his belly. Aphrodite os the godess of beauty. Persephanie was taken down to the underworld by Hades. Hades stole apolos golden charite and rode passed Persephanie and grabbed her. Hades fell in love with her and wanted her to stay with him forever. If she ate anything she would have to stay with him. Persephanie ate 4 seeds. So she had to stay with hades in the underworld for 4 months. the other few months she could visit her mother dimeter, the godess of the seasons. when persphanie is gone the green in the world dies, as dimeter mourns for her daughter. Apolo rides across the sky in his golden chairte which brings a new day.

Basically, mythology is an old religion that hasn't nessicarily been proven wrong, but no one believes in it anymore. its the older cultures beliefs of why things happen on earth.

mission statement

Dear readers,
                     My blog mission is to compare and contrast all the different types of mythology. Have you ever wondered how all the different types of mythology is similar but they come from all over the world. I would like to figure out how that happened. Also I want to figure out the significance of mythology.