Author: Robert Alan Segal
Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Press
ISBN: 9781558491915
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
For two hundred years the subject of myth -- its origin, function, and significance -- has been addressed again and again, first by theologians and philosophers and then by anthropologists, sociologists, and psychologists. From the outset the topic has sparked intense debate, with differing opinions expressed on everything from issues of epistemology and methodology to the meaning of "myth" itself. In this collection of essays, Robert A. Segal surveys the contours of this ongoing discussion, comparing and evaluating the leading theories of myth. Among the theorists discussed are Edward Tylor, William Robertson Smith, James Frazer, Jane Harrison, S. H. Hooke, Mircea Eliade, Rudolf Bultmann, Hans Jonas, Sigmund Freud, C. G. Jung, Joseph Campbell, Claude Levi-Strauss, and Hans Blumenberg. Author and editor of numerous books and articles in the fields of theories of myth and theories of religion, Segal has developed a reputation as a preeminent proponent of a social-scientific approach to the study of both. The essays in this book represent some of the best of his writing on myth over the past ten years."
Theorizing about Myth
Author: Robert Alan Segal
Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Press
ISBN: 9781558491915
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
For two hundred years the subject of myth -- its origin, function, and significance -- has been addressed again and again, first by theologians and philosophers and then by anthropologists, sociologists, and psychologists. From the outset the topic has sparked intense debate, with differing opinions expressed on everything from issues of epistemology and methodology to the meaning of "myth" itself. In this collection of essays, Robert A. Segal surveys the contours of this ongoing discussion, comparing and evaluating the leading theories of myth. Among the theorists discussed are Edward Tylor, William Robertson Smith, James Frazer, Jane Harrison, S. H. Hooke, Mircea Eliade, Rudolf Bultmann, Hans Jonas, Sigmund Freud, C. G. Jung, Joseph Campbell, Claude Levi-Strauss, and Hans Blumenberg. Author and editor of numerous books and articles in the fields of theories of myth and theories of religion, Segal has developed a reputation as a preeminent proponent of a social-scientific approach to the study of both. The essays in this book represent some of the best of his writing on myth over the past ten years."
Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Press
ISBN: 9781558491915
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
For two hundred years the subject of myth -- its origin, function, and significance -- has been addressed again and again, first by theologians and philosophers and then by anthropologists, sociologists, and psychologists. From the outset the topic has sparked intense debate, with differing opinions expressed on everything from issues of epistemology and methodology to the meaning of "myth" itself. In this collection of essays, Robert A. Segal surveys the contours of this ongoing discussion, comparing and evaluating the leading theories of myth. Among the theorists discussed are Edward Tylor, William Robertson Smith, James Frazer, Jane Harrison, S. H. Hooke, Mircea Eliade, Rudolf Bultmann, Hans Jonas, Sigmund Freud, C. G. Jung, Joseph Campbell, Claude Levi-Strauss, and Hans Blumenberg. Author and editor of numerous books and articles in the fields of theories of myth and theories of religion, Segal has developed a reputation as a preeminent proponent of a social-scientific approach to the study of both. The essays in this book represent some of the best of his writing on myth over the past ten years."
Theorizing Myth
Author: Bruce Lincoln
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226482022
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 315
Book Description
In Theorizing Myth, Bruce Lincoln traces the way scholars and others have used the category of "myth" to fetishize or deride certain kinds of stories, usually those told by others. He begins by showing that mythos yielded to logos not as part of a (mythic) "Greek miracle," but as part of struggles over political, linguistic, and epistemological authority occasioned by expanded use of writing and the practice of Athenian democracy. Lincoln then turns his attention to the period when myth was recuperated as a privileged type of narrative, a process he locates in the political and cultural ferment of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Here, he connects renewed enthusiasm for myth to the nexus of Romanticism, nationalism, and Aryan triumphalism, particularly the quest for a language and set of stories on which nation-states could be founded. In the final section of this wide-ranging book, Lincoln advocates a fresh approach to the study of myth, providing varied case studies to support his view of myth—and scholarship on myth—as ideology in narrative form.
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226482022
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 315
Book Description
In Theorizing Myth, Bruce Lincoln traces the way scholars and others have used the category of "myth" to fetishize or deride certain kinds of stories, usually those told by others. He begins by showing that mythos yielded to logos not as part of a (mythic) "Greek miracle," but as part of struggles over political, linguistic, and epistemological authority occasioned by expanded use of writing and the practice of Athenian democracy. Lincoln then turns his attention to the period when myth was recuperated as a privileged type of narrative, a process he locates in the political and cultural ferment of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Here, he connects renewed enthusiasm for myth to the nexus of Romanticism, nationalism, and Aryan triumphalism, particularly the quest for a language and set of stories on which nation-states could be founded. In the final section of this wide-ranging book, Lincoln advocates a fresh approach to the study of myth, providing varied case studies to support his view of myth—and scholarship on myth—as ideology in narrative form.
Explaining, Interpreting, and Theorizing Religion and Myth
Author: Nickolas P. Roubekas
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004435026
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 405
Book Description
In Explaining, Interpreting, and Theorizing Religion and Myth: Contributions in Honor of Robert A. Segal, nineteen renowned scholars offer a collection of essays addressing the persisting question of how to approach religion and myth as academic categories. Taking their cue from the work of Robert A. Segal, they discuss how to theorize about religion and myth from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. With cases from ancient Greece and Mesopotamia to East Asia and the modern world by and large, and engaging with diverse disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, anthropology, history, film, theology, and religious studies among others, the volume establishes a synthesis that demonstrates the pervasiveness as well as the pitfalls of the categories “religion” and “myth” in the world. Contributors are: Douglas Allen, Fiona Bowie, Dexter E. Callender, Jr., Laura Feldt, José Manuel Losada, William Hansen, Raya A. Jones, Roderick Main, Jon Mills, Henry Munson, Angus Nicholls, Daniel L. Pals, Lukas Pokorny, Bryan S. Rennie, Ivan Strenski, Steven F. Walker, Eric Ziolkowski, Nickolas P. Roubekas, Thomas Ryba.
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004435026
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 405
Book Description
In Explaining, Interpreting, and Theorizing Religion and Myth: Contributions in Honor of Robert A. Segal, nineteen renowned scholars offer a collection of essays addressing the persisting question of how to approach religion and myth as academic categories. Taking their cue from the work of Robert A. Segal, they discuss how to theorize about religion and myth from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. With cases from ancient Greece and Mesopotamia to East Asia and the modern world by and large, and engaging with diverse disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, anthropology, history, film, theology, and religious studies among others, the volume establishes a synthesis that demonstrates the pervasiveness as well as the pitfalls of the categories “religion” and “myth” in the world. Contributors are: Douglas Allen, Fiona Bowie, Dexter E. Callender, Jr., Laura Feldt, José Manuel Losada, William Hansen, Raya A. Jones, Roderick Main, Jon Mills, Henry Munson, Angus Nicholls, Daniel L. Pals, Lukas Pokorny, Bryan S. Rennie, Ivan Strenski, Steven F. Walker, Eric Ziolkowski, Nickolas P. Roubekas, Thomas Ryba.
Myth
Author: Robert Alan Segal
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0198724705
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 161
Book Description
This Very Short Introduction explores different approaches to myth from several disciplines, including science, religion, philosophy, literature, and psychology. In this new edition, Robert Segal considers both the future study of myth as well as the impact of areas such as cognitive science and the latest approaches to narrative theory.
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0198724705
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 161
Book Description
This Very Short Introduction explores different approaches to myth from several disciplines, including science, religion, philosophy, literature, and psychology. In this new edition, Robert Segal considers both the future study of myth as well as the impact of areas such as cognitive science and the latest approaches to narrative theory.
Myth Analyzed
Author: Robert A. Segal
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000163261
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 316
Book Description
Comparing and evaluating modern theories of myth, this book offers an overview of explanations of myth from the social sciences and the humanities. This ambitious collection of essays uses the viewpoints of a variety of disciplines - psychology, anthropology, sociology, politics, philosophy, religious studies, and literature. Each discipline advocates a generalization about the origin, the function, and the subject matter of myth. The subject is always not what makes any myth distinct but what makes all myths "myth". The book is divided into five sections, covering topics such as myth and psychoanalysis, hero myths, myth and science, myth and politics, and myth and the physical world. Chapters engage with an array of theorists--among them, Freud, Jung, Campbell, Rank, Winnicott, Tylor, Frazer, Malinowski, Levy-Bruhl, Levi-Strauss, Harrison, and Burkert. The book considers whether myth still plays a role in our lives is one of the issues considered, showing that myths arise anything but spontaneously. They are the result of a specific need, which varies from theory to theory. This is a fascinating survey by a leading voice in the study of myth. As such, it will be of much interest to scholars of myth and how it interacts with Sociology, Anthropology, Politics and Economics.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000163261
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 316
Book Description
Comparing and evaluating modern theories of myth, this book offers an overview of explanations of myth from the social sciences and the humanities. This ambitious collection of essays uses the viewpoints of a variety of disciplines - psychology, anthropology, sociology, politics, philosophy, religious studies, and literature. Each discipline advocates a generalization about the origin, the function, and the subject matter of myth. The subject is always not what makes any myth distinct but what makes all myths "myth". The book is divided into five sections, covering topics such as myth and psychoanalysis, hero myths, myth and science, myth and politics, and myth and the physical world. Chapters engage with an array of theorists--among them, Freud, Jung, Campbell, Rank, Winnicott, Tylor, Frazer, Malinowski, Levy-Bruhl, Levi-Strauss, Harrison, and Burkert. The book considers whether myth still plays a role in our lives is one of the issues considered, showing that myths arise anything but spontaneously. They are the result of a specific need, which varies from theory to theory. This is a fascinating survey by a leading voice in the study of myth. As such, it will be of much interest to scholars of myth and how it interacts with Sociology, Anthropology, Politics and Economics.
Aryans, Jews, Brahmins
Author: Dorothy M. Figueira
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791487830
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 218
Book Description
In Aryans, Jews, Brahmins, Dorothy M. Figueira provides a fascinating account of the construction of the Aryan myth and its uses in both India and Europe from the Enlightenment to the twentieth century. The myth concerns a race that inhabits a utopian past and gives rise first to Brahmin Indian culture and then to European culture. In India, notions of the Aryan were used to develop a national identity under colonialism, one that allowed Indian elites to identify with their British rulers. It also allowed non-elites to set up a counter identity critical of their position in the caste system. In Europe, the Aryan myth provided certain thinkers with an origin story that could compete with the Biblical one and could be used to diminish the importance of the West's Jewish heritage. European racial hygienists made much of the myth of a pure Aryan race, and the Nazis later looked at India as a cautionary tale of what could happen if a nation did not remain "pure." As Figueira demonstrates, the history of the Aryan myth is also a history of reading, interpretation, and imaginative construction. Initially, the ideology of the Aryan was imposed upon absent or false texts. Over time, it involved strategies of constructing, evoking, or distorting the canon. Each construction of racial identity was concerned with key issues of reading: canonicity, textual accessibility, interpretive strategies of reading, and ideal readers. The book's cross-cultural investigation demonstrates how identities can be and are created from texts and illuminates an engrossing, often disturbing history that arose from these creations.
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791487830
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 218
Book Description
In Aryans, Jews, Brahmins, Dorothy M. Figueira provides a fascinating account of the construction of the Aryan myth and its uses in both India and Europe from the Enlightenment to the twentieth century. The myth concerns a race that inhabits a utopian past and gives rise first to Brahmin Indian culture and then to European culture. In India, notions of the Aryan were used to develop a national identity under colonialism, one that allowed Indian elites to identify with their British rulers. It also allowed non-elites to set up a counter identity critical of their position in the caste system. In Europe, the Aryan myth provided certain thinkers with an origin story that could compete with the Biblical one and could be used to diminish the importance of the West's Jewish heritage. European racial hygienists made much of the myth of a pure Aryan race, and the Nazis later looked at India as a cautionary tale of what could happen if a nation did not remain "pure." As Figueira demonstrates, the history of the Aryan myth is also a history of reading, interpretation, and imaginative construction. Initially, the ideology of the Aryan was imposed upon absent or false texts. Over time, it involved strategies of constructing, evoking, or distorting the canon. Each construction of racial identity was concerned with key issues of reading: canonicity, textual accessibility, interpretive strategies of reading, and ideal readers. The book's cross-cultural investigation demonstrates how identities can be and are created from texts and illuminates an engrossing, often disturbing history that arose from these creations.
Hero Myths
Author: Robert A. Segal
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
ISBN: 9780631215158
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 232
Book Description
Hero Myths: A Reader provides a selection of 25 stories about heroes from around the world.
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
ISBN: 9780631215158
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 232
Book Description
Hero Myths: A Reader provides a selection of 25 stories about heroes from around the world.
Jung on Mythology
Author: C. G. Jung
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691214018
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 289
Book Description
At least three major questions can be asked of myth: what is its subject matter? what is its origin? and what is its function? Theories of myth may differ on the answers they give to any of these questions, but more basically they may also differ on which of the questions they ask. C. G. Jung's theory is one of the few that purports to answer fully all three questions. This volume collects and organizes the key passages on myth by Jung himself and by some of the most prominent Jungian writers after him: Erich Neumann, Marie-Louise von Franz, and James Hillman. The book synthesizes the discovery of myth as a way of thinking, where it becomes a therapeutic tool providing an entrance to the unconscious. In the first selections, Jung begins to differentiate his theory from Freud's by asserting that there are fantasies and dreams of an "impersonal" nature that cannot be reduced to experiences in a person's past. Jung then asserts that the similarities among myths are the result of the projection of the collective rather than the personal unconscious onto the external world. Finally, he comes to the conclusion that myth originates and functions to satisfy the psychological need for contact with the unconscious--not merely to announce the existence of the unconscious, but to let us experience it.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691214018
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 289
Book Description
At least three major questions can be asked of myth: what is its subject matter? what is its origin? and what is its function? Theories of myth may differ on the answers they give to any of these questions, but more basically they may also differ on which of the questions they ask. C. G. Jung's theory is one of the few that purports to answer fully all three questions. This volume collects and organizes the key passages on myth by Jung himself and by some of the most prominent Jungian writers after him: Erich Neumann, Marie-Louise von Franz, and James Hillman. The book synthesizes the discovery of myth as a way of thinking, where it becomes a therapeutic tool providing an entrance to the unconscious. In the first selections, Jung begins to differentiate his theory from Freud's by asserting that there are fantasies and dreams of an "impersonal" nature that cannot be reduced to experiences in a person's past. Jung then asserts that the similarities among myths are the result of the projection of the collective rather than the personal unconscious onto the external world. Finally, he comes to the conclusion that myth originates and functions to satisfy the psychological need for contact with the unconscious--not merely to announce the existence of the unconscious, but to let us experience it.
Theorizing Old Norse Myth
Author: Stefan Brink
Publisher: Brepols Publishers
ISBN: 9782503553030
Category : Mythology
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
This collection explores the theoretical and methodological foundations through which we understand Old Norse myths and the mythological world, and the medieval sources in which we find expressions of these. Some contributions take a broad, comparative perspective; some address specific details of Old Norse myths and mythology; and some devote their attention to questions concerning either individual gods and deities, or more topographical and spatial matters (such as conceptions of pagan cult sites). The elements discussed provide an introductory and general overview of scholarly enquiry into myth and ritual, as well as an attempt to define myth and theory for Old Norse scholarship. The articles also offer a rehabilitation of the comparative method alongside a discussion of the concept of 'cultural memory' and of the cognitive functions that myths may have performed in early Scandinavian society. Particular subjects of interest include analyses of the enigmatic god Heimdallr, the more well-known Oðinn, the deities, the female asynjur, and the 'elves' or alfar. Text-based discussions are set alongside recent archaeological discoveries of cult buildings and cult sites in Scandinavia, together with a discussion of the most enigmatic site of all: Uppsala in Sweden. The key themes discussed throughout this volume are brought together in the concluding chapter, in a comprehensive summary that sheds new light on current scholarly perspectives.
Publisher: Brepols Publishers
ISBN: 9782503553030
Category : Mythology
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
This collection explores the theoretical and methodological foundations through which we understand Old Norse myths and the mythological world, and the medieval sources in which we find expressions of these. Some contributions take a broad, comparative perspective; some address specific details of Old Norse myths and mythology; and some devote their attention to questions concerning either individual gods and deities, or more topographical and spatial matters (such as conceptions of pagan cult sites). The elements discussed provide an introductory and general overview of scholarly enquiry into myth and ritual, as well as an attempt to define myth and theory for Old Norse scholarship. The articles also offer a rehabilitation of the comparative method alongside a discussion of the concept of 'cultural memory' and of the cognitive functions that myths may have performed in early Scandinavian society. Particular subjects of interest include analyses of the enigmatic god Heimdallr, the more well-known Oðinn, the deities, the female asynjur, and the 'elves' or alfar. Text-based discussions are set alongside recent archaeological discoveries of cult buildings and cult sites in Scandinavia, together with a discussion of the most enigmatic site of all: Uppsala in Sweden. The key themes discussed throughout this volume are brought together in the concluding chapter, in a comprehensive summary that sheds new light on current scholarly perspectives.
Theorizing about Myth
Author: Robert Alan Segal
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 200
Book Description
A collection of essays analyzing the leading theories of myth. It surveys the contours of this ongoing discussion, comparing and evaluating the theories of Edward Tylor, William Robertson Smith, James Frazer, Jane Harrison, Sigmund Freud, C.G. Jung, and others.
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 200
Book Description
A collection of essays analyzing the leading theories of myth. It surveys the contours of this ongoing discussion, comparing and evaluating the theories of Edward Tylor, William Robertson Smith, James Frazer, Jane Harrison, Sigmund Freud, C.G. Jung, and others.