During the past two months, I have been able to reflect deeply on what I have learned, continuing to understand that the meaning behind myths has not been diminished as they have aged. I will be able to demonstrate my mastery in power standards 1 and 3 within this checkpoint, though I will improve the quality of my work even further throughout the upcoming months.
Learning Targets
I took notes and reflected on both my and Ancient Egyptian views of death while watching the film The Book of the Dead. Although the notes I took were brief, they were key takeaways from the film that expanded on my understanding of how cultures viewed death. My reflection demonstrates that I understand the cause and effect relationship between Egyptians believing in the afterlife and the actions they would take during the time they were alive on Earth. I stated that because the ancient Egyptians believed in the afterlife, many ancient Egyptians would commission their bodies to be mummified, while the most wealthy would commission a writing of a Book of the Dead to serve as a guidebook while they were in the afterlife and/or an amulet of a scarab beetle to protect them while they made the journey there. Finally, I was able to express my own opinions of death while relating to the Egyptians’ ideas of the afterlife (1A, 1B, 1D, and 1F).
In our group’s Norse Mythology slides, we discussed queer theory and feminist criticism for Viking culture. In those slides, we stated that cross dressing was tolerable in Norse culture and used that point to structure our argument that the Vikings often broke gender norms in their culture. We were able to do this because we analyzed an article titled “What Stereotypes About Viking Masculinity Get Wrong” and confirmed that the author’s observation of how Viking skeletons of Norse men donned a dress and jewelry contributes to our understanding of how the Vikings often broke gender norms. We also used two other articles in our slides that both contributed to our discussion on gender and queer theory; we used an excerpt from the article “Viking Gender Roles” to indicate how Norse culture expressed little leniency to female adulterers and excerpts from the article “A Womb by Magic - Transcending Gender, Transcending Realities” to indicate that homosexuality was not forbidden in Norse culture, but rather, common (1C and 1E).
In my second blog, I wrote a reflection based on two apocalypse stories: God’s cleansing of the world depicted in the book of Revelations in the Bible and Ragnarök in Norse Mythology. In that blog, I stated how the elaborate plot depicted in both apocalypse stories contributed to my understanding of the stories’ meaning of uncertainty and human weakness in comparison to supernatural forces. It broadened my understanding of how humans in different cultures viewed life and death, allowing me to understand that the book of Revelations did not merely demonstrate Christians’ views of sinners and that the Vikings illustrated their society’s vulnerability in their myths (3A, 3B, and 3E).
In my group’s Norse Mythology project, we talked about how Norse myths demonstrated the fallacies of the gods, particularly their inability to win against fate. Because of this, we understand how different cultures interpret their higher powers. We explained Loki's characterization as a jester: although Loki is a scheming, obnoxious god that Thor usually suspects when something goes wrong, we explained that even Loki understands the significance of Thor's lost hammer in the story "Freya's Unusual Wedding" and is willing to assist Thor in finding it. We demonstrated our ability to interpret “Freya’s Unusual Wedding” through both a queer and feminist critical theory lens by explaining how homosexuality was fine in Norse culture, yet adultery was punishable for women only. We also explained the irony of the gods’ binding of Fenrir by stating that their treatment of Loki’s wolf son would be one of the main catalysts for their eventual downfall. Additionally, we analyzed how Neil Gaiman’s interpretations depicted betrayal in “The Children of Loki’ and “Freya’s Unusual Wedding”, comparing and contrasting these depictions throughout our presentation. Finally, our group was able to pronounce the names of figures in Norse Mythology correctly and showed a deep knowledge of Viking culture, demonstrating our dedication to the project and our respect of Scandinavian culture (3C, 3D, 3F, 3G, 3H, 3I, and 3J).
Further Reflection
I have learned throughout the time I have gained a lot of insight into how I learn and when I learn best. When I am interested in the stories I read, I am usually able to decipher their deeper meaning or quickly understand how the excerpts’ true meaning applies when it is explained to me. I also found that working in a group is beneficial to my learning because my teammates often find meaning behind stories that I would not have realized on my own. For example, while we worked on the Norse Mythology project, one of my teammates explained how feminist critical theory applied to how Loki’s infidelity in “The Children of Loki”, illustrating that Norse views towards cheating men were relatively passive compared to cheating women.
In terms of the content that I had read in the span between the previous checkpoint and now, I was fascinated by interpretations of the apocalypse. For example, although I had previously known about how sinners would be punished as depicted in the book of Revelation, I had not thought deeply about its metaphor for human powerlessness until I learned about it in class. In addition to apocalypse stories, I was fascinated by stories in Norse mythology, which I can partially attribute to my lack of knowledge of Norse culture prior to our learning about it. On the topic of my lack of such knowledge, I remember when I believed Asgard was a paradise with the likes of the new Heaven and new Earth depicted in the book of Revelation or the gleaming-gold interpretation of Asgard in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It was to my surprise that Asgard was a gloomy, cold, and relatively inhospitable place. While this is a relatively minor fact that I gained, it proves that I have a lot to learn, and I am excited to see what I will understand going forward. It truly is a shame that a lot of Norse myths have been lost as a result of their exclusively verbal spread, and with it potential tales of the realms within Yggdrasil and stories of Thor and Loki’s adventures.