Using at least one example from the tutorial readings, describe the relationship between myth or ritual and the maintenance and recreation of soci...

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Myth, and the maintenance and recreation of the socio-cosmic order, is a seemingly paradoxical occurrence in religion, yet their relationship to one another becomes established as the evolution of belief flourishes and the intricate understanding of the cosmos coupled with the allegory of myth become increasing interlinked.

Boas, a pioneer and a dominant influential figure in the discipline of anthropology stated that, ‘mythology reflect[ed] culture, implying something of a one–to-one relationship’ (Boas, 1910, pp. 371- 384), insinuating that mythology placed upon a culture, exists not as a single consciousness, but rather different people holding distinguishable myths, and socio-cosmic beliefs of one specific entity.

Malinowaski, who favored studying one culture at time, in depth, argued upon similar lines, stating that ‘…alive myth… is not symbolic, but a direct expression of its subject matter’ (Malinowaski, 1954, pp.101). Interestingly enough, Sigmund Freud, the founding father of psychoanalysis, thought upon identical lines. Freud stating,

I believe that a large portion of the mythological conception of the world, which reaches far into the most modern religions, is nothing but psychology projection to the outer world. The dim perception of psychic factors and relations of the unconscious was taken as a model in the construction of a transcendental reality. (Freud, 1938:164)

This is an indistinguishable aspect in Alan Dundes paper: Earth-Diver: Creation of the Mythopoeic Male, who analyses and comprehends the understanding that a ‘myth may be analysed with knowledge of a particular mythmaker, or a myth may be analysed without such knowledge’ (Dundes, 1962, pp. 1033), in an anthropological sense it suggests the fact t...

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...B.C.E, Phaedo: Plato’s o the soul, The school of Athens

Roheim, Geza, 1951, ‘The gates of the dream, New York, International University Press

Rooth, Anna Birgitta, 1957, ‘The creation myths of the North American Indians, Anthropos 52: 479-508

Saville, Marshall, H, 1920, ‘The goldsmiths art in ancient Mexico, Indian Notes and Monographs, New York, Heye Foundation

Schwarzbaum, Haim, 1960, ‘Jewish and Moslem sources of a Falasha creation myth, In studies in Biblical and Jewish folklore, Raphael Patai, Francis Lee Utely, Dov Noy, eds, American Folklore Society Memoir 51, Bloomington, Indiana University Press

Silberer, Herbert, 1925, ‘A pregnancy phantasy in a man’, Psychoanalytical Review 12: 377-96

Wheeler-Volgelin. Erminie, 1949, ‘Earth-Diver’, In standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend, Vol 1, Maria Leach, ed, New York, Funk and Wagnalls

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