Online Education Review

My experience with online education at OU has been solely through this class and one other last semester. They work particularly well for me because I'm pretty involved outside of class, so not having a specific class time allows me to get work done without having to plan around anything. It's clearly been a positive experience for me because I'm actually taking another online class next semester (Online Programming). While it can sometimes be frustrating to have something due every single day, I think having items due at the least on a weekly basis helps keep students accountable and prevents us from falling too far behind. I know that I would have done better had all assignments lasted through the end of the week, because I get a lot of my homework done on the weekends. I wouldn't say this is a weakness because it kept me even more on top of my game, but maybe something to consider. It definitely depends when the subject is for me when considering an online class. I could never take a math-intensive course online because I have to work through the problems with someone, but for history or literature courses I think they work quite well.

Glad this wasn't me this semester

Gen. Ed. Review

I have had a generally good experience with Gen Eds at OU. I came into college with quite a bit of AP credit, so I was able to avoid the very lowest level of Gen Eds. However, the math classes I was forced to take actually led to me taking an additional 12 hours that weren't required in mathematics that will ultimately improve my chances of getting into graduate school. With the Gen Ed. Humanities specifically, last semester I took an online Native Authors of Oklahoma course as well that I think really helped to augment that very math and economics intensive course load I've been dealing with. That expanded my understanding of Oklahoma as a state, while this course has allowed me work with my creativity in a way that I'm not often able to. I really like the structure of the class, especially the way in which students don't have to do every single assignment and can instead pick and choose what works best for them. The reading opportunities are very diverse while still forcing students to get a sampling of literature from a variety of areas. I honestly don't have any suggestions. The only struggles I had this semester were tied to my own laziness, not any problems with class structure or content.

My feelings about the biological science with a lab class I'll have to take next semester

College Writing Review

I'm an economics major, and as such haven't had a ton of experience with writing in college. I came in with all of my English requirements covered by high school classes, so the real only classes I've had that have involved much writing have been through the Honors College. I took Politics of U.S. Economic Policy with Dean Ray and believe it helped me tremendously. We really focused on the purpose of our writing, making sure that the details we included were necessary to expand on the point we were making. This has lent itself well to the occasional research papers I have to write for economics. I've also worked with both the Oklahoma Group and Center for the Creation of Economic Wealth, and have that each of those has helped with my writing. The research we do and presentations we create really emphasize intentional use of language, which has translated directly to my writing. I would say the best part of my writing for this class has been the opportunity to be as creative or non-creative as a chose to be. On a personal level, I didn't particularly enjoy the weekly storytelling because I prefer to really dedicate a lot of time to my writing, and it was difficult to do that every single week on top of the Storybooks. That's definitely a personal preference though, and the extra credit made it so that I didn't have to write those blogs to still be successful.

Finals week feelings

Extra Reading Diary: Lang's European Fairytales II

This week I read from the Lang's European Fairy Tales II unit. In it, my favorite story was the two parts of the Seven Headed Serpent. These tell the story of a king and his people who arrive on an island, only to discover that it is ruled by a king of its own, a Seven Headed Serpent. This serpent promises to leave them alone so long as they pay homage to him every year. This required ten youths and ten maidens every single year. When they've finally had enough, the people learn how to kill the snake, and the King's son ultimately sneaks into his lair and kills him, freeing the land.

The Seven Headed Serpent

Lang's European Fairy Tales II

Reading Diary A: Lang's European Fairy Tales I

This week I read from the Lang's European Fairy Tales unit. I was initially drawn to it because I saw it included Puss In Boots, which is a personal favorite of mine, but ultimately found How the Dragon was Tricked to be my favorite. This is partially because I've always found myself interested in dragons, but also because the story was fun to read. It's about a young man who is forced to steal from, and ultimately capture, a dragon. The ways he tricks the dragon are very entertaining though I did find myself feeling bad for the dragon who didn't really seem to have done anything wrong. Overall, a very good story!

The dragon

Extra Reading Diary: The Brothers Grimm

For my extra reading this week, I finished the Brothers Grimm unit that I started with Reading Diary A. Of the second half of stories I read, my favorite was Eve's Unequal Children. The thing that initially interested me about it was that it didn't seem like it followed the typical plot of a Brothers Grimm story, which, at least in my experience, don't touch on religion much. In the story Adam and Eve are giving birth to children, with some of them being good looking and some being somewhat ugly. Eve learns that God will come to visit, and so she decides to hide her ugly children and only show God her good looking children. When God comes he proclaims that the children will become hugely successful, with some being princes, knights, and counts. After hearing this, Eve decides to show God her ugly children as well. Eve is surprised and dismayed when God declares that they will be a fisherman, a tanner, and a potter, amongst others. Eve is upset about this and questions God, but he explains that it is necessary for people to play all roles on Earth, else there will be no one to sow the food that the prince ultimately eats. All have different roles, but all are equally important. I really enjoyed this story because I thought the theme of equal value is an important one for people to learn. No matter how successful a person is, they still rely on other people in their day-to-day lives.

God with Adam, Eve and their children

Brothers Grimm (Ashliman)

Reading Diary A: Brothers Grimm

This week I read a story from the Brothers Grimm. I've always been a big fan of these stories because they're so interesting to read when paired with the more popular fairy tales that we all read as kids. I didn't realize that there were many others stories from the Brothers Grimm that weren't adapted into children's stories. My favorite that I read today was Old Sultan. It's the story of a dog - Old Sultan - who is getting old, so the father of the family decides to put him down. The wife talks him out of it, and so the dog hatches a plan with a wolf to interrupt a kidnapping of the family's child. After doing this, the mother and father love the dog again. When the dog refuses to let the wolf steal sheep in repayment, the wolf challenges Old Sultan to a fight. I won't ruin what came next. I really enjoyed this story because it was from the point of view of a dog, and it offered an interesting take on the negative outcomes that can come from laying with a wolf.

Old Sultan about to battle the wolf

Brothers Grimm unit

Extra Reading Diary: Aesop's Fables (English)

I read the second part of the Aesop's Fables unit for my Extra Reading Diary. My favorite story was Cats and Weasels because it was a very interesting contrast between a lot of the stories I'm familiar with. They offered an example of how back in this time the typical fable of the cat and mouse is actually the weasel and mouse. I thought that was a cool alternative to the Tom and Jerry story we're familiar with. They also discussed cats too, but that specific comparison made it stick out to me.

A man and his Weasel, who hunted the mice

Aesop's Fables (English)

Reading Diary A: Aesop's Fables (English)

This week I decided to read Aesop's Fables in the English version. I had previously read the Classical/Biblical versions, so it was interesting to see the contrast. The biggest thing I noticed was the form itself, with the earlier ones I read being structured as a story while the English versions were poems. I personally enjoyed the stories more just because I have trouble following poetry all that well. My favorite stories from the book came from Lions and focused on the experiences of Lions with man and other animals. It talked about the Lion and Man and their disagreements, as well as how the Lion cunningly separated the Bulls so that he could hunt them one by one, but my favorite individual poem was about the Lion and a Mouse. The Mouse wakes up the Lion while he's sleeping, but the Lion decides to let the Mouse live. Later, when the Lion is caught in a trap, the Mouse comes and rescues him to pay back the kindness. I enjoyed this because I'm a big fan of circular kindness like this.

The Mouse rescuing the Lion from a trap

Aesop's Fables (English)

Extra Reading Diary: Beowulf

For my extra reading, I completed the Beowulf unit. I really enjoyed the unit as a whole, and of the second half my favorite story was Battle With the Dragon. In this story, Beowulf goes to challenge the dragon. He is abandoned by all but one of his warriors, but fights nonetheless. He is able to use his shield to block the fire of the dragon, but his sword doesn't do any damage. They battle on like this, neither managing to damage the other, but both tiring. I really liked the description given in this story, both of the battle itself and each of the warriors.

Beowulf blocks the flame of the dragon

Beowulf

Reading Diary A: Beowulf

This week I decided to read the stories of Beowulf for my reading diary. I was especially interested in the stories Beowulf Lands in Daneland and Beowulf Comes to Heorot because the focused on the land of the Danes, Denmark. I'm actually 50% Danish with both of my grandparents on my dad's side being there, so it was especially interesting to read a story that involved Denmark. The story is about how Beowulf and his warriors arrive in Denmark on a mission to assist the king there. The king and his followers are harassed constantly by a demon named Grendel, and Beowulf is there to help. Upon arriving, they are greeted at the beach by a warrior of the king, who conveys them to Heorot. There they are welcomed and begin to learn about the terrible danger of Grendel.

King Hrothgar of Heorot

Beowulf

Reading Diary A: Blackfoot Stories

This week I read the Blackfoot unit, which focused on stories from the Blackfoot people. All involved animals in some way, but my favorite was The Wolf Man. In the story, a man has two wives who do very little to serve him. They don't cook or clean because they're too busy having a good time, and so the man decides to move them out away from other people so then women won't be distracted. They move and he continues to provide, but the women grow bored quickly. They decide to build a trap for the man and trick him into falling in a hole. When he does, they run back to the village and pretend he disappeared while hunting. What they don't realize, though, is that the man is still alive. He's dug out of the hole by a pack of wolves, and they use magic to make his head and hands like a wolf's. The man shows the wolves how to steal food from the humans, until he's finally captured and it's revealed that his wives had tried to kill him. I enjoyed the story because of the mix of supernatural and folktale. I liked that in many of the other stories as well, but I thought this story was particularly interesting because of the betrayal by the wives, and then the semi-betrayal by the Wolf Man in stealing food from people that used to be his neighbors.

What Wolf Man looked like, probably

Blackfoot Stories

Extra Reading Diary: Eskimo Folk Tales

My favorite story from the second half of the Eskimo Folk Tales was The Eagle and the Whale. It's the story of an Eskimo family with two daughters and a bunch of sons. The daughters are married off to a whale and an eagle, and live with them for a long time. They sons begin to miss the daughters, so they work on a plan to break them out. The first daughter escapes from the eagle using a rope, and then the brother shoot it with an arrow and kill it. The second daughter escapes from the whale using a boat, and the brother row away fast enough to escape. Ultimately the whale dies after beaching itself. I enjoyed these stories because they involved animals as well as creativity for the daughters to escape. Humans marrying animals is still a tad odd to me but I think I'm slowly adapting.

An Eskimo whaling ship

Source:

Eskimo Folk Tales

Reading Diary A: Eskimo Folk Tales

My favorite story in this unit was The Woman Who had a Bear as a Foster Son. I've always enjoyed stories about animals that get integrated into human life, which is essentially what this story is. A woman adopts a small bear, who grows older and stronger until he is a hunter for the woman and her community. It eventually gets to the point where he is too strong, and ultimately ends up killing a human. It's then that the bear is sent off in to the world, but not before the woman marks him with black soot so that he can be recognized. It was a bit of a sad ending in that sense, but at the end they reference that a bear with a black mark can be periodically seen hunting in the area.

Polar Bear

Eskimo Folktales

Commenting Review Week

I think I've definitely had a positive experience with the commenting system so far. It provides a good chance to get to know other students better, and helpful critiques and advice for the various writings we do. I think it will be most helpful with the Storybook writings because it gives a great outside perspective on the writing.

Every day of the week

Reading Review Week

I don't know that I have a far and away favorite set of stories so far, but I think if I had to pick one I'd select Folk Stories from Southern Nigeria. I'm personally a huge lover of animals so I enjoyed getting to read about adventures that involved them quite a bit. I think something that I noticed is that the stories I liked most weren't necessarily better overall, but they consistently had at least one story that I really liked. I think that was what distinguished them for me.

The story of the Elephant and the Tortoise was one of my favorites.

On the flipside, I don't think a single bad story really impacted my view strongly to the negative. The only set of stories I really didn't like were the Tales of Sindbad, and that was because I didn't really enjoy any of them. To me that suggests that I at least would prefer a variety of themes and ideas in a set of stories, because it's unlikely I'll dislike many of them and there's a good chance that I'll find one that makes the whole set stick out to me!

Reading Diary B: South African Folktales

To start, I was slightly confused by The Dance for Water. I believed it was earlier in this unit that I read another story that was almost exactly identical. The Dance for Water is a story about how all the animals but the Hare dance to get water, and it actually works. Then the Hare drinks the water even though he didn't dance for it any everyone's upset. So they decide to have the Tortoise hide at the edge of the pond and make his shell sticky, so that when the Hare came he would be stuck to the Tortoise's shell. In the previous portion of the unit, The Story of a Dam tells a similar story concerning Jackal, one that ends with Lion determining the punishment will be spinning by the tail and dashing Jackal's head against the rocks. In the second story, the punishment is taking Rabbit's tail and dashing his head against the stones. I found this close parallelism in consecutive stories interesting and a little confusing. Outside of that, I again enjoyed the second half of this unit, though there were no stories that really stood out to me like Tink Tinkje did in the first half.

Citation:
South African Folktales

Rabbit tracks in the sand

Reading Diary A: South African Folktales

First, an overall comment. I enjoyed these stories quite a bit but was somewhat frustrated with them. The Lion loses to the Jackal in basically every single story. I know that this is a shout out to being cunning and clever and manipulative, but the Jackal was also pretty clearly a terrible creature. I'm boring and prefer a story with a moral message that I approve of, so that was somewhat discouraging. On an individual level though, I thought the stories were quite good. My favorite was Tink-Tinkje, which is a story about the competition between the birds of South Africa to be named King of the birds. There is a lot of disagreement on what the actual competition should be, but ultimately they decide that it will be whoever can fly the highest. This seems rigged from the start, because it's openly acknowledged that the Vulture can fly the highest. But they compete anyways, and just when the Vulture thinks it has flown the highest, the Tink-Tinkje appears from beneath its (the Vulture's) wing and declares that it has actually flown the highest. I did enjoy this show of cunning to outwit a physically superior animal, which is interesting because it is somewhat a parallel of the situation between the Jackal and the Lion. That further reinforces for me the idea that the message of a story has quite a bit to do with whether or not I enjoy it.

South African Folktales

Tink-Tinkje Bird

Reading Diary A: Folk Stories from Southern Nigeria

Topic: The stories I focused on in this unit were The Fish and the Leopard's Wife and The Elephant and the Tortoise. Each of these stories is intended to explain natural phenomena that occur with animals in Africa. The first tells the story of the Fish, who was banished to live only in the water after taking part in an affair with the Leopard's wife. The Leopard and the Fish are good friends, so the Leopard asks the King to handle the punishment. This punishment is to be allowed to live only in the water, and to be killed if the Fish comes on land. The second story, explains why the Elephant has such small eyes. The Elephant used to eat so much food at feasts that other animals couldn't get their fair share. So, the Tortoise tricks the Elephant into trading each of his eyes in exchange for more food. After realizing he has been tricked, the Elephant talks the Worm into giving him his eyes. For this reason, the Elephant has small eyes and the Worm is blind. This was the general theme of all the stories I read in the unit, creating an explanation for the characteristics of the various animals in Africa.

Table of Contents:
Folk Stories from Southern Nigeria

Elephant eye

Comment Wall

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Extra Reading Diary: Raja Rasalu

I enjoyed the second half of Raja Rasalu quite a bit. My favorite story was Raja Rasalu and the Swans. It was about a crow stealing the wife of a swan by tricking the king into believing that the wife had been stolen from him in the first place. Raja Rasalu again arrives as an arbiter of justice, correcting the king and telling him that in fact the crow had stolen the wife of the swan. This is a running theme for Rasalu, as in most stories he is righting some type of wrong. This is another reason I enjoyed the stories, as I feel it's an easy idea to support. Of the readings I've done this, this was the first that included much poetry at all. I personally have trouble following and interpreting poetry all that well because I think it takes a little bit more patience and intricate thought than I can typically dedicate to reading. I thought I understood it reasonably well though, and it made the speaking portions of the readings more interesting and vivid.

Link:
Raja Rasalu

Romantic Tales from the Punjab

Reading Diary A: Raja Rasalu

My reading for Week 5 was interesting because it was actually somewhat similar to the Sindbad stories I read in Week 4, but I enjoyed it a lot more. I've been trying to do some thinking to figure out why exactly that is. Raja Rasalu is a somewhat invincible, incredibly strong and smart hero. He beats a famous king in a game of skill and kills many giants. He's just as infallible as Sindbad, yet I found him to be a much more likeable character. I think there are two reasons for this. The first is that the stories of Raja Rasalu are set in 3rd person, whereas the stories about Sindbad are first person. Each achieves great successes, but in the case of Sindbad it feels as though he is bragging, while it feels like Raja Rasalu's story is just being accurately recounted. I think this has something to do with the fact that I'm especially reactive to what I consider bragging, and Sindbad was especially unlikeable to me. The other factor is that Raja Rasalu has undeniable abilities. His major successes are by virtue of his major capabilities, whereas with Sinbad it appeared that everything was a result of his general luck. I have always felt that capable people are more worthy of respect than those that just fell into a situation, so I enjoyed Raja Rasalu more. I also felt that there was more variety to the stories in Raja Rasalu and then they never seemed to follow just one set storyline.

Links:
Raja Rasalu

Raja Rasalu kills the giants

Essay: Why Sindbad Doesn't Fit My Definition of a "Hero"

One thing I find particularly compelling about folktales and mythology is the role of heroes in them. I have a bit of a Romantic outlook on life and so I've always loved the idea of a hero who is both physically and ideologically superior to the people around them. I like it especially because I don't think it has the same capability to exist today in the world of guns and poisons and a thousand different ways to die that take no talent or ability. I like heroes from these tales most because they are heroes by virtue both of their personal characteristics and their individual capabilities with a sword or bow and arrow, or any other variety of weapon that requires skill. As such, and without much knowledge of Sindbad, I went into this unit kind of expecting more of this. Or even half of this. What I felt like I found was a generally typical man with no extraordinary circumstances who continually found himself getting lucky. He wasn't particularly capable with a weapon or morally righteous, but somehow seemed to always be the last one living. I guess you could argue that this is a skill in and of itself, but I had a hard time seeing it that way. What it ultimately felt like was an old man recounting stories that had grown in splendor and unlikeliness over the preceding 30 or 40 years. I don't think that necessarily says anything about the actual merit of the tales of Sindbad, but it was a stark difference from the Greek mythology I read in the previous unit. I also found that it really failed to teach much of a lesson at all, outside of "do whatever you want because it'll be other people that die". In conclusion, the plot of Sindbad itself was somewhat interesting and had a good amount of variety. Despite this, at the end of the day I felt myself disappointed by the lack of a real hero or lesson.

The Voyages of Sindbad

Roc by Rene Bull

Reading Diary B: Voyages of Sindbad

Summary: I really feel like I'm just missing the point in these Sindbad stories. The more I read them the less I enjoyed them. I think that I just don't like the structure of a hero constantly being honored and achieving incredible things speaking about it in first person. In elementary school I was a bit of a braggart and ever since my grandpa sat me down and gave me a talking to I've been especially aware of what I perceive as bragging coming from myself and other people. Reading Sindbad just feels like listening to that guy at the high school reunion who wants people to know about all the incredible things he has done in life, even though most of them are definitely to good to be true. I did enjoy that his sixth and seventh voyages were at least tied together by the plot, I thought this plus the addition of complementary character that stayed around made it much more interesting.

Table of Contents:
The Voyages of Sindbad
The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898).

Sindbad is taken to the elephant graveyard

Reading Diary A: Voyages of Sindbad

Topic: I had some sort of mixed feelings about Sindbad as a whole. I'm sure it's some sort of storytelling method, but I didn't particularly enjoy how each of his voyages mostly followed the same basic structure, even down to reuniting with the original captain and recovering his shipment of goods. I read Ovid's Metamorphoses previously and they seemed to more or less follow a constantly changing storyline, which I appreciated. I just found these stories too repetitive. I did enjoy the stories of Sindbad once he had become trapped in one place or another though, especially on the island with the one-eyed giants. It was definitely very interesting the parallels this story had to one of the tales of Odysseus. We aren't especially far into this class but I definitely feel as though repitition of themes and even plotlines is a very common thing across cultures. This could possibly be put down to plagiarism but I think a more benign explanation for it is that storytellers want to put tales in a context that their listeners will understand and appreciate. So if a storyteller from Baghdad heard the tale of Odysseus, it actually makes a lot of sense for him to translate it over to Sindbad so his listeners can relate better.

Table of Contents:
Voyages of Sindbad
The Arabian Nights' Entertainments by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1898).

The one-eyed giant that eats many of the sailors

Greek Mythological Creatures of Africa Styles

Topic: My Storybook will be about some of the different animals of Ethiopia that are mentioned in Greek mythology. My goal is to find four different mythological beasts to 'do battle with'. My main source for this will likely be the Theoi Greek Mythology Bestiary but I will also spend time searching for other sources. Some possible animals I've already found are Drakones Aithiopikoi and Pegasoi Aithiopikoi. My criteria will be animals only from Africa with the potential of somehow coming to conflict with a human. Some of the stories may combine multiple animals instead of just one.

Bibliography: 
Pliny the Elder, Natural History 8. 72 (trans. Rackham) (Roman encyclopedia C1st A.D.)
Aelian, On Animals 2. 21 (trans. Scholfield) (Greek natural history C2nd A.D.)

Pegasoi Aithopikoi

Microblogging: I read a description of storytelling in the form of a blog and at the end it mentioned telling the story as though it were via Twitter. I think this could be a super interesting format for the story, almost as though an adventurer is live tweeting his trip through mythological Africa. I think it could be used to provide some comedy in the story.

Pick Your Own Ending: I love the idea of pick your own ending. I used to read a lot of books with this type. Instead of writing just different endings, I think I would write a total of 5 stories with the final 2 being the potential endings. This might be a great way to make the stories even more interesting. They could either be about the same animal but with positive/negative ending or the decision could lead to encountering a different animal and therefore a different experience. 

The Prequel: I also really like the idea of a prequel. I have read stories about a lot of Greek heroes and I think it would be really cool to give an origin story to someone like Achilles. It could take details from already written stories, like a scar or injury, and give them a specific origin. 

Traveler As Storyteller: I was also interested in stories from the perspective of a traveler. I think this would be interesting because it doesn't demand any sort of realism to the stories. Although Greek mythology includes a lot of supernatural aspects, this would allow me to go ahead and change them as a see fit and as I believe will most benefit the story.

Reading Diary B: Ovid's Metamorphoses (Books 5-7)

For this diary I read the second part of Ovid's Metamorphoses. The portion I was most impacted by and interested in was the tale of Procne, Philomela, and Tereus. In this story, Procne and Philomela are sisters, with Procne being married to Tereus. When Tereus meets Philomela, he decides that he must 'have' her. So he tricks Procne and Philomela's father into letting him take Philomela with him back to Procne, and instead rapes and mutilates her. He leaves her trapped inside a building while he goes back to Procne and pretends she has died. Philomela manages to weave a message using her hair, which she gets to Procne. Procne then saves Philomela and exacts revenge on Tereus in a pretty horrifying way. Tereus and Procne have a son together, and because he is very much like Tereus, Procne proceeds to murder him and then feed him to Tereus. It's pretty awful. Then Tereus tries to kill the sisters and they all turn into birds and fly away. I've got some pretty mixed feelings about this story. The beginning with the rape of Philomela was terrible, but it didn't seem like an entirely uncommon thing in the context of Greek mythology. The murder of Procne's own son took me off guard though, as I (perhaps naively) don't associate many Greek myths with filicide being committed. I have read similar stories that appeared more recently that follow a similar path, but typically the two feuding parties aren't in the same family and so it's different. I think that ending turned me off to the story as a whole, but I would say I enjoyed it up to that point.

Ovid's Metamorphoses (Books 5-7)
Tereus Marries Procne
Tereus Rapes Philomela
Procne's Revenge

Rubens: Tereus Confronted with the Head of his Son Itys

Storytelling Week 3: Arachne Weaves a Web

Minerva began to weave, depicting Troy upon a hill with the battles raging beneath. Brave Achilles runs through the battle, arrows ever searching for his heel. Noble Hector runs out to challenge him but will find only death in this decision. Further down she shows Odysseus, lost for so long at sea. His boat approaches an island covered in hulking cyclops. At the corners are the Gods, with royal Jupiter looking down over the struggles of common men.

Across the room, Arachne's work is coming together, though it doesn't appear as a typical tapestry. There are depictions of heroes or great battles; instead, the tapestry seems oddly translucent, as though the thread she used were thin enough to rip right through. As she progressed further and further in her weaving, Minerva noticed and began to grow confident. Though the material itself was incredible, it was undeniable that the scenes up on Minerva's work were far superior to those Arachne.

Finally time in the hour glass had run out, and it was time to compare the two works of art. Minerva began, showcasing the vibrant colors and incredible landscapes she had created. All in attendance agreed that it was certainly the most impressive weaving they had ever seen. Upon hearing this Minerva grew even more confident, knowing that she truly was superior to Arachne.

Then it was Arachne's turn. She pulled her weaving out, and the crowd looked on, confused. "Why, there's nothing on there!" said Minerva in glee. "You have to get closer," replied Arachne, "the silk is so very fine that you can't see it all from a distance.

And so Minerva moved closer, until her face was nearly touching the tapestry, and yet still she could not make out the designs. "You are nothing but a fake," declared Pallas Minerva, just as the tapestry suddenly rushed towards her, then over her, and finally around her. Suddenly Minerva found herself wrapped within the weaving, unable to escape. Though the material looked thin to the eyes, it was very strong and very sticky. The more she struggled the more entangled she became. "What is this travesty?!" she screamed. "I have had enough of your meddling in my life," replied Arachne, "maybe this time you will learn your lesson about messing with humans whenever you feel like it." And with that Arachne departed, and Minerva was left to scream and struggle, caught by the web of Arachne.

Author's Note: In the original story they offer quite a bit more detail for the actual weaving of the tapestries but I didn't have the Greek mythological background for that. The original version of this story is a classic example of Gods putting mortals in their place for perceived slights. Minerva challenges Arachne to a competition and loses. She is unwilling to accept this, and ultimately destroys Arachne's tapestry and attacks. Arachne can't stand this and decides to hang herself. Before going back to Olympus, Minerva changes her into a spider. This plotline occurs all throughout Greek mythology, as mortals are constantly doing one thing or another to anger Gods. I decided to put a twist on this. I don't like the idea omnipotent beings just fiddling around in mortal lives, so I put the twist on it to change that and make Arachne the one to defeat Minerva. The image is obviously just a picture of Arachne, though it's supposed to be her as part-spider. I chose this spider because Minerva is one of my favorite Greek gods and I had never actually heard the story of Arachne. I hope readers take from this story the idea that an individual with one special talent can do quite a bit, even against a person that seems incredibly powerful.

Minerva Weaves a Web

Ovid's Metamorphoses, translated by Tony Kline (2000) 

Arachne working on her web.

Reading Diary A

The Greek gods have always interested me because they generally come off as entitled babies. It's a significant contrast to God in Christianity or Judaism because humans seem to be their playthings as opposed to creature that they care for to some extent. I think this makes sense because they were originally thought up as a means for explaining all the terrible things that happened back in those days, and eventually transitioned to also explaining the good. For example, when crops died or there was an extended drought, Ceres could be to blame. Now of course if she was to blame when things were bad, she also received some credit for an especially strong crop. An example of the whims of the Gods exists in this section in the story of Arachne and Minerva. In this story, Minerva is essentially angry because Arachne is an excellent wool spinner, but refuses to give any credit to Minerva, thought Minerva claims that she in some way taught the girl this ability. Ultimately Minerva is so upset that she challenges Arachne and turns her into a spider. This is just one in a long lineage of stories of Gods messing with the lives of mortals. Later, a woman named Niobe rejects the goddess Latona as being inferior to her and tells the people to worship her instead. Latona is furious at this, and kills first Niobe's sons and then her daughters. Again, this is an example of a mortal putting themself above the gods, making one of them angry, and ultimately paying the price. These stories both explain the many tragedies that took place back in those times, but also teach people to be careful not to display hubris.

Ovid's Metamorphoses Part 2

Death of Niobe's Children, Konig

Mythology and Folklore Topics Brainstorm

Topic: Greek myths about humans and monsters
Comments: I've always really enjoyed Greek mythology, starting with a lot of video games that I played earlier in my life such as Age of Mythology and Titan Quest. I like the idea of battle that values ability as opposed to just a person being able to shoot a gun. Achilles was always one of my favorite mythological characters.
Possible Stories: A couple examples are obviously The Odyssey and The Illiad. I know there are also additional stories following warriors like Ajax and Hercules.
Sample Story Comments: I found a story about Jason tricking a dragon to grab the Golden Fleece that I enjoyed.
Bibliography Information: 
Sample Story: Jason and the Golden Fleece
Book Title: Ovid's Metamorpheses
Book Author: Tony Kline
Year: 2000

Topic: Greek gods and constellations
Comments: The interesting other half of Greek mythology is the story of gods and goddesses and how manipulate common men. I think it's very interesting to see how they mess around in the lives of men.
Possible Stories: Any stories about Jupiter, Mars, or the variety of other Greek gods that exist.
Sample Story Comments: I found a story about Mars having an affair with Vulcan's wife and how Vulcan gets revenge for it.
Bibliography Information: 
Mars and Venus
Book Title: Ovid's Metamorpheses
Book Author: Tony Kline
Year: 2000

Topic: Stories from the Middle Ages
Comments: Monty Python and the Holy Grail was a defining film in my early childhood life and ever sinec then I've been very interested in the Middle Ages. Again, I like the idea of success in battle based on strategy or pure ability as opposed firepower.
Possible Stories: A ton of different stories about all the knights of the round table.
Sample Story Comments: I read the story of King Arthur and the Sword Excalibur from the arm in the lake.
Bibliography Information: 
The Sword of Excalibur
Bookie Title: King Arthur: Tales of the Round Table
Book Author: Andrew Lang
Year: 1902

Topic: Brothers Grimm
Comments: I think it's really easy to like Brothers Grimm after hearing so many of the kid-friendly stories from it. It only gets cooler when you get older and get to appreciate the actual stories.
Possible Stories: Lots of different stories based around animals as well as things like Little Red Riding Hood and Cinderella.
Sample Story Comments: The story of the Fox and the Cat, and how the Fox was so busy collecting a bag full of clever that he couldn't escape when he had to.
Bibliography Information:
The Fox and The Cat
Book Title: The Grimm Brothers' Children's and Household Tales
Book Author: D.L. Ashlimann
Year: 1998-2013

Reading Diary A: Aesop's Fables (Jacobs)

The most interesting thing about my reading in this unit was the contrast between what I would consider somewhat similar creatures. It's very clear that the various animals have been given specific characteristics and personalities to describe them. For example, the Lion is proud and dangerous. The Fox is very cunning and sneaky, while the Wolf appears to be vicious and just downright bad. This was a especially interesting because these characteristics linked directly to the lesson that each fable was intended to teach. The vast majority of the Lion's stories involved him eating or killing something, and often referenced his place as 'King of the beasts', as with "only cowards insult dying majesty". This suggests to me that there is an extent to which the author was attempting to place personalities on these animals to serve a message, but they seem to make a lot of sense. I don't think many people would argue with the idea of a fox as devious and cunning, so the use of one for those lessons seems to make perfect sense.

References:
Aesop's Fables (Jacobs)
Lions Part 1
Lions Part 2
Foxes Part 1
Wolves

The Lion takes all of the hunt for himself

UnTextbook

Dante's Inferno: this is a story I've always wanted to read, particularly because I really enjoy mythology. The writing looked well translated into English which I also think could help with my actual comprehension.
Homer's Odyssey: I have read the Illiad before but never the Odyssey. This section said it focuses on the monsters that Odysseus fights, which I find very interesting.
Brer Rabbit I and II: I've actually heard quite a few people talk about the Brer Rabbit and never really understood what it was. After reading the brief description, I think this would be a valuable way of delving more into a culture that I can't really claim to understand.
Tibetan Folktales: this also focuses to an extent on monsters and mythical creatures, while still involving some animals interacting with each other.

Odysseus and the Sirens.

Storybook Favorites

The three storybooks I found most interesting all had to do with legendary creatures. https://sites.google.com/site/chrispunlap/introduction Discussed your typical evil legendary creatures, like vampires and werewolves. It also took a very interesting approach for the introduction, telling the story of a monster hunter in a format that I found very interesting. https://sites.google.com/site/seamonsters3043/introduction took this same approach in the form of a monster hunter at sea. I particularly enjoyed the background graphic that the first storybook used, while I thought the graphic of the ocean and all its tides was a really cool way to link to monster hunting there. The third storybook took a different twist to the story, instead looking at humans from the perspective of monsters: https://sites.google.com/site/ahumanencountersconvention/introduction. I enjoyed this twist a lot because it was a very atypical way of telling the story. As a whole, I felt the aesthetic of the pages worked really well with what the authors appeared to be trying to accomplish. The first one definitely gave off a serious and spooky vibe, while the last was the complete opposite. I think I'd also like to do a background that stays put while the words scroll, that was the most interesting background to me. I also think I'd like to repeat the organization that the storybooks used, I felt that the table of contents in the top left made a lot of sense to me. One tweak I might want to make is putting a link to the next story at the bottom of the previous story so it seems like the stories are continuously flowing. I do think I would be most interested in a topic similar to those written about by these authors, especially the one who wrote about the ocean. I find monsters a very interesting concept and I would like to specifically look at monsters in the context of mythology such as the hydra or gorgons.

Medusa, one of the Gorgons. 

Introduction

Hi everyone! My name's Cooper Lund, although technically Cooper is my middle name and Jorgen is my first name. I'm originally from Kansas City, KS. Currently I am a junior studying economics with a minor in math. I'm very interested in using past events to predict future ones, which is one of the primary reasons I enjoy economics. I'm an avid fantasy football player and Netflix watcher. I've probably seen all the seasons of The Office 7-8 times. I also managed to watch every season of Criminal Minds over the break, an accomplishment I'm particularly proud of. On campus I am involved with a variety of organizations such as Soonerthon, CCEW, and SGA. I've got one sister named Katy who is a sophomore at the University of Minnesota. My mom owns a veterinary clinic in Kansas City and my dad is a computer programmer. Because my mom is a vet, we have always had a ton of pets cycling through our house. Currently we only have two dogs, Motor and Ace. Motor is a 7 year old shi-tzu and Ace is some kind of pekinese mix. Ace's claim to fame is that he actually only has one eye. When he was a puppy he lived in a puppy mill and the eye got infected and by the time he was rescued from the mill it was too late to do anything but take it out. Luckily, he is black so the eye isn't super noticeable and he's still one of the happiest dogs you will ever meet. I am a very laid back person, so I enjoy watching TV and movies, hanging out with friends, and listening to music. My favorite artist is Passenger and I actually got to see him perform in Dallas for my birthday last year. And that's pretty much all the even moderately interesting things about me.

Jim having a very deep and introspective discussion with Dwight about a variety of topics. 

Week 1 Storytelling: The Old Lion and the Fox

       Once there was a very Old Lion who was too old to hunt food, as he had in his younger days. It was winter, and he found himself becoming sick. Knowing he would surely die without food to help him combat his illness, the Old Lion invited all his neighbors to come to his cave and talk to him. One by one they went, and one by one they disappeared.

      

The Fox was very wary of the Old Lion, and he refused to get to close to his cave when he went to visit. “Come closer,” said the Old Lion, “I can’t hear you from there.” But the Fox refused, not wanting to disappear like all of the other animals. He returned back to his home, and tried to wait out the winter. Colder and colder it grew, until finally the Fox was stuck in the freezing cold all the time. He grew sicker and sicker.

One day, knowing he would soon die, the Fox went back to visit the Old Lion. To his shock, the Old Lion was no longer sick. In fact, he looked healthier than ever. “How have you recovered?!” exclaimed the Fox, “you are so old and I am young!” “Who is that out there?” the Fox heard from behind the Old Lion, inside the cave. Suddenly, the pink face of his neighbor Pig popped out of the cave, followed by the dusky face of Raccoon, whom he used to share food with.

“There you are Fox!” shouted Raccoon, “we were afraid you had died, why didn’t you come into the warmth with us?” “You mean the Old Lion didn’t eat you?” replied Fox. Pig looked confused, “Of course not! He offered all our neighbors the chance to share the warmth of his cave in exchange for bringing him food. We’ve all been doing great.” Then, finally, the shock of seeing his friends alive and the depth of sickness was too much, and with one final sigh, Fox died.

Strife can bring together strange friends.

The Fox and the Old Lion

Author's Note: In the original version of this fable, the Old Lion actually is eating all of the neighbors, and the lesson is to take warning from the bad things that occur to other people. The Fox sees footprints going into the cave but not coming out, and comes to the conclusion that misfortune has occurred for his neighbors. He's right, because the Old Lion has been eating all of the neighbors. I wanted to mix things up by actually making him appear paranoid instead of showing common sense. Instead of having the Old Lion eat the neighbors, he had been letting them into his home all along in exchange for collecting food. This story is part of series of stories involving the Old Lion, who previously had actually been a younger Lion going through other experiences. I think it's interesting because the Lion is sort of gaining in cunning throughout the stories, so this is the culmination of all that. I chose the image above because I thought it was kind of amusing. It makes me think of the Fox outsmarting the Old Lion and sort of sticking out his tongue at him. It doesn't fit my story quite right but I think it fits the original one very well. 

Bibliography: Aesop for Children, by (anonymous), illustrated by Milo Winter (1919)

Image Information: http://mythfolklore.net/aesopica/milowinter/55.htm