Crossing Boundaries
A hero's journey into a foreign landscape--often a strange, hostile, and sometimes barren place--is a common mythological theme. As an archetypal rite of passage, heroes from all cultures cross boundaries in a "big think" kind of way, searching for answers to profound human questions. Countless myth-makers in Hollywood and countless writers of amazing tales use this crossing of boundaries as setting for high drama. Lord of the Rings is a contemporary example. It is a "call to adventure" and we see it in Sherman Alexie's Smoke Signals as well for Victor and Thomas literally step through the door of a bus into a foreign land called The United States; they leave the Coeur d' Alene Indian reservation and journey to the desert outside Phoenix, Arizona, a city named itself for the mythic bird that symbolizes the apocalyptic transformation from an old world order to a new world order. In The Epic of Gilgamesh the King's heroic crossing into the wilderness (in the second journey) also embodies this quest for understanding, again a consciousness only available in the most formidable and mysterious of alien territories. Sometimes the journey is a descent into the Underworld or Netherland; amidst a conversation with ghosts of the past (sometimes these ghosts are our mothers and fathers) heroes find direction and a pathway to peace or destiny and the way home--the return. We see this in Homer's Odyssey and Virgil's Aeneid. One of the most salient modern examples of the ancient mythic journey out of civilization into the wilderness (in search of a workable philosophy) is found in the travels and writings of Henry David Thoreau. Roderick Nash summarizes Thoreau's conclusions about the tension between culture and wilderness in the following link: Thoreau.
In the Uses of Mythology discussions, we will consider other manifestations of Crossing Boundaries. For many Native American artists, the journey is symbolic of "moving into" a dominant, yet foreign, culture and encountering its laws and regulations and the systemic conventions and formulas that define established order. We see this in the mythological structure of Alexie's film Smoke Signals. And thus we soon begin to ask questions about the paradoxes and dangers involved, questions about the costs and benefits of assimilation. That is, for many heroes, the story of crossing boundaries underscores a kind of journey toward an imaginary center of power, which raises questions about how heroes maintain their own sense of identity and yet still engage and adapt in a healthy way to the new and foreign world--the crossing juxtaposes success and profit with the possibility of losing your sanity, your sense of who you are, and potentially your life.
It is in this context that the Washington State University Museum of Art has sponsored the current exhibit of Native American Art, Art in 2 Worlds. The title suggests the same mythological tension, as heroes--in this case, including artists and storytellers--attempt to express authentic voices while crossing boundaries between different worlds.
Task: Assume that you are writing this three-page paper for an academic audience interested in the mythological aspects of heroic behavior in Native American Art, not only the indigenous myths of a specific tribe, but also how artists engage the mythology of the Western Civilization and its powerful influences. Using the Native American Art in the exhibit Art in 2 Worlds, construct an argument about heroic behavior through a critical process of mythological interpretation and analysis of the Native American Exhibit. As the title suggests, we want to identify the problem that heroes face when crossing boundaries. Your goal is to persuade you audience toward your particular perspective. Your introduction should explain the problem-at-issue before presenting your thesis. Identify the main problem of crossing boundaries; once again this is not limited to the protagonist of the tale. You can expand your definition of heroic behavior to both the artist and the viewer. As a point of entry, I want you to select one work of art (and one artist) as a focus for writing. For instance, the painting below is by the Navaho painter James Joe. I might begin by doing some research on the myths of the Navaho tribe. But remember that the art also uses the medium of and lives within the dominant culture. There are links below to get you started. Here is another example. I may "think" about the implications of David P. Bradley's American Indian Gothic as a kind of reimagining of Grant Wood's American Gothic. I might then construct an argument that identifies and discusses the consequences of Bradley's artistic parody. In my argument I would use evidence from essays on Grant Wood and the myths of David Bradley's tribe in support of my thesis on heroic behavior.
The due date for this assignment will be posted on the course schedule. We will begin by talking about the assignment in class on Thursday. We will then go to the Museum of Art and look at and discuss the exhibit.
Resources:
Native American Legends
Flood Stories from Around the WorldThe Hero: some categories for cross-cultural consideration
• The hero in literature, art, popular culture: novels, statues, movies, TV, songs, comics. We are considering the hero in art.
• The male hero, the female hero; the hero and class, race, ethnicity. How do these things determine heroic behavior?
• The hero through time--the changing image and context, the decline of the hero.
•Violence and the hero - the issues of risk, danger, triumph, dominance.
• The hero and sexual attractiveness: beauty, muscles, fighting, the body.
• The traditional hero (noble, fair, honorable): the anti-hero (cynical, selfish, detached)
• Individualism and the hero: defiance, disruption, criticism, freedom, revolution.
• Culture heroes, role-models, hero-worship - advertising, propaganda, social control.
• Creative and intellectual heroes (geniuses); business and political heroes (charisma)
• Superheroes, sports heroes, real-life heroes; media heroes: cops, cowboys, martial artists
• The image of the villain (and cowardice, passivity, fear) as enabling the hero
• History and the hero: social change and "great" leaders, dominant individuals
• War, the military, and terrorism
