Pop Culture and Modern Mythology
Pop Culture and Modern Mythology
We can, and should, make old stories new
Welcome to From the Teacher’s Desk, where we take turns further reflecting on our episodes and applications to the classroom.
I’ve always loved Star Wars. Honestly, some of that love was probably driven by my peers and a childhood obsession with another powerful princess, She-Ra. It wasn’t until I was in college in the late 90s that I even realized that I had spent my entire childhood idealizing a modern renaissance of an old story.
My own experiences with Star Wars (which we discuss in our episode about the Disney+ series Obi Wan Kenobi), highlights the importance of using modern pop culture to bring old mythology to life. Mythology explains the hows and whys of our world and uses unique characteristics of a culture to explain the universal human experience. Because most of our students have very little experience with regional warfare, sailing the seas, growing crops, and exploring new lands, these references in the ancient mythology we study in class can quickly lose their interest.
So what do we do? Throw out the old stories in favor of the new? No. I’m a firm believer in learning about the past so that we can understand our present and build a better future. But it is essential that we use renewed mythology to show them the universal nature of stories.
Start by referencing modern allusions to classic mythology
Ancient mythology has certainly gotten a contemporary boost. Regardless of how you feel about his novels, Rick Riordan did English teachers a favor when he started bringing mythology to life in the bodies of 21st century teenager characters. Two generations of readers now know the names of Greek, Norse, and Egyptian gods and goddesses. Marvel’s Thor franchise brought us space versions of Norse mythology, something that my own children could better appreciate when we listened to the Magnus Chase books as a family before seeing Thor: Love and Thunder. The Harry Potter series gave us references to Cerberus, alchemy, and legendary monsters.
When introducing old stories, show why knowledge of those stories matter by highlighting pop culture references to those stories. Use movie clips, music, and memes to demonstrate that the stories of the present echo the stories of the past. This can become a powerful lesson in not only the concept of monomyth, but also the significance of the allusions they are exposed to daily.
Show how culture changes the details
When George Lucas wrote Star Wars: A New Hope in the mid-1970s, he created a story that became a perfect reflection of Joseph Campbell’s theory of the hero’s journey. He tried to resurrect the concept of knights and medieval swordplay reminiscent of King Arthur. And he did it all in space, less than ten years after Neil Armstrong took his first steps on the moon.
Does that mean he was just telling a tired tale that no one wanted to hear again? No. He was telling a foundational story that has engrossed every generation in every culture for thousands of years. And Lucas wasn’t the last filmmaker to successfully bring the old quest story to life. Moana has to leave her home to save it. Mulan challenges the Hun’s. Katniss finds purpose with her bow and arrow. Shrek accidentally becomes the “knight in shining armor.” When Alicia and I discussed Cinder on the podcast in season one, we talked about prevalence of the Cinderella motif across the globe. We’re all searching to make meaning out of our own life journey and we can use pop culture to show students how stories have always sought to do just that.
The old will always be new again, and we should continue to bring those new stories back to our students to help them see the echoes of the past and the cultural concerns of the present. The monomyth is not the end of our discussion of literary analysis, it’s the springboard for everything else. If we are interested in promoting lifelong literacy, we can get students started by showing them these patterns in the media they already consume. This is something that we can easily do at nearly every grade level.
I keep building up my resources for the hero’s journey. Last year I created a complete unit for The Alchemist and have also used this chart to compare the stories of two heroes or this chart to compare the stories of three characters. I also created this comparison chart for two tragic heroes from different stories.
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