LEADER 04487nam 22007095 450 001 996248075003316 005 20200928172311.0 010 $a1-283-37990-2 010 $a9786613379900 010 $a1-4008-4286-7 024 7 $a10.1515/9781400842865 035 $a(CKB)2670000000133802 035 $a(EBL)827791 035 $a(OCoLC)769343156 035 $a(SSID)ssj0000642873 035 $a(PQKBManifestationID)11372032 035 $a(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000642873 035 $a(PQKBWorkID)10649111 035 $a(PQKB)11012499 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC827791 035 $a(OCoLC)778432201 035 $a(MdBmJHUP)muse37009 035 $a(DE-B1597)447408 035 $a(OCoLC)1054877335 035 $a(OCoLC)979624186 035 $a(DE-B1597)9781400842865 035 $a(dli)HEB30949 035 $a(MiU)MIU01000000000000012332561 035 $a(EXLCZ)992670000000133802 100 $a20190708d2012 fg 101 0 $aeng 135 $aur|n|---||||| 181 $ctxt 182 $cc 183 $acr 200 10$aWhen They Severed Earth from Sky $eHow the Human Mind Shapes Myth /$fPaul T. Barber, Elizabeth Wayland Barber 205 $aCourse Book 210 1$aPrinceton, NJ :$cPrinceton University Press,$d[2012] 210 4$dİ2005 215 $a1 online resource (311 p.) 300 $aDescription based upon print version of record. 311 $a0-691-09986-3 311 $a0-691-12774-3 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references (p. [253]-263) and indexes. 327 $tFrontmatter --$tCONTENTS --$tILLUSTRATIONS --$tAcknowledgments --$t1 Time Capsules --$t2 The Memory Crunch: How Long a Pipeline? --$t3 The Silence Principle: Of Lethe and the Golden Calf --$t4 More Silence: Movie Reels from Snapshots --$t5 Analogy: Our Brain's Best Talent --$t6 Willfulness: The Atom or Thou --$t7 Multiple Aspects: The More the Merrier --$t8 Multiple Viewpoints: Ear,Trunk, or Tail --$t9 Views through Biased Lenses --$t10 Metaphoric Reality: Magic and Dreams (or H?'s on First) --$t11 Compression: Methuselah and the Eponymous Heroes --$t12 Post Hocus Ergo Pocus: Space Aliens Mutilate Cows! --$t13 Restructuring: New Patterns for Old --$t14 Mnemonics: Behind the Silliness --$t15 The Spirit World: A Realm Reversed --$t16 Of Sky and Time --$t17 Prometheus --$t18 Fire-Breathing Dragons --$tAPPENDIX. Index of Myth Principles --$tBIBLIOGRAPHY --$tINDEX 330 $aWhy were Prometheus and Loki envisioned as chained to rocks? What was the Golden Calf? Why are mirrors believed to carry bad luck? How could anyone think that mortals like Perseus, Beowulf, and St. George actually fought dragons, since dragons don't exist? Strange though they sound, however, these "myths" did not begin as fiction. This absorbing book shows that myths originally transmitted real information about real events and observations, preserving the information sometimes for millennia within nonliterate societies. Geologists' interpretations of how a volcanic cataclysm long ago created Oregon's Crater Lake, for example, is echoed point for point in the local myth of its origin. The Klamath tribe saw it happen and passed down the story--for nearly 8,000 years. We, however, have been literate so long that we've forgotten how myths encode reality. Recent studies of how our brains work, applied to a wide range of data from the Pacific Northwest to ancient Egypt to modern stories reported in newspapers, have helped the Barbers deduce the characteristic principles by which such tales both develop and degrade through time. Myth is in fact a quite reasonable way to convey important messages orally over many generations--although reasoning back to the original events is possible only under rather specific conditions. Our oldest written records date to 5,200 years ago, but we have been speaking and mythmaking for perhaps 100,000. This groundbreaking book points the way to restoring some of that lost history and teaching us about human storytelling. 606 $aMythology$xpsychology 606 $aMythology 606 $aMyth 615 10$aMythology$xpsychology. 615 0$aMythology. 615 0$aMyth. 676 $a201.3 686 $a73.56$2bcl 700 $aBarber$b Elizabeth Wayland$0650968 702 $aBarber$b Paul T. 801 0$bDE-B1597 801 1$bDE-B1597 906 $aBOOK 912 $a996248075003316 996 $aWhen They Severed Earth from Sky$92312873 997 $aUNISA