There is a strange emptiness to life without myths.
I am African American — by which I mean, a descendant of slaves, rather than a descendant of immigrants who came here willingly and with lives more or less intact. My ancestors were the unwilling, unintact ones: children torn from parents, parents torn from elders, people torn from roots, stories torn from language. Past a certain point, my family’s history just… stops. As if there was nothing there.
I could do what others have done, and attempt to reconstruct this lost past. I could research genealogy and genetics, search for the traces of myself in moldering old sale documents and scanned images on microfiche. I could also do what members of other cultures lacking myths have done: steal. A little BS about Atlantis here, some appropriation of other cultures’ intellectual property there, and bam! Instant historically-justified superiority. Worked great for the Nazis, new and old. Even today, white people in my neck of the woods call themselves “Caucasian”, most of them little realizing that the term and its history are as constructed as anything sold in the fantasy section of a bookstore.
These are proven strategies, but I have no interest in them. They’ll tell me where I came from, but not what I really want to know: where I’m going. To figure that out, I make shit up.
Tag: myth personal-history african-american constructs making-stuff-up
When being objective, we can transcend and look back at our constructs with powerful clarity; instead of looking through them, which can give a murky and distorted view.
Jay WoodmanTag: clarity objective view objectivity transcend clear view-point constructs distorted
When you engage with people, you build your own insight into what’s being discussed. Someone else’s understanding complements yours, and together you start to weave an informed interpretation. You tinker until you can move on.
Marcia ConnerTag: collaboration engagement constructs tinkering
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