1. First read pages 20-25 in your Elements of Literature anthology.
2. Next, choose a Native American myth or legend. One person will present the Native American folk tale to the class. In Native American tradition, stories, legends and history were passed down through oral tradition; there were no written documents. Often, storytellers would illustrate their tales with drawings on cave walls or clothing, and even in dirt on the ground. They never read the stories. Instead, the shamans, or storytellers, would engage their audience by telling the folk tale with emotion using different voices, facial expressions and gestures. I expect you to do the same. You are to use a four panel story board as a visual aid during the presentation and supplement your telling with appropriate music, photographs or artifacts.
3. The other partner will present a comparison of your Native American myth or legend to a myth or legend from another culture. They will share an explanation of how the two stories deal differently with a similar theme or event.
4. For the third part of the project, each person is to write a 350-500 word essay that explains how the two myths you have researched illustrate the archetypal mythological and heroic elements identified by Joseph Campbell. Essays are to include appropriate MLA documentation of citations and a Works Cited bibliography of at least three sources.
Online sources about mythology include: