The Earth On Turtle's Back Analysis

These Native American spiritual stories can be compared to the book of Genesis. Both of the stories and the book of Genesis all start with water at the beginning of the story. In "How the World Was Made" everything was all water and the animals lived above in the sky. "The Sky Tree" starts with the earth covered in water. The book of Genesis claims that the earth began in water. Another common characteristic between all three stories is how land came after water. In all three stories, land

rather than the usual patriarchal perspective of women and their influence in the development of the world. The myth states, "After a while, the woman’s time came, and she was delivered of a daughter. The woman and her daughter kept walking in a circle around the earth, so that the earth and plants would continue to grow." In the perspective of the audience, women are depicted as role models and their ability to fulfill a motherly role allows humanity to gain knowledge. Knowledge is a key aspect in the development of civilizations and the women 's knowledge of cultivating the land will ultimately result in the continuation of civilization on the Turtle 's back. The myth also states, "As she

In the beginning of the myth, the gods Plumed Serpent and Hurricane created the first plant life and the mountains on Earth. As time went by, the gods felt there was something missing because there was no noise on the planet. They then created animals to live in the forests. Once the animals were created, the gods had the intention of having the animals speak. Without language, the animals could not worship the gods properly. This left the gods unsatisfied. With this, the gods decided to create humans. The humans would be able to worship the gods and the animals would stay in the forests to serve the needs of man.

After reading the Native American myths "When Grizzlies Walked Upright" and "Earth on Turtle's Back," it can be inferred that the characters in each story reveal the values of the Native American culture. The characters in these myths reveal the Native Americans' views of man, nature, and God.

¨Folktales are oral narratives that do not have a singular, identifiable author. Expanded and shaped by the tongues of tellers over time, and passed down from one generation to the next”(Forest). Folktales are comprised of many different forms of myths, such as trickster tales, clan, and creation myth, like in the two short stories The World on the Turtle’s Back by the Iroquois tribe and The Earth on Turtle’s Back by the Onondaga-Northeast Woodlands. Although both of these creation myths are similar, they have subtle differences depending on the tribe that they came from.

People have told myths throughout the centuries to give the unknown a meaning behind its existences. Myths are the results of the human imagination to explain the supernatural events. An explanation gives the people a better understanding to what the unknown may be, offers hope to what the people can achieve in the American Dream, and giving us an inspirational story to achieve the

The telling of tales is a tradition old as time. Ancient culture from all over the world have folktales and grand stories of their land. Although many of these cultures are divided by language barriers and thousands of miles, they all all share one thing in common: Myths. Myths were told to answer questions that these ancient societies pondered. Although there were many types of myths, creation myths were told to teach values that were highly values in that society, this was important because these values preserved their land.

We tend to think of myth as an untrue story or as an outdated explanation for a mystery long since cleared up by science, but myth is actually a framework of meaning, a set of collective fantasies that story our relationship to each other, the world and the universe. To tell a myth is to tell a culture 's dream about its inner workings and truths. Myth does not convey these truths literally, however. A myth tells its tale through symbol, image and metaphor. They don 't explain so much as offer an enchanting, elevating or disturbing experience, sometimes warning us about where we should or should not go. Myths continually come back to life all around us. No one leaves them behind because we always face the recurring problems of life they address.

The exact origins of myths are unknown and have been changed or altered because myths were passed on orally before the invention of writing (Barnett 6). As stated by Barnett, “They developed and changed in the telling according to the customs, tastes, and needs of the tellers” (6).

Before the cars came flying through, the insects jumped and crawled through the dry, tangled, broken grass. The land turtle walked through the grass dragging his shell and not stopping for any reason. Behind the turtle there was a trail due to his big shell and his hard yellow nailed legs. The turtle pushed up on his hind legs to the pavement using all his strength which were as strong as an elephants legs.

“A myth is a way of making sense in a senseless world. Myths are narrative patterns that give significance to our existence.” ― Rollo May

There is allusion of the two trees in the blibcal content. The dragon tree behind Adam which represents eternal life, or the Tree of Life. In the middle ground towards the right side, there is a date tree with a black snake coiled on the trunk. The allusion of the snake represents the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil; which mankind will soon be doomed when Eden picked apples from this tree. Also, the dark water with mysterious creatures hiding beneath the surface, that is ready to crawl out, is hinting a dark future. The introduction of man and women is thought to have some sexual allusion. The presence of rabbits beside Eve’s feet symbolize

From before the dawn of civilization as we know it, humanity has formed myths and legends to explain the natural world around them. Whether it is of Zeus and Hera or Izanami-no-Mikoto and Izanagi-no-mikoto, every civilization and culture upon this world has its own mythos. However, the age of myth is waning as it is overshadowed in this modern era by fundamental religion and empirical science. The word myth has come to connote blatant falsehood; however, it was not always so. Our myths have reflected both the society and values of the culture they are from. We have also reflected our inner psyche, conscious and unconscious, unto the fabric of our myths.

When Earth began there was just one thing, water. The people lived in the sky. You would think you would never run out of space, but guess what, you do. It started to become crowded with all of the animals and the Cherokee tribe therefore, they became curious about what was beneath the water. One day Dayuni’si, the water beetle, volunteered to go and check it out. He went everywhere across the exterior but couldn’t find solid ground. So he then he dove below the surface and only found mud. This began to enlarge in size and spread outwards to it became Earth as we know it. Myth has it that after all of this, an animal connected the new land to the sky with 4 strings. When Earth formed it was saturated and mushy, so the tribe decided that a bird

Neil began to sense brisk movements in their vehicle. Thunk! As he looked up a sense of hope left his body. The driver was shot and killed. In desperation for survival Neil reached for the lock. Gravity was turned off as he began to float in the rolling car. The car had started to tear apart and open creating an escape route for Neil. He was launched out of his car into the lush rain forests of Jamaica. From the perspective of a 1 inch turtle, he was lost. Neil had decided to take refuge in his shell.