Adolescence & Mythology
Option A: Explain why mythology is crucial in the life of adolescents, according to the authors. Support your idea using four examples from the text. Be sure to offer your opinion about your main points, explaining why you agree with the authors.
Adolescence and Mythology can be a very debatable article. Many say mythology does not affect adolescence, while many others say it does. In the midst of these people there are the in between-ers who can’t decide. This article has many facts to support all three opinions but it mainly has facts that support the opinion that adolescence cannot exist without mythology. Throughout the article it explains why and how adolescences use and need mythology. Adolescence use myths to help themselves with growing up, find help/solutions/blame for their problems, and find out who they are. “Adolescents need to live their myths. During this transitional phase, myths have a facilitate function making gods, heroes and nymphs, figures who are all-good or all-bad thus creating a spiritual and mental transitional space for growth. Mythical thinking is an integral part of adolescence.” When children start to mature, they need someone they can be, they need someone they can look up to, they need someone who can give purpose to their lives. The excerpt explains how thinking of myths and mythological characters can help adolescence grow and how they aspire to become like the character they look up to. Just like how kids look up to Superman, the same goes for adolescence. They make their own lives into living myths and comparing their own to others so that they can formulate their next step. “When something goes wrong, the adolescence might be caught in perverse, distorted myths that may inhibit him or her. Likewise, he or she may be trapped in a psychic life empty of myths and magic, of passions and feelings, and thus unable to work through said frustrations and losses toward an integrated self-image and identity.” The saying “Too
Adolescence and Mythology can be a very debatable article. Many say mythology does not affect adolescence, while many others say it does. In the midst of these people there are the in between-ers who can’t decide. This article has many facts to support all three opinions but it mainly has facts that support the opinion that adolescence cannot exist without mythology. Throughout the article it explains why and how adolescences use and need mythology. Adolescence use myths to help themselves with growing up, find help/solutions/blame for their problems, and find out who they are. “Adolescents need to live their myths. During this transitional phase, myths have a facilitate function making gods, heroes and nymphs, figures who are all-good or all-bad thus creating a spiritual and mental transitional space for growth. Mythical thinking is an integral part of adolescence.” When children start to mature, they need someone they can be, they need someone they can look up to, they need someone who can give purpose to their lives. The excerpt explains how thinking of myths and mythological characters can help adolescence grow and how they aspire to become like the character they look up to. Just like how kids look up to Superman, the same goes for adolescence. They make their own lives into living myths and comparing their own to others so that they can formulate their next step. “When something goes wrong, the adolescence might be caught in perverse, distorted myths that may inhibit him or her. Likewise, he or she may be trapped in a psychic life empty of myths and magic, of passions and feelings, and thus unable to work through said frustrations and losses toward an integrated self-image and identity.” The saying “Too