The Types of Archetypes (Week 7)

Archetypes. It is a word thrown around by academics a lot, but what does it actually mean? According to Merriam- Webster, it is defined as "the original pattern or model of which all things of the same type are representations or copies." Makes a lot of sense, right? Yeah, doesn't to me, either. But basically it means the original that all others come from. The original story, the original print, the original god.
There are a lot of types of archetypes, but for now I will only inundate you with a few pertaining to mythology: hero, Great Mother, and what usually brings them together.

We will start off easy: the hero. We, being of European descent, often picture heroes as dashing young white men who come from a noble background and fight the odds to do great deeds. More realistically/modernly, our heroes come in all shapes, sizes, and colors. Shrek is a big, ugly, green ogre. But he is the hero of his own tale and wins the damsel with the aid of a frustrating sidekick. He is hated by most, has no notable origins, and befriends the dragon instead of killing it. The hero is often the protagonist of the myth, be it Shrek or Prometheus.

But the Great Mother is a lot more complex. The Great Rounds, created by Erich Neumann, hosts 6 mythological mothers that represent broad types of the Great Mother figure. This round includes Isis the good mother (fruit, birth, rebirth, immortality), Mary (spiritual transformation), Sophia the positive anima (wisdom, vision, inspiration, ecstasy), Kali the terrible mother (sickness, dismemberment, death, extinction), the Witches, and Lilith the negative anima (ecstasy, madness, impotence, stupor). For more information on this incredible analysis, look at Neumann's book, "The Great Mother: An Analysis of the Archetype." But overall this gives most people a good view of what the Great Mother can do: she is the embodiment of both creation and destruction.

The relationship between the hero and the Great Mother is often circumstantial, however. In many myths, she attempts to help the hero save mankind. But sometimes she is also depicted as a jealous and vengeful creature who is the main antagonist. Mostly this relationship depends on the values of the originating culture. For instance, Sedna of the Inuit mythos is a creator and mother goddess because she defied her father (the supreme god) and provides enough sea life for her people to survive. She was birthed from a culture where gender roles do not exist. Contrast that with the wife figure of Hera in the Greek pantheon, who hates all of Zeus' bastards vehemently. Greece had rather strict gender roles up until recently and even now their culture is viewed as sexist by some.