I encourage you to google "incest" and "mythology", "greek mythology", "native american mythology", and any other cultures that interest you.
Think back to stories you've read that deal with incest - King Arthur is seduced by his sister, Morgan le Fay, and has his son, Mordred, with her. You'll start to agree that it is a common theme. Read some about incest in myth and then discuss why this is so here.
The University of Pittsburg has a whole class that deals with incest in Indo-European folk tales. This site has the myths and then discussions:
www.pitt.edu/~dash/incest.html
Also, think about the Greeks - Oedipus comes immediately to mind. And I found this on-line: "The princess Myrrha was bewitched by Aphrodite into seducing her father Theias, king of Syria. Myrrha tricked him into committing incest with her, although when he found out, he wished to kill her. She fled and was turned into a myrrh tree by Aphrodite to protect her from her father. Adonis sprang from the bark of the tree." Incest is common in other Greek myths as well.
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Detail of beadwork from an Ojibwe medicine pouch
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3 comments:
i think its wierd that incest is illegal in some states but its legal in some places too... incest is disgusting and wrong. however, even though the bible says its wrong, who is to say it should be illegal, because the church and state are supposed to be seperate...
It seems like the theme of incest is an important plot element in a lot of myths. For instance, the entire storyline of Oedipus is based around his marriage to Jocasta, and Jocasta's realization of Oedipus' true identity is essentially the climax of the plot.
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