Symbols and Myth-Making in Modernity: Deep Culture in Art and Action

Product Description Why do people queue up and break the bank to watch fantasy movies? Why do some fictional characters and mythical creatures strangely arrest our mind and senses? Why do some images and tales affect us so deeply? From mystical heroic journeys to uncanny images and invincible goddesses, ‘Symbols and Myth-Making in Modernity’ investigates the metaphoric power of symbols in human imagination today and in the past. The book traces how ever-present symbols in cultures and rituals across the world, as well as in masterpieces of Renaissance, Sufi poetry and Finnish ‘Kalevala’ myths, erupt in popular culture today, including in cinema, books, visual art, music and politics. The authors develop a phenomenological theory of deep culture that nourishes human perception of reality through multivalent symbols and myths, in which art and rituals occur as liminal spaces of symbol-making. Drawing on examples from the Hobbit and Avengers, street art, politics, and work of acclaimed modern artists, the book describes how deep culture can be seen as a symbolic map of modern mythology. Dismantling literalism and disturbing our view of the world, at each step the book unpacks how symbols play out in the modern world and the work they do in transforming the self. Review “Deep Culture showcases an innovative theory that is both rigorous and applicable for making sense of the symbolic world around and within us. Tatiana and Ali Qadir are delightful guides, sensitively navigating an entrancing journey into the depths of popular culture and the mythical bedrocks of our psyches. This is an exceptional, multidisciplinary scholarship presented accessibly." ―Dr. Durre Ahmed,Clinical PsychologistChairperson, Center for the Study of Gender and Culture,Pakistan. “In this refreshingly innovative work, the authors incisively relate the mythical themes in popular films such as Matrix, Moana, and Pirates of the Caribbean, among others, to ancient mythemes. They reveal the link between ancient myths and the themes foregrounded in this type of film. More importantly and revealingly, they show how modernity’s aversion to ambiguity, multivalence, and especially to interior transformation leads to a situation that has produced fragmentation. Fragmentation modernity generates both at the level of the individual and at the societal level. This situation has given rise to epidemic levels of mental illness and drug addiction in modernity as well as to a deepening of political fragmentation and ecological destruction.” ―Dr. Frederique Apffel-Marglin,Professor Emerita of Anthropology,Smith College, USA.“Certain to provoke spirited debate, this interdisciplinary tour de force offers a framework for the exploration of mythic structures in religion and art as well as contemporary politics, such as attitudes toward the veil and the multiple fundamentalisms that arise in response to it.” ―Dr. Neilesh Bose, Associate Professor, Department of History, Canada Research Chair, Global and Comparative History, University of Victoria, British Columbia.“Drawing on the analytical psychology of Carl Jung and post-Jungian scholarship, Tatiana Tiaynen-Qadir and Ali Qadir open the symbols and myths of contemporary popular culture from a fascinating perspective. Rather than seeing the worldwide success of ‘Western’ popular culture as a manifestation of ‘Americanization’ and cultural imperialism, they suggest that present-day mass culture recycles ancient symbols and myths of global deep culture, shared by the entire humanity. Yet this does not mean that the authors merely celebrate an eternal repetition of ancient hero myths. By scrutinizing the myths of popular culture, they reveal critical truths about ourselves and our current era.” ―Pertti Alasuutari,Professor of Sociology,Tampere University, Finland. About the Author Tatiana Tiaynen-Qadir, anthropologist and historian, researches and writes on anthropology of religion, especially Eastern Christi