Author: Elspeth Newton

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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Margaret Ann Mendenhall, PhD

Maggie’s talk is called “The Inner Light”: The Alienation and Re-Membering of soma in Star Trek: The Next Generation

This paper will discuss the idea of soma, the appeal of Star Trek, and how in both the television series and films, soma has been alienated — designated to be illustrated in non-human characters. It will then use the episode from Star Trek: The Next Generation, “The Inner Light,” to examine how soma has been dismembered from the ideals of Starfleet, but how it can also be re-membered. In this episode, Captain Jean-Luc Picard is sent to live out a lifetime in a now extinct culture that died when it became too hot for life to exist. That culture’s idea to preserve its existence was to send a probe into space in order to find a teacher to tell others about their civilization. Reflecting that sentiment, this paper will discuss the importance of myth and depth psychology – including soma, and how Star Trek reflects our culture in all its imperfections.

About Maggie

Margaret (Maggie) Mendenhall, PhD, currently resides in Long Beach, California and is a graduate of Pacifica Graduate Institute’s Mythological Studies program. She is also currently a student in Pacifica’s Depth Psychology program, specializing in Jungian and Archetypal Studies. Margaret has presented papers on Star Trek-related topics at various conferences, including past Mythologiums; the Science Fictions, Popular Culture Academic Conference; the Association for the Study of Women and Mythology (ASWM); and Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association (PCA), for which she also serves as Area Chair for Psychology and Popular Culture. She writes a blog, My Daily Soul Trek, analyzing each Star Trek episode and film from the beginning in chronological order through a depth psychological perspective. She has written, performed, and produced two myth-based one-woman shows: Dancing to the Edge of a Cliff: A Mythical Journey Toward Wholeness, and Soul Trek: My Sci-Fi Journey Toward Wholeness, and produced and hosted the public access television series Myth Is All Around Us.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Dr. Leon Aliski

Leon’s talk is called “Visions of a City on a Hill: A Mytho-Historic Perspective in this Age of Global Crisis”

We will explore the roots of inspiration for John Winthrop’s A Model of Christian Charity, an obscure text written to inspire residents of a largely Protestant England to uproot themselves and embark on a journey to the unknown North American continent. “We shall be as a city upon a hill; the eyes of all people are upon us,” Winthrop wrote in 1629.

In more recent times, the phrase “as a city upon a hill” has proliferated in evangelical Protestantism and contemporary political rhetoric to express the hope and promise of the American Dream. Yet, other parts of the text expressing concern about social inequality and community have been largely forgotten.

How has this text that originates from England’s Puritan past morphed into inspiration for what has become known as American exceptionalism and nationalism? Does its political appropriation mark a turning point, a reframing of our colonial myth in this age of global crisis? We will explore these questions and more, with deep reflection on how mythology and history are interwoven.

About Leon

Leon Aliski, PhD holds a doctorate in cultural mythology and depth psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute. His dissertation, Wild Bison and the Buffalo People: Reimagining ‘The Heart of Everything That Is’, explores the cultural and historical significance of the buffalo as expressed through sacred narratives, songs, visions, and ceremonies. He is a supporter of Cloud Horse Art Institute, dedicated to Lakota traditional arts, performing arts, and culture camps, and the Reel Jobs Film School located on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Rebecca Migdal Kilicaslan

Rebecca’s talk is called “Climate Cassandras and the Psychology of Believing”

Scientists and environmental activists are modern-day Cassandras, desperate to convince world leaders that drastic action must be taken immediately to avert disaster. In this polarized time, have we lost our sense of a shared myth of progress, crippling our ability to act collectively and avert the coming climate catastrophe? Can depth psychology set us back on track towards psychological and cultural effectiveness and resolve?

Looking at the Cassandra myth through an archetypal lens reveals a story of the rupture between unconscious instinct, represented by Cassandra, and conscious rationalism, in the guise of her spurned lover Apollo, who has cursed her to foresee the future but never be believed. While most of us are convinced that our beliefs are formed by conscious choice, the process of belief formation is rarely rational, whether these beliefs originate in childhood, are encoded into the social fabric of our communities, or are constructed by imposing unconscious contents onto the random stream of information encountered on the internet. Using the insights of depth psychology to correlate the Cassandra myth to Q-anon, Ken Keyes’s The Hundredth Monkey, and the film Don’t Look Up, this paper strategizes a more conscious attitude towards belief in inconvenient facts.

About Rebecca

Rebecca Migdal Kilicaslan, MA, MFA is an artist, performer, and author who works with dreams, myths, and folktales. In 2017 she co-founded Book & Puppet Co., a bookstore and puppet theater in Easton, Pennsylvania. She is a doctoral candidate in Jungian Psychology and Archetypes at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Rebecca studied with Steve Aizenstat, and is a certified Dreamtender™. She teaches in the Art + Design department at East Stroudsburg University.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Dr. Jennifer Degnan Smith

Jennifer’s talk is called “Mythic Places of Greece Speak of our Ecological Ills”

The ancient Greeks recognized the deep connection between myth and place. The sacred places of myth were often the locations of rituals to honor the gods and goddesses. Perhaps there is something about these places that, even in modern times, holds the archetypal energies of the deities who were worshipped there.

Engaging the mythic places that hold archetypal energies around ecological consciousness through a terrapsychological lens (Chalquist, 2007) may provide insight into modern-day ecological and psychological ills. Terrapsychology explores how our outer landscapes reflect our inner landscapes, and vice-versa. We can access a place’s wisdom by listening empathetically to it through its symbols and images.

Engaging with mythic places may reveal the “health” of the archetypal energies of the gods and goddesses who were once worshipped there. For instance, Eleusis, once the place of the sacred mysteries of Demeter, the goddess of the harvest, is now a major industrial area with severe environmental issues. The River Ilissos in Athens, once the river of the gods, has been cemented over. These sacred places may provide wisdom about our ecological crisis and consciousness if we pay attention. 

Work Cited
Chalquist, C. (2007). Terrapsychology: Reengaging the soul of place. New Orleans, LA: Spring Journal Books.

About Jennifer

Jen Degnan Smith has a Ph.D. in Jungian and Archetypal Psychology. She explores sociocultural issues, particularly healing and empowering the feminine within individuals and the collective. Her 20-year career in organizational consulting and university teaching spans the United States and Europe. She spent eight years traveling extensively to Greece exploring ancient myth and the modern economic crisis.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Dr. Geoff Berry

Geoff’s talk is called “Ecomythic Light”

Our relationship with our more-than-human kin–the other animals, plants and elements we share this planet with–has been inscribed in countless animistic myths. Cosmologies of a living world can help us to practice deep listening to other forms of intelligence, creating breathing space for our embodied forms of consciousness as self-aware primates.

But we humans also dream up visions of a realm beyond the physical universe. In this endless imaginal dreaming of life beyond the limits of materiality, light holds a special place for the metaphorical potential it embodies. Light is both physical phenomena and a vehicle of meaning. This presentation offers an “ecomythic” way to balance and clarify our focus on these two streams of embodiment and gnosis at the same time. On the one hand, we consider the spiritually liberating nature of light, as it symbolises freedom and hope; and on the other, we breathe into the body of our physical paradigm, exploring how we might live in “right relation” with our kin on planet earth.

About Geoff

Dr. Geoff Berry’s PhD dissertation traced the way human relationships with nature could be interpreted through the way we inscribe meaning upon light (Monash University 2010). His previous MA explored the nexus between personal dreams and collective mythologies, again from an ecophilosophical perspective (Deakin University 2005). Geoff trains psychotherapists and ecotherapists with the Metavision Institute. He is the Australian Representative to the International Ecopsychology Society and has served as the Chairperson of the Melbourne Zen Group and CEO of the South Coast NSW Aboriginal Elders organization.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Rosalyn Fay

Rosalyn’s talk is called “Expanding Empathy and Cultures of Care by Re-centering the Mother Archetype”

Our planet is in crisis due to the devaluing of the Mother archetype. From the minimal support human mothers are given for raising children, to the mass exploitation of farm animal mothers, to the endless extraction from our Mother Earth, we can see this devaluing everywhere. The culture of commerce, and hero-based narratives idolizing the individual over the collective have effectively replaced ancient narratives of how to live in harmony with the earth and each other. This has bred a narcissistic mindset where we see a dangerous decline in empathic ways of being. No other archetype symbolizes communal care and empathy more than the life-bringing and nurturing Mother. Mother, by very definition, is “life creator.”

Many myths depict the wastelands that ensue when gods or people fail to honor the feminine, including the Lady of Llyn-y-Fan Fach (Celtic mythology), Demeter (Greek), and Nuwa (Chinese). These stories demonstrate the vital importance of re-balancing the feminine with the masculine as well as returning the Mother archetype to her rightful place at the center of communal life. This restoration of the natural order is a key part of the healing process and the rebuilding of cultures of empathy and care.

About Rosalyn

Rosalyn is a writer, herbalist, and ritualist. She resides in the coastal redwoods of northern California where she makes herbal medicines and body care products foraged from the surrounding forest. She also facilitates community grief and earth-based healing rituals. She believes it is women’s grief and anger that can fuel real global change, but she believes women must first reconnect with the earth and re-establish that relationship before they can speak to what is fundamentally missing and leading humanity off course. To that end, she is passionate about leading women back to nature and to their natural, deeply feeling, intuitive states. To learn more, visit www.rosalynfay.com.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Danielle Alexander

Danielle’s talk is called “Remembering Eve: How the Myth of Seven Sisters Connects Homo sapiens and Could Be an Avenue for Empathy Across Cultures”

The mythology surrounding the Pleiades is almost canonical, despite tales emerging from various cultures across time and space. Myths of the Seven Sisters are found in ancient Greece and Aboriginal Australia, and variants of the tale are found in Incan, Mayan, and eastern European cosmology. Even in locations where the story is not clear, such as in the Canary Islands, the Lascaux caves, and pre-Islamic Arabia, the Pleiades were culturally influential features of the sky.

It has been proposed that this mythos predates the Homo sapiens migration out of Africa 100,000 years ago when the tale of the Seven Sisters began crossing Europe and Asia. This would mean that the mythos of the Pleiades is one of if not the oldest story told by humans. The tale could be a means for all of humanity to connect to their shared ancestry, regardless of culture, politics, or religion. I seek to highlight how this mythos could encourage empathy by creating a space where diverse voices and traditions can connect through shared mythology and ancestry.

About Danielle

I am an English woman who lives in near Glastonbury, Somerset, United Kingdom. I have received a first-class Bachelor’s degree in Ancient Civilisations and I am currently studying for a Master’s in Cultural Astronomy and Astrology; both degrees are with the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, Lampeter. Mythology has been a keen interest since I was young, and going to university to study the ancient world only affirmed my love for the mystical tales, practices, and traditions from around the globe. My main interest lay in architecture and the Neolithic or Early Bronze Age periods. I am also a cat-lover and enjoy sky-watching, both day and night.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Reise Eiseman-Sanchez Tanner

Reise’s talk is called “Baba Yaga and the Dark Forest: Engendering Truth and Wildness at the Thresholds”

Mythologist Martin Shaw has written that “myth is a wild way of telling the truth.” In these challenging times, both truth and the wild—in ourselves and the natural world—are endangered. Might the old stories be a way to preserve them and find our way forward? With their symbolic images and archetypal figures, myths are doorways to the collective unconscious. They are the voices of wild nature and the ancestors telling us who we are and how to be in the world even when we seem to have severed our connections to them.

Echoes of mythic figures are everywhere—embedded in pop culture, media and merchandise—reminding us that they are still present and can’t be silenced. One such figure that seems to be appearing is Baba Yaga, a wild witch of the woods in Slavic cultures. Depicted as an old woman or hag, her ambiguity, association with natural cycles, and status as a psychopomp inhabiting threshold locations suggest a connection with more ancient goddess traditions and an ecological consciousness. Perhaps her image shows up because it is time to listen rather than attempt to control and contain, to risk the unknown of apprenticeship with truth and wildness.

About Reise

Reise Eiseman-Sanchez Tanner is a PhD student focused on the practices of decolonial depth psychology, ecopsychology, and applied mythology at the crossroads of women’s spirituality, Indigenous traditions, and liberatory methods. Her research positions birthwork as sacred activism and mothering in feminist discourse while exploring archetypes of the Feminine, centering what has been marginalized, and finding ways to reconnect with the natural world. She is also a mother, storyteller, seasoned doula, perinatal educator, Certified Empowerment Coach, Maya Abdominal Therapy practitioner, and creator of multiple group programs who has attended hundreds of births and supported thousands of people through initiations and life cycle events.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Jason D. Batt

Jason’s talk is called “Do This in Remembrance of Me: Bits and Pieces in Re-membering the Body”

A third testament of the Christian tradition was never canonized. However, two works explore the fresh manifestation of a divine revelation of community within the natural world. These new scriptures guide us towards “re-membering” new bodies of community within a natural environment. Written 136 years apart, Moby Dick by Herman Melville and Beloved by Toni Morrison explore this transformation within the evolving American landscape. Each work’s Biblical allusions and narratological structure beg to be seen as a third testament, one which incarnates the collective community within the new sacred space of the natural world.

Ultimately, these scriptures guide the development of community firmly rooted in an ecological understanding. In Beloved, Baby Suggs is the manifestation of the divine and her chapel is that of the wild forest, far from the walls of standard temple or church. In Moby Dick, Queequeg is the Word incarnate and his prophet, Ishmael, extends the sacred space to the whole of the Earth: “I mean, sir, the same ancient Catholic Church to which . . . all of us . . . belong; the great and everlasting First Congregation of this whole worshiping world . . . in that we all join hands.” The two works, in concert, present a path through myth towards community empathy.

About Jason

Jason D. Batt is the co-founder of Signal Hill Road Publishing. He serves as the Creative and Editorial Director for the 100 Year Starship and is the founder and organizer of the annual Canopus Award for Excellence in Interstellar Writing. His novels include Onliest, Young Gods, and Dreamside, and his short fiction has appeared in Perihelion, Bastion, Bewildering Stories, A Story Goes On, and other periodicals. Most recently he edited the science fiction anthology Visions of the Future, published through Lifeboat Foundation and Strange California, a successful Kickstarter through Falstaff Books.

2022 Mythologium program
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Mythologium 2022 welcomes Sophie Strand

Sophie’s talk is called “Myth and Mycelium”

I have been thinking of myths as the “fruiting body mushrooms” of underground mycelial mythic systems. I have come to the conclusion that you can only understand a myth in its particular ecosystem. Just like mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of underground mycelial systems, so are myths the particular above-ground mushrooms of a specific ecology. We can think of mythologems and mythic figures as being like the giant (perhaps 7,000-year-old) honey fungus in Oregon. It stretches for miles underground and fruits up as mushrooms that superficially look like individuals.

The cattle cults that spread across the Mediterranean during the Bronze Age are like the honey fungus. Orpheus and the Orphic hymns are now treated more as a title than a specific mythic figure. Lyric prophets stepped into the role of Orpheus. Perhaps my favorite example is Dionysus. Dionysus “fruits” up across the Mediterranean, in different cities, often looking different, offering a variety of fermented beverages as suited to the different ecologies. But the real Dionysus is the mycorrhizal system of vegetal gods underground, weaving a net that is ready to pop up and proliferate wherever nature-based, ecstatic wisdom is needed.

About Sophie

Sophie Strand is a writer based in the Hudson Valley who focuses on the intersection of spirituality, storytelling, and ecology. Her first book of essays The Flowering Wand: Rewilding the Sacred Masculine will be published by Inner Traditions in Fall 2022 and is available for pre-order. Her eco-feminist, historical fiction reimagining of the gospels The Madonna Secret will also be published by Inner Traditions in Spring 2023. Subscribe for her newsletter at sophiestrand.substack.com, and follow her work on Instagram (@cosmogyny) and at www.sophiestrand.com.

2022 Mythologium program