Bard Mythologies:
What is on offer here?
The Bard Mythologies purpose is to explore the mythic and archetypal roots of culture. The best analogy to understand this comes from the world of computing. Myths are the operating systems of culture. But like most operating systems they are often not known, even invisible. This is partly because they are intrinsic to culture, though so much of what they contain is (just) taken for granted.
McLuhan, the Canadian media guru had a pithy aphorism for this matter, “the one thing about which fish know exactly nothing is water”. And so it is for culture. The goal, or mission of Bard Mythologies is clear. It is to raise awareness, through oral storytelling, of the way myth and archetype shape every aspect of culture, whether people know it or not.
The outcome of any serious engagement with myth is that the individual, culture, community, or nation becomes conscious of the “myth it lives by”. Without this “the myths have you”. This means an internal feeling of being somewhat tossed hither and thither by forces more powerful than you, of being somehow dis-embedded, or off centre. What we learned from the Bard Global Myth Survey on Irish Myth is that the familiarity with the Myths is very partial, both in Ireland and among the diaspora.
The real gift of the Bard Mythologies journey or way is the same gift that was given to the High King Bran. It was given by the Sea God Manannan mac Lir after a great otherworld adventure. It is “silver branch perception”. This is the gift of seeing deeply, of seeing the deep slow-moving currents that shape our world and avoid being distracted by all the noisy and turbulent waves on the surface.
What is certainly not on offer is a belief system, or indeed any great truths, certainly not of divine revelation. Rather what is to be found (here) is a relatively simple method, the Mythic Method, built totally around Oral Myth-telling in a community context. It is, at its core, a timeless, ancient approach that is pragmatic, functional, and useful. This Mythic Method is a means of continual self-reflection. The conclusion or destination will not be utopia. Indeed there would be an inherent distrust of such an outcome. Utopia’s are static, and too often the cause of much terror and tyranny.
The potential sought here is about balance and equilibrium, rather than growth and power. This balance is about containing our different aspirations and desires, and at the very least preventing us from wiping each other out. It is also an idea of an imagined place, where communities listen to each other through storytelling, restorative justice and feasting and to experience that we are all the people from somewhere else, with much in common. In the Irish Myths this is what is called The Fifth Province. Much more on that when you dig in further.And it is the world’s myths and archetypes that do attest to that assertion!
