Crash Course: World Mythology

Welcome to Crash Course World Mythology, our latest adventure (and this series may be literally adventurous) in education. Over the next 40 episodes or so, we and Mike Rugnetta are going to learn about the world by looking at the foundational stories of a bunch of different cultural traditions.

Today on Crash Course Mythology we?re starting in on creation stories. This week, we?ll focus on the creation of the universe out of nothing, or Ex Nihlio creation. Basically, a god decides to make a universe out of nothing.

In which Mike teaches you about the creation of the universe, with sex. This week we're talking about creations stories from Egypt, West Africa, Greece, China, and Persia that have a lot in common with human sexual reproduction.

So, we?re still talking about sex this week, but we?re talking about Earth Mothers and their children. We'll start with Gaia, and her son Kronos, who had a classic childhood rebellion and castrated his father.

In which Mike Rugnetta sits you down for a little talk about myth as a way to construct or reinforce social orders. Specifically, we?re going to look today at stories from around the world that establish or amplify the idea that the errors of women have brought bad things into the world.

In which Mike Rugnetta brings you the final installation of our unit on creation myths. This week, we're talking about human beings and their relationship to the natural world. It turns out foundational stories have a lot to teach us about the ways in which people relate to the physical world.