Gender Socialization in Creation Myths

Abstract—The creation stories vary in different peoples and cultural groups; however, it is noteworthy to investigate the common representation of the man and the woman in these creation myths. This research theorizes that men and women in the legends of the origin of human beings, through their plots and archetypes, reveal the gender socialization across nations. This is supported by the theories of gender schema, formalism, archetypal, mimesis, and feminism in the analytical approach toward delving into the creation of man stories, focusing on their structural and archetypal dimensions. Specifically, it analyses the following: (1) the plot structuration of the creation of man myths; (2) the archetypal image of men and women in the stories and their signification; and (3) the gender socialization in the creation myths. The method of research used in this study is discourse analysis of the ten creation myths from representative regions of the world: Greece’s Prometheus’ Creation of Man, Israel’s Adam and Eve, Korea’s Dan Gun Legend, Ethiopia’s Story of Wak, Australia’s Punjil’s Creation of Man, India’s Kausitaki Brahmana Myth, New Zealand’s Rangi and Papa, the Philippines’ Malakas and Maganda, Zimbabwe’s Wahungwe, and Wicsonsin’s The Menominee and Manabush. The results of the discourse analysis are these findings: (1) the creation myths reveal that man is the primary being created for a purpose while woman is created as secondary or supplementary and is created for man; (2) the archetypes of male legendary characters are god-like and powerful while female legendary characters are made out of man, from man or by man; (3) the common signification of men’s superiority and the women’ inferiority in reflects the gender socialization depiction in the myths. Hence, the assumption has been proved as the conclusion of the study: the creation of man stories, as evidenced by their plots and archetypes, are agents of gender socialization.

Index Terms—Culture, feminism, gender roles, gender schema, masculinism or masculism, origin of man, sociology.

Doris Ogdoc-Gascon is with Cebu, Philippines (e-mail: doris_ogdoc@yahoo.com).

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Cite: Doris Ogdoc-Gascon, "Gender Socialization in Creation Myths," International Journal of Culture and History vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 83-86, 2016.