Thomson Li
Professor Dr. Leigh Gold
ENG 1121 D432
                              Genre Assignment
In Japanese mythology there culture was meaningful, I found this genre interesting. There are many Japanese myth that was factiting, when reading some of these myths they sounded like old fable. The Japanese always try to incorporate something in existence and time of creation. Which means beginning of time were ancient peoples beliefs on a certain thing or certain creature with power. For generations a person name Nihon Shoki stated “that the Kamiyonanayo group was the first to appear after the creation of the universe, as opposed to the Kamiyonanayo appearing after the formation of heaven and earth”. It was said that the Japanese people believes in the higher up (deities). They worship these myth and fables and legends because of the proud it gives out. Given that I believe that ancient Japanese myth are necessary for society because of how relatable it is for the people to come together. How even deities got problems like a normal person.
What I found interesting about Japanese mythology was how there version of gods are deities and warriors. The samples that I have read, they all seem like fables to me because they are short stories. I found these five myth on wikipedia “Izanagi in the underworld”, “Sun, moon and storms”, “Amaterasu and Susanoo”, “Susanoo and Orochi”, “ Prince Ōkuninushi”. I read many other too, but these seem more connected with one another. What these five myth have in common was that how their story went about, all five all lead back to the origin of deities. I feel like if the people in our society knew of the myth that Japanese had, they would be interested in other cultures and their way of thinking and how their culture came to be. How their Japanese people in the past created this myth. The history about the myths are how one deities gave birth to many other. In the “Sun, moon and storms” the deities was given birth from Izanagi. It was said that each time he undress another deity was formed “As he undressed and removed the adornments of his body, each item that he dropped to the ground formed a deity”. This gave birth to “Amaterasu (incarnation of the sun) from his left eye, Tsukuyomi (incarnation of the moon) from his right eye, and Susanoo (incarnation of storms) from his nose”. The moral of this story was how these deity came to be, and reading about the others it show how these individual deity and what they had to protect, they were given a role to what needing protecting.
The Japanese myth  had many view to their main points. They all share a common message of what they had to protect and how deity came to be from their origin. The five story I chose are closely similar due to their structure. You can say that these deities were once a family at one point and separated because of different belief, and one of the story is about a descendant of susanoo, the story of “Prince Ōkuninushi”. She was a foreshadowing a figure, she foresee a future that she didn’t want to happen and she went to see the descendant susanoo in the underworld where he was banished. so what I found interesting in this was how it talks about how when she needed help she would go seek it. This bring you back to a real life scenario. Where a person can relate to the story. The form of this genre is basically a short story, easy to understand and help give us a small picture of imagination. Although we don’t know who started the myth but we know they wanted people to understand the story and hopefully relate to it and respect its legend. There are other who knows of these myths in Japan, the people who believe so much in these myth they named their shrine after these tails. All five of these myths are almost similar like I said in the beginning it’s like one origin starts
These myth gives off vivid examples of what they are giving off to the people that wants to believe in their myths. I believe that the goals of these myth was for the Japanese to come together, and relate. Although they are not exactly the same they all have their own story, how in “Izanagi in the underworld” was about how “Izanagi lamented the death of Izanami and undertook a journey to Yomi (the shadowy land of the dead)”. While in the others like “Sun, moon and storms” was about how Izanagi dropped items, and how the items becoming deities. That the beginning of the origin story for the deities. In “Amaterasu and Susanoo” it was about how siblings have different ideal of what good and evil, and being deity Susanoo was banish from the heaven, and “Susanoo and Orochi” was about an old tail of susanoo being a deity he was banaish, while being banish he met a old couple. They sought his help protecting their only daughter from the evil dragon orochi “The old couple explain that they originally had eight daughters who were devoured, one after the other, by the dragon, Yamata no Orochi”. So he offer to help if he can have a “ hand in marriage” with the author and of course the couple agree. As a parent all you want is to protect the most precious thing their child. Finally the story of “ Prince Ōkuninushi” he was a descendant of Susanoo. The main plot of this story was that the prince encounter a rabbit that was hurt, and cured it “the cured rabbit made a divined prediction that Ōnamuji”. This goes to show how different these myth are but it also goes to show how similar they are. By showing deities having the same problems as a regular person so that many can relate to the myth.
As stated I believe that Japanese mythology is a meaningful genre. That I think people should know about. I feel like many can relate to these myth. Even though I find these myth like a short story, it is so much more. It relatable to many other, you can understand the culture so much with these myth and many others. How do origin of these came from, where they come from, and how their purpose of life. What they need to protect, what they stood for. A myth that a parent can tell to their kids so they would pass it on to the next generation. Having the story pass down to one generation to the next with proud from these story that they can one day relate to it.
Works Cited
Japanese mythology. (2019, April 03). Retrieved from https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_mythology
Japanese Creational Myths. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.crystalinks.com/japancreation.html
To the Underworld (Yomi-no-kuni) and Back. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.japanesemythology.jp/yomi-no-kuni/
