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Tagged: alphabet, David Abrams, hieroglyphs, image, Jean Huston, language, metaphor, onomatopoeia, word
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September 1, 2020 at 2:10 am #3855
Can’t help but notice that the more I play with language, the more intrigued I am with its origins and evolution.
In one sense, language itself is metaphor. Words are symbols and not the things themselves – which brings to mind an example often offered by Campbell and his friends, Alan Watts and Buckminster Fuller: “the menu is not the meal.”
Language wasn’t invented on the first Tuesday in April of 232,000 B.C. as a complete set of abstract sounds with fixed meanings – though that seems sometimes how we view it today.
So where does language come from?
As a child, we all learned to talk without having to take classes on syntax, sentence structure, and the eight parts of speech. As infants we laughed and cried and made baby sounds – googahs and gawgaws and such, often mimicking the sounds surrounding us – such as the sounds animals make.
Our first recognizable word with clear meaning is often “mama.” Babies seem to naturally make a “mmm” sound when content and happy and safe and sound, which happens most often when Mom is in the vicinity, since love and all good things flow from her.
An easy association to make – things that feel good – suckling and hugging and napping, “mmmm, mmmm, good … ” – and She-Who-is-the-Whole-World to me, also “mmmm, mmmm, good …” – an example of pre-literate, even pre-conscious, metaphorical thinking?
Theorists such as David Abrams (whose elegant volume, The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More Than Human World, is an enchanting, delightful brain-spinning read) suggest language developed from humanity’s interactions with the natural world – the plants and animals and breezes and waters and such all around one. (To give a totally simplistic analogy using onomatopeia, “splash” and “gush” are English words that echo the sound water makes when it’s splashing and gushing – so it’s no surprise to us that the word splash refers to the sound water makes when it splashes or is splashed … yet the word splash is not the splash itself, but represents it – again, a metaphorical relationship of sorts; not the best example of the actual dynamic at work, but maybe gets across the gist of what I’m trying to say).
Spoken language, then, appears to have emerged from human experience and interplay with the natural world, creating a set of collective metaphors that, over time, have become more abstract and removed from the natural world … and written language as well, as it developed, also emerged out of metaphor.
Egyptian hieroglyphs, for example, don’t just represent abstract sounds (though over millennia hieroglyphs changed, especially in response to the adoption of the Phoenician alphabet throughout the Mediterranean world, so over time moved away from image and more towards abstract symbol). The hieroglyph for “bee,” for example, represented the sound a bee makes – zit zit – but also included the image of a bee, and referred as well to the land of milk and honey.
Egyptian hieroglyphs are both images and sounds.
The ancient texts are full of double meanings and hidden clues. The name of the lion, for example, was ra-ra, an onomatopoeic word in imitation of the sound of the lion’s roar. Is it an wonder, then, that we find the sun god Ra appearing as a lion, or that the lion runs beside the chariot of the pharaoh Rameses II as a direct sign that Rameses ( Ra-mose) is the son of the sun god Ra and the lion-headed goddess Sekhmet? …
The pictorial aspect of the hieroglyph contains total meaning. The hieroglyph of the giraffe, for example, means “to foretell,” because the long neck of the giraffe allowed it to see farther into the distance. The picture of a wall falling down carries the message of something overthrown, and the hieroglyph for a jackal means ‘to digest.’
In modern Western languages writing is used in an abstract, linear fashion. If we read the word “jackal,” for instance, the mind conveys memorized sound and visual associations. Hieroglyphic writing and thinking works in a circular fashion. The hieroglyphic image – jackal – is there before our eyes and can expand, evoking within the prepared viewer a whole complex of qualities and associations from abstract, intuitive notions or states of being to relationships and understandings that cannot be defined but must be experienced on many levels.
A jackal, for example, buries its kill until the natural elements have digested it. It knows the right moment to dig up the carrion and finish the eating and digestive process. The jackal-headed god Anubis was not only the neter [god/image] for the human digestive system, but also the one who knew just the right moment to lead the newly dead person before Osiris and the forty-two Assessors, who test the spirit for worthiness to enter the Immortal Realms. Jackal thus represented readiness, timing, preparation, digestion, and immortality: these are some of the images and knowings that would be evoked in the mind of an ordinary Egyptian when seeing the hieroglyph for the jackal.
Jean Houston, The Passion of Isis & Osiris, p. 120
Over time, the Phoenician alphabet morphs from natural image to abstract sign: the letter A, for example, originally depicted an ox or bull, but gradually adopted the de-animated form it has today. (Abrams and others argue that as writing developed and became more abstract, this created distance between the reader and the natural world, creating space for a reflective ego to emerge – but that’s another story.)
As far as a specific language today that relies almost exclusively on metaphor, there are the Dine’ – aka the Navaho – whose poetic use of image made their language the ideal “code” that the Japanese couldn’t break in WWII: hence the term “windtalkers” to describe the role of the Dine’ who transmitted classified messages for the military during the war.
Excuse my rambling as I wander far afield – but seems the relationship between language and metaphor – and how myth appears intertwined with the emergence of language – merits further discussion.
Stephen Gerringer
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September 4, 2020 at 11:46 pm #3873
Oh Stephen, now you’re hitting bull’s eye!
Language… I’m blessed being dutch because we’re used to learn besides dutch also english, french and german. Three germanic and one romanic, members of the the same group yet very distinct (nomative vs verbative {is that the proper word?}). But in utter contrast: there are more languages in Papua-New Guinea then in the rest of the world, mainly by it’s extreme accidented landscape, shouldering english to mandarin to hopi to latin to hindi: the other is an alien, and taste good by the way.
How things and experiences are cast in words is nature, nurture, environment and interpretation (read: the the tale of the winner). Each speaker of a languge considers its own as the perfect representation of the right sounding words. Splash and gush suffice in english, but sounds as ‘spetter’ and ‘plons’ in dutch. My daughters first sounds sounds as pwa-pwa-pwa-pwa, which I take as curious variation (!).
Where does it come from? Apes evolving, mumbling, the males on hunt (MwuhMhuh!, meaning mammoth {english is strange: mother-moth?}), the woman more sedentary invent, unfold and refine speech, civilizing the game-loaden males on returning to their primitive settlement. The world is infinite, and hence the various languages.
Just into the reading of Sumerian history, an almost complete civilisation emerges from nowhere with a equal male-female balance (a requirement for a true and fruitfull culture) with an extreme steep developing language, wedges in clay is the technology only. A marvalous mythology, much copied, unsurpassed in it’s origins.
Ramblings are ok, and lots of references sweep through my memory and the pile of unread books grows out of my chimney (that’s certainly not english, but I’m sure you’ll understand), and I’ve not even mentioned Chomsky! (Now I did.)
On metaphors, the menu is not the meal: your perception of reality is not the reality, but only your perception of it, and hence it is not the reality. Ceci, c’est n’est pas une pipe. Your senses are impaired, your vocation crippled.
Time is a reciprocal dimension: t'=t*√(1-V²/C²)
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September 14, 2020 at 12:01 am #3943
Mars,
Sorry to take so long to respond. Exchanges on these message boards unfold at a much more leisurely pace than the speed of social media. When I read something profound, I often have to let it sit and simmer in the back of my mind for several days for the full flavor to come through. I have to say your words certainly strike a chord (speaking of “hitting the bull’s eye”).
What resonates most for me is your concluding thought:
On metaphors, the menu is not the meal: your perception of reality is not the reality, but only your perception of it, and hence it is not the reality. Ceci, c’est n’est pas une pipe. Your senses are impaired, your vocation crippled.”
Yes! A thousand times, yes!
When we encounter an object in the external world, we don’t observe the actual “thing in itself” (Kant’s dinge an sich), but an image formed by our senses (not that this is anything new for you). The rose I see is perceived differently by a dog, or a butterfly, or an amoeba encountering that same rose. Our senses, in conjunction with the mind (considered a sixth sense in Hindu/Buddhist metaphysics), in effect construct the universe out of metaphors – the subjective sensory images we perceive. Archetypal psychologist James Hillman offers imagination as the organ through which we perceive and engage “reality” – which could be described as a projection of the interior world onto the external universe.
I find myself bringing this back to myth (as metaphor), which then serves as both the womb, and the substance, of experienced reality.
We can expand this theme and approach mundane reality as we would a dream, where everything we experience, everything we encounter, has a symbolic value that deepens and enriches life. Life as a waking dream is a perspective adopted by the many cultures that value oracles. Hence, everything bears significance: the appearance of a rainbow or an abrupt shift in the flight of a bird speaks volumes to an African pygmy or Australian aborigine, as does an I Ching spread to a Taoist adept. “All that exists is but a metaphor,” to paraphrase Campbell’s favorite quote from Goethe (“Alles Verganglich ist nur ein Gleichnis.”). We can interpret, analyze, and engage the stuff of life just as we can the stuff of dream, if we view life with a mythic eye.
Does embracing the metaphor that consensus reality is as illusory and transitory as dream somehow negate the searing pain I feel when I touch a hot stove? Hardly. On one plane, I can recognize that I “am One with” a brick wall – but it doesn’t follow that I’ll decide to physically become one with that wall while zipping along the freeway at ninety miles an hour. That would be reading the metaphor a mite literal . . .
The mythical perspective is in addition to that of waking consciousness – not to replace rational thought and ego consciousness, but deepening and enhancing our experience.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales -
September 14, 2020 at 9:54 pm #3946
If we perceive any input to our senses as a metaphor in a distinctive, tuned language, then dreams are truely in focus of this other sense which seems to switch off at daylight. One can say that dreams are another perception of the fragmented reality, where the awake mind has it own (corresponding) part. Most people will be satisfied by such an idea, but it can or will be very frightening if our dreams come to life before our very eyes. Then you close your eyes, shake your head as if to cleanse the mind, and when you have a closer look at it again, it is gone. That’s why I consider time as reciprocal.
‘The menu is not the meal’ is a phrase of an inspiring fellow, to which this website is devoted.
Time is a reciprocal dimension: t'=t*√(1-V²/C²)
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October 13, 2020 at 6:16 am #4087
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” John 1:1
Perhaps we have it backwards? First we had the Adamic/Proto-Indo-European language then these thought forms gave rise to physical form.
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October 14, 2020 at 12:26 am #4095
The evolution of language and abstract thought is Fascinating. From its inception and emergence the need to Comprehend encode and convey information Has grown as a tree along with our species . I love the organic metaphor of vegetation both annual and perennial. Our ancestral family tree , the etymological tree of languages , Darwin’s tree of life , Genesis tree of life and tree of knowledge , the Burning Bush . One and All metaphors … “There is a tree of many One” . Language has now been abstracted to binary , mathematical information comprised of 0, 1 … yes , no … Stop , flow … The exponential growth is breathtaking … ultimately leading to The black hole information paradox … Where it shall lead is unknown … but it does make for one interesting Journey and Mythic narrative … I do so love the myths we live by …
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October 14, 2020 at 9:31 pm #4097
I consider it ridiculous to have ‘a word’ first after which ‘things’ emerge. Topsy-turvy reasoning: I say ‘blue’, hence ‘the Sky is blue!’ And the sky is not blue, it is diffracted sunlight (blue defracts most) you see. The rest is transparent.
For most people, exponentials, logarithms, math in general and logic reasoning are perpendicular to their personal perception and resulting understanding or awareness of the fragmented or simplified reality surrounding the comfy habitat. Once thrown out of such prejudice, nothing remains. Escapism to religion, dictators and servility remains. Nulling as a beast. That is utter human poverty where in contrast a lazy dalit beggar is more respectfull.
Time is a reciprocal dimension: t'=t*√(1-V²/C²)
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October 15, 2020 at 11:05 am #4099
Mars
much can be lost in translation especially where metaphor and myth meet . In John 1:1 “word” in the original Greek is Logos . There have been volumes written on the intended meaning and insights that are referred to. There are philosophical and metaphysical debates going on to this day that affect our contemporary understanding of the very nature of reality vs our Human perception of reality… I enjoy being a fly on the wall listening to these debates … With Greek language come Greek rational logical discourse and the foundation and bedrock of western thought and civilization. Hellenism Did carry its own Hell within its Coach as it traveled and spread with Alexander. The spread propagation of civilization Ó the linguistic poetic metaphors we use a Coach by land an Ark by sea . What things they contain inside !!! How many compartments??? Sub classification??? Oh the science of it , the naming and classifying of nature and reality …may we saluté with a quark from the punster Munster Mark !!!
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October 15, 2020 at 9:29 pm #4100
Dear R³,
Agreed up to Alexander, but you’ve lost me from ‘Ó’ onwards to Mark. things are lost in translation indeed (and cultural differences too). Oh Stephen, what a wonderfull subject! But science and conviction cannot merge into democratic truth, like your hands shaking themselves: it will never fit.
Time is a reciprocal dimension: t'=t*√(1-V²/C²)
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October 15, 2020 at 11:56 pm #4101
Mars,
No worries those are Riffs on western literary Biblical scientific Joycean Allusions … Just Having fun injecting a little humor . Joseph Campbell loved James Joyce who was adept at metaphor entendre language etymology …
the Word that was in the beginning could be anything from the Big Bang to Om To the Cosmic background noise … In some archaic idioms to name something is to create it , speak it into being … Lots of fun to empathize with ancient idioms of thought … assume a disposition of Suspended disbelief for a time …
R³
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October 26, 2020 at 12:39 am #4135
“In a deeper sense, no matter what classification system we use, and no matter how fragmentary or poor our historical records, it remains the case that all human languages are related — and all human literatures too — because all human beings are related. All human beings, let us remember, are closely related; and all human languages are born, bear their fruit and die in the minds and mouths of human beings.”
Robert Bringhurst, A Story As Sharp As A Knife: The Classical Haida Mythtellers and Their World
Though this be only tangentially related to the conversation, it’s a favorite quote, from a brilliant work, that I thought worth sharing. Bringhurst has a poet’s eye, rather than a scholar’s, which enhances and amplifies his study of the role myth (and language) play in this culture indigenous to the American northwest.
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales -
October 26, 2020 at 12:59 am #4137
JCF has posted a few excerpts on its YouTube channel of thought-provoking conversation with anthropologist Wade Davis. Here’s an example that seems relevant:
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales -
October 26, 2020 at 12:10 pm #4139
Hello,
There is much cognitive dissonance in our species. That is what I enjoy and where I long to dwell . Between the opposites. In the midst of multiple perspectives.
“If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it’s not your path. Your own path you make with every step you take. That’s why it’s your path.”
― Joseph Campbell
Is seeing the path of others wrong ?
We in the west often long for the connection to the earth to the season to vegetation to animal life our ancestor had . We catch glimpses of this path in indigenous and eastern perspectives and paths. But these paths while being foreign and new to us are well known paths to our species and it’s collective consciousness.
We are a restless lot . We do enjoy the Journey to exotic landscapes mindscapes worldviews. We enjoy our collections of perspectives … we enjoy our collections of myths.
Can we learn to appreciate our own perspective and myth that we live by ?
Is our reality just as mythic as we purport other peoples to be ?
The rat race and labyrinth of modernity is fraught with scientific & mythic connotations.
I think I shall go to the Everglades , become one with the river of grass , the Sea of Reeds !!! Yet that path is known , tread by indigenous feet for millennia …
“Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.“Where do I find mine own Path ?
How do I sink below ?
How do I rise above ?
How do I sink below ?
How do I rise above ?
How do I sink below ?
How do I rise above ?
I shall plant myself here now and seek …
What is this Cosmos that revolves around my center my still point connected to the stillness in All ?
Our calling is to recapitulate resurrect the archaic mythic the foreign the dead , move forward and cloth them in newness of life in this our evolutionary metempsychotic episode …
R³
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October 28, 2020 at 10:08 pm #4165
R³, your path is unique as anyone’s, so engage!
“The rat race and labyrinth of modernity is fraught with scientific & mythic connotations.”
As long as the word connotations is part of the statement, I accept it. Without it, I reject it. Science and fraught are as unrelated as mortality to belief.
Time is a reciprocal dimension: t'=t*√(1-V²/C²)
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October 29, 2020 at 1:24 am #4168
Mars ,
For me science is as mythic as myth. I enjoy science. It is a tool of discovery and classification created by humanity to understand the mystery of nature . It is not nature. It does not exist in nature. It is at best an attempt to draw a symbolic abstract map. But the map is not the territory. The best we can do is create metaphors and equations to explain nature. I thoroughly enjoy Richard Feynman presentation of the scientific method. Something I adhere too. I also enjoy exploring the mythopoetic aspect of humanity and being which is why I am here . Your interest is appreciated and engaging.
Robert R Reister
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October 29, 2020 at 6:36 pm #4170
Robert,
You are opening up a wonderful can of worms (I mean that in the best possible way). If you don’t mind the nudge, rather than bury this post in an existing thread, perhaps you wouldn’t mind opening a brand new conversation on this topic (maybe something like The “Mythology” of Science). Frankly, if you leave out the shout-out to Mars, you might want to paste your comment above word-for-word as the opening post, along with the Feynman video.
I don’t believe we have a discussion devoted to science yet, but I can imagine people checking out COHO being drawn to the topic, whereas most might not know it’s here if they have to read the entire metaphor thread to get to this post (forgive me for thinking like an admin, which I am – the greater the variety of fascinating topics, the better for the forums as a whole).
If you wouldn’t mind, we could do that (to avoid duplication, might want to delete the comment and clip here, and just leave a message re-directing Mars to the new thread if he’s interested).
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales -
October 29, 2020 at 10:51 pm #4171
Stephen,
By all means feel free to repost move delete add to augment edit critique any and all of my posts. Your curating patients administration tasks are greatly appreciated. I am here as a student to learn. I trust your insights. I known I tend to go far a field and take different tangents . I enjoy communicating from the boarders of my knowledge here using a humorous and sometimes confusing perspective. Lots of Fun !!!
R³
Robert R Reister
Ps
an alternate spelling for Ra is Re (Rey) a drop of golden sun ! O those Egyptians and their Sun Gods ! Freud had his go at it . Monotheism.
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October 29, 2020 at 11:32 pm #4173
Robert – I have some thoughts; if you have a chance, check your private messages.
Thanks
Stephen Gerringer
tie-dyed teller of tales -
October 29, 2020 at 11:36 pm #4174
Very bluntly spoken, R³ is a genius or a hermit. Both appreciated, we have fine discussions. But better branch off very preferred as this keeps things more readable (intertwinted topics don’t work). And a fresh open start better too! So the single R³ subject of Science vs Myth. Maybe a chapter on its own (lots of fun too!).
Outshouted on a ‘Language as Methaphor’ topic as a non-english native tongue in the lions den I consider as a mere compliment. All my fierce stodgy sparking and spicey thoughts are lost in translation throughout.
Thanks Stephen.
Time is a reciprocal dimension: t'=t*√(1-V²/C²)
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October 31, 2020 at 2:19 am #4183
Mars,
I assure you I am neither genius or hermit, just an inquisitive east coast dude that enjoys reading and sharing thoughts. Your translation skill are excellent. It is a joy to read your translated thoughts. I could not imaging attempting to translate my poetic musings into a foreign tongue . Thank you for your input.
Robert
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November 2, 2020 at 12:26 am #4189
Thanks Robert, let’s engage to the next conversation!
Regards,
Time is a reciprocal dimension: t'=t*√(1-V²/C²)
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November 25, 2020 at 12:04 am #4334
What people express in words to one another is not captured, nor displayed to the receiver’s inner truth the speaker’s or writer’s revelation conveyed. Words are only pointers. That is the illusion of words, also the metaphor of mirages lived. That is the mirage of The Tower of Babel symbol found in Genesis 11:1–9, and the origin myth meant to explain why the world’s peoples speak different languages, whether written, or placed upon a canvas, or spoken.
No one sees or feels the truth which culminate s as a written or spoken word, or painted image of experience through the eye of another. The viewer, or reader, or hearers becomes selective in relativity points which are relative to their personalized comprehensive living and evaluation. The reader, viewer, and listener accept or reject, something they do, or do not relate to, thus, words have become the Father of lies, for they have deceptively caused people to accept or reject someone’s experience as their own. This is the illusion, the lie, the mirage, the metaphor men live by and as.
Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa
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Before you start posting and responding in these forums, please read and follow the following guidelines:
- 1. Respect Others You may certainly take issue with ideas, but please — no flaming / ranting, and no personal or ad hominem attacks. Should the opinion of another forum member spark your anger, please take a deep breath, and/or a break, before posting. Posts must be on topic – related to mythic themes.
- 2. Respect Others’ Opinions These are conversations, not conversions. “Conversation” comes from the Latin words con (“with”) and verso (“opposite”). We expect diverse opinions to be expressed in these forums, and welcome them – but just because you disagree with what someone has to say doesn’t mean they don’t get to say it.
- 3. Come Clear of Mind In addition to expanding the mind, certain substances (alcohol, cocaine, marijuana, LSD, etc.) have been known to impair good judgment. We recommend you keep a journal while under the influence and then later make more rational determinations regarding what is appropriate to share in this forum.
- 4. Respect This Space The Joseph Campbell Foundation, a US not-for-profit organization, offers this forum as part of our mission of continuing Mr. Campbell’s work of increasing the level of public awareness and public discourse with regards to comparative mythology.
- 5. Avoid Contemporary Politics Given the volatile nature of contemporary political discourse, we ask that members steer clear of candidates or current political controversies. Forum members come from across the political spectrum. There are other fora across the internet for discussing myth and politics.
- 6. Be Polite Forum members come from many different sets of cultural assumptions, and many different parts of the world. Please refrain from language whose only purpose is offense. If it helps, imagine your grandmother reading forum posts – as perhaps she may, since other folks’ grandmothers are.
- 7. Refrain from Sexually Explicit Posts Please do not make sexually explicit posts within these forums, unless they are absolutely germane to the discussion underway – and even in that case, please try to warn readers at the top of your post. Not all members have the same threshold when it comes to taking offense to language and pictures. NOTE: Under no circumstances will we condone the posting of links to sites that include child pornography, even inadvertently. We will request that such links be removed immediately, and will remove them ourselves if compliance is not forthcoming. Any Associate knowingly posting such links will be suspended immediately; we will forward a snapshot of the offending page, the web address and the associate’s contact information to the appropriate criminal authorities
- 8. Refrain from Self-Promotion Announcements linking to your new blog post, book, workshop, video clip, etc., will be deleted, unless they are demonstrably part of the greater conversation. The only exception is the Share-Your-Work Gallery, a subforum within The Conversation with a Thousand Faces. If you have art, poetry, writing, or links to music and other work you would like to share, do so here.
- 9. Search First If you’re thinking of starting a new topic, asking a question, etc., please take advantage of the search functionality of this forum! You can find the search field above the list of forums on the main page of the forums. Also, consider searching on the greater JCF website – this site is full of amazing resources on a wide variety of topics, all just a search away.
- 10. Report Violations If you witness or experience behavior that you feel is contrary to the letter or spirit of these guidelines, please report it rather than attacking other members. Do this by choosing the Report button (next to “Reply”) at the top of the post, and select a reason from the dropdown menu (Spam, Advertising, Harassment, or Inappropriate Content). The moderation team will be notified. Depending on the degree of bad behavior, further posts might require approval, or the user could be blocked from posting and even banned.
- 11. Private Messages Forum guidelines apply to all onsite private communications between members. Moderators do not have access to private exchanges, so if you receive messages from another member with inappropriate or hostile content, send a private message (with screenshots) to Stephen Gerringer and/or Michael Lambert.
Visit the Contact the Foundation page, select Technical Support, and fill out the contact form.
The Conversations of a Higher Order (COHO) consists of ten public forums loosely focused on a central theme. The forums are listed, with a brief description, on the COHO home page (each forum listed on that page also appears in the same order in the menu in the lefthand column – that menu stays with you as you move about the forums). This also shows who created the last post in each forum, and when.
When you visit a specific forum you will see the list of topics people have posted so far in that forum. Click on one to read that post and any replies. Feel free to add a reply if you have something to share, or just enjoy following the conversation. You can return to the COHO home page by clicking the "Home>Forums" breadcrumb at the top of the page – or move directly to a different forum by clicking on one of the listings from the forum menu in the lefthand column of the page.
If there’s anything you want to introduce – a question, an observation, or anything related to Campbell, myth, or one of his many related interests – create a topic in the forum you feel comes closest to including the subject you want to discuss. Most forums include in their description a link to a corresponding part of the website. For example, The Work of Joseph Campbell description has a link to all his published works: you can of course focus on a specific book or lecture, but also any topic related to the ideas arising out of his work is welcome in that forum.
When posting a new topic or a reply to an existing conversation, check the “Notify me of follow-up replies via email” box (conversations unfold at a leisurely pace: someone might need a few days to let what you write simmer in the back of their brain – this is how you find out someone has replied), and then click Submit. You can also click "Favorite" (top of the page on the right when reading forum threads) to be notified of all responses in a discussion.
Click on the Profile link under your user name in the upper left corner above the forum menu. Then select Edit and follow the prompts to upload an image file from your computer.
When you finish your post, before clicking the Submit button check the box at the bottom of your post that reads, “Notify me of follow-up replies via email.” You can also click on “Subscribe” (in the upper right corner of a thread) to follow the complete conversation (often a comment on someone else’s post might inspire a response from you).
We ask that when linking to web pages, please avoid posting the raw URL address in your text. Highlight the relevant text you'd like to link in your post, then select the link icon in your formatting bar above your post (immediately to the left of the picture icon, this looks like a diagonal paperclip). This opens a small field:
Paste the URL of the page you are linking to into the field provided. Then click on the gear icon to the right of that field, and check the box that says “Open link in a new tab” (so readers can see your link without having to navigate back to the forums), before clicking the green “Add Link” button.
To add an image to your post, click on the image icon in the menu at the top of your post (it's the icon on the far right):
In the Source field of the pop-up form, click on the camera icon on the far right. This should give you access to the files on your PC / laptop, or the photo library on your mobile device. Select the image, and add a brief description (e.g., "Minoan Goddess") in the appropriate field.
In the dimensions field, you only need enter the first number (240 is a good size for starters; if too small click the edit icon and increase that number). Then select OK.
Click on the name of the person you want to contact (under their avatar in a any of their posts). This link will take you to that member’s profile page. Then click on “Send a Message,” and compose.
If you witness or experience behavior that you feel is contrary to the letter or spirit of these guidelines, please report it rather than attacking other members. Do this by choosing the Report button (next to “Reply”) at the top of the post, and select a reason from the dropdown menu (Spam, Advertising, Harassment, or Inappropriate Content). The moderation team will be notified. Depending on the degree of bad behavior, further posts might require approval, or the user could be blocked from posting and even banned.
Visit the Contact the Foundation page, select Community and Social Media, and fill out the contact form.