Busting the Myth: The Use and Misuse of Myth in Historical Philosophy (Senior Thesis)

Unfortunately, my Senior Thesis is too big to post as text on Blogger! While I prefer to post the text versions of my documents here (with links to the scanned originals for legacy's sake), this document, one I am very proud of and that was very highly received, I can only embedd through Scribd.

This paper was written as my Senior Thesis for the Bachelor's of Arts in Philosophy Degree at the University of Colorado - Colorado Springs. It was presented to the Faculty on the 30th of April, 2007, and successfully defended. It was also selected to be presented at a state-wide symposium and was very well received.

Busting the Myth - Laura DiFiore

The Admonitions of Ipuwer: Lamenting Progress

In the Admonitions of Ipuwer, the author paints a bleak portrait of massive social disruption and change occurring in ancient Egypt. The text, found on Papyrus Leiden 344, dates to approximately 1300BCE, and is believed to be a later copy of an earlier work.[1] It is generally believed by current scholars that Ipuwer does not deal with specific actual historical events, as often argued in the past, but is instead more of a literary work on the theme of “national distress”[2] A close reading of Ipuwer, however, provides tantalizing hints at a society that has indeed experienced significant social change, regardless of the specific historical details, and should be read more as a work of social commentary over that of a strict historical or literary reading.