Author Archives: Lixia Pena

Final Essay

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Lixia Pena

Professor Jessica Pressman

ECL 305

9 May 2024

Final Essay

            This semester we have been studying the path of mermaid folklore across time. As we are introduced into the mermaid mythology of the 19th century there is an interesting duality that is occurring. The mermaid becomes the most humanized that we have ever experienced by way of Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale The Little mermaid; She also becomes the most monstrous that she has ever been by way of P.T Barnum’s Feejee Mermaid Hoax. It is interesting that we get these vastly differing versions both within the same century during a time that is moving the west into the future of industrialization and capitalism whilst the romantic movement is being developed and actively rejects these systems. If we are to view stories as being archives of a point in history, then comparing and contrasting these two different mermaids can give us a better understanding of the people of this time.

We begin with an examination of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid. As mentioned previously, in this story we see the mermaid be more humanized than ever. Andersen starts his story by painting a portrait of what this underwater world looks like. Contrary to the common idea of the time that the ocean was a barren place, Anderson posits the idea that the underwater world is much like the human world. It is ruled by a monarchist society, not unlike the governments of the human world. Even the architecture underwater resembles the structures of our own world. By making the underwater environment parallel the human world, the reader is able to identify the little mermaid less as a monster and in closer proximity to humans. Another example of this humanization can be found in the text, “So do they rise to unknown and favoured regions that we shall never be privileged to see” (118) This is part of the grandmother’s explanation of what makes humans and mermaids different. Contrary to the differences the narrative highlights we must consider the trope of promised knowledge that constantly appears through the mermaid mythos. The earliest stories we have of mer-people is from the Babylonian god Oannes. They are positioned as holders of knowledge unknown to humans. It is this promised knowledge that is used by the sirens to tempt Odysseus. Within Andersen’s story it is the humans who are possessors of knowledge that the Little Mermaid longs and bargains for. It is interesting that this trope is inverted at this point in time when the development of the study of science is in full force and society is shifting away from the church into a more secularist education. Humanity has apparently evolved past the need for the mythic to impart knowledge to them. At the same time, placing the little mermaid as desiring access to this knowledge humanizes her by giving her the same wants that humans can identify and sympathize with. While the humanization makes her more sympathetic to the reader, it is important that she is not fully humanized. The romantic period after all, strives to define what makes us human and so the mermaid continues to walk that fine line between the other and the human.

So let’s consider the differences which her grandmother reveals to her, “-the term of their life is even shorter than ours. We can live to be three hundred years old; but when we cease to be here, we shall only be changed into foam and are not even buried below amongst those we love. Our souls are not immortal. We shall never enter upon a new life… human beings, on the contrary, have a soul that lives eternally – and that rises up through the clear pure air to the bright stars above” (118). At this point the story highlights the key difference between the other and humans; It lies within the possession of a human soul. Where the mermaids only become an organic part of the natural world, humans have a soul with which they can ascend to heaven. We have previously discussed in class how western thought, shaped largely by Christianity, places emphasis on up v. down. Up being considered more favorable as it is in closer proximity to God whereas down is considered to be a realm much closer to hell. Humans live their mortal lives in a place already closer in proximity to heaven but their immortal soul is granted the “privilege” of ascending further. Mermaids, by living in a realm below humans, are not even given permanence through remembrance, they are not memorialized with a burial. The reader, so far, can surmise that being human is a far more privileged position than to be a being that would eventually just form part of nature. If we understand the mermaid to be a representation of nature then we have to surmise that under western ideas the natural world is not as important as the human world. Here then the story exposes the western views of a social hierarchy in which humans are at the top. And so under this frame of thinking it must be decided who gets to be human or how a being can attain humanity.

The little mermaid’s grandmother informs the little mermaid and the reader that there are conditions under which they can earn the privilege of a soul, “Unless a human being loved you so dearly that you were more to him that either father of mother; if all his thoughts and his love were centred in you, and he allowed the priest to lay his right hand in yours…then would his soul glide into your body…he would give you a soul without forfeiting his own. But this will never happen!” (119). We are no strangers to the presence of the contract of marriage in mermaid folklore. This text emphasizes that marriage, a Christian marriage specifically, is necessary for the mermaid to have a hope of sharing a soul with her partner. Given that the intended audience of this story is most likely going to be Christian we can safely infer that it is the Christian religion that the text is referring to. This quote then establishes that to obtain a human soul the little mermaid has to marry into what they would consider to be the right kind of religion. The only other option proposed by the text is something akin to martyrdom. So our heroine embarks on this journey for everlasting life. Ultimately she is unsuccessful in getting the prince, for even if she now physically resembles a human, the prince still considers and treats her as little more than a slave. We can certainly make the claim that within human society there are borders that cannot be crossed but the little mermaid still circumvents this by becoming an air spirit. We have to wonder if this mermaid is given another chance simply because she is so humanized within the story. It is certainly a version of this particular mermaid that the modern world most often thinks of when the topic of mermaids arises. In a very

The story of the Feejee Mermaid hoax is a much lesser known figure in mermaid history which is ironic since this story takes place within real life. If the little mermaid depicts the mythical creature as more human than ever, then the Feejee Mermaid acts as an antithesis to the fairytale as she is presented as the most un-human like and therefore more monstrous. Very early on in the article “The Mermaid” This creature is established to be an animal not unlike the recently discovered platypus. The hoax of the mermaid lies not only within the fact that it is a fake specimen made of two completely different animals but it also dismantles the idea of the fair beautiful temptress that is the mythological mermaid. Within the same article that constantly attributes the title of animal to this specimen it also provides descriptions of its human features “It was a female, with ugly negro features. The skin was harsh, the ears very large.” (243) The language implies that the mermaid is ugly due to its “African” features.  And further down it describes a second mummified mermaid, “It’s face is like that of a young female- its eyes are a fine light blue- its nose is small and handsome- it’s mouth small- its lips thin…but its chief ornament is a beautiful membrane or fin rising from the temples,” (243) Here the writer is describing a “Asiatic mermaid” the description focuses on the features that would be more pleasing to the western audiences. And so we can deduce that even amongst the “exotic” there is a hierarchy and it heavily relies on how close it comes to the western ideals of beauty. But even this “Asiatic” mermaid’s “human” half is less beautiful than the fins atop her head.

If the story of the little mermaid reveals the Romantic movements quest for understanding what makes us human, then the Feejee Mermaid reveals the racist history within the development of science. In treating both mermaid stories as archives that reveal western culture of the time we can get a better sense of how we end up recognizing the fairytale more readily than the hoax. That the Little Mermaid lives in our collective mind more presently the Feejee Mermaid demonstrates how erasure and re-writing a narrative operates within society.

Works Cited

Andersen, Hans-Christian. The Little Mermaid. Bacchilega, Cristina, and Marie Alohalani Brown. The Penguin Book of Mermaids Penguin Books, 2019.

The New York Herald. “The Mermaid.” Bacchilega, Cristina, and Marie Alohalani Brown. The Penguin Book of Mermaids Penguin Books, 2019.

Week 15: We are Mermaids

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Stephanie Burt’s poem We are Mermaids is the perfect reading to close off the semester. We have been studying our relationship with the environment throughout the mythology of the mermaid but this poem proposes the idea that our very nature is that of mermaids and this provides a thought provoking exploration of how we can imagine a different relationship with the natural world that is in harmony with our nature and against the capitalist model that has been taught to us.

Within the first stanza Burt establishes that our very tears, often a reflection of human emotion, are composed of the same substance as that of the ocean. Thus we are not beings separate and superior to the natural world but rather an extension of it. If mermaids are the bridge between the human and the natural world then it must follow that we are also mermaids. Her second stanza assures us that life has existed long before the presence of humanity and life was simply a matter of survival, in other words “to get through the day”. Within her third stanza she claims that there is stability to be found in this simple way of life. To try to depend on the machine of fortune is much less certain and provokes doubt. Given that we are mermaids we have the gift of choice; to try to fit into the life modeled to us by society or we can choose the stability of a life of simplicity. Her fourth stanza shows us that we would be wrong to think a simple life dull or meaningless. She shows us this by describing different organisms and how they thrive when following their nature, “The thermophiles…whose sulfur would kill a human being. They love it here”. Jumping onto the sixth stanza it made me think of our discussion in class about the modern world’s demand for originality to be seen as someone of importance. Such a thing does not exist in the natural world and, if the mermaid can live in and out of water, then we, we being mermaids, can live with or without the need of originality or usefulness. The first line of the seventh stanza reads, ” You can spend your life benthic of brackish.” Benthic means in the deep ocean whilst brackish water can be found within estuaries which are a threshold between river and open sea. So too can we as mermaids live within this threshold without sacrificing our role in the natural world.

This is a beautiful piece that I will be taking and perfectly encapsulates one of the most important things that this course has taught me.

Week 14 The Deep

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The text that really caught my attention in this week’s reading is on page 84. “They organized the world as two sides of a war, the two-legs in conflict with everything else. The way Suka talked about farming, it was as if they ruled the land and what it produced, as opposed to… existing alongside it” (Solomon 84) It’s a great passage about the human condition delivered through the point of view of Yetu. Throughout the semester we have been discussing the relationship between us and our natural environment. We see that the attitudes have certainly changed over time but for many societies they have truly seen it as something separate from us. i like that the passage also describes human history as one that is constantly at war. That is certainly how history is commonly taught to us. We can orient ourselves within a point of time based on the wars that were being fought and of course, the way that history is taught is commonly taught through the perspective of the conqueror of these wars. We then treat our relationship with the environment as if waging a war against it for our own means of profit. It is something we come in contact with only under our terms. Through these mermaids the book has shown us what living alongside our environment, as a part of it, might look like. I like that later on Yetu comments on her dislike of how the rain breaks water apart, she is so used to it operating as 1 whole body. The Wajinru are simply one more organism forming a part of this one body of water. This again reinforces the ideas of unity that are so prevalent in her community that most of the westernized world does not possess.

Week 13: Ti Jeane

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The story of TI Jeane was particularly striking to read because it both contains traces of the folklore elements present within western mermaid folklore but The mother of the water has a much more active role as a protector of the forest. Much like how mermaid stories of the west are full of history of the christian culture that shaped them so to does this story tells us of the markedly different relationship that the native people’s of the caribbean had with the environment.

I appreciate that the text preceding the story explains Mother Water as being a “transnational Deity”. We have been considering mermaid folklore stories to be an archive that can teach us of the cultural history of a group of peoples. Since this story is widely known amongst the Caribbean and through many different language we can imagine how the trafficking of enslaved people across the ocean contributed to the creation of this transnational deity. As we know how Christianity sought to break people’s ties to their cultural beliefs through conversion, to have this story survive and spread can be considered as an act of resistance. Here then we can also see the ocean acting not as a barrier to the spreading of this story but rather as the vessel through which this story is carried and spread.

Essay 2: Close Reading Assignment

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Lixia Peña

Professor Jessica Pressman

ECL 305

14 April 2024

Close Reading Essay

The path of mermaid folklore across time takes us into the story of The Little Mermaid and Melusine in the 19th century. Here we see the mermaid form the desire to acquire a human soul through marriage with a human man. It is worth analyzing how the introduction of a human soul within mermaid folklore reflects the hierarchy by which the industrialized western world of the 19th century was structured. This is a hierarchy in which humans, specifically Christian, are at the top and dominate over nature. Through the analysis of this theme we can gain a better understanding of the Western understanding of what makes someone human and how it has shaped our current relationship with nature.

The text we are studying for our purposes is found on page 118. This is the scene in which the grandmother of our unnamed protagonist explains to her the difference between the life of humans and mermaids. The texts reads as follows, “-the term of their life is even shorter than ours. We can live to be three hundred years old; but when we cease to be here, we shall only be changed into foam and are not even buried below amongst those we love. Our souls are not immortal. We shall never enter upon a new life… human beings, on the contrary, have a soul that lives eternally – and that rises up through the clear pure air to the bright stars above…So do they rise to unknown and favoured regions, that we shall never be privileged to see.” In considering that the text reflects a western hierarchy of value we have to pay attention to some key details in this conversation. The story so far has established that the underwater kingdom parallels the same structures to be found on land. The environment is very similar and a monarchy also exists under water. The only difference lies then on the possession of a human soul. Where the mermaids only become an organic part of the natural world, humans have a soul with which they can ascend to heaven. We have previously discussed in class how western thought, shaped largely by Christianity, places emphasis on up v. down. Up being considered more favorable as it is in closer proximity to God whereas down is considered to be a realm much closer to hell. Humans live their mortal lives in a place already closer in proximity to heaven but their immortal soul is granted the “privilege” of ascending further. Mermaids by living in a realm below humans are not even given permanence through remembrance, they are not memorialized with a burial. Humans, when they ascend, are also privy to the privilege of knowledge. Here the myth of the mermaid possessing unknown knowledge is transposed. Humans are now the possessors of privileged knowledge and it is our mermaid who is drawn onto land hoping to one day acquire this same knowledge. The reader, so far, can surmise that being human is a far more privileged position than to be a being that would eventually just form part of nature. If we understand the mermaid to be a representation of nature then we have to surmise that under western ideas the natural world is not as important as the human world. So far, we can also presume that all humans have this advantage but the text goes on to provide further specificity.

            The little mermaid’s grandmother goes on to explain to her under what conditions one could acquire a human soul. “Unless a human being loved you so dearly that you were more to him that either father of mother; if all his thoughts and his love were centred in you, and he allowed the priest to lay his right hand in yours…then would his soul glide into your body…he would give you a soul without forfeiting his own. But this will never happen!” We are no strangers to the presence of the contract of marriage in mermaid folklore. This text emphasizes that marriage, a Christian marriage specifically, is necessary for the mermaid to have a hope of sharing a soul with her partner. By making the requisite of a Christian marriage we can assume that not all humans have the privilege to having an immortal life in heave. Given that this is a story written for a Christian audience we can safely infer that it is the Christian God that the text is referring to. To understand how the story reflects the values of a western hierarchal society we must understand what is happening historically at this time. Colonization is in full force and indigenous peoples of the lands being exploited are being driven out of their homes; African natives are being kidnapped and trafficked into slavery and both groups of oppressed peoples are being forced into abandoning their religions and being converted to Christianity in the name of “righteousness”. In America western expansion is driving indigenous people’s out of their ancestral homes under the banner of “Manifest Destiny” and western settlers view the wilderness as land ready to be worked into production on Tobacco and cotton. Considering this history and the idea proposed by Andersen’s story, we have to wonder if the text implies that non-Christian peoples are then subhuman. This is certainly the understanding that colonial literature would present of enslaved and indigenous people as literature of the time will often use the word “savages” as a descriptor. It is worth mentioning that the origins of the word savage come from the French word Sauvage which means wild and from the Latin word Sivaticus which translates to “of the woods”. We can see here that under this Christian way of understanding, to live in a close relation to the natural world is to be less civilized and thereby less human. It is under this belief that the western world both justified its exploitation of non-christian peoples and forced them into converting to Christianity, so as to have a hope for their soul’s salvation and ascension into heaven. We could then understand the little mermaid as being the story of non-christian desiring a place at the top of the hierarchy, moving upwards into becoming a human i.e. Christian. The reader of the time in which this story is published is then taught that not only are they privileged above others but that these indigenous people are grateful to westerners for providing their souls salvation through conversion.

            Through the focused exploration of this passage in Andersen’s The Little Mermaid, we can conclude that the story functions as a conversion story and further reinforces the idea that the natural world is in subservience to humans. It is something that ought to be used for the benefit of our own production and consumption. Even now as we work our way into de-colonizing our own thoughts and ideas it is clear that in order to do so our relationship with the environment is also something that needs to be re-examined. We need to understand our relationship the environment not as something to be dominated but as something to have a symbiotic relationship with. After all, when we put religion aside, the human body does eventually come to form a part of the natural world just as the mermaid becomes sea foam.

The Water Will Carry us Home

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In her short film “The Water Will Carry Us Home” Tesfaye has the audience consider the ocean as an archive and a place that holds history for descendants of the African Diaspora. Furthermore she also emphasizes the need to reach back to old rituals and traditions to find connection back to ancestors. The film opens with a couple of depictions of African deities. Amongst these is the Egyptian goddess Isis and there are all sorts of offerings being shown to us. The song seems to be a chant she is using to connect to old gods. The visual medium then moves from being live action to stop motion animation. This signals the moving into a spiritual domain where resides a god, whom i believe to be Papa Legba. This is a god known by different names across different African religions. This god is often considered to be a god that stands at crossroads and holds the keys to the past and the future. One historical fact that we ought to consider is that in these passages people from the same groups were often separated and placed amongst other people that did not have the same common language. This was done out of a need to cut communication amongst these stolen people to limit the possibility of an uprising against the ships crew. That many displaced people were still able to form connections with each other through gods that they all believed in is an act of resistance against the attempt of erasure. Through this god we are shown this origin myth. I consider it to be an origin myth because the nature of the trans-atlantic slave trade made it so that descendants of this diaspora have no exact knowledge of where they come from, from what tribes or culture and so it creates this disconnect with the past. This story then serves to memorialize those who lost their lives in this middle passage. To imagine their spirits as being saved through transformation so that they could find their way home. The narrative does compel one to examine the history that the ocean carries for so many people today. in this narrative it is particularly for descendants of enslaved peoples but let us not forget that the history of is thought to originate in the ocean as well. The shot of Tesfaye holding conch shell headset to her ears and the cable on the sand imply that the way to learn and go back to one’s roots is by listening to the stories the ocean holds. Perhaps in listening to the past we can come to know our future.

Sirenomelia

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Wow, there is so much to unpack from this video. The first time I watched it was before I read the description and so I was mostly trying to understand what I was looking at. That first watch made me uncomfortable and anxious. I was thinking of the barrenness of the arctic as if the lack of humans is what made it scary and uncomfortable. Then to see the presence of the mermaid does little to make me comfortable because seeing them swimming in freezing temperatures still distances her from my ingrained concept of humanity. She still feels otherworldly and therefore something to be scared of. After the video ended I did read the description which helped in directing my train of thought throughout the second watch. When I understood that the mermaid is exploring this structure made by humans it occurred to me that it must be a scary experience for her too. It occurred to me that if this mermaid is present in this environment, then it negates the idea that the arctic is a barren place. I remembered that actually, plenty of wildlife is capable of surviving the conditions of the arctic including many mammals. The presence of human structures in this video further proves that even humans, under certain conditions, can live in this environment. My perspective changes and the sense of anxiety discomfort is replaced by a sense of curiosity. I start examining this creature as they examine humanity. I noted that we do not get a sense of the skin color of the mermaid. The mermaid simply blends in with their surroundings. The last shot was particularly interesting. As we see the mermaid swimming away the rippling effect and the sound gives me the sense that there are more mermaids, they are simply not visible. At the very end the mermaid turns onto their belly and reveals to us that it has been observing us just as we have been observing them.

It’s interesting to see this coming together of the human and the natural world especially when considering the narrative that we are just as much a part of the natural world as the mermaid. It challenges the thought that humans have of superiority over the natural world. I imagine that it is this cultural through ingrained in me that led me to forget that life can exist in the arctic and imagine it as something barren and devoid of life. The second watch allowed me to apply frames of thinking that we have been studying this semester and rendered me humbled.

Deterritorializing Preface

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It is interesting that for so long the ocean has been considered a place where change does not take place even though it’s literally a place that is constantly undergoing movement. This week’s reading show that to believe the ocean to be ahistorical and un-dynamic says more about the way we as humans have shaped our beliefs and how the very language we create reinforces this “offshore” way of thinking. I am interested in comparing and contrasting our western relationship with the ocean with the relationship that other coastal cultures have with the ocean. It would be particularly interesting to analyze how language differs based on the geographical proximity to the ocean. Based on the readings we have been assigned these past couple of weeks it’s clear that in the environmental humanities it is crucial to listen and learn from people of all backgrounds, who have differing relationships with the natural world. It is a collective labor that will help re-examine ever sifting relationship with the environment. The Deterritorializing preface excerpt further examines how our language shapes the reality in which we live in. The examination of these aquatic terms helped me understand how more terrestrial terms can often limit our thinking. For example, the term current as opposed to field; It is clear that the usage of field connotes an understanding of safety in the reliable but it does not prepare us for when the reliable fails the way that the word current does. In such a rapidly changing world and one in which humans are in constant movement, I’m thinking particularly of immigration, is it not easier to accept change and difference with a word like current? It allows us to view the world as one of constant ebbs and flows and therefore something that we can all move in rhythm to rather than resistance. It seems like now more than ever, we can benefit from moving from terrestrial thinking, into a more “liquid” manner of thinking. I am getting a better understanding of the blue humanities and what it seeks to explore. After all, I believe it was last week’s readings that mention that the solution to our environmental crisis does not rely on technological innovation but rather in reshaping how we relate and think of the environment and that includes even the language we use.

Week Nine Reading Response

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It occurs to me, after this week’s reading, that I knew nothing about what the environmental humanities were. I am thinking that the environmental humanities seem like a response to some of the important points of our reading of Cronon last week. Reading “The Emergence of Environmental Humanities” further solidifies some of our discussion point from last week. Western views of our relationship with nature are deeply narrow and do not allow for the communication and open mindedness required to provide solutions to our ecological problems. It’s no coincidence that the study of environmental humanities grew through the contributions of different fields of study like gender and indigenous studies both being intersectional studies that try to de-centralize the western narratives. On discussing what topics are covered by the study of humanities the text says, “a new range of concepts emerged that provide a framework for environmental humanities, such as ecoracism, environmental justice, ‘naturecultures,’ the environmentalism of the poor and the posthuman.” It never occurred to me how important these topics are when considering environmentalism and that new technology is not always the only answer or even the answer to our environmental crisis. I like how the text mentions that science does not always consider the knowledge that is readily available to us. I remember discussing early in the semester how indigenous peoples have so much knowledge of the land that has been dismissed by science as nothing but folklore without actually considering what knowledge they have to offer. It is how we learn that controlled fires in a forest are necessary to bring about new life.

 I have recently read Greg Grandin’s book “The end of the Myth” and in it he re-contextualizes the conditions that led to the dustbowl famine during the great depression. A big part of the reason for the famine was the destroying of land by unsustainable farming practices used for the production of cotton. The book explores the idea that plantation owners were not interested in sustainability of farming because the myth of the frontier gave them a false sense of confidence that when the land was spent they could just extend further west. Pairing this book with the topics being discussed in this class helps reinforce why environmental humanities are necessary.

Week Eight Reading Response

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I appreciate how this reading defines wilderness and the environment. It helped to enrich my understanding of these concepts when considering them in conversation with mermaid mythology. The idea of wilderness had always seemed to be a naturally occurring thing. Something that simply existed and humans affected. To realize that wilderness is but a human construct and a rather narrow and exclusionary point of view is fascinating.

            Whilst reading, it was interesting to notice the how the ideas of wilderness and mermaids shift over time. By this I mean that as the wilderness becomes less and less a place of evil and more a place to consume recreationally, so too do the attitudes about Mermaids shift. She becomes less of an evil monster and is commercialized in the 19th century. This also gives me a better understanding of why she is often used as a representation of nature and wilderness. On page 17 Cronon describes wilderness as a “siren song of escape.” I find this particularly interesting because we are learning that wilderness in many ways is a social construct that is a product of myth. The idea that nature and civilization operate on separate spheres is likewise a myth. We see this even in the story of Melusine. The beginning of the story describes that nature is in many ways a man’s domain, it is for a man to find adventure and prove their bravery by conquering it. Constantly humans infringe upon nature but so many stories show the mermaid as being the invader. Many years later we see these same sentiments still being echoed in the figurehead of The Virginian. I appreciated that the text also does away with the Christian idea of wilderness as untouched and “virgin” first because it denies the presence of natives that were forcibly removed from their homes; Second because to say that wilderness is virginal and that it is the environment in which the individual man can enforce their freedom and masculinity is deeply troublesome. When gender is considered as these elements of power, it is not difficult to understand how we end up with so much history of misogyny. It further reinforces the texts claim that to think of the wilderness through such a narrow scope also influences who we view as human and worthier of protection. If the point is to save the environment by keeping it pristine and untouched then what of the people that live in constant relation to the land and see themselves also affected by the same environmental issues affecting the natural world. Does that mean that these humans are not worth protecting? Again, we are put into the conversation of defining who is human who is not and what and who is worth saving.