Cultural Reflection On The Great American Solar Eclipse

Cultural Reflection on the Great American Solar Eclipse Before the fall semester began, I enjoyed one of the many benefits of my status as an “Asheville Native”, and attended a presentation by Professor Britt Lundgren on the upcoming solar eclipse. Although she covered a broad scope of content concerning solar eclipses, two aspects of her talk stood out to me in particular. The first aspect was an interesting similarity between ancient Chinese and Cherokee myths about solar eclipses. The ancient Chinese believed that a celestial dragon would swallow the sun on eclipse days, while the Cherokee believed it was a great frog who devoured the star. Both cultures were known to chant loudly in order to scare off beast attempting to consume the cornerstone of human existence. Hearing of near parallel explicatory

Oddly enough, when I first donned my solar eclipse glasses on August 21st and gazed up at the half-hidden sun, I mused that someone had taken a huge bite out of yellow cookie, a thought which echoed among my peers. I find it amazing that three groups of people separated thousands of miles and years of history—the ancient chinese, ancient cherokee, and modern students—share such a similar initial reaction to a cosmic event. It reminded me of what you said in class: in your experience, everywhere, people are the same. Studying the humanities at UNCA has caused me to agree with this perspective. Although the cultures we learn about often have vastly different customs, beliefs, and methodologies, the themes which we explore (such as heroism in Sundiata) seem to exist in all regions and time periods we have record of. Furthermore, the ways in which cultures attempt to make sense of unexplainable phenomena—such as justifying extraordinary events like solar eclipses using familiar actions like eating—appear to be generally universal. I believe that by studying these patterns in human behavior we