Applied Mythology Graduate Certificate 2025

“If you live with the myths in your mind, you will find yourself always in mythological situations. They cover everything that can happen to you. And that enables you to interpret the myth in relation to life, as well as life in relation to myth.”  —Joseph Campbell

“We are all part of the old stories; whether we know the stories or not, the old stories know about us.”  —Leslie Marmon Silko

The Advanced Training Certificate in Applied Mythology brings together expert myth practitioners with participants eager to understand the multiple ways which myth structures not only storytelling, but psyche itself.  Recorded learning sessions will usher you into the world of mythology, where deep sources of wisdom can illuminate contemporary turns of life and fate. Live, weekly interactive sessions with master teachers will help you learn to recognize the mythologic patterns that are influencing not only world events, but your own individuation process.

Drawing on the sacred stories of many times and places, this Advanced Training Certificate invites you to apply what you learn to a variety of life areas, including self-development, love and family life, work and career, spirituality, consciousness, and personal creativity. You will also learn and practice the crafts of storytelling—including the science behind why it’s so effective—and ceremony creation for workshops and professional presentations.

Explore the inner, storied dynamics of current events: politics and power, science and technology, the media, the environment, religious and spiritual traditions from around the world, all from the standpoint of ready comprehension (no academic expertise required), everyday relevance, and practical application.

This online, 7-week Certificate course is designed so that both clinicians as well as story lovers from any location or time zone can participate.

What you will receive:

• 7 Interactive Live Webinar Sessions with world recognized Myth Practitioners
• 7 Video Learning Sessions to watch at your convenience
• A Learning Resource Guide with links to suggested books, articles, films
• A Private, on-line Discussion Forum
• Pacifica Graduate Institute Advanced Training Certificate upon successful completion of the course

 

This course is ideal if:

• You are a student or practitioner of depth psychology, psychoanalysis or have an interest in deepening your mythic literacy as a way of decoding the social messages and deeper meanings behind the complex constellations of symbolic events emerging in a radically changing world.
• You are a Myth-Lover who would like to deepen your understanding of how the mythic collaborates with the creative instinct to influence and shape the creative process.
• You are a student or practitioner of depth psychology, psychoanalysis or a healer who is looking to deepen your own work by identifying and integrating the mythologic patterns that influence the individuation process as well as world events.

 

Individual Session Descriptions

Week 1: Opening into Myth: True Lies and Inspired In-vocations

Instructor: Devon Deimler, PhD

Live Zoom session Thursday, June 26, 2025, 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM PT

This introductory module provides various practical definitions of mythology and mythopoesis that will ground participants as they move through the certificate program. The Greek root of myth is muthos, indicating an opening of the mouth. We will explore this starting image of myth for its relevance to storytelling, inspired affect, calling out, and taking-in of meaningful experience. Drawing from ancient and foundational sources, we will frame mythology as a humanities and humanitarian practice for our contemporary world.

 

Week 2: Psyche’s In-Signt: Illumination in Creation Myth and the Creative Process

Instructor: Dr. Joanna Gardner

Live Zoom session Thursday, July 10, 2025, 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM PT

In creation myths from around the world, creator goddesses and gods demonstrate big, bold creativity when they make the earth and sky. In other words, these sacred narratives contain metaphorical models of creativity that can inspire and empower your creative process. In this session, we will delve into one aspect of mythic and applied creativity: insight, or illumination. You will learn about the psychology of insight, how it relates to C.G. Jung’s transcendent function, and how it appears in a variety of creation myths. Most importantly, entering into these mythic models will help you experience your creativity as the sacred force that it is.

 

Week 3: The Collective Heroic Journey

Instructor: Dr. John Bucher

Live Zoom session Thursday, July 17, 2025, 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM PT

While the significance of our individual journeys will always remain, we are entering a new landscape of mythic consciousness. The journey of our collective has taken on increasing significance. In this module, we will explore how we might navigate a journey together as an ensemble, what we can learn and bring with us from our individual heroic journeys and what must be left behind. Building on the work of Joseph Campbell, Maureen Murdock, and others that have offered frameworks for how we might understand our passage through the various phases of mythic development, we will consider what a future mosaic of meaning could look like. Through investigating models offered by various narratives in literature, film, television, comics, and other popular culture, we will discover symbols, mythic motifs, and archetypal patterns leading us toward a new story.

 

Week 4: Echoes of Eternity: Mythic Patterns in a Changing World

Live Zoom session Thursday, July 24, 2025 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM PT

Instructor: Stephanie Zajchowski, PhD

Myth pulsates throughout the contemporary world—for those attuned to its presence. Amid unfolding events, myth offers grounding in a larger story and deeper meaning to lived experience. A mythological lens reveals mythic patterns in Margaret Atwood’s haunting dystopia, The Handmaid’s Tale; the gravity-defying cinematic adaptation of Wicked; and the transformative innovations of artificial intelligence. Exploring myths of the underworld, boundary crossing, and apocalypse, this course illuminates contemporary expressions of enduring mythological themes and their ongoing cultural resonance.

 

Week 5: New Times, New Heroes: Reimagining Myth Through the Heroine’s Journey and Afrofuturism

Instructor: Li Sumpter, PhD

Live Zoom session Thursday, July 31, 2025 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM PT

Myths shape and inform reality through the power of archetype and symbol. Each generation takes a turn at retelling timeless tales and reimagining old symbols that reflect the collective imagination and resonant signs of the times. The Hero embodies the hopes and fears, strengths, and weaknesses of the people. But when it comes to the representation of our cultural heroes in history, myth, and the media, there is not always equity and inclusion. This module compares the classic Hero’s Journey to emergent narrative models like the Heroine’s Journey and the Quantum Quest in contemporary film, graphic novels, and animation. We will examine art and media through the lens of “archetypal aesthetics” and the historic experiences, future visions, and marginalized perspectives of BIPOC (black, indigenous, people of color) and female-identifying peoples and protagonists. Through “mythic literacy” we will decode the social messages and deeper meaning behind the complex constellations of vital symbols, active archetypes, and rising stars illuminating new myths for a radically changing world.

 

Week 6: Creative Ceremony, Art, and Embodied Ritual

Instructor: Mary Antonia Wood, PhD 

Live Zoom session Thursday, August 7, 2025 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM PT

Ritual has been described as “serious play.” This paradox illustrates the possibility that actions performed with intention coupled with spontaneity and an openness to chance can have revelatory, transformative, and even magical, effects. If myths are stories, then rituals are the necessary embodiment of those stories. We will experiment/play with intention this week as we discover the rhizomatic origins of myth and ritual and how to bring more of their magic into our lives, the lives of our communities, and the life of the planet.

Week 7: Deep Ends and Near Futures: Myths of Metamorphosis and Many Returns

Instructor: Devon Deimler, PhD

Live Zoom session Thursday, August 14, 2025 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM PT

Our concluding module plays with the Dionysian dimensions of our mythic sensibilities, which discover meaning through aesthetic experience, ecstatic transformation, and integrating drama and underworld perspectives into everyday life. We’ll reflect upon how the mythic applies itself to us—what this looks like in contemporary conditions of madness, inspiration, and inevitable (even catastrophic) change—and we’ll imagine what unique mythic roles each of us might play in today’s theatrum mundi (theater of the world).

Learning Objectives:

By the End of This Course You Will Be Able To:

1. Identify how mythic motifs recur in contemporary technology.
2. Experience your own relationship with myth as a useful metaphor for exploring the psyche and its teleology toward wholeness.
3. Increase your attunement to the mythic world around you and its impact on you (intrapersonally, interpersonally and transpersonally)
4. Better understand the dynamics of mythic sensibilities and how they manifest in times of chaos, inspiration and transformation.
5. Become acquainted with the spectrum of qualities the Dionysian mythos presents within the context of a mythic pantheon.
6. Critically and creatively apply a Dionysian lens to the transformative encounters of one’s own life and/or the challenges of our contemporary and future world.
7. Transcend popular and established mythic models of consciousness and human journey with the intent of moving from an individual structure to a collective structure.
8. Survey narratives focused on collective journeys that have been recurrent in popular culture through the framework of mythic cycles frequently explored in mythological studies.

 

 

Career Competencies:

1. Mythic Literacy and Symbolic Interpretation:
   • Competency: The ability to recognize and interpret mythic motifs, archetypes, and symbolic patterns within contemporary events, media, and personal experiences. This competency enables individuals to decode complex societal messages and identify the deeper meanings of stories that shape our world.
   • Application: Useful for professionals in storytelling, marketing, media, psychology, and leadership, as well as those working in fields that require understanding the unconscious drivers of behavior and social dynamics.
2. Creative and Transformative Leadership:
   • Competency: The skill to incorporate mythological frameworks, such as the Heroine’s Journey or collective mythic motifs, to guide individuals or groups through personal and professional transformation. This competency emphasizes empathy, narrative-driven leadership, and visioning for collective growth and change.
   • Application: Ideal for leaders in business, education, or community organizations who seek to foster transformation, inclusivity, and creative problem-solving within teams or larger societal contexts.
3. Storytelling and Narrative Crafting:
   • Competency: The ability to craft compelling stories that tap into the power of myth and archetype, enhancing communication in personal, professional, and therapeutic settings. This includes understanding the science behind storytelling, structuring narratives effectively, and creating impactful ceremonies or presentations.
   • Application: Beneficial for professionals in public speaking, writing, marketing, therapy, education, and arts-based careers, where effective communication and emotional resonance are key.
4. Cultural Sensitivity and Diversity Integration:
   • Competency: The capability to critically engage with and integrate diverse cultural perspectives and mythologies into contemporary contexts, particularly regarding underrepresented groups. This competency helps professionals engage with and support marginalized voices and experiences in a meaningful way.
   • Application: Crucial for those working in social justice, media, education, human resources, and policy-making, as it fosters an inclusive environment and an understanding of the cultural and historical narratives that shape modern identities.

 

1. Applied Mythology in Healing and Personal Growth:
   • Competency: The ability to apply mythic concepts, such as the Hero’s Journey or creation myths, to personal growth, therapy, and healing practices. This includes integrating mythic storytelling into clinical work, self-development, or community healing practices to facilitate transformation and individuation.
   • Application: Beneficial for therapists, healers, coaches, and anyone involved in personal development or clinical psychology, where understanding myth’s role in shaping identity and psychological well-being can be transformative.

 

SCHEDULE FOR LIVE ONLINE LEARNING SESSIONS

Week 1: Zoom Session – Thursday June 26, 2025, 12:00 – 1:30pm PT

Week 2: Zoom Session – Thursday, July 10, 2025, 12:00 – 1:30pm PT

Week 3: Zoom Session – Thursday, July 17, 2025, 12:00 – 1:30pm PT

Week 4: Zoom Session – Thursday, July 24, 2025, 12:00 – 1:30pm PT

Week 5: Zoom Session – Thursday, July 30, 2025, 12:00 – 1:30pm PT

Week 6: Zoom Session – Thursday, August 7, 2025, 12:00 – 1:30pm PT

Week 7: Zoom Session – Thursday, August 14, 2025, 12:00 – 1:30pm PT

 

 

 

 

 

Required & Recommended Readings:

Week 1: Devon Deimler – Required Readings

 

Armstrong, K. (2005). What is a myth. In A short history of myth (pp. 1-11). Canongate.

 

Barthes, R. (1999). Toys; Wine and milk; The brain of Einstein; Plastic; The great family of man. In A. Lavers (Trans.), Mythologies (pp. 53-55; 58-61; 68-70; 97-99; 100-102). Hill and Wang.

 

Campbell, J. (2001). Metaphor and religious mystery. In E. Kennedy (Ed.), Thou art that: Transforming religious metaphor (pp. 1-9). New World Library.

 

Doniger, W. (1998). Microscopes and telescopes. In The implied spider: Politics and theology in myth (pp. 7-25). Columbia UP.

 

Hillman, J. (1975). An excursion on fiction; Psyche and myths. In Re-visioning psychology (pp. 150-161). HarperPerennial.

 

Hillman, J. (1989). Pathologizing: The wound and the eye. In T. Moor (Ed.), A blue fire: (pp. 142-151). HarperPerennial.

 

 

 

 

Week 2: Joanna Gardner – Required Readings:

 

Astor-Aguilera, M. (2018). Maya-Mesoamerican polyontologies: breath and Indigenous American vital essences. Rethinking Relations and Animism: Personhood and Materiality, edited by Miguel Astor-Aguilera and Graham Harvey, Taylor & Francis Group, 2018.

 

Jung, C. G. (1966). On the relation of analytical psychology to poetry (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 15. Spirit in man, art, and literature (pp. 65-83). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1922) https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400850884.65

 

Kabrél, N. (2024, July 31). Your 10-step plan for achieving a creative breakthrough. Psyche. https://psyche.co/ideas/your-10-step-plan-for-achieving-a-creative-breakthrough

 

Week 3: Required Readings: John Bucher

Milkowska-Shibata, M. (2025). The Heroine’s Journey and The Journey of Integrity: Illustrating Women’s Truths in a Graphic Memoir on Health, Disability, and Childhood Trauma. Graphic Medicine Review, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.7191/gmr.1033

 

Nelson, A. L. (2024). The Heroine’s Journey and The Journey of Integrity: Illustrating Women’s Truths in a Graphic Memoir on Health, Disability, and Childhood Trauma. Heroism Science, 9(1). https://doi.org/10.26736/hs.2024.01.10

 

Sonnenburg, S., & Runco, M. (2017). Pathways to the Hero’s Journey: A Tribute to Joseph Campbell and the 30th Anniversary of His Death. Journal of Genius and Eminence, 2(2), 1-8. https://doi.org/10.18536/jge.2017.02.2.2.01

 

Vogler, C. (2017). Joseph Campbell Goes to the Movies: The Influence of the Hero’s Journey in Film Narrative. Journal of Genius and Eminence, 2(2), 9-23. https://doi.org/10.18536/jge.2017.02.2.2.02

 

Recommended Readings:

 

Campbell, J. (2008). The Hero with a Thousand Faces (3rd ed.). New World Library.

 

Murdock, M. (2019). The Heroine’s Journey Workbook: A Map for Every Woman’s Quest. Shambhala.

 

Shahid, M. S., Rehman, T. U., & Mukhtar, R. (2024). How the Archetypal Hero’s Journey is Represented in Literature Across Different Cultures and Genres. Bulletin of Business and Economics, 13(2), 1040-1047. https://doi.org/10.61506/01.00439

 

Week 4: Stephanie Zajchowski:

Required Reading:

Hillman, James. Archetypal Psychology. Volume 1 Uniform Edition. Spring Publications, 2013, 1-24: “Chapter 1: Sources of Archetypal Psychology; Chapter 2: Image and Soul: The Poetic Basis of Mind; Chapter 3: Archetypal Image.”

Downing, Christine. The Goddess: Mythological Images of the Feminine. Crossroad, 1981, 1-29: “Preface; Chapter 1: To Start Us Imagining: The Goddess.”

 

 Week 5: Li Sumpter:

Required Readings 

Carriger, Gail. “Chapter 5: Heroine’s Journey: Beats, Themes, and Messages from The Heroine’s Journey: For Writers, Readers and Fans of Pop Culture,  pp: 85 -125. 

 

Sneed, Roger A. Chapter 3: Octavia Butler as Architect of Intersectional Afrofuturism. The Dreamer and the Dream: Afrofuturism and Black Religious Thought, pp 41 – 61. 

Romare, Ingela. “The Feminine Principle in Film: Reflections on Film and Its Relation to the Human Psyche”,  in Spring 73: Cinema and Psyche. pp 90 -100. 

 

Burke, Brianna. “Beasts of the Southern Wild and Indigenous Communities in the Age of the Sixth Extinction”. Iowa State Digital Repository. pp 1 -25. 

Required Films 

 The Wiz, 1978. Dir. Sidney Lumet

Beasts of the Southern Wild, 2012. Dir. Benh Zeitlin

Fast Color, 2019. Dir. Julia Hart – OR – The Girl with All the Gifts, 2017. Dir. Colm McCarthy

Recommended Books

The Heroine’s Journey: Woman’s Quest for Wholeness, Maureen Murdock

 From Girl to Goddess: The Heroine’s Journey through Myth and Legend, Valerie Estelle Frankel

 

The Hero With A Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell

Tatar, Maria, The Heroine with 1001 Faces.

 

hooks, bell. Art on My Mind: Visual Politics.

 

Nyong’o,  Tavia, Black Apocalypse: Afrofuturism at the End of the World. 

 

Afrofuturism: A History of Black Futures, National Museum of African American History and Culture

 Kelley, Robin D.G. Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination

 

Week 6: Mary Wood – Required Readings:

(Please read in the order listed)

 

1. Oliver, Mary. “Sometimes.” In Devotions.
2. May, Katherine. “Pilgrimage.” In Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age, pp. 81-93.
3. Moore, Thomas. “The Need for Myth, Ritual, and a Spiritual Life.” In Care of the Soul, pp. 219-229.
4. Campbell, Joseph. “Creativity.” In The Mythic Dimension: Selected Essays 1959-1987, pp. 183-188.
5. Wood, Mary Antonia. “Mythopoesis: The Archetypal Ancestors of the Modern Creator.” In The Archetypal Artist: Reimaging Creativity and the Call to Create, pp. 120-141.
6. Driver, Tom. “Transformation.” In Liberating Rites: Understanding the Transformative Power of Ritual,” pp. 166-184.
7. Hawk Wing, Pansy. “Lakota Teachings: Inipi, Humbleciya, and Yuwipi Ceremonies.” In The Sacred Heritage: The Influence of Shamanism on Analytical Psychology, pp. 193-202.
8. Anzaldúa, Gloria. “ritual…prayer…blessing…for transformation.” In Light in the Dark/Luz en lo Oscuro: Rewriting Identity, Spirituality, Reality, pp. 156-159.

 

Recommended Books:

Armstrong, Karen. A Short History of Myth.

Bell, Catherine. Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice.

Blackie, Sharon. The Enchanted Life: Unlocking the Magic of the Everyday.

Campbell, Joseph. The Power of Myth and The Mythic Dimension: Selected Essays 1959-1987, along with Myths to Live By.

Driver, Tom F. Liberating Rites: Understanding the Power of Ritual. Originally published as The Magic of Ritual: Our Need for Liberating Rites That Transform Our Lives and Communities.

Eliade, Mircea. The Sacred and the Profane and Rites and Symbols of Initiation: The Mysteries of Birth and Rebirth.

Grimes, Ronald. L. (Ed.) Readings in Ritual Studies.

Han, Byung-Chul. The Disappearance of Rituals.

Hillman, James. A Blue Fire: Selected Writings. Thomas Moore, Ed.

Hollis, James. Tracking the Gods: The Place of Myth in Modern Life.

Hyde, Lewis. The Gift: How the Creative Spirit Transforms the World. (Any edition of this classic book will do. It will also appear as The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World.)

Ingerman, Sandra. The Book of Ceremony.

Johnson, Robert. Inner Work: Using Dreams and Active Imagination for Personal Growth.

May, Katherine. Enchantments: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age.

May, Rollo. The Courage to Create.

Meade. Michael. Initiation and the Soul and with James Hillman: Mythology in the Age of Psychology.

Moore, Thomas. Care of the Soul, Rituals of the Imagination, and also The Re-enchantment of Everyday Life.

Oliver, Mary. Upstream: Selected Essays and Red Bird: A Poetry Collection, along with Devotions.

Parca, Maryline. Finding Persephone: Women’s Rituals in the Ancient Mediterranean.

Progoff, Ira. The Dynamics of Hope.

Segal, Robert. (Ed.) The Myth and Ritual Theory: An Anthology.

Sexson, Lynda. Ordinary Sacred.

Somé, Malidoma, Patrice. Ritual: Power, Healing and Community.

Stephenson, Barry. Ritual: A Very Short Introduction.

Turner, Victor. From Ritual to Theatre: the Human Seriousness of Play and The Ritual Process: Structure ad Anti-Structure.

Wood, Mary Antonia. The Archetypal Artist: Reimagining Creativity and the Call to Create.

 

Week 7: Devon Deimler – Required Readings

 

Miller, D. L. (1978). Hades and Dionysos: The poetry of soul. Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 46(3), 331–335. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1463801

 

Euripides. (1906). Bacchae (G. Murray, Trans). Project Gutenberg, February 4, 2011. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/35173/35173-h/35173-h.htm (Original work first performed 405 BCE).