The uses of ancient Greek myths: From social-historical description to ideological criticism

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Paris School, with leading scholars Jean-Pierre Vernant and Pierre Vidal-Naquet, has made an indelible contribution to the understanding of the social uses of ancient Greek myths within their original historical contexts. This article argues, in line with a postmodern hermeneutics of suspicion, that it would now be imperative to move from social-historical description to ideological criticism of the values encoded by those myths. The argument is throughout illustrated with pertinent examples from ancient Greek mythology.