Julia Song, Period 8, 1/14/22

 Julia Song, Period 8, 1/14/22

One of the mythologies that my group was assigned to create a lesson plan on was the story

of Freya’s Unusual Wedding. I quickly came to love this story because it was such a stark contrast to the previous Greek tragedies that we read like the story of Oedipus Rex. Instead, Freya’s Unusual Wedding was more like a comedy. From Loki’s sassy tongue to the whole plot of Thor dressing up as Freya to deceive a head-over-heels ogre. It also had a happy ending where the protagonists of the story achieve their goals and defeat the villain of the story.

My part in the lesson plan was to inform the class on the gender roles seen in Freya’s Unusual Wedding. In the story, Thor lost his hammer and could not do what he was meant to do and had to dress as a woman. The hammer, in this case, is analogous to his manhood. Because Thor couldn’t be a hero and do his duties, he had to dress up as a woman: docile and meek. Freya was also expected to just go and agree to be an object in an exchange for the hammer. The ogre coveted the reputation of Freya, being the most beautiful. If he could marry her, he would essentially own her and have the bragging rights of marrying the most beautiful goddess. I connected this to the Cinderella stories in which the Prince took one glance at Cinderella and decided to do anything to make her his bride.

Thor could be described as having a ‘fragile masculinity’ for not wanting to wear a dress or dress like a woman. In modern times, many celebrities such as Harry Styles are idolized for being confident in their masculinity and not being afraid to rock crop tops or painted nails. In today’s society full of ‘cancel culture’ the behavior of Thor would get him deplatformed or ostracized.