The psychological foundations of the hero-ogre story

Human Nature 12 (3):247-272 (2001)
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Abstract

Stories in which a hero defeats a semi-human ogre occur much more frequently in unrelated cultures than chance alone can account for. This claim is supported by a discussion of folk-tales from 20 cultures and an examination of the folk-tales from a random sample of 44 cultures. The tendency to tell these stories must, therefore, have its source in the innate human nature discussed by evolutionary psychologists. This essay argues that these stories reinforce innate positive biases in the perception of self and ingroup and negative biases in the perception of outgroups

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References found in this work

Ethnographic atlas.George Peter Murdock - 1967 - [Pittsburgh]: University of Pittsburgh Press.
Evolution and literary theory.Joseph Carroll - 1995 - Human Nature 6 (2):119-134.

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