SCAND 330 A, University of Washington (pdf)
Instructor:
Dr Timothy Bourns
Email: tbourns@uw.edu
Office: Raitt Hall, 305 X
Office Hours: Thursdays, 3-5pm, or by appointment
Classes:
Sieg Hall, 224
In-person, Mondays and Wednesdays, 2:30-4:20pm
Spring Quarter, 2026
Course Description:
Welcome to SCAND 330: Scandinavian Mythology! During the first half of this course, we will closely examine the primary source materials for the study of Norse mythology, namely the Poetic and Prose Eddas. We will thoroughly immerse ourselves in the cosmology of this mythic world, reading tales of gods and goddesses, valkyries and dragons, giants and dwarves, elves and monsters, animals and hybrids, and even people. As the course progresses, we will broaden our focus to consider other kinds of evidence for understanding Norse myth, including Latin and European texts, Icelandic sagas, skaldic poetry, archaeological evidence, runic inscriptions, and picture stones. We will then move beyond Norse mythology to study select stories from Finnish, Baltic, Sámi, and Greenlandic traditions, approaching these mythologies both comparatively and on their own terms. We conclude by turning to the modern reimaginings and future trajectories of northern mythologies, considering their enduring relevance and importance today, both in the world at large and for understanding our own lives.
Learning Objectives:
- Acquire a base knowledge about Scandinavian mythological traditions, as well as the sources for studying them and their limitations
- Read, understand, and appreciate a diverse selection of mythological and legendary texts from medieval Scandinavia and its surroundings
- Develop source-critical reading and analytical skills to meaningfully engage with and examine Old Norse mythological texts, placing them in their cultural, historical, and religious contexts
- Apply these skills in two writing workshops and a comparative practicum, demonstrating both critical and creative thinking
- Reflect critically on popular conceptions and misconceptions about these myths in modern media, as well as their relevance for our own lives
Grading:
Final grades for this course will be calculated as follows:
Writing Workshop One: 10%
Eddic Midterm Test: 20%
Writing Workshop Two: 10%
Comparative Proposal: 10%
Comparative Practicum: 20%
Final Exam: 30%
Grading Scale:
4.0 – 96-100% 3.2 – 84% 2.4 – 76% 1.6 – 68%
3.9 – 93-95% 3.1 – 83% 2.3 – 75% 1.5 – 67%
3.8 – 90-92% 3.0 – 82% 2.2 – 74% 1.4 – 66%
3.7 – 89% 2.9 – 81% 2.1 – 73% 1.3 – 65%
3.6 – 88% 2.8 – 80% 2.0 – 72% 1.2 – 64%
3.5 – 87% 2.7 – 79% 1.9 – 71% 1.1 – 63%
3.4 – 86% 2.6 – 78% 1.8 – 70% 1.0 – 60-62%
3.3 – 85% 2.5 – 77% 1.7 – 69% 0.0 – 0-59%
Writing Workshops 1 and 2:
There will be two in-class writing workshops during the quarter, and additional details about each will be provided beforehand, including a prompt and rubric, though you won’t be expected to prepare your response in advance.
These will be open-book – you can bring your texts with you to class, but no additional papers or notes. To encourage you to think for yourselves and to discourage the use of AI-generated writing, there will be no access to a phone or computer during these writing sessions. Each workshop will be fifty minutes long and the anticipated length of writing will be 1-3 pages.
The first writing workshop is a close reading exercise in which you respond to a short poetic passage and demonstrate skills in textual analysis and interpretation. It will be held during the second half of class on Wednesday, April 15th and is worth 10% of your final grade.
The second writing workshop asks you to construct a psychological profile of a mythological or heroic figure from Norse tradition by analyzing how personality, motivation, and emotional tendencies are inferred through narrative. It will be held during the second half of class on Wednesday, May 13th and is worth 10% of your final grade.
You are expected to attend the writing workshops in-person. If you are unable to attend class on one of these days, please contact me in advance to make alternative arrangements, or be prepared to provide a doctor’s note.
Comparative Proposal and Comparative Practicum:
The writing workshops provide the foundations for your comparative practicum, which will provide you with an opportunity to explore a pre-approved topic of your choosing with greater depth and develop an independent argument.
The practicum will be held in-class and will be open-book; it is sixty minutes long and the anticipated length of writing will be 2-4 pages. It will be held during the second half of class on Monday, June 1st and is worth 20% of your final grade.
Your practicum should emphasize comparison – with attention to both similarity and difference – through one of the following methods:
(i) textual comparison: choose one mythological figure, object, or event, and analyze two or more representations across different medieval sources studied in the course
(ii) cultural comparison: consider one clearly delineated aspect of the Old Norse mythological tradition alongside another mythological tradition (e.g. Finnish, Baltic, Sámi, Greenlandic)
(iii) reception comparison: compare one modern retelling of Norse myth (novel, film, game, poem, etc.) with at least one medieval source studied in this course (e.g. an eddic poem, a passage from Snorri’s Edda, or a saga episode)
In advance of the practicum, you should submit a proposal which includes your chosen comparative method, central argument, reasons for choosing this topic, primary sources, and any secondary sources you might use as well. The proposal is an opportunity for feedback and should be submitted between May 27th and May 29th via Canvas.
Midterm Test and Final Exam:
The Midterm Test will be held at the beginning of class on Monday, May 4th. It will consist of multiple-choice questions, evaluating your knowledge of the material from weeks one through five of the course (based on the readings and lectures), emphasizing the poetic and prose foundations of Norse Mythology.
The Final Exam will be held on Tuesday, June 9th (2:30-4:20pm). It will consist of two components: multiple-choice questions, evaluating your knowledge of the material from weeks six through ten of the course (based on the lectures and readings), as well as a written response to a reflective prompt which will be provided in advance.
Please let me know if you will require any accommodations for these evaluations; I am happy to make arrangements as needed.
Course Structure:
In-class lectures are a major component of this course, consisting of the presentation of topics and themes relating to the main subject of the course: Scandinavian Mythology. Lectures will occasionally be supplemented by films and video clips, and there will also be plenty of time for discussion and group activities.
Course Readings:
Most of the required readings for this course are available via the UW Bookstore: The Poetic Edda (trans. Carolyne Larrington), Snorri Sturluson’s Edda (trans. Anthony Faulkes), and Gerður Kristný’s Bloodhoof (trans. Rory McTurk). All other required readings will be uploaded to Canvas as PDFs in advance, and optional readings may also be uploaded from time to time.
Course Schedule:
Week 1: Welcome and Introduction
Monday, March 30: Mythology and Scandinavia
Wednesday, April 1: Sources, Gods, and Beings (The Seeress’s Prophecy)
Week 2: Eddic Poetry I: Wisdom and the Worlds
Monday, April 6: Odin’s Wisdom (Sayings of the High One, Vafthrudnir’s Sayings, Grimnir’s Sayings)
Wednesday, April 8: Thor and the Giants (Harbard’s Song, Hymir’s Poem, Thrym’s Poem)
Week 3: Eddic Poetry II: Gender, Comedy, and Destiny
Monday, April 13: Trouble in Paradise (Skirnir’s Journey, Loki’s Quarrel, The Poem of Volund)
Wednesday, April 15: The Final Word (The List of Rig, All-wise’s Sayings, Baldr’s Dreams)
Wednesday, April 15: Writing Workshop 1 (Poetic Analysis)
Week 4: The Writings of Snorri Sturluson
Monday, April 20: The Saga of the Ynglings and the Prologue to the Edda
Wednesday, April 22: Gylfaginning (‘The Beguiling of Gylfi’) I: Creation and Cosmology
(I am away for a conference this day but will record a lecture which will be posted to Canvas)
Week 5: Mythic Narratives in Prose
Monday, April 27: Gylfaginning (‘The Beguiling of Gylfi’) II: Adventures and Eschatology
Wednesday, April 29: Tales from Skaldskaparmal (‘The Language of Poetry’)
Week 6: Beyond the Eddas I: Texts, Inscriptions, and Art
Monday, May 4: Eddic Midterm
Monday, May 4: Latin and European Sources
Wednesday May 6: Runes and Picture-Stones
Week 7: Beyond the Eddas II: Sagas and Skaldic Poetry
Monday, May 11: Legendary Sagas (Saga of the Volsungs)
Wednesday, May 13: Skaldic Verse (readings on Canvas)
Wednesday, May 13: Writing Workshop 2 (Narrative Psychology)
Week 8: Beyond Old Norse I: Neighboring Traditions
Monday, May 18: Finnish Mythology and the Kalevala, with guest Professor Andy Nestingen (readings on Canvas)
Wednesday, May 20: Baltic Mythologies and Comparative Methodologies (readings on Canvas)
Week 9: Beyond Old Norse II: Indigenous Arctic Traditions
Monday, May 25: Memorial Day
Wednesday, May 27: Sámi and Greenlandic Mythologies, with guest Amy Swanson King (readings on Canvas)
Wednesday-Friday, May 27-29: Comparative Proposal Due
Week 10: Northern Mythological Futures
Monday, June 1: Reimagining Norse Mythology (Gerður Kristný’s Bloodhoof, with excerpts from Francesca Simon’s The Monstrous Child and Genevieve Gornichec’s The Witch’s Heart)
Monday, June 1: Comparative Practicum
Wednesday, June 3: Ragnarǫk: The End of the Course, The End of the World
Finals Week:
Tuesday, June 9 (2:30-4:20pm): Final Exam
Policies, Procedures, and Acknowledgements:
Academic Style and Format:
For primary references, citations used in course work should clearly indicate the title of the text and page number in brackets. If you are using a different translation from the one assigned for the course, then the translator should be included. Any secondary references should clearly indicate the author, the title of the book or article, and the page number.
Academic Integrity: Cheating and plagiarism include, but are not limited to:
- Copying the work of others or allowing others to do your work
- Directly quoting the words of others without using quotation marks, indented format, and in-text citations to identify them
- Using sources (published or unpublished) without identifying them
- Paraphrasing materials or borrowing the ideas of others without identifying the sources.
Plagiarizing, or copying and/or using the words or ideas of others without acknowledgement can undermine your learning and devalue the degree that you are seeking. It can result in failure of the assignment or course. Acknowledge and/or cite every single source that you consider when producing assignments. Over-citing is better than under-citing! If you need help understanding and avoiding plagiarism, come talk to me. Consequences for plagiarizing will be determined on a case-by-case basis. Please refer to the Community Standards & Student Conduct – Academic Misconduct webpage for more information about plagiarism and other forms of misconduct.
Use of AI:
All work submitted for this course must be your own. Any use of generative AI tools, such as ChatGPT, when working on assignments is forbidden. Use of generative AI will be considered academic misconduct and subject to investigation.
Since the vast majority of course work will be written in-class without access to technology, this should not be a problem. While I cannot prevent you from using these tools to consider your responses to the writing workshops and practicum in advance, I discourage you from doing so due to their falsehoods, limitations, and hallucinations. In addition, the writing tasks have been designed to challenge you to develop creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills. Using AI technology will limit your capacity to develop these skills, to think for yourselves, and to meet the learning goals of this course.
If you have any questions about what constitutes academic integrity in this course or at the University of Washington, please feel free to contact me to discuss your concerns.
Washington state law requires that UW develop a policy for accommodation of student absences or significant hardship due to reasons of faith or conscience, or for organized religious activities. The UW’s policy, including more information about how to request an accommodation, is available at Religious Accommodations Policy (https://registrar.washington.edu/staffandfaculty/religious-accommodations-policy/). Accommodations must be requested within the first two weeks of this course using the Religious Accommodations Request form (https://registrar.washington.edu/students/religious-accommodations-request/).
Your experience in this class is important to me. It is the policy and practice of the University of Washington to create inclusive and accessible learning environments consistent with federal and state law. If you have already established accommodations with Disability Resources for Students (DRS), please activate your accommodations via myDRS so we can discuss how they will be implemented in this course.
If you have not yet established services through DRS, but have a temporary health condition or permanent disability that requires accommodations (conditions include but not limited to; mental health, attention-related, learning, vision, hearing, physical or health impacts), contact DRS directly to set up an Access Plan. DRS facilitates the interactive process that establishes reasonable accommodations. Contact DRS at disability.uw.edu.
Land Acknowledgement:
The University of Washington acknowledges the Coast Salish peoples of this land, the land which touches the shared waters of all tribes and bands within the Suquamish, Tulalip, and Muckleshoot nations, including the Duwamish, on whose traditional lands the University of Washington-Seattle stands in violation of the Treat of Point Elliott.