Differences Between Joseph Campbell And The Hero's Journey

This research paper is intended to discuss and analyze the structures as well as the evident differences between the Hero’s Journey—as depicted by Joseph Campbell—and the Heroine’s Journey—described by Maureen Murdock. In the former, female protagonists are frequently limited, and are exposed to challenges relating to sexualization and conforming to patriarchal societies that male heroes do not typically encounter, thus altering the progression and accuracy of the Hero’s Journey for women. On the contrary, the Heroine’s Journey pertains solely to women—which is limiting in itself—and revolves around the idea that a woman’s psychological inherencies will cohort her to resorting to the reliance or seeking of motherly instincts. However, the growing societal awareness of these socially constructed norms, along with the strive to eradicate stereotypes and promote gender fluidity, has and continues to be a leading causation for the dissipation of differences between the two. My paper will help demonstrate how this is highly influential in the neutralization of gender specific attributes in modern film. Through the use of The Hunger Games’ Katniss Everdeen as an example, it will become evident that a female character can transgress the situational and sex-based archetypes that both journeys depict, therefore creating a gender neutral …show more content…
The plot of The Hunger Games clearly mimics Joseph Campbell’s ideology, while the character development of the protagonist exhibits Murdock’s description of a Heroine’s Journey; therefore, it accurately embodies the true definition of