discussion

These are the two questions that should be answered.
1) Focus on one story from our studies in HUM 125   Choose one story from our readings (or viewings) on tricksters. Describe the trickster and the culture in which he/she/thing is from. What are the specific tactics that the trickster uses to survive, outwit and steal from another character? I would encourage you to use quotations from the text in your response instead of paraphrasing. 

2) Find and describe a trickster. You must find and describe a trickster from either modern, tribal or ancient cultures. This trickster cannot be any of the ones we have covered in class and in our readings. Go through these steps to describe – who is the trickster, their culture, what have they done to defy social expectations and put them in the grey area of hero, anti-hero, and sometimes villain?

This is some more information on the readings. 
Readings include the following. 
-Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain.    Tom Sawyer is a clever boy who in this scene uses his wits and cleverness to convince other kids to whitewash (paint the fence) for him. 
-Native American trickster legends – Coyote & Iktomi the Spider   (Coyote plays games and pushes Gods. Notice how he gambles with his life, and cheats, to win the opportunity to give fire to other animals.  Iktomi gets himself into trouble simply by being curious. He also uses his wit and knowledge to get himself out of a jam. 
-Anansi (Ashanti) from West Africa  (Similar to Itktomi, the famous West African mythical spider of Anansi spins metaphorical webs around others to get what he needs. Notice that none of these figures are necessarily evil or in fact are the mightiest amongst their society. They do tend to run counter to the expectations of society (like with Monkey) and have supreme intelligence, wit, and so on. 
-Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman (The Last Days of Loki).   This story is the prequel of sorts to the Norse Mythology apocalypse story we read a few weeks back. It shows how Loki gets into a drunken brawl, kills people, and is banished by the Gods. His tricks only last so when avoiding some of the Gods. The end to this story is without a doubt the darkest of all the stories you will read last week as the Gods determine how Loki and his family will be punished. 
Attached is the pdf for reading below.