By Laurel Bergsten with Jasmyne Gilbert and Kira Kull
On the Mythological Times Blog our goal is to always bring attention to the voices of members and opportunities in the myth community. This post is the first of what we hope will be occasional interviews with journal editors and authors that highlight publications that have to do with mythology. Where better to start than with the Mythological Studies Journal (MSJ)? I (Laurel Bergsten, Mythological Times blog editor), served as Senior Co Editor with Kira Kull last year, and am delighted to highlight the journal here. Best of all, every issue of MSJ is free to read on the Pacifica website.
Many ISM members will already have some familiarity with the MSJ. It is still the only academic journal entirely dedicated to mythology–though ISM’s own journal is in its nascent stages–and is a wonderful resource for myth scholarship. The journal is produced by students in the Mythological Studies program at Pacifica Graduate Institute (PGI), and publishes the work of current students. Much like the myth program, MSJ emphasizes interdisciplinary study. The journal was founded in 2010, and the recent 2024 issue is the 12th Volume. As students come and go from the myth program the journal experiences revitalizing energy from a new team of editors, and new student submissions.
Headed by Co Senior Editors Kira Kull and Jasmyne Gilbert with Emily Lord-Kambitsch as Faculty Advisor, a team of 14 readers and editors selected 11 pieces to publish out of 23 submissions for the theme “Interstitial Intermediaries.”
Senior Co-Editors Jasmyne Gilbert and Kira Kull
Jasmyne Gilbert (she/her/hers) is an interdisciplinary scholar amplifying the stories that shape, sustain, and subvert American cultures. For Jasmyne, stories are sources of power and tools for critique and transformation. Merging myth, depth psychology, speculative imagination (what-if thinking), and cultural analysis, her research examines the hidden potential of narratives to inspire community-building and systemic change. You can connect with her on social media @jasmynegilbert or follow her public research at jasmynegilbert.substack.com
She is a third-year Mythological Studies student at Pacifica Graduate Institute, and Co-Senior Editor of the Mythological Studies Journal. She started working on MSJ as a reader in 2023 with secret machinations to pitch herself as Managing Editor, and was approached to help lead the 2024 and 2025 editions before she could get around to making the pitch.
Kira Kull (they/them) is a Ph.D. candidate in the Mythological Studies program at Pacifica Graduate Institute with specialization in Queer, Intersex, and Decolonial Theory. Coming from an integrative background of classical and experimental theatre, interfaith mysticism, and restorative justice work, it is Kira’s greatest delight to explore the themes and modalities of creative expression that shine light on pathways toward personal and collective liberation. Kira currently resides in Los Angeles where they work as a Myth Specialist, Queer Consultant, and Line Dance Instructor with Stud Country. Follow their journey at www.kirakull.com & @kkmiracle on Instagram.
Initially uncertain of their desire and capacity for editing, Kira quickly and gratefully grew into their work with MSJ and joyfully served as Co-Senior Editor for the past two years (2023, 2024). As much as they are excited to focus on their dissertation and other outside projects, this journal will always hold a special place in their heart.
Interview
What makes Volume XII of MSJ special?
All articles in Volume XII of the Mythological Studies Journal speak to the theme “Interstitial Intermediaries.” The previous few volumes of MSJ did not include a theme in their Call for Papers, which is often an editorial choice to keep the edition open to as wide an array of topics as possible. In our experience, especially in a program that is teeming with so many brilliant scholars and interdisciplinary possibilities, we found that people sometimes feel stumped about which papers to submit. So we believed it was important to include a theme for the 2024 edition to help make the choice easier for folks, as well as to help focus our material in the acceptance process.
It’s also important to mention that this edition of MSJ highlights the ways that people who get pushed to the margins of society can become kin and advance noble causes in solidarity. As far as we know, Kira is the first intersex senior editor, and Jasmyne is the first Black senior editor on the team. This is a huge milestone for Pacifica, and we have been honored to bring it to life.
It’s also important to mention that this edition of MSJ highlights the ways that people who get pushed to the margins of society can become kin and advance noble causes in solidarity.
How did you pick the theme “Interstitial Intermediaries?”
We chose the theme Interstitial Intermediaries to invite our peers into a conversation we wanted to have about challenging narratives and norms. To quote the call for papers we shared last spring, “We are seeking papers that challenge conventional narratives by visioning into new realities.” We are living during liminal and emergent times, so we asked for papers that could give others insights about what myth, depth psychology, and archetypal psychology can teach us about navigating the threshold.
Where do you see the world reflecting themes in the journal and vice versa?
Jasmyne: Building on the previous response, the 2024 MSJ is chock full of conversations about power, sexuality, belonging, queerness, gender, and history. The authors have managed to get to the heart of some of the most divisive sociopolitical issues of our times by emphasizing the beauty and power of stories. I think one of the great challenges of this next period of history will be helping people reconnect with their sense of imagination and weave it with method and narrative, and MSJ does that.
I think one of the great challenges of this next period of history will be helping people reconnect with their sense of imagination and weave it with method and narrative, and MSJ does that.
Kira: Absolutely. Especially given the emphasis in depth psychology that comes with this program, many of the MSJ authors offer a personal perspective, often quite an intimate perspective, alongside their scholarship. In the same way that we’re increasingly able to recognize the personal as political and vice versa, the world seems to be craving an integrated approach that weaves reflections on both collective and individual experiences together.
How does this edition contribute to the mythological community?
Jasmyne: How do I nicely say that this is the only peer-reviewed scholarly journal about myth coming out of the only full-time graduate program in mythological studies in the country? If we were not doing this, it would not exist. MSJ gives the outside world a mere taste of the magic of Pacifica, and offers some of our authors (like me) our first chance at publication.
Kira: And like we said above, our roles in this journal mark firsts for the Pacifica community, so you can imagine what that means for the larger myth community. I think it’s so important to nurture the expansion of perspectives being shared in the academic field of myth and I hope that our contributions as scholars embodying marginalized identities, who do not historically have much of a place in any field of scholarship, will help broaden the field a little further. So much of the work foundational to our field is still based on the theories of wealthy white European men, time to shake it up a bit, no?
I hope that our contributions as scholars embodying marginalized identities, who do not historically have much of a place in any field of scholarship, will help broaden the field a little further.
Kira, As the departing Senior Editor, do you plan to keep editing? What is on your horizon?
I definitely plan to continue editing and am available for work if you know folks in need of an editor. That said, my primary focus for the next few years will be writing my dissertation which traces the lineage of survival for sacred androgyny in ‘western’ socio-mythologies. I’m also excited to share that I’ll be presenting my paper “Ancient Liminality in Egyptian Frog Symbolism” at The Association for the Study of Women & Mythology (ASWM) conference this March. And you can keep an eye out for the theatrical release of Ponyboi (Sundance 2024), a film about an intersex sex worker that was my first major consulting project and will be coming to theaters for Pride month in June 2025.
Jasmyne, as the continuing Senior editor, what do you anticipate coming forward in the 2025 Journal? Are there new ideas churning?
It’s hard to anticipate the 2025 MSJ because I’m still riding the wave of joy from publishing 2024’s volume! I’m looking forward to continued collaboration with our new Co-Senior Editor Daniel Enbysk. Interested parties will have to stay tuned and take a peek at some of the pinboards on the Lambert campus in the spring to see what’s next ;)
What are you most proud of in your time as Senior Editor?
Kira: I feel really proud of the skills I developed not only in editing, but in managing and producing the journal. So much of the behind-the-scenes work is communicating with individual authors and editors and finding ways to adapt for the specific needs and style of each piece. The visual component was also a big priority for me both in 2023 and 2024 and I want to shout out our layout and design team Jason Batt and Daniel Enbysk. They helped elevate the journal to another level of both readability and elegance. I’m really proud of my work selecting images for these two editions, but it was the skill of these designers that brought it all together in formatting.
The Mythological Times is dedicated to showcasing the voices of our community. The opinions expressed in each Mythological Times blog post are those of the author and are not necessarily those of the International Society of Myth.
Subscribe to our blog, The Mythological Times, to read insights about mythologies from different disciplines, cultures, and perspectives. We anticipate featuring different writers each week. If you are an ISM member and would like to contribute to our blogs, please contact us at Info@ISMythology.com with a 250-word abstract.
Yorumlar