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Hi, I'm Lindsey Parrish, a sophomore.  I am majoring in English, minoring in Film Studies, concentrating in Gender and Sexuality Studies, and concentrating in Creative Writing.  While I was in high school, the US Government paid me to also attend classes at different universities, where I took numerous courses in Chemistry, Physics, Anatomy and Physiology, and Biology.  Four years ago, I began discussing the mythology and evolution of classical fairy tales with one of my instructors at Saint Francis University, and it remains to be the most fascinating part of my literary studies.  As I have studied evolution and the mythology of stories separately, I am very excited to study the intersection of these two topics. 

Have stories evolved as a product of the evolution of the brain, or is it more appropriate to think of the evolution of stories as a product of the evolution of society and changing moral values?

It is possible for two stories to be very similar in plot structure but to be from completely different origins.  Is this also possible for creatures to be very similar in anatomical structure but to have evolved in entirely different ways?

Society and morals, as I mentioned above, have evolved over time.  It seems that most things (if not all things) evolve in some way.  Why is it, then, that stories are posited in this course as having a special tie to evolution.  Why are these two topics in particular seen as analagous?