Myths and Legends: Journeys Through Time
Urban Legends
If somebody told you to be wary of something called “di hydrogen mono oxide”, that it was
dangerous and you should avoid it at all costs, and you believed them and went around
telling everyone you knew about it…well then you would be in the middle of an urban
legend experience. Urban legend? What’s that you say? Well you know that a myth is a
traditional story or idea that centers on a hero, deity or event that isn’t exactly easy to
explain naturally or factually. A legend is a story that has a teeny grain of truth that is
wrapped in layer upon layer of story or myth. An urban legend…that’s a whole other
creature. Urban legends are actually fairly new. They’re also called contemporary legend…
which is the name most preferred by folklorists….urban myth or urban tales. Despite
the name “Urban” for something to be an urban legend doesn’t mean it exists solely in
or originated in a city or urban area. The word urban is merely a way for people to
differentiate between modern legends/myths and more traditional folklore myths and
legends. Also…urban legends tend to be more hoax like and told in a tree-branch story
format. What that means is that one person “might” have experienced the story, they tell
somebody else, who tells somebody else..at the third retelling the storyteller is saying
“I heard from a friend of a friend that this happened to so and so”. In a sense…it’s kind of
like the trunk of a tree with it’s branches going outward. The farther from the trunk the
branch is…the more the story has been twisted and exaggerated. One thing that holds
true…ironically…for all urban legends is that the person repeating the urban legend
believes them to be 100% true. They take the story as fact and spread it around as such.
Going back to di hyrdogren mono oxide being bad for you….well if you didn’t know that
di hydrogen mono oxide was the scientific name for the most common thing on earth…
Water, then from the simple sound of it, it’s understandable as to how one could think
it was harmful. The scientific name sounds a whole lot scarier then simply saying “water”.
Another popular form of urban legends are ghost stories. We’ve all heard a version of the
escaped murderer with a hook for a hand, the girl in a dress who died either going to or
coming from prom, the lonely hitch hiker who died only minutes from home….all of these
are common forms of urban legends. There’s no die hard facts or 100% scientific proof to
back up any of these stories yet people repeat them all the time. Same with stories about
a lady dying from multiple bites due to spiders making a nest in her hair do, or the ever
famous swelling cactus. That one…if you own a cactus and it starts swelling or looking like
it’s breathing..quick! stick it outside and cover it in a plastic bag because it’ll explode and
hundreds of hungry baby spiders will come out and eat you! Pure urban myth. The eco-
system inside of a cactus simply cannot support a colony or even a nest of spiders.
Urban legends are fun…they can be scary or interesting, they can even be good for keeping
younger brothers and sisters in line for an hour or two. Just remember though…just because
somebody tells you it’s true..doesn’t always mean it is. If somebody comes to you with an
outrageous story..and you believe it..you just might be the next branch in a tree of urban
legends.