Abstract

Popular and technical usages yield unequivocal definitions of "myth"' and "ideology," terms which imply distinct meanings of "history" as both accumulated symbolic product and dynamic symbolic production. "Culture," the historical symbolic realm, is analyzable objectively as accumulation in terms of art, law, etc., or subjectively as dynamic process through mythology and ideology-the former dealing with beliefs originating in historical experience, value integration, and establishment of consensus, the latter with beliefs originating in competitive social situations and their communication and segregation. Irrational mythologies spark historical dynamism, rational ideologies extend it. Sorel, Mannheim, and other writers here examined use these distinctions systematically in historical interpretation