Thursday, December 9, 2010

THE FINAL ENTRYYY!!!!

As the semester comes to an end it is incredible to look back and see how far I have come since I first stepped foot in this class. When I first chose the class, Once Upon a Time – Folk and Fairy Tales Around the World, I did not know to expect. I was hoping to just get some Mcdaniel plan requirements done but this class has impacted me in a way that I will never forget. I developed a greater appreciation for fairy tales and now respect them as not just children stories but valuable pieces of history and culture. These tales have been passed down from generation to generation primarily by word of mouth. When you think about it that is truly incredible. These stories carry with them years of tradition and they create a whole new dream-like world where anything can happen, where the impossible is possible. When I was a kid I never thought that fairy tales were anything more than just stories told for entertainment. This class has showed me that they can be analyzed from a variety of perspectives, including that of psychology, religious and feminist.
This class was extremely fun and very engaging. Our class discussions were always very colorful and entertaining. Each week I always looked forward to our guest lectures and really enjoyed their insight into the world of fairy tales. Through this class I was able to read and analyze fairy tales from a variety of cultures around the world. We read tales from the Arabic tradition all the way to African-American story telling traditions. We looked at the Jewish folktale tradition and the storytelling in Kenya. Before this class I had no idea how broad fairy tales were and that each culture had its own unique characteristics.
For me this class was never that difficult, primarily because the work was always enjoyable and the stories were fun to read. They kept you entertained and it was nice to see the variety that is out there. I especially enjoyed the trickery tales that are from the Kenya. I would defiantly recommend this class to others. I truly enjoyed this class and it would be safe to say that it was my favorite class that I have taken since attending McDaniel College. 

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Myths and Legends of the Adivasis India


This week in class Dr. Greg Alles came to our class to talk about the “Myths and Legends of the Adivasis in India”. This lecture was particularly interesting. Dr. Alles began his lecture by asking if we had ever heard of fairy tales being the cause of a genocide or court case. I was kind of taken back because I would have never thought that a fairy tale could be taken so seriously. We learned that in India fairy tales are not just tales that teach morals but rather they are considered an accurate account of history and religion. Fairy tales are seen as a constant theme in Hinduism. The magical world that the fairy tales posses are thought to be holy and the tales depict their god’s and deities. This is a huge difference from any other country we have learned about. In every other origin we have seen the fairy tales are not taken as seriously and are just thought to be stories, not reality. Additionally, I found it different that the stories were a whole lot longer than others we have encountered. Dr. Alles brought and showed us a collection of tales and the books were humungous, larger than most novels. He even showed us clips of a television series that was based on the story of Rama, depicting just how serious and widespread the tales are in Indian society. 

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Arabic Folktales


Last Thursday our class was lucky enough to hear a lecture by Professor Zaru about Arabic Folktales. I liked how she started out clarifying which countries actually make up the Arabic world. There is much confusion revolving around which nations are truly a part of it. After clearing up the misconceptions we had a better idea of the origins of the following tales and traditions.
 I think Professor Zaru’s Arabic lecture was a very good compliment to our last speaker, Dr. Ochieng' K'Olewe. Both Arabic and Kenya story telling involves themes of animals, trickery and humor. To me the Arabic tales of Kalila wa Dimna were very similar to that of Ashanti and Anansi, where the characters are animals who offer practical and moral advice. In both traditions storytelling is considered an art form, a form of entertainment and both set moral guidelines.  In Arabic folktales the common characteristics are: oral tradition, entertainment, insight into human behavior, and variations in theme.

Another aspect that stood out for me was the frame story of One Thousand and One Nights. I was fascinated how one woman pushed off her death for such a long time by using a web of folktales that intertwined together. It especially was interesting how each night she was able to leave the tale at a cliffhanger that would prolong the ending for another time. Her wits allowed herself to evade her execution and win the heart of the cruel man who once was extremely sexist and violent. 

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Folktale and Storytelling Tradition from Kenya

Today our class was privileged enough to experience a lecture by Dr. Ochieng’ K’Olewe titled “Folktale and Storytelling Tradition from Kenya”. This was by far my favorite guest speaker we have had so far. He was a very knowledgeable and entertaining speaker and was an excellent storyteller.  I especially enjoyed his use of the traditional drum and how he got the class involved in singing. His lecture was very engaging and extremely fun. Dr. Ochieng’ K’Olewe enriched our knowledge of folk and fairy tales by providing us with engaging traditional tales from Kenya and through the use of music. What stood out for me was that in Africa the tales are told at night when there is no light so that the voice of the story teller becomes more prominent and the focus is strictly guided to the teller’s voice. Story tellers are prominently Aunts and Grandmothers. We learned that the importance of the tales lie in entertainment, the musical aspect, carries values, beliefs, and taboos, teach morality, meant to celebrate and emphasize the importance of wits, and is used to provide an understanding for the “stuff” phenomenon. Dr. Ochieng’ K’Olewe also mentioned the value of riddles.  Riddles can be told anytime of the day, are based on things you can see and teach the importance of language and competence. In Africa the community and society may not be as safe as we would like it to be so the riddles teach children how to use their wits to outsmart any threats they may come across. They must learn to think on their feet and out do others.

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Fairy Tale

Once upon a time there lived a hunter by the name of Fudd. He was the father of three and every day he would go out into the woods and shoot an animal to bring back for dinner. One day Fudd was hunting in a nearby forest and he fell asleep. When he awoke, standing in front of him was the biggest deer he had ever seen. Fudd picked up his rifle and pointed it at the deer. The deer looked up and said “please Fudd do not shoot me for if I was in your shoes I would not shoot you”. Fudd laughed and replied I’m a hunter and I’m better than you, therefore I will shoot you and eat you up”.  He then pulled the trigger but nothing happened, the deer laughed and said “I am clever and you will never get me” and ran off into the woods. The next day the hunter decided this time he was going to bring extra bullets and put in his pocket so if the deer unloaded his gun he would have more ammunition. He went back to the exact same place where he saw the deer last and once again fell asleep. When he woke up the giant deer was standing there grazing in the meadow right in from of him. He pulled out his gun and aimed it at the deer. The deer said “please Fudd do not shoot me for if I was in your shoes I would not shoot you”. Fudd laughed and replied I’m a hunter and I’m better than you, therefore I will shoot you and eat you up”. He then pulled the trigger and nothing happened so he reached into his pocket to grab the extra bullets. When he reached in the bullets were gone and he had grabbed a mousetrap and it snapped his fingers off. The deer laughed and said “I am clever and you will never get me” and ran off into the woods. The following day Fudd decided that he would go to the exact same spot but this time he promised himself not to fall asleep. After waiting for three hours the deer walked up and Fudd aimed his rifle at the deer. The deer said “please Fudd do not shoot me for if I was in your shoes I would not shoot you”. Fudd laughed and replied I’m a hunter and I’m better than you, therefore I will shoot you and eat you up”. He pulled the trigger and this time the gun did fire and hit the deer but then it ricocheted back and hit Fudd in the chest. The deer laughed and said “I am a clever deer and you will never get me, I am also immortal and my hide is indestructible and now you are dead. Since you treated me with no respect and insisted on shooting and eating me I shall do the same and go and eat your family as well”.  

African-American Folk and Fairy Tales

Last Thursday our fairy tale class had the privilege of hearing a lecture from Dr. Johnson-Ross about the African American story telling tradition. She provided the class with many historical facts and mentioned bits of history I had never heard before, leaving me with a feeling that I didn’t know as much about American history as I had thought. She placed a lot of emphasis on The Brownies Book and created a comparison to the magazine Highlights that I used to read quite frequently as a child. The Brownies Book  was written between January 1920 – December 1921, and it used folk tales, games, and songs aimed to help support African Americans through the times of segregation. The tales in this book included fairy tales from all around the world. A lot of the stories focused primarily upon animals as being the main characters which is unlike the European fairy tales we have read in class that are largely focused on humans. Dr. Johnson-Ross additionally addressed a story by the name of The People Could Fly. She showed us a power point that included many pages from the book and it showed people being told they could fly and then they would fly away and escape slavery. The idea behind this story is that if you believe you can achieve. This is a very meaningful message and was very appropriate for the time period it was wrote in. Overall, I found Dr. Johnson-Ross’s presentation to be very emotional and historical. It was an interesting lecture that included many key underrated pieces of American history and showed how fairy tales can be used to educate and encourage the concepts of freedom and opportunity. 

Sunday, October 31, 2010

Rags to Riches

 Cinderella is one of the so-called “rise tales”, which features a narrative arc of “rags to riches through magic and marriage” (Ruth Bottigheimer). For our class we have read a few stories that are related to this theme. They are comprised of an individual who is living in a bad situation and are troubled, later being introduced to magic and go through a social and economic transformation. Many times the main character ends up meeting and marrying a hero who is from a higher class and provides the character with a better standard of living. I do agree that in real life someone can go through a “rags to riches” transformation, although it is rare. These situations are not ones ignited by magic or happen instantly and spontaneously. In reality these stories are fueled by the desire to better oneself and through the use of hard work and perseverance. These situations also normally only include earning a substantial amount of money. It is possible and seen when an individual marries someone else who is rich, and in these situations they marry into money.
 

Sunday, October 24, 2010

ASL and Fairy Tales

The presentation of Dr. Rust and Rose was very moving and interesting. They focused on the use of ASL to tell stories. It is incredible how the deaf culture in America has developed their own form of communication and with that they are able to spread the folktales that are predominantly passed down through the oral tradition. When they presented the tales using ASL I was shocked at how well I was able to understand the story when I had no background in American sign language at all. What really stood out for me was the fact that through ASL the tales can be portrayed similar to watching a movie, in that at certain moments you can present the story in slow motion and with influence from cinematography. The speaker also mentioned that he was a child of deaf parents and when he would go out to watch a movie he would come home and recite the storyline of the movies in a storytelling setting. He would sign the movie for his family as they sat around and watched the film through his sign language. Additionally, the speakers brought to attention that in the deaf community a lot of the stories poke fun at the dominate population and make fun of “hearing” people. This presentation opened my eyes to truly grasp how fairy tales are not just stories that are dependent on oral or auditory forms of communication but can also be portrayed visually.  


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZjah32LoW0 - Coda Brothers



Friday, October 15, 2010

Your Shamanic Child

On October 7 our fairy tale class went to hear a lecture by Vivien Deitz. She is a clinical social worker who uses a variety of techniques including Jungian psychology and shamanistic healing. In her lecture she addressed the tales "Aladdin" and "the Velveteen Rabbit". Claiming that "Aladdin" is a story about the transformation from depression to enlightment, while "the velveteen rabbit" was about moving from anxiety to optimism. A reoccuring theme of the "shamanic child" was present in her lecture and is what really stood out for me. I thought this concept was rather interesting and a creative way of interpretation. I do not necessarily agree with what was said but I definatly found it to be intertaining none the less. When she told us to close our eyes and locate our inner shamanic child I just kept envisioning penguins, which was quite strange. I did however really like her theory that fairy tales were a gateway into lost innocence and that everyone has an inner child, or personal genie. In one of our reading in class it mentioned a similiar concept. That children relate best to fairy tales because their adolescence most closely relates to the motifs and images present in many of the tales. I do kind of agree that fairy tales can connect you to your "inner child" in that it can bring you to remember what it was like to be a child and to let your imagination take over. Overall I found Vivien Deitz lecture to be very entertaining and although a bit fruity, it was a fun approach to fairy tales.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

Rammstein and Snow White

The music video Sonne by Rammstein is a modern adaptation of the classic fairy tale Snow White. I think this music video is not related to any of the stories in that it does not follow the same storyline or structure at all. However, there were many motifs present. The miners represented the 7 dwarves, which is the same as the tales, because in the Brothers Grimm the Dwarves are miners that dug for minerals. In the video the dwarves were the servants of Snow White and she was evil as opposed to the tales where she is innocent. Some imagery that stood out to me was the presence of red apples, the glass coffin, the “evil” female figure, the mirror and the poison comb. Additionally it was interesting to see the symbol of gold in the video, gold was not present in the tales but in the music video Snow White has the dwarves mining for gold to fuel her addiction. She can be seen snorting gold and it even shows her injecting gold before she overdoses. Furthermore, in the tales there is the attendance of a prince but there is no prince in the video. I really enjoyed Rammstein’s video because it is a very interesting and unique modern adaptation. 

Friday, October 1, 2010

Cupid and Psyche/Beauty and the Beast


The story “Cupid and Psyche” bears much resemblance to the tale of “Beauty and the Beast”. In both stories the youngest daughter of three is an extraordinarily beautiful young woman who possesses the attention of everyone around them and the older two sisters are jealous of their younger sibling. This image of three sisters, the youngest being the most beautiful is a very common theme in fairy tales and can be seen in a number of stories. In both “Cupid and Psyche” and Beauty and the Beast” the beautiful young girl lives in the luxurious homes of their counterpart but go for a long period of time without seeing them. One difference here in these tales is that in Beauty and the Beast, the young girl does not think she is in love with the Beast until the end of the story and constantly rejects his marriage proposal. While in Cupid and Psyche, Psyche is almost instantly enticed by Cupid through his loving words and kind manner.
In both tales, the older sisters bring many problems for the lovers. In Beauty and the Beast, the sisters are jealous of their sister’s happiness and pretend to be very loving of their younger sister and trick her into staying more than the ten days the Beast granted, in doing so the Beast attempts to kill himself through starvation. In Cupid and Psyche, her sisters motivate her to sneak in a lamp and a knife to the dinner table to reveal her husband and to kill him if he is a monster. By doing so Psyche almost loses her husband and betrays his trust. In both of these fairy tales in the end the two mean sisters face punishment. In Beauty and the Beast the sisters are turned into statues and in Cupid and Psyche the sisters fall off a cliff and die.
The overall message in these two fairy tales are ultimately the same. That people should love for more than appearance and to “not judge a book by its cover”, and that the value of personality is greater than that of appearance. These two tales although different in details, portrays similar messages and use  the same central theme.
 

Sunday, September 26, 2010

Little Red Riding Hood


The “little red riding hood” themed cartoon I chose was created by Mark Parisi and can be found on www.offthemark.com.  This little red riding hood depiction is defiantly a social cartoon. It is kind of a modern illustration of the classic fairy tale story. In the cartoon little red riding hood is talking to the wolf through instant messaging. My interpretation of it relates to how nowadays people have conformed to technology and have become rather dependent, especially socially. This cartoon still retains the same vibe of the original tale and alters a well known line from the classic story. Instead of writing “what big ears you have” or “what big teeth you have” the modern adaptation replaces it with “big typos”. Additionally this cartoon can be interpreted as an image of how technology has taken over the world of entertainment through its popularity over classic literature and methods of communication. Overall I think this cartoon is pretty funny and is successful at relating it to our modern time period. What really stood out and captured my attention was the phrase “the classics, updated”. Showing how many works of art from the past have been transformed and altered to conform to modern societal desires.

Friday, September 17, 2010

Fairy Tales and Psychology

For years psychologists have used fairy tales in an effort to understand the human mind. The connections between the two are through archetypes, id, ego, super ego, collective unconscious, and the psychosexual stages of development. Psychologists claim that the uses of fairy tales are symbolic images that reflect insight into the human unconscious. Carl Jung the father of analytical psychology interprets fairy tales by using his theories of collective unconscious and archetypes. The collective unconscious is basically an experience or memory that we all as a specie share. Archetypes are basically defined as an ideal person or personality type, examples of archetypes in fairy tales consist of wise old man, great mother nature, eternal child and the trickster. Another influential psychologist was Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis. He used his theories of id, ego, superego, dreams and psychosexual stages of development to analyze fairy tales. He thought that fairy tales and dreams could possibly be derived from the same place, so fairy tales like dreams may provide insight into the unconscious. Additionally in the story of Hansel and Gretel, there is evidence of psychosexual stages of development, in the tale there are many indications of the oral stage, shown through the constant use of bread. The id, ego and superego are also visible psychological aspects of fairy tales. The id is basically the primal desires of man that do not think about morals or what is socially acceptable. An example in fairy tales would be when a family is on the brick of starvation the parents often decide to take their children out to the woods and leave them so they don’t have to share their food anymore. In these situations the family is acting primarily on the id. They ignore the ego and super ego that would tell them that that particular action is immoral. What really stood out for me in Dr. Mazeroff’s lecture would be the use of fairy tales in psychotherapy. He spoke of using fairy tales to bring out our repressed memories. One example was when he once asked a patient to recite a well known fairy tale, in doing so the patient blindly left out one key section of the tale that included the mistreatment of a child. Then when Dr. Mazeroff asked the patient why he left it out the patient realized that he himself once was mistreated as a child and he unknowingly repressed that particular memory. Since fairy tales can supposedly provide insight into the unconscious they are capable of locating and resurfacing repressed memories. 

Sunday, September 12, 2010

What is a fairy tale?

What is a fairy tale? For centuries fairy tales have sparked the imaginations of people of all ages around the world, these stories have been passed down from generation to generation verbally and are one dimensional. We all grew up listening to fairy tales and letting our imagination take over. Fairy tales are not just stories but a literary art form, one in which the origin is unknown. They do not contain depth, they posses archetypes, structure, history, religion, motifs, and even psychoanalytic views. They can be applied to anyone from any country and in each individuals interpretation they can derive meaning and apply that meaning to their own lives.
Orally transmitted folk literature is seen in only a few types of narratives. Legends, Saint’s Legends and folktales have all existed side by side. But folktales are unlike these, they are bound neither to reality or dogma. Folktales survive without the support of the church and continue to exist when faced with opposition. In its own way folktales provide answers to the questions of human existence. Additionally, folktales do not interpret or explain, they merely observes and portrays a dreamlike vision of the world. The characters are provided with opportunities not things and gifts appear right at the moment when the hero and task collide, they do not reward the hero but instead impel him into the adventure and allow him to fulfill his destiny. It is almost as if the folktale wished to give us assurance, even if you’re not sure what you’re doing or where you’re going it provides assurance that your apart of something meaningful. It says no more than it knows and it knows only what it perceives. Individuals read folktales and either unconsciously or consciously regard the images as being not just pictures but as metaphors. In this sense they are not symbols that conceal but rather reveal. 

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Introduction

I chose the class “Once Upon a Time – Folk and Fairy Tales Around the World” basically because I thought it would be a very fun and interesting class. In English class I would get so bored reading books that lacked excitement and were rather dull. To me reading and analyzing fairy tales will be much more enjoyable and amusing. From this seminar I hope to gain a lot more knowledge about the origins of fairy tales and am very interested in how different fairy tales from around the world compare with each other, discovering how each origin differs in style, context and form. I want to analyze fairy tales as a whole genre and discover how they were developed and how they have been kept alive for such a long time. Additionally, just about all of the fairy tales I know are the most commonly known ones, such as Snow White, the Little Red Riding Hood and Cinderella. I know there are hundreds of fairy tales and I would like to expand my knowledge of them and to learn about many that are not as widely known and recognized. As of right now I honestly do not have a favorite folktale or fairytale but hopefully after taking this class I will discover one.