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Comment
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Jungleman
Registered User
(9/18/01 3:40:54 am)
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More Details for the Fairy Tale im looking for
I got some more details from my Girlfriend, She said that the little girl was actually trading her clothes to the animals so that they would show her the way home, and at the end of the tale they all ate waffles together.
Special thanks go out to Lotti and Kate for their Help =-)
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Terri
Registered User
(9/19/01 3:15:32 am)
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Re: More Details for the Fairy Tale im looking for
I recall reading as a child a rather racist version of the tale you described,called (appallingly enough) Little Black Sambo. A little boy living in some jungle somewhere went out in fancy new clothes and encountered a tiger -- or maybe it was many tigers, I can't quite remember. I recall that he kept giving up pieces of clothing in order to save his life, and then...sorry, my memory of the tale is vague...somehow it ended up that the tiger(s) was tricked into running around a tree (chasing the boy? it's own tail?) and it ran so fast that it turned into butter. The boy went home and had the butter on waffles. Strange story.
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NancyMe
Registered User
(9/19/01 3:55:59 pm)
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Tiger to butter
That story has been reissued in a PC version ("Babaji" is the version I saw). He meets each tiger individually (for a total of 3) and each one demands a piece of his clothing in exchange for not eating him (and/or he negotiates with the tiger and convinces it that it would look better wearing the shoes on its ears, etc.) Essentially, he uses his wits and barters his clothes for his life. They do, indeed, tree him and then chase each other so fast that they turn into butter and he takes the butter home for pancakes. Is this the story?
Nancy
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janeyolen
Unregistered User
(9/23/01 2:22:03 am)
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Racism
Little Black Sambo became a racist touchstone some time after it had been published by Helen Bannerman, not because of the story, but because of the pictures which were exaggerated big lipped pictures. The name "Sambo" became a derogatory name for a black man.
Interesting, though, that the story itself in Bannerman's telling is set in India.
And the black child is quite a hero, having defeated the tigers who had been set on eating him. In fact in the end the tigers race around the tree so quickly, they become tiger butter which Sambo uses on his pancakes.
In the past couple of years, the story has been resurrected and made whole again, in two versions, one of which is by Julius Lester with pictures by Jerry Pinckney, both African-American artists of the highest caliber.
Jane
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GanFae
Registered User
(11/22/01 5:35:27 pm)
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Shedding clothes to escape a cat
I know this has nothing much to do with Sambo....but this talk reminded me of a movie I watched recently. Songcatcher. Lovely movie about my home and the music thereof. In this movie, if you've not seen it, the main character is warned about panthers. That if she should hear a woman screaming (which is the sound of a panther) that she should run while shedding her clothing a piece at a time. This should ensure her safety as the panther supposedly will be distracted by each article, tearing each to bits one by one giving her time to make her escape or for the panther to lose interest eventually. Interesting. I'd never heard this before....but of course it was put to test and worked smashingly well in the movie.
~~Meagan
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Jess
Unregistered User
(11/23/01 10:18:18 am)
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Little Black Sambo
I was always interested in what happened to this story. I was under the impression as a child that Sambo was Indian, rather than African (maybe it was the presence of the tigers). Also, in the U.S. it spawned a chain of breakfast restaurants. Anyone remember Sambo's? Anyone know of the origin of this story?
And an FYI to panther encounters. According to Washington State Fish and Game, you should NEVER run from a mountain lion (also known as an American or Florida panther) if you encounter one. You should make yourself as big and aggressive as possible! They are supposed to scream like a woman just before they attack. I personally have only seen one in the wild (from the safety of pick up) in Big Bend, TX.
Jess
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Heidi
Anne Heiner
ezOP
(11/23/01 11:32:23 pm)
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Re: Little Black Sambo
If you really love the story of Little Black Sambo, but are wary of the racism of the older version when sharing it with children, please be aware of the "updated" version that changed the names and the setting (through illustrations) to India. The book is wonderful and touted by Jim Trelease in his workshops as being more accurate as to where the animals are actually found in India vs. Africa. It is called:
The Story of Little Babaji
by Helen Bannerman, illustrated by Fred Marcellino
Heidi
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Gail
Unregistered User
(11/25/01 3:03:17 pm)
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Bannerman's Little Sambo
This book actually was first written by Helen Bannerman and depicted India -- not Africa. The racism that developed was a result of the reading audience "reinterpreting and moving" her story when relating it in North America. Gail
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janeyolen
Unregistered User
(11/26/01 4:24:27 pm)
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racism
Gail--while that is true if you are just hearing Bannerman's words, once you look at the pictures she did, they were definitely African and racist. (Though not by early mid twentieth century standards.) And then the name "Sambo" got taken over as one of those words after the n--- word which got used for male African Americans. There was, alas, no hope after that.
Though both the Marcelliono and the Lester/Pinkney new versions that came out the same season about five years ago did much to redeem the story for African American kids.
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Gail
Unregistered User
(11/26/01 7:10:21 pm)
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Bannerman
Jane, I agree with you. Here is the text -- for both Little Black Sambo and Little Black Mimbo -- written and illustrated in India but ... I use all 3 versions in my classrooms when we talk about illustrations/images. Gail
ftp://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext98/sambo11.txt
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