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Author
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Comment
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(4/4/05 3:23 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
>>And now, because I cannot help myself, lots of college and high school paper-writers post questions here. While I admit that certain questions get asked an awful lot (I love the sites new FAQ pages for this very reason!), one of the things that makes this discussion board the fine thing that it is, is the general atmosphere of welcome and support. "Speaking" patronizingly or slightingly of posters, as in “At the risk of encouraging the original poster (oh, don'tcha just hate college-paper time on the Internet?” seems mean-spirited to me, DerekJ. Though I may be projecting my own memories of first posting to this site and worrying that everyone would think I was an idiot. A remark like that would have scared me off for good.<<
...Oh, and just kidding, Erica (note the smiley in the OP):
Going to a discussion board is usually more effective and more focused than a Usenet group if you want to expend the effort in digging up discussion fodder for a thesis--And given March and April, they do tend to happen at around the same time (hence the joke)...
But my own particular bonnet-bee (as you probably may have noticed) is the corner of fairytale-academia that wants to "prove" some social point by digging up old grudge-bouts against "Cinderella" or "Many-Fur", etc., or other easy-target Grimm stories without the appearance of having previously read them too open-mindedly.
Yes, this may be the fault of the original test-thesis question putting the poster in the position of asking it, but if you have to, remember, it's still all about diplomacy:
Jumping into a board with a loaded-sounding gender or gore-centric question, eg. "What do you think is the social significance of the stepsisters cutting off their heels?", or some such, might rub some purist readers the wrong way by sounding as if one is spoiling for a fight, and a seemingly over-fought one, too...
A well-meaning note of "Help me out, folks, I've got a paper
due!" will at least earn some sympathy and take some of the
personal blame off.
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Erica
Carlson
Registered User
(4/4/05 4:43 pm)
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Re: Smiley
Thanks for clarifying. I initially took the smiley face to be aimed
at the non-newbie members of the board, and was feeling sorry for
the new poster in case s/he was a sensitive sort. Also, I started
participating in this board because of a library school project
(that I started around March of last year, actually ), and I very
much appreciate how kind people were in helping me with my own highly
un-original question.
Erica
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Veronica
Schanoes
Registered User
(4/4/05 5:04 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
I've been occupied with other things lately, and at this point haven't much to say because Helen and Black Sheep have, I think, made all the points that I would have made. However, I will note that the qualities associated with traditional forms of masculinity have by and large been valorized in our culture--boys have not been penalized for being assertive, ambitious, etc, whereas girls have been penalized for having those qualities while at the same time the more passive qualities associated with traditional forms of femininity do not lead to success. Hence I am far more concerned with girls' absorption of such gender ideology than I am with boys'.
More to the point, I enjoy debates about gender and gore, separately
or together. There's room for lots of different kinds of threads
on surlalune, and I don't think asking about the social significance
of the stepsisters' mutilated feet is "spoiling for a fight,"
whether or not it rubs "purists" (and what are the rest
of us, adulterated?) the wrong way. Rather, it seems like a value-neutral
question that can be taken lots of different ways--what does it
say about issues of beauty, of suffering, of the propriety of gore
in tales directed at children, how such standards change over the
years, the desire for revenge, etc. There are certainly other types
of questions and issues that I, on the other hand, find banal or
uninteresting or annoying. Certain questions rub me the
wrong way. Rather than questioning the validity of those questions,
though, I just avoid those threads.
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Erica
Carlson
Registered User
(4/4/05 9:34 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
Thanks for bringing that up, Veronica. I'm curious about what a fairy tale "purist" is, myself. I'm certainly not one. Hmm--am I adulterated? Sounds serious. Is there a test for that? Perhaps I should see a specialist.
Folk lore isn't a pure thing, though. It changes from culture to culture and from time period to time period. Stories are told (written, filmed, and spoken) differently with different audiences, not only because of age- or message-appropriateness, but because audiences are different and bring different interactions to the mix. My own thought is that it's impossible to be a purist, and that we should all enjoy, and when possible/enjoyable passionately and courteously defend our (pick one or add your own:
adulterated
corrupted
nuanced
shaded-by-personal-experience
critical
subjective
influenced-by-education-or-reading) view points.
Best (and apologies for the grammar of my adjectives),
Erica
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catja1
Registered User
(4/4/05 10:42 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
Thank you, Erica and Veronica. It's impossible to be a "purist" about folklore, because there ain't no such thing as "pure." There's "older," there's "more in line with what we think uneducated lower-class people ought to be like," there's "not bearing any obvious marks of outside influence," and there's "not obviously written or rewritten by an outside scholar or artist with an axe to grind," but not "more pure."
Every single telling of a tale is a, for lack of a better word, *valid* telling of that tale. It may be more or less well-told, more or less influenced by extra-cultural factors, more or less in keeping with past or current moral tenor, more or less influential than other versions of the story, but all of them are valid as *examples* of that story. There is no such thing as the One True Version, or the Ur-Version from which all others are merely degenerate copies.
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redtriskell
Registered User
(4/4/05 10:53 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
And at this point I have to add, along with catja, that "purity"
is non-existent as far as these tales are concerned. They have all
been...altered?... to suit the needs of various tellers and hearers
for hundreds of years. And to Erica- I think I like being adulterated.
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(4/4/05 11:32 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
I didn't mean "purism" of the tales, I meant "purism" of the reader:
There are some who still read them for the stories, you know--Sometimes, a glass slipper is just a glass slipper, and a many-furred coat is not an incest metaphor, it's just something really neat a disguised princess wears.
As C.S. Lewis spent seven books hinting at, the ability to accept
the situation of someone else being able to succeed at moral decisions
in a world overseen by supernatural arbiters of right and wrong
makes it pretty darn easier to accept the idea of whether our
moral decisions matter in a world that might be overseen by its
own supernatural arbiter, as we've already had the secondhand training
at it...We're used to it.
When we stop seeing stories as stories, and only see them as "social indictments"--and pat ourselves on our back for what fine, indupable adult cynics we are, and what fools we were to ever buy into it at face value--that's the exact moment we also forget how to play. And neither one comes back by itself.
Believe Erica also happily used the word "corrupt" as
one of the synonyms, and I'd say that was much more appropriate
for the condition than "adult".
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Veronica
Schanoes
Registered User
(4/5/05 3:25 am)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
I understood that you mean the "purism" of the reader,
and I stand by my point. You seem to be assuming that if one reads
for anything other than story, an idea that you call reading
that story as "social indictment," one automatically loses
the capability to enjoy story as well. Frankly, that's absolutely
incorrect--those I know who enjoy analysis enjoy analysis precisely
because they enjoy reading stories, and then become interested
in why the image of the glass slipper, for instance, is
so resonant personally and/or culturally. The rhetoric of "corruption"
seems to assume that there is ever a time when we are pristine,
uninfluenced readers, and I don't think that's possible. Being conscious
enough to read and understand automatically means being conscious
enough to have ideas about how stories work and what they mean.
The idea that one kind of reading is "pure" and another
is "corrupt"--aside from the self-righteous value judgments
inherent in those words--ignores the fact that deciding that a story
can only be read in one way is also an ideological bias.
As an aside, I don't believe that it's the coat of many furs that is considered a "metaphor" for incest by many readers. It's the fact that the king tries to force his own daughter into marrying him.
The issue is not that a story can't be a good story, or that a glass
slipper can't be a glass slipper--the issue for those of us who
analyze the stories is what makes a particular story or
image "good"--why does it resonate? Further, in my experience,
those who consider themselves "purists" are often passing
judgment on those who read stories differently--ideas like "corruption"
and "losing the ability to play" (something that I think
the kids I babysit would be very surprised to hear I have done)
and suchlike. Whereas I have rarely run across situations wherein
those of use who enjoy analysis suggest that one shouldn't
read for the pleasure of the story.
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AliceCEB
Registered User
(4/5/05 7:08 am)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
Derek, I don't want to pile it on, but as someone who is not an
academic and does not engage in critique, I think you've missed
something. Everyone
analyses a tale they read--even a child. The analysis might not
be academic, but it's there: Why didn't Cinderella run away? Why
didn't Jack use the cow for milk? (When you have a particularly
verbal child, the questions come fast and furious.) The answers
given, either by an adult or by the children themselves will influence
how the listener/reader understands the tale.
Part of the pleasure of reading is thinking over what you've read. Part of the pleasure of being an adult is to take lots of information you have about the world and inform your thinking with it.
Best,
Alice
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Erica
Carlson
Registered User
(4/5/05 3:36 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
More piling. To underscore what Alice and Veronica have written, a story doesn't exist in isolation. Stories are made powerful by the reactions they cause within their readers, viewers, and listeners.
I believe that part of reading folk and fairy tales thoughtfully involves being aware of how they shift and change depending on context, and also of how we, as readers, are effected by our own contexts. I don't believe in the "pure" or even the "objective" reader. (I might even go so far as to offer the term "sterile" as an alternative for "pure.") I think the closest we can come to being objective is to recognize what we bring (and we all bring something) to our readings and to be honest about it.
Out of curiosity, why would it be "pure" to look for morals in tales and "corrupt" to look for the influences of society and culture within tales?
Best,
Erica
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(4/5/05 4:34 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
Ain't nothin' "corrupted" about examining a story's influences, if you're examining the story as written--
Problem is, not everyone does that.
Possibly due to their overpublicized guilt-by-association with Disney, or to just being an over-easy "deluded childhood innocence" symbol, EVERYBODY with a personal axe to grind wants to line up and take a punch at them, as if they were inflatable Boppo the Clown toys:
Those looking for "shock" want to play up Grimm-gore...Those of a progressively feminist bent want to beat the "Cinderella as makeover propaganda" arguments into the ground (although to a less innocent degree as in the other thread)...Those with abused childhoods want to initiate "Many-Fur" into their private protest "club"...
Even "Shrek" spent most of its onscreen time straining to lecture us on how Disney Wrote Every Image-Conscious Un-PC Princess Story Ever Written and deserves to be punished...
...Find anyone with a personal axe to grind, from traumatic childhoods to right or left-wing political soapboxing, and it's not five minutes before they're on a children's-book group or a folktale group begging for some piece of carefully dug-up scapegoat evidence on how "children's stories" personally warped them/society for life.
Failing to note the obvious caveat that no story is held responsible
for the actions of its readers.
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Helen
J Pilinovsky
Registered User
(4/5/05 5:04 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
Er ... Derek, if you read Donkeyskin as written, it really
is about what you're objecting to the inclusion of. It's one of
those stories that, actually, tends to tick me off when misinterpreted
as well, because, frankly, nowhere in there does it say anything
about Vestal Virgins, despite what Bettleheim would have us believe,
and nowhere in there is there anything about the daughter propositioning
her father, despite what Alan Dundes might say. It's a very straightforward
story about a king who wants to force his daughter into marriage.
Because she resembles her dead mother. Who produced the daughter,
implying the probability of procreation, at one point or another.
There's a definite implication that the king is planning to engage
in that same procreative ability with his next bride, meaning that
the reading of incest? Is all too literal. Incest isn't a modern
invention ... considering the presence of abuse in Donkeyskin is
most certainly examining the original influences at work in the
composition of the story. And it's doing so in an important fashion,
as well, because (despite the Victorian suppression of such bad
thoughts), such things do happen to children, and seeing a role-model
who shares that experience and overcomes it, both symbolically and
literally, is invaluable.
While the idea of the "makeover" is, in and of itself a modern anachronism, the idea of the transformation which lies at the heart of even that shallow institution can certainly be traced back to the fairytales, Cinderella among them, which demonstrate the possibilities of shifting social and physical positions. So while the direction of the influences might be a direct inversion of the "modern" interpretation (in my eyes, anyway), it's still a more-than valid reading, on the basis of the descriptions proffered by numerous authors - Strapparola, Perrault, etc. - which emphasize the physical changes which the heroine undergoes, which lead directly to her betterment. Going back to one of your earlier examples, explorations of the symbolism behind the severing of the heels and toes of the sisters is also important: understanding how and why interfering with the mobility of the villains acts as a suitable commentary on their motivations and behavior informs, not only our understanding of the commensurate virtues expressed by the heroine, but also of the values held by the authors - modesty, honesty, and a certain element of destiny (to name only a few).
I quite agree with you that blaming the tales is a silly and counterproductive exercise - no fairy tale ever born dragged a child across the floor by its hair screaming "READ ME!" - but reading them to interpret the motivations of the authors (historical, societal, and other) as well as to better understand the common aims and perceptions of their audience is both crucial and significant. It's the whole point of criticism, as a profession and a discipline: not to castigate, but to understand. I really don't see how it's possible to argue for anything but the broadest understanding possible of a beloved subject ... the more opinions, the better! After all, what on earth would we all talk about in the presence of single opinion - how much we all agreed with one another? That way lies a strict and censored society, to my way of thinking ...
P.S. - Derek, I could be misreading your words here - and, if I am, my apologies - but you seem to bear a particular onus against feminist interpretations. Any particular reason?
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Black
Sheep
Registered User
(4/5/05 5:09 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
Oh look Derek is grinding his axe again. It must be a very dull axe to need sooo much grinding...
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DerekJ
Unregistered User
(4/5/05 7:07 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
>>Derek, I could be misreading your words here - and, if I am, my apologies - but you seem to bear a particular onus against feminist interpretations. Any particular reason?<<
No particular "onus", just noting the...frequency:
Ie. that most overused broad misinterpretation generally falls into two camps:
Male interpretations generally tend to be attracted by the sensationalized idea that the original stories were more "icky" than the overexposed Disney whitewashes, and drool off into the Grimm-gore or blood-symbolism camps--
While female, and not just "feminist", interpretations
have the bad habit of looking for symbols, and publicly punishing
the symbols for the greater good--In this case, the notion
that young girls are "force-fed" Happily Married Endings
and good-princess mythology by society and their upbringings to
talk them out of self-determination, etc., etc....It's conceivably
harder to persuade anyone on this path that they might be heading
in the wrong direction, as at least even the best couldn't be persuaded
that it wasn't for a Good Cause and being done "for principle".
It could be a general Mars-Venus distinction, and certainly not exclusive, but any strategic misinterpretation for the sake of making of the interpreter look or feel better about themselves doesn't do the secondhand listener any service.
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Helen
J Pilinovsky
Registered User
(4/5/05 7:54 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
There are quite a lot of assumptions at work in your use of the
terms "male" and "female." Some of the very
best critics who I associate with the debunking of the "innocence"
or non-violence of the fairy tale are female (Maria Tatar, for one),
and some of the most cogent cultural critics arguing for the use
of fairy tales as tools of indoctrination into established social
mores are male (Jack Zipes, for example). Those, in and of themselves,
are the kinds of social constructions that I'm interested in examing
- in fairy tales, and in general - myself. On the "good cause"
front ... well, I'm sure that authors at the time felt that they
were imparting profound moral wisdom. And in the context of their
culture, perhaps they were presenting the most successful strategies
for living well. But, well, subjectivity is a part of human nature
- and when I read a story like "Patient Griselda," and
think of the abuses against women which arose from those values
(things like the rule of thumb, and the idea that a good woman was
a long-suffering woman), I do tend to find myself responding in
a critical (critical-negative as well as critical-introspective)
fashion, anachronistic as it might be. Because even the views of
the authors at the time were not all encompassing ... sometimes
the stories were intended to be subversive, and sometimes they represented
the views of those who I would not view as natural allies,
as opposed to their contemporary critics. So, to each their own
"principles" ... I do quite agree with you on the count
of strategic misinterpretation, though, although I tend to find
myself more roused by Freudian readings in particular. Glad to know
we agree on one count, at least!
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Crceres
Registered User
(4/5/05 10:09 pm)
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Re: Impact of fairy tales on Children and Women
No, I'm certain I must have been dragged across the floor by a fairytale
that was yelling 'READ ME!' at some point.
Anyway, I just thought I'd point out that analysing stories is now being analysed, which in turn means I'm analysing the analysis of analysation of stories...
I think I'll go back to literal interpretation of shoes now.
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