Once Upon a Lesson Learned

I have always taken pride in my “nerdy ways.” I love to learn new things and explore ideas with other “nerds.” With that being said, this class has been so much fun!

I have never really thought about fairy tale literature in terms of analysis. I knew that Perrault and the Grimm brothers wrote some unusual tales, but I never really considered why. It never occurred to me that their versions of the tales were not intended for children. Honestly, it never occurred to me how irrelevant children were. It never registered that, perhaps, the lessons on jealousy and immorality were more relevant to adults. Though I am not proud of my term paper – procrastination and two jobs got the best of me – I really enjoyed the idea. My thesis developed from reading all of the discussion boards throughout the quarter. All of your questions and comments really made me think about the sexual and racial messages that are hidden in fairy tales. I learned, through the readings and discussions from this quarter, that many of my prejudices concerning good and evil started with fairy tales.

As a child, I was taught that pretty people are good and ugly people are bad. Let’s not get this twisted, I am no fairy tale princess. I chose to not wear makeup to school yesterday and a student asked me if I was sick. Of course my reply was, “No Kory, this is just my face!” That’s neither here nor there. The point I am trying to make is that I learned how much emphasis is placed on beauty. Pretty people are not held to the same standards as ugly people. Snow White should have caught a breaking and entering case, but because she is pretty, the dwarfs let her stay at rest. I would love to be pretty enough to get some rest!

Another important lesson I learned, through the readings and discussions this quarter, is that women are taught to hate each other. We are taught to see other women, whether they are family or not, as competition. Again, this trend dates back to early fairy tales. Older women are taught to see younger women as their replacement. Why do stepmothers hate their stepdaughters? Competition! While friendly competition can be very healthy, if it involves poisonous apples, I would venture to say that’s a bad idea.

I plan to continue reading fairy tale literature to my students and my daughter; however, I will present the information through a different lens. I will engage in the discussions that we shared this quarter and encourage them to question the underlying messages of what seems to be innocent bedtime stories.