Thursday, November 27, 2014

Blog 11- Final Blog

After reading over my blogs I have noticed that I have learned about my writing and the concept behind fairy tales. When entering into this class I knew we would be learning about the true meaning of fairy tales and the origin of them. I never would have thought that we would read articles by  Bruno Bettelheim about "sexual meaning of fairy tales". I learned that the Grimm tales are totally different then the Disney films we see today. I never really read the Grimm versions of these tales until I got to this class. I always thought that the original tales was the books and films by Walt Disney. Disney makes the tales seem more positive and child friendly, while the Grimm tales can be shown as harsh and brutal. Max Luthi believes that such things teaches children about the bad things that happen in life. He believed that taking these scenes completely from the story would slow down a childs development process; because children have to know about the good and bad things in life in order to learn and grow from them. FYS: Grimm to Disney was a class I wasn't expecting to be as deep as it as. I thought that we would just watch Disney films and talk about the differences, but we actually talked about the feminism aspects of the tales. We analyzed the tales as though they were real life stories with real life people. I really enjoyed my time in this class and hope my SIS is as exciting as this class was.

The Brother's Grimm; Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

Walt Disney

Thursday, November 20, 2014

Blog 10

The video below is a bed time story version of the Grimm Brothers Rapunzel. The bed time story was very similar to the Brothers Grimm tale. Both tales start off with a man and a woman wanting to have a child. There was a garden in the back of their house that was full of lettuce. The wife had a craving for them and asked he husband if he could get some for her. The husband obeyed because he loved his wife. The husband was then caught by the witch/sorceress around the 3rd or 4th time he went (in the bedtime story it was only once). The husband pleaded for forgiveness and explained to the witch/sorceress that his wife craved the wonderful lettuce and he had no choice but to take them. The witch/sorceress told he husband that the wife could have as many lettuce as she wants but they would have to give her their first born in return. The child was born and the parents had no choice but to give her away and the witch named her Rapunzel. In the Brothers Grimm version Rapunzel was put in the tower when she was 12 years old but in the bed time story she was in the tower the whole time; she grew into a beautiful young woman. The witch would come to visit Rapunzel and would say the magic words, "Rapunzel, Rapunzel let down you hair for me." A prince shows up in both version and heard Rapunzel singing, but in the Brother Grimm version he knew she was located in the tower and wanted to climb up to her but there was no door. In the bed time story the prince was clueless to where she was at, and even wondered why she didn't answer his call. In both versions the prince seen the witch approach the castle and waited to see what she would do. The witch called up to Rapunzel like she always did and the prince knew just how to get up to her. The prince said the magic words and Rapunzel let him up and he fell in love with her beauty. In the Grimm version he must bring a skein of silk every time he came in order to make into a ladder. In the bed time story she warns the prince that the witch keeps her locked up and she he must run away before she catches him. But he agreed to still continue to come visit her every night. In the Brother Grimm version the witch found out about the prince because she accidentally asked her, "how is it that you are so much heavier then the prince". In the bed time story the witch actually sees the prince climb down from Rapunzel's hair. As a punishment she cut off Rapunzel's hair and sent her away to the desert. The prince goes to visit her at the tower but ends up seeing the witch and fell from the tower blinding himself. He wandered around searching for Rapunzel and finally came across her by the sound of her voice. The tears from her eyes returned his sight. In the Brother's Grimm version he found her with two twins, a boy and a girl, and then took her off to his kingdom. In the bed time story he took her off to his kingdom where they married and later on had a beautiful girl that looked just like Rapunzel. 

They all lived happily ever after, The End!

Rapunzel- Bedtime Story Animation/Best Children Classics 

Thursday, November 6, 2014

The Psychology of Happiness-Extra Credit

This lecture focused on the methods and things people can do to actually become happier. This was interesting because I was always told that you couldn't measure a person's happiness. She talked about various things that people could do to become happy like writing gratitude journals to themselves, doing community work for others, being tour guides for people, and taking pictures and posing them online to allow other people to see the beautiful things you see. These methods were scientifically proven to promote happiness among people. The way I see that this lecture connects to our class is the happily ever after in fairy tales. I don't know of any fairy tales that end in deaths or any negative aspects. Disney films focus on happiness since the purpose of his films was to promote hope for people during the Great Depression. In the films no matter what they are going through they always find ways to be positive and happy. In Cinderella she sang songs to animals and danced around in the forest. She always kept a positive attitude and smile on her face. This caused good things to happen to her in the end. In most fairy tales there is some since of evil, but in the end the evil person always gets punished and the person who was good the whole tale is rewarded for their positive attitude. In the end happiness pays off in fairy tales and in real life.

Blog 9

The Robber Bridegroom, Fitcher's Bird and Blue Beard are all similar and different in a variety of ways. All three stories involved the male figure in some way of form trying to kill the wife. In Fitcher's wife he actually killed two sisters before the third sister caught on to his plan and put the egg in a safe place before she actually went into the room. In each story the woman were told by the male figure that they would be leaving and leaving them keys to certain things. In all stories the woman searched in the forbidden room even though the husband asked them not too. The sense of curiosity is in each story which leads the woman to die horrible deaths. In Fitcher's Bird the third sister was so smart that when she went in the room and saw that her two other sister's were in the room she put their bodies together and they came back alive. They did not die but were reborn; which is the central theme of fairy tales. The key was replaced as a egg in Fitcher's Bird. The tale also kept the #3 fairy tale rule in having three daughters and three different flavors of wine (the robber bridegroom). The only time this rule broke was in Blue Beard when there was two daughter to choose from and of course it was the youngest daughter who won that spot (typical in fairy tales). The hero in each story is also different. In The Robber Bridegroom she was saved by a woman who knew that the man did not want to marry her but chop her up into pieces and eat her. She woman told her to hide behind a pop and stay there until the men have left and they would escape the place together. In Fitcher's Bird the third daughter was actually the protector. She was smart enough to trick the man in carrying her sisters in a basket without him ever knowing that the sisters were inside. When the sisters got back to the house the family came to rescue the girl. In Blue Beard she was rescued by her brothers. She fooled the man into giving her some time to pray and while he thought she was doing that she was yelling out the window to get Anne to signal her brothers to come to her immediately. When Blue Beard got tired of waiting for his wife; she finally came down to witness her fate but her brothers came and killed Blue Beard and she gained all his riches. The stories are unique in how they make the woman look so weak until it gets to the third sister in Fitchr's Bird who is smart and independent like a woman should be portrayed. I liked Fitcher's Bird the most because it seemed more realistic to me that one of the woman would catch on to this situation. Why would he keep coming to the same family getting these woman? What ever happen to the other sisters? The third sister must have had these questions in the back of her head when the man then came to ask in her hand in marriage. Her curiosity was the same as the other but she also knew that something bad must have been in that room if he gave her the key and then told her not to look. She also knew that something must have been significant about the egg so that's why she put the egg before she went and snooped around in and looked at the room. As a feminist I appeal more to Fitcher's Bird because the end of the story ended with a female using her brains to rescue herself and her family.

Blue Beard
The Robber Bridegroom
Fitcher's Bird