A Reflection by Courtney Jackson
It's been a pleasure exploring Beauty and the Beast across cultures. This class and this assignment taught me a lot. For instance, before writing this paper, I had never really examined the themes in fairy tales. They just always seemed funny, or scary as the case sometimes is, and that the extent of it. In this assignment, I was able to analyze not just my chosen fairy tale, but most of the ones I grew up with.
In my examination I realized how naive I would have had to be to not grasp the absurdities in most of the tales. Disproportionate retribution in the tales are the ones that struck me as the most odd. For example, in my stories the father of beauty only made the mistake of trespassing on someones property and that one act all but ensured he would lose his beloved daughter. That could only make sense in a fairy tale! it does make for a fun time though.
On my page, I chose a few images that i found to be either interesting or funny. The first one pictured above is a meme that I found summarized the whole takeaway from Beauty and the Beast. The sort of unhealthy love and attachment is par for the course in story. Unfortunately, this is what the most perverted of us will gather from the movie, that locking chicks up will make them love you more.
The second image is the same image, but with a different message that also speaks to the possible bad takeaways. The idea that matter the appearance love will win out as long as you're rich comes to mind. The family was trying to regain their social status in some adaptations, so I find it hard to believe that him being rich didn't play a huge role in her deciding to stay.
In the end, writing this paper has made me a little more critical of the these kinds of stories. Maybe those sort of stereotypical themes only exist in archaic editions of the stories, as the modern ones seem to want only to turn those on their heads. I don't know if I'll be reading my kids some of these editions though.
In my examination I realized how naive I would have had to be to not grasp the absurdities in most of the tales. Disproportionate retribution in the tales are the ones that struck me as the most odd. For example, in my stories the father of beauty only made the mistake of trespassing on someones property and that one act all but ensured he would lose his beloved daughter. That could only make sense in a fairy tale! it does make for a fun time though.
On my page, I chose a few images that i found to be either interesting or funny. The first one pictured above is a meme that I found summarized the whole takeaway from Beauty and the Beast. The sort of unhealthy love and attachment is par for the course in story. Unfortunately, this is what the most perverted of us will gather from the movie, that locking chicks up will make them love you more.
The second image is the same image, but with a different message that also speaks to the possible bad takeaways. The idea that matter the appearance love will win out as long as you're rich comes to mind. The family was trying to regain their social status in some adaptations, so I find it hard to believe that him being rich didn't play a huge role in her deciding to stay.
In the end, writing this paper has made me a little more critical of the these kinds of stories. Maybe those sort of stereotypical themes only exist in archaic editions of the stories, as the modern ones seem to want only to turn those on their heads. I don't know if I'll be reading my kids some of these editions though.