Conclusion


Well, this is it. My final blog post. Over the past several weeks, I have learned a lot of interesting things about fairy tales and was exposed to a variety that I had no idea existed. At the beginning of the semester, I mentioned that I was excited to read tales from other cultures and was very happy that this is exactly what we ended up doing. Of the atlas of tales that we read, I think that my favorite were probably the Native American and Arabic ones for their beauty and humor. I also really enjoyed the modern short stories, films, and cartoons that we analyzed for their relationships to the classic fairy tales. It was fascinating to see how these tales continue to permeate our culture and I even found my favorite tale of the ones we have read this semester in Oscar Wilde’s “The Nightingale and the Rose.” The critical theories articulated by von Franz and Bettelheim were very interesting too. I especially liked Bettelheim’s notion of fairy tales as something that children can use to work through the challenges of growing up and von Franz’s discussion of how archetypal experiences can become fairy and folk tales. Overall, I really enjoyed this class and cannot wait to tell some of the new tales I heard to my little cousins next time they ask we to tell them story.


Thank you, Dr. Esa!

Image result for dark forest path
                                www.nc-mag.com/2012/04/what-happens-on-dark-forest-path.html

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