Week 2 - Morality
8:28 PM
Jiminy Cricket: Now, you see, the world is full of
temptations.
Pinocchio: Temptations?
Jiminy Cricket: yep, temptations. They’re the wrong things
that seem right at the time, but even though the right things may seem wrong
sometimes, or sometimes the wrong things may be right at the wrong time, or
visa versa. Understand?
In our discussion of morality, we discussed archetypes in
fairytales. Characters in these stories are either completely bad or completely good. We talked about the Big Bad Wolf that appears in so many fairytales
as a representation of what society fears. We also discussed how so much of
children’s media’s purpose is to teach kids right and wrong. When the characters are morally polarized, children are able to see more clearly the stories' teachings.
This video, The Man with
a Turnip for a Head from HitRECord.org, fits with some of our discussion
this week.
This story’s moral is stated at the end. “One cannot win
when ashamed of one’s natural quirks… so parade them with pride.” Just like the
Red Riding Hood fairytales we read in class, this story has a teaching purpose,
but the moral has evolved to fit with what we are concerned with in the here
and now. Just like the fairytales that
addressed the fears of when they were written, this story reflects a very
current concern. The story also fits the traditional fairytale structure, but
the subject matter isn’t traditional, like one of the classic fairytales.
We watched Pinocchio this week during our discussion of
morality in media. This is a coming-of-age tale. It’s a story following
Pinocchio as he grows up, encounters trials, and overcomes them, until he
finally becomes a real boy. Pinocchio obviously has several morals. Some of
these include the importance of telling the truth, and learning right from
wrong. I felt that in this story about growing up, the villains weren’t
necessarily out to get Pinocchio. All of them were in it for their own personal
gain. I thought this made it even more a didactic story about making good
choices, instead of a classic fairytale. The villains in Pinocchio were just
representations of adversity that will inevitably come in our lives; it is
unlikely that our “villains” will be out solely to destroy us.
I enjoyed the W.W. Charters quote we read in class, and I thought it was a good summary of the purpose of morality in children's media. Media
does have a huge appeal to children, and such a huge part of that media for
children deals with right and wrong. I like to believe that children are affected and shaped
by the pictures they see, and that by being exposed to media, such as these
morality stories, they will be affected for good.
0 comments