Feminine Beauty Ideal In Children's Fairy Tales

1392 Words6 Pages

Baker-Sperry, Lori, and Liz Grauerholz. “The Pervasiveness and Persistence of the Feminine Beauty Ideal in Children's Fairy Tales.” Gender and Society, vol. 17, no. 5, 2003, pp. 711–726. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3594706.

This source centers on the feminine beauty ideal in fairy tales and how it has survived through time. According to this source, beauty has tremendous influence over women and usually, the more beautiful in the end is compensated and seen as more likable. This takes the power of women and can lead to risks, because of envy and conflict. The source is effective in getting it points across by using significant examples from fairy-tales such as Cinderella, Snow-White, and Sleeping Beauty, and comparing them to other …show more content…

This essay is useful for this Project because it addresses the power relationships between adults and children, as well as the ways fairy tales can support children come to terms with their position in the social authority of their lives.

Bettelheim, Bruno. "The Uses of Enchantment. The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales. New York (Knopf) 1976." (1976).

This book explores how fairy tales have affected the way children develop by analyzing some of the well-known fairy tales to find how the uses of magic have shaped on people, especially children, think and understand the world. Bettelheim explains that for a child to grow up to find meaning in his or her life the child must be presented to literature such as fairy tales. This book will provide arguments that fairy tales are positive impacts on children’s development. This book has very useful chapters that break down some favorite fairy tales and explain how these fairy tales are relevant.

Crain, William C., et al. "The impact of hearing a fairy tale on children's immediate behavior." The Journal of genetic psychology 143.1 (1983): …show more content…

It explains how fairy tales were not originally meant for kids. They were targeted at maturer children and adults. It is important to explain what the fairy tales signified to them and the process they used to get the fairy tales and turn them into books. Kamenetsky also explains the history of fairy tales. Most folk tales were recognized offensive and not appropriate for juvenile children. Most importantly, the book details the Brothers Grimm’s ways of how they wrote their fairy tales and how they developed their characters. It is a well-written book on the history of children’s literature. This book will help the project to cite aspects of the fairy tale’s