This diploma thesis deals with the question of how fairy tales affect preschool children. The theoretical part of the work presents the definition, history, development, types and forms of fairy tales, its function and meaning. It also presents the archetypes in fairy tales, the meaning of fairy tales in kindergarten, or the process of reading. Other chapters of the theoretical part of the work characterize the individual developmental periods of the child according to developmental psychology and importance is given mainly to the period of preschool age. The work also deals with the influence of fairy tales on the development of children's thinking, fantasy, attention, memory or communication. The empirical part is processed in the form of qualitative research, the output of which is a project week focused on the importance of fairy tales in a particular kindergarten and interviews with teachers.

This thesis examines issues of cultural identity and modernity, and the anthropology of spirituality and sacred sites by conducting ethnographic research on fairy beliefs in contemporary Ireland. Irish folk belief has traditionally identified a spirit world intertwined with our own which is inhabited by spirits, often collectively referred to as fairies. Belief in these spirits was once widespread. My research sought to determine the prevalence of these traditional beliefs among modern Irish people within my research area, as well as differences in belief across variables including age, gender, and religious preference. I conducted eight weeks of ethnographic fieldwork during June-August 2008 in and around Sligo Town in County Sligo, Ireland. I selected County Sligo as a research site because it is a sparsely populated, largely rural area, identified in an earlier major study of Irish folklore as a region where belief in the Irish spirit world persisted more strongly than in other parts of the country. My primary research methodology was to conduct structured and unstructured interviews, complemented by visual site surveys. In the preparation of this thesis I utilized data from 52 Sligo residents plus ten other visitors to the area from surrounding Irish counties. While my research suggests that few Sligo residents from the project area continue to believe in the literal existence of fairies, it also shows a much more common belief in a "power" associated with sites identified as "fairy forts," which are natural features of the landscape or the remains of ancient burials or dwellings apocryphally endowed by folk tradition with supernatural or mysterious energies. These beliefs led to a taboo against intruding on, altering, or destroying these "forts" that is still very much alive today. Additionally I was able to discuss at length the subject of the Irish death-herald spirit called the banshee (bean sidhe) with several study participants. Although it can be classified under the umbrella label of "fairy", my research indicates that the banshee is seen as a stand-apart element of Irish tradition by research area residents, and is believed in by those who do not otherwise profess a belief in "fairies" in general.

Fairy tales as a form of social acculturation can subvert and/or perpetuate potentially harmful social norms. In this essay, Chris Anne Wolfe’s lesbian romance novel Bitter Thorns (1994) and the film Shrek (2001) are analysed as adaptations of the fairy tale Beauty and the Beast, with a focus on the extent to which they challenge and/or reinforce three fairy tale norms: women as tradeable objects, heteronormativity and idealised beauty. Both these texts can be seen as subversive, Bitter Thorns in how it challenges heteronormativity and Shrek in how it challenges the norm of idealised beauty. This subversion, however, is limited, as both texts do more to perpetuate fairy tale norms than to challenge them. They both reinforce the idea of women as objects for trade, Bitter Thorns perpetuates the norm of idealised beauty, and Shrek advocates heteronormative relationships and the dominance of heterosexual masculinity.

published_or_final_version / Comparative Literature / Master / Master of Philosophy

Much like oft-repeated quotes or catchy movie soundtrack tunes, famous illustrations often outweigh and outlast their original contexts and establish themselves as iconic cultural reference points for generations to come. Over the last 100 years in Sweden, John Bauer’s fairy tale illustrations have maintained a strong grip on that nation’s popular imaginary through over thirty reprint editions, museum exhibits, stamp collections, and, of course, stylistic imitations. While their century-old narrative contexts remain relatively unknown and uninteresting to contemporary audiences, his beautifully blonde children, enchantingly ugly trolls, and stark, Swedish landscapes continue to be bought, sold, and validated as embodying a typically Swedish relationship to nature. Why John Bauer’s work has remained so influential over time while the publication they appeared in has faded is a question that many of his biographers have attempted to answer. Harald Schiller, the most thorough of these, claims that “when one sees [his] images in black and white or color, they capture one’s interest to such a degree that there is none left for the text” (152). This essay uses Schiller’s comment as a starting point to pose one answer to this question. By exploring the dynamic potential of the relationship between Bauer’s images and their early twentieth-century contexts, it locates the artist’s appeal over against his narrative guidelines and the historical movements of his time. To this end, its comparative analysis of the textual and visual narratives in the illustrated Swedish fairy tale annual, Bland tomtar och troll (Amongst Gnomes and Trolls) explores how the interplay between the historical pregnancy of its fairy tale stories and the Swedophilic affects of John Bauer’s illustrations contributes to the project of imagining and proliferating a new Swedish national identity at the beginning of the twentieth century. / text

This thesis reexamines the purpose of fairy tales throughout history and explores the effectiveness of a modern alternative to classical methods of telling these stories. To increase interactivity as well as the agency of the female protagonist and players themselves, this thesis reimagines the popular classic, Cinderella, as a visual novel.

Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka hur pedagoger i förskolan arbetar med sagor som ett hjälpmedel till barns språkliga och emotionella utveckling. För att göra detta har jag använt kvalitativa intervjuer med fem pedagoger på tre olika förskolor. Jag har utgått från det sociokulturella perspektivet i mina intervjuer för att undersöka hur samarbetet mellan pedagoger och barn ser ut i sagoarbetet. Mitt resultat visar att pedagogerna är överens om att litteraturen är mycket viktig för barnens utveckling och att det finns många olika metoder som man kan använda sig av i arbetet med sagorna. Pedagogerna var överens om att man måste variera arbetssättet för att göra sagorna mer levande och därmed väcka barnens intresse för litteratur. / The purpose of this study is to examine how teachers in preschool are working with fairy tales as a tool for children's linguistic and emotional development. To do this, I used qualitative interviews with three preschool teachers in two different preschools. I have my base in the socio-cultural perspective in my interviews to examine how cooperation between educators and children appear in the story work.My results show that the teachers agree that literature is very important for children's development and that there are many different methods that you can use in the work of the tales. The teachers agreed on the need to vary the approach to make the stories more vivid and thereby arousechildren's interest in literature.

This essay examines Angela Carter’s feminist rewritings of classical fairy tales. By examining the original fairy tales and comparing them to what Angela Carter published I aim to highlight a feminism that is subtle and non-binary. In the analysis I draw on ideas presented by Hélène Cixous as well as Simone de Beauvoir. Furthermore, a pedagogical reflection is included to show ways in which these stories could be incorporated in the upper- secondary school.

This thesis traces Margaret Atwood's uses of three major elements of fairy tales in her novels. Atwood creates a passive, fairy-tale-like heroine, but not for the purpose of showing how passivity wins the prince as in the traditional tale. Atwood also uses the binary system, which provides a moralistic structure in the fairy tale, to show the necessity of moving beyond its rigidity. In addition, Atwood's novels focus on transformation as the breaking of a spell. However, the spell to be broken arises out of the fairy tales themselves, which create unrealistic expectations. Thus, Atwood not only presents these fairy tale elements in a new setting, but she also changes their significance.

Within American religious culture, there is a small but significant and growing movement that overlaps and interacts with the environmental movement. It's known by many names, including Contemporary Paganism, Neo-Paganism, Earth Religion, and Nature Religion. A few years of observation at Starwood Festival, the largest annual Pagan gathering in North America, revealed that many individuals who identify as Pagan (or Wiccan, Druid, animist, or another of the identities that fall under the Pagan umbrella) include in their spiritual practice engagement with faeries or other nature spirits. My research employed qualitative methods including participant observation and interviews to examine the extent to which engagement with faeries and other nature spirits among Pagan festival attendees affects their relationships with nature and their behaviors in the natural world. The Pagan understanding of the Earth and all of its inhabitants and elements as animate or inspirited, as exemplified in the phenomenon of faery faith, conflates the wellbeing of the Earth and wild nature with the psychological wellbeing of each individual human, making this worldview highly compatible with the emerging field of ecopsychology. Drawing on theories of enchantment, consciousness, multiple realities, imagination, and play, my interpretations of the stories of my informants contribute additional perspective to the contemporary practice of Paganism as a small but growing countercultural movement within the dominant Western culture, particularly as it informs the human-(in)-nature relationship.