Tuesday, October 30, 2007
I perticularly liked the story about Dolly in the Brownies Book. I feel like it was light hearted enough but also would send African American children a positive messege about their heritage. I feel like the story of Dolly is a common one for most children whether or not they are African American. At some point all children feel unhappy with an aspect of themself. These feelings of unhappieness definatly stem from societys pressure on people to conform to the norm or status quo. It is not easy for children to feel different becasue one of the most important things as a child is to be accepted. I liked how the author in Dolly explained that if you change yourself you no longer have connections to the things that are most important to you like family and community.
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11 comments:
I enjoyed the Dolly story the most as well. It is a cute story that provides children with a good message. I agree with what you said at the end of your blog about the message that the author was trying to convey.
I agree, after reading Dolly this story really sent a message of being true to your identity. That you are beautiful just the way you are. We have seen many messages not really portraying this in our previous readings.
In Passing Clare is not happy with who she is and pretends to be someone / something else. She is not true to her born identity and therefore truly suffers heartache by giving up her connection to her community and the things that are ultimately of the most importance to her. Also in the Auto biography of an Ex-Coloured Man the narrator also has many struggles between being true to his identity and forming a connection to a race or identity.
This story of Dolly seems to be a more positive message to the children of the time.
I agree that the story, Dolly’s Dream was very relatable for all children. Many of the children who read the story could think of some time in their lives when they wanted to change something about themselves. This writing was a very simplistic story that was brought down to the children’s level and also dealt with concepts that interested them. The story was obviously aimed at dealing with larger issues in the African American community at this time particularly about passing as well as dealing with white standards of beauty. I think that this story would have been very effective for helping African American children deal with these issues.
The Dolly story was also my favorite. In essence I felt as though Dolly was passing. She wanted to be something else and when she became somebody else she was treated differently. The man down the street gave her the highest repects but he did not give the young "Dolly" candy. It was not appropriate for a black man to give candy to little white chilldren.
This passage also raises many questions but the one question that I have is was there not any black dolls to play with or was it the magic of the yellow hair and blue eyes that made Dolly play with her.
I liked Dolly too. The moral was a very good one and can apply on maany different fronts. It is important to embrace who you are, to use the cards that are dealt to you to your advantage and to appreciate what you are and have. Its sad that to appreciate, to really appreciate something it takes something drastic to happen. It is good to remember this and to try appreciate what you have and not to think about what you need, (want) or could have.
I definately agree with you about Dolly. I think all children can relate to this story, white or black. I also think it was important that the author made it appoint to show the readers that you shouldnt change your self for the wrong reason and shouldn't change if you dont want to. I think it is true that if you change for the wrong reasons you do lose the connection between your family and community.
I think you bring up a good point. At some level, all children no matter what color, begin to dislike some characteristics of themselves and to compare themselves to their peers. I think Dolly was a good way of enstilling racial pride while addressing issues common to young children.
I really liked the Dolly story as well. It was lighthearted and can help children see they are loved and help them appreciate what they have. Alot of people at some point tend to feel uphappy with themselves, I agree. I feel this cute little story showed how she realized what she had was great and she was loved just the way she was.
All children can relate to this story. It is not just based on color, becuase the want to conform and be accepted applies to everyone.
I completely agree with you. Dolly was one of my favorite stories also out of the collection we read. I think the whole idea of this magazine being targeted towards younger children is great. It makes me wonder why it didn't last very long. Like you said all children can relate to not being happy about some aspects of themselves. I still find things with myself that I'm not happy with. It's crazy to try to live up to these standards that society has. The conversation in class about Barbie is a perfect example of this. Nice post!
I enjoyed the Dolly story as well. I think it was interesting to see a children’s take on such as adult subject as passing. Obviously, every young child reading that story hopefully walked away with self confidence, an idea that they were perfect as they were. An idea we would want all children regardless of race to know.
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