scholarly journals Was Cinderella just a fairy tale? Survival differences between stepchildren and their half-siblings

2021 ◽  
Vol 376 (1827) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan Schacht ◽  
Huong Meeks ◽  
Alison Fraser ◽  
Ken R. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Child Outcomes ◽  
The United States ◽  
Adaptive Behaviour ◽  
Natural Fertility ◽  
Parental Loss ◽  
Maternal Child Health ◽  
Parental Presence ◽  
Folk Tales

The death of a parent, particularly the mother, is linked to a suite of negative outcomes across the life-course. Compounding concerns for child outcomes are expectations of poor treatment by step-parents after parental remarriage. Indeed, folk tales of step-parental abuse abound cross-culturally and are embedded into stories taught to children. To understand why child outcomes might be sensitive to levels of relatedness within the household, evolutionary-oriented research targets patterning in parental expenditure in ways predicted to maximize inclusive fitness. In particular, parents are expected to prioritize investments in their biological children. However, stepfamilies are only formed after children experience multiple unfortunate events (e.g. parental loss, poverty), blurring causal interpretations between step-parental presence and stepchild outcomes. Moreover, stepchildren have been shown to be integral to household functioning, caring for their half-siblings and stabilizing relationships. These results challenge narrow views of adaptive behaviour; specifically, that step-parents, unlike biological parents, do no stand to reap fitness benefits from the care that they provide to their stepchildren. To evaluate these critiques, we analyse the survival outcomes of stepchildren. We include over 400 000 individuals from across a natural fertility period (1847–1940) in the United States state of Utah and examine the consequences of parental loss and step-parental introduction. Our analyses yield three key results: (i) exposure to maternal loss in childhood is associated with elevated mortality risk, (ii) parental remarriage does not increase the risk of mortality among stepchildren compared to non-stepchildren who too had lost a parent, and (iii) stepchildren enjoy higher survival than their half-siblings within the same family. Ultimately, this work contributes to the increasingly recognized importance of cooperative relationships among non-kin for childcare and household functioning. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Multidisciplinary perspectives on social support and maternal–child health’.

Witch as Fairy/Fairy as Witch: Unfathomable Baba Yagas

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jack Zipes
Keyword(s):  
Fairy Tales ◽  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Deep Roots ◽  
Folk Tales ◽  
Brothers Grimm ◽  
Literary Traditions ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter attempts to clarify the importance of the connections between witches and fairies coupled with their deep roots in pagan and Greco-Roman beliefs by moving away from western Europe to look at the great witch Baba Yaga of Slavic countries. It cites three reasons for concentrating on Baba Yaga and Slavic fairy tales. The first one regards neglect. For the most part, the focus of folklore and fairy-tale studies in the United States and western Europe has been on the works of the Brothers Grimm and other notable western European writers and folklorist. The second is to understand the relationship between goddesses, witches, and fairies. The third reason is that a brief analysis of Baba Yaga tales with a focus on the neglected work Russian Folk Tales (1873), translated and edited by W.R.S. Ralston (1828–89), might assist us in grasping how oral and literary traditions work together to reinforce the memetic replication of fairy tales.

scholarly journals FOLKLORE MOTIVES AND THEIR REINTERPRETATION IN THE WORK OF AMERICAN WRITER L.F. BAUM

2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 30-35
Author(s):  
Olga Iu. Orlova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Native Americans ◽  
North America ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Fairy Tales ◽  
Fairy Tale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
Folk Tales ◽  
The Usa

. It is generally considered that the genre of the literary fairy tale in Europe expressed itself amply in the age of romanticism and used folklore imagery and motifs, as many other literary genres. But the folklore of Native Americans is also known to be ignored by authors in the USA. At the beginning the European folk tales served as the basis for the literary fairytale in the United States. Nonetheless, by the 20th century the authors had decided to create their own national fairy tale tradition. The article deals with the problem of folklore motifs reshaping in the collection entitled “American Fairy Tales” by L.F. Baum. There are some recurrent folklore motifs in the fairy tales: the motif of the forbidden door, the magical object, etc. At the same time, imagery of natural objects typical of North America (corn fields, huge cities with apartment houses) add some new traits to the national variant of the fairytale.

Grimm Legacies

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jack Zipes
Keyword(s):  
Fairy Tales ◽  
Oral Tradition ◽  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Folk Tales ◽  
Brothers Grimm ◽  
Folk Tale ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
High Standards ◽  
Wilhelm Grimm

This book explores the legacy of the Brothers Grimm in Europe and North America, from the nineteenth century to the present. The book reveals how the Grimms came to play a pivotal and unusual role in the evolution of Western folklore and in the history of the most significant cultural genre in the world—the fairy tale. Folklorists Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm sought to discover and preserve a rich abundance of stories emanating from an oral tradition, and encouraged friends, colleagues, and strangers to gather and share these tales. As a result, hundreds of thousands of wonderful folk and fairy tales poured into books throughout Europe and have kept coming. The book looks at the transformation of the Grimms' tales into children's literature, the Americanization of the tales, the “Grimm” aspects of contemporary tales, and the tales' utopian impulses. It shows that the Grimms were not the first scholars to turn their attention to folk tales, but were vital in expanding readership and setting the high standards for folk-tale collecting that continue through the current era. The book concludes with a look at contemporary adaptations of the tales and raises questions about authenticity, target audience, and consumerism. The book examines the lasting universal influence of two brothers and their collected tales on today's storytelling world.

scholarly journals Geospatial Analysis of Birth Records to Target Programming for Mothers With Gestational Diabetes Mellitus in Michigan, 2013

2018 ◽  
Vol 134 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth MacQuillan ◽  
Amy Curtis ◽  
Kathleen Baker ◽  
Rajib Paul
Keyword(s):  
Diabetes Mellitus ◽  
Logistic Regression ◽  
Gestational Diabetes ◽  
Gestational Diabetes Mellitus ◽  
Hot Spot ◽  
The United States ◽  
The State ◽  
Maternal Child Health ◽  
Birth Data ◽  
Birth Records

Objectives: The incidence of gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) in the United States has increased during the past several decades. The objective of this study was to use birth records and a combination of statistical and geographic information system (GIS) analyses to evaluate GDM rates among subgroups of pregnant women in Michigan. Materials and Methods: We obtained data on maternal demographic and health-related characteristics and regions of residence from 2013 Michigan birth records. We geocoded (ie, matched to maternal residence) the birth data, calculated proportions of births to women with GDM, and used logistic regression models to determine predictors of GDM. We calculated odds ratios (ORs) from the exponentiated beta statistic of the logistic regression test. We also used kernel density estimations and local indicators of spatial association (LISA) analyses to determine GDM rates in regions in the state and identify GDM hot spots (ie, areas with a high GDM rate surrounded by areas with a high GDM rate). Results: We successfully geocoded 104 419 of 109 168 (95.6%) births in Michigan in 2013. Of the geocoded births, 5185 (5.0%) were to mothers diagnosed with GDM. LISA maps showed a hot spot of 8 adjacent counties with high GDM rates in southwest Michigan. Of 11 064 births in the Southwest region, 829 (7.5%) were to mothers diagnosed with GDM, the highest rate in the state and a result confirmed by geospatial analyses. Practice Applications: Birth data and GIS analyses may be used to measure statewide pregnancy-associated disease risk and identify populations and geographic regions in need of targeted public health and maternal–child health interventions.

scholarly journals THE IMAGE OF THE CROW IN THE GERMAN AND UZBEK PEOPLES

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-100
Author(s):  
Akmal Akhmatovich Jumayev ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Fairy Tales ◽  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Folk Tales ◽  
Negative Images ◽  
The World ◽  
Personal Qualities

Background. The article focuses on specific similarities of the peoples of the world in their views on the crow. Also in myths, in German and Uzbek fairy tales, the portrayal of the crow in positive and negative images was analysed comparatively. All folk tales lead to good. The same lesson is also reflected in the article on the educational significance of the two folk tales. Methods. Particular attention is paid to the fact that the peoples of the world have certain similarities in their views on the crow. The image of the Crow also moved to fairy tales based on Legends. Results. In the fairy tale, it is not explained why the hero became a crow. It is known that in fairy tales the evolution of children to different birds (often owl or crow) is described either because of some side work of their father, or because of his own senselessness. Discussions. In German fairy tales Interesting is that in “Die sieben Raben“ “The seven ravens”, “Die Rabe“ ‘The raven” fairy tales, a crow is not just an ordinary bird, but a symbol of children. In Uzbek fairy tales, the image of birds is focused on fostering such positive personal qualities as industriousness, honesty and friendliness.

scholarly journals THE PROBLEM OF FINITENESS OF HUMAN EXISTENCE IN UKRAINIAN FOLKLORE

2020 ◽  
pp. 100-104
Author(s):  
Volodymyr Yatchenko, Oksana Oliinyk Volodymyr Yatchenko, Oksana Oliinyk ◽  
Volodymyr Yatchenko, Oksana Oliinyk Volodymyr Yatchenko, Oksana Oliinyk
Keyword(s):  
Fairy Tales ◽  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Human Existence ◽  
Folk Tales ◽  
Philosophy And Literature ◽  
Spiritual World ◽  
European Philosophy ◽  
The One ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Painful Feeling

The article analyzes the existential problems of life, death and immortality in Ukrainian folklore (based on Ukrainian fairy tales). In the corpus of Ukrainian folk tales there are widely used topics, which in European philosophy and literature are called "tragic foundations of human existence" - awareness of the inevitability of death in the earthly existence of man, the search for forms of individual immortality. In Ukrainian fairy tales there is a dual attitude of the individual to the inevitability of his own death. On the one hand, there is the motive of reconciliation with the fate of human destiny, and in order to relieve the painful feeling of one's own finitude, the instruction on the higher meaning of the existence of death is forced. Death is justified because it appears as the prevention of the absurdity of infinite human existence or as an obstacle to the debauchery of the whims and dangerous wishes of the individual, or ultimately as the punishment of people for violating the commandments of the Supreme Spiritual Creature. In other words, death appears in a number of fairy tales as the expression of the highest world justice. At the same time, death mostly appears in fairy tales as an objectified pagan idea of Death as a concrete living creature with its whims, sympathies and weaknesses. The problem of finding ways to achieve immortality is traced in Ukrainian fairy tales in two ways. Most often, this search unfolds in the plane of the victory of the hero of the fairy tale over death, or through the imprisonment of death, or through the marriage of the hero to a divine being. This is a very common motive in the tales around the world. Less common is the motive of achieving immortality through the moral self-improvement of the hero, his compliance to the moral commandments of God. This is already a reflection in fairy tales of the influence of Christianity on the spiritual world of the ancestors of modern Ukrainians.

scholarly journals “We are the People”: The Holodomor and North American-Ukrainian Diasporic Memory in Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch’s “Enough”

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 49-71
Author(s):  
Anastasia Ulanowicz
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Fairy Tales ◽  
North American ◽  
Cultural Memory ◽  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
The United States ◽  
Historical Event ◽  
Young Readers ◽  
The People

“We are the People”: The Holodomor and North American-Ukrainian Diasporic Memory in Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch’s Enough. Although the Holodomor — the Ukrainian famine of 1932–1933 — has played a major role in the cultural memory of Ukrainian diasporic communities in the United States and Canada, relatively few North American children’s books directly represent this traumatic historical event. One exception, however, is Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch’s and Michael Martchenko’s picture book, Enough 2000, which adapts a traditional Ukrainian folktale in order to introduce young readers to the historical and polit­ical circumstances in which this artificial famine occurred. By drawing on what scholar Jack Zipes has identified as the “subversive potential” of fairy tales, Skrypuch and Martchenko critique the ironies and injustices that undergirded Soviet forced collectivization and Stalinist famine policy. Additionally, they explicitly set a portion of their fairy tale adaptation in Canada in order to gesture to the role played by the Holodomor in structuring diasporic memory and identity, especially in relation to post-Independ­ence era Ukraine.«Мы — народ»: Голодомор и североамериканско-украинская диаспорная память в книге Enough Марши Форчук Скрыпух. Несмотря на то, что Голодомор — голод в Украине 1932–1933 гoдов — сыграл важную роль в культурной памяти украинских диаспорных общин в Соеди­ненных Штатах и Канаде, относительно мало североамериканских детских книг описывает это травматическое событие. Важное место в этом контексте является книга Марши Форчук Скры­пух и Майкла Мартченко «Достаточно» 2000, которая адаптирует традиционную украинскую сказку для того, чтобы познакомить молодых читателей с историческими и политическими обстоятельствами этого искусственного голода. Опираясь на то, что ученый Джек Зайпс назвал «подрывным потенциалом» сказок, Скрыпух и Мартченко критикуют иронию и несправедли­вость советской принудительной коллективизации и политики сталинского голода. Кроме того, они установили часть своей сказочной адаптации в Канаде, чтобы показать роль Голодомора в структурировании диаспорной памяти и самобытности, и связи последних с независимой Украиной.

Children's fingernail cortisol among BaYaka foragers of the Congo Basin: associations with fathers' roles

2021 ◽  
Vol 376 (1827) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lee T. Gettler ◽  
Sheina Lew-Levy ◽  
Mallika S. Sarma ◽  
Valchy Miegakanda ◽  
Martha Doxsey ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Marital Conflict ◽  
Skinfold Thickness ◽  
The United States ◽  
Congo Basin ◽  
Parental Conflict ◽  
Maternal Child Health ◽  
Energetic Condition ◽  
The Family ◽  
Family Resource ◽  
Psychosocial Conditions

Children and mothers’ cortisol production in response to family psychosocial conditions, including parenting demands, family resource availability and parental conflict, has been extensively studied in the United States and Europe. Less is known about how such family dynamics relate to family members' cortisol in societies with a strong cultural emphasis on cooperative caregiving. We studied a cumulative indicator of cortisol production, measured from fingernails, among BaYaka forager children (77 samples, n = 48 individuals) and their parents (78 samples, n = 49) in the Congo Basin. Men ranked one another according to locally valued roles for fathers, including providing resources for the family, sharing resources in the community and engaging in less marital conflict. Children had higher cortisol if their parents were ranked as having greater parental conflict, and their fathers were seen as less effective providers and less generous sharers of resources in the community. Children with lower triceps skinfold thickness (an indicator of energetic condition) also had higher cortisol. Parental cortisol was not significantly correlated to men's fathering rankings, including parental conflict. Our results indicate that even in a society in which caregiving is highly cooperative, children's cortisol production was nonetheless correlated to parental conflict as well as variation in locally defined fathering quality. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Multidisciplinary perspectives on social support and maternal–child health’.

scholarly journals ‘Once Upon a Time in Marseille’: Displacement and the Fairy Tale in Anna Seghers’ Transit

Humanities ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 173
Author(s):  
Rebekah Slodounik
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Fairy Tales ◽  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Forced Migration ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mistaken Identity ◽  
Anna Seghers ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Formal Level ◽  
History Of

Written in 1941, while she was living in exile in Mexico, and published in 1944 in Mexico and the United States, Anna Seghers’ novel Transit replicates on a formal level an experience of displacement, statelessness, and exile. In the following analysis, I examine Transit as a text of forced migration. Several features of the novel attempt to produce an experience of displacement: the narrative situation, the incorporation of descriptions that place the events of World War II into a longer history of forced migration, and the use of references to the genre of the fairy tale. The descriptions that engage with past forced migration and displacement attempt to universalize the historical specificities of the time period, whereas the references to fairy tales generate a sense of timelessness associated with this genre. Through these strategies, Seghers’ novel itself attempts to displace time. Seghers situates Transit within a long history of forced migration and exile, in which the categories that are often used to define and divide populations—such as nationality, ethnicity, and religion—are in flux. By emphasizing the role of mistaken identity, Seghers destabilizes the concept of immutable identities in a period of upheaval and transition.

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