Teaching Fairy Tales: Constructing Culture and Learning Language

Abstract

Fairy tales often occupy only a superficial role in German language classrooms, used to check a culture box and teach the simple past tense. However, teaching fairy tales can engage students’ analytical faculties and expose them to the culturally and linguistically embedded nature of folktales, leading them to a deeper appreciation of language, culture, and history. This article examines a course titled “Fairy Tales and German National Identity,” and discusses ways to incorporate fairy tales into a course focused on German and intercultural literacy. Instructors can assist in developing students’ critical thinking and writing abilities by highlighting the deep connections between language, culture, politics, and history as well as cross‐cultural awareness. Students apply cross‐ and intercultural lenses to the study of excerpts from Goethe's Das Märchen, a selection of Grimm tales (especially those that fall out of or were added to subsequent editions), Heine's Deutschland. Ein Wintermärchen, and other secondary and student‐selected readings. Students learn to contextualize the tales within discreet German and contemporary political and historical frameworks through discussion, writing, and lectures. They may also adopt a new perspective on how high and low cultural artifacts influence social, cultural, and political attitudes.