Lecture 14

Grimms’ Fairy Tales

Hans the Hedgehog

  • More famous in Germany, didn’t catch on in the U.S.

The Donkey

Cripples and Supercripples

  • Enfreakment: society creating a freak, othering eccentric bodies. (Stigmatization, marginalization.)
  • Supercripples: people with disabilities who also have talents or abilities desired by able-bodied people and are thus viewed as “normal.”
  • In Grimms’ fairy tales, disabilities are portrayed as bad. Characters are “cured” of their disabilities, and only then are they allowed a “happily ever after.” But this isn’t possible in real life.