In the attached link, please read from the bottom of page 6 (Fair Tales and the Existential Predicament) to the top of page 11. Just in the few pages that you have read, you will note that Bettelheim makes many claims and covers a variety of topics. (The rest of the assignment is located on the bottom)
The term topic indicates “region of discourse.” The word is derived from the Greek word “topos” which means place. So, when you tell a person about your topic you are providing your subject matter, but not your stance, position, opinion, or judgement. Your topic is simply, a matter of—from the vast universe of things to talk about, say, cars, sports, music, dance, the environment, the constellations, and so on—which is your topic? Bruno Bettelheim’s piece touches on a lot of topics: children’s education, child psychology, parenting, children’s literature, trauma and art, fairy tales, and the unconscious. I think I may have missed out some. These are the regions of his discourse.
Let us move on to thesis. Thesis comes from the Greek word for “statement.”Imagine a thesis as a statement that has a trumpet embedded in it; it is a big pronouncement- stating a point of view, a judgement, an evaluation; i.e, something is pronounced as good or bad; an environmentalist will say pollution is bad; planting trees is good. Both of these are theses. A thesis may also sound a call to action. An environmentalist might remind us: humanity must find more green energy sources. In all cases the environmentalist’s topic has been the environment. Within the topic she has given us three theses, pollution is bad, planting trees is good, we must find green energy.
For this assignment please do the following: match up 4 different topics from Bettelheim with 4 corresponding theses.
Thank you!
