The Adaptation of Urban Legends and Folklore to Education Urban Legends, conspiracy theories, and ghost stories stem from the fears of society. The fictional, yet fact-based stories should be taught in the K-12 curriculum. It is better to learn about the fear society holds and see what comforts their minds, rather than refuting the impossible. Though based on “pseudoscience”, it is important to show students to think for themselves. It’s the student's jobs to choose what beliefs to live by. Psychology plays a huge part in conspiracy theories and urban legends. As mentioned above, the fears of society alter and manipulate stories into what the subconscious sees. In the article, “Conspiracy Theories: Why we believe the unbelievable,” the author, Michael Shermer states, “There are …show more content…
Students will be researching numerous studies and gaining knowledge. Students will get a full worldview. Children wouldn’t be closed off the world around them. Critics may refute claims that the students will be expanding their psychological knowledge and their schema because such theories and legends are based on false science, but they don’t see that learning of such things makes independent learners. Students would learn why urban legends and conspiracies are so popular. Children would learn background and history. In the article, “Folklore Today: Urban Legends,” by Shirley Brinkerhoff, two urban legends are retold, with origin and background. A professor stated his opinion on folklore, the article read, “...and what strikes me as perhaps the most outstanding feature is the creativity, imagination, and virtuosity brought to a performance by all kinds of people… (Shirley 6).” Folklore can be created by anybody, those with and without education and those young and old. For students to learn where folklore began and where it is still going is an incredible inclusion to
2. It teaches how to read the world by showing a different view, not only about the past, but abhor
Urban legends exist in every society and change with the times adapting to the new innovations that occur. An urban legend is a story that has been passed down through generations with the intention of being informative whether it causes fear or joy. The only problem with urban legends is the fact that they are so hard to be proven true. Sometimes they have actual events attached with them but are obviously false; people try to attach relevant topics to legends to make them more believable. Some examples of these are the tale of the crazed Hook man or death by tanning bed. Each was related to some kind of event that was popular but it made it more believable. The legend that has caught my eye is the tale of the Hook man because it causes fear and creates an atmosphere that is similar to a foggy night: thick and visibility is limited. The legend adds a sense of fear and anxiety, which will discussed in the latter part of the paper. The main focus is to show what causes these two emotions and how they relate to the myth.
Conspiracy theories are thoughts that people have about what happened to a person or even a thing like aliens being real. Although some are clearly not real, some may be true and may have happened. An example of one that most people believe is true is the Illuminati. But no one knows can ever know for sure, except the people in the Illuminati themselves.
Ellis describes three types of ostension that can occur on a legend-trip, “quasi-ostension”, “pseudo-ostension”, and “ostension”. “Quasi-ostension” is an observer’s interpretation of puzzling evidence. For example, an exaggeration or misinterpretation of an event on a legend-trip. “Pseudo-ostension” is a participant's imitation of an outline of a known narrative, most often to perpetuate a known hoax. Young people spray-painting pentagrams or making prank phone calls typifies the behavior of pseudo-ostension. The final type, ostension, is
Ever heard a story so outlandish that you start to wonder if that could possibly ever happen. Well you’ve just been told a conspiracy theory, but do not worry. Many people don’t just wonder about them, they believe in them. There is a great many reason of why this is, there have even been studies done on it. Many scientists concede that people believe in conspiracy theories because they have some uncertainty or fear with in them, and the conspiracy is a way to relieve themselves. They also believe that mistrust has a huge roll in people believing, especially mistrust in huge corporations and big bodies of power such as the government. But fear and mistrust aren’t the only reasons. People also just love a good story, something that is complex and has a lot of action. I mean no one goes to the movie to see a movie about paint drying. They want drama, romance, and lots of action. That’s why people are so compelled into believing conspiracy theories.
Conspiracy theories have caused people to question everything the government tells them for hundreds of years. A conspiracy theory is an explanation of an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy without warrant. Conspiracy theories generally involve an illegal or harmful act carried out by the government or other powerful actors.The Moon landing is still one of the biggest conspiracy theories in the world. After forty-eight years it is still being debated and discussed in many laboratories, and classrooms across the globe.On July 20, 1969, two American astronauts by the name of Neil Armstrong, and Buzz Aldrin allegedly, landed safely on the moon. The entire world was shocked, especially the Soviet Union. On that day many people were
Conspiracy theories are everywhere. It seems that for every event in to have taken place in history, there is a group of individuals saying that it is a government conspiracy. There are conspiracy theories regarding the 9/11 attacks, presidential assassinations, Area 51, Jimmy Hoffa, the English crown and Elvis. The list is endless. In this paper we are going to discuss the moon landing conspiracy. Apparently there are people who believe the entire moon landing was a hoax. They believe that we did not actually land on the moon, but produced the event in a movie studio so that we would be able to beat Russia in the great “Space Race”. These people have taken all the evidence from the moon landing and analyzed ever aspect and tried to
Conspiracy theories have been around since the beginning of time. When NASA sent the first landed on the moon, there are people who believed that NASA faked the moon landings. Men, such as Bill Kaysing, the Flat Earth Society, and Davie Groves, and Bart Sibrel, have written books, delivered lectures, and made videos about why they believed NASA faked the moon landings. Based on their observations which include no stars in their pictures, NASA's drive to beat the Russians to the moon, and a way to distract people from the Vietnam war, the group believes that the moon landings were faked.
Throughout American history and still today these conspiracy theories always come up about any major tragedies. Some have been true but until someone within our own government comes out and says that these theories are true, they will continue to be all make believe. 9/11 is one of the biggest attacks on American soil and it also has a lot of conspiracies surrounding it. What really hit the towers? Where they commercial jet liners? How does a 747 leave that small of a hole in the Pentagon? These are some of the questions surrounding it. What it all comes down to though is what makes these theories so fascinating to Americans. What makes these so believable and to think that our own government would do this to us is just crazy, or is it?
Synopsis. One of the more interesting readings in Behrens and Rosen’s Wrting and Reading Across the Curriculum was “A Psychology of Rumor” By Robert H. Knapp. His major point was the understanding of the process and the reasoning behind rumors.
In education field, it is hard to know if all claims are credible and it is not so easy to assess good research. Curiosity and expertise will be helpful to to decide if you can trust the educational change that has been offered. Science can answer many questions, but not all of them.
The flaw with this kind of teaching is that it could create rebels who do not completely understand the idea of what it is to be a free thinker. It doesn't mean that they should just turn everything into anarchy and do as they please; it just means that they should be cautious of the information they are learning because not everything they learn is completely right all the time. Sometimes we must be able to argue with the text and consider our own opinions and beliefs.
My personal favorites all happen to involve the government, some classics included. It is said that 9/11 was an inside job perpetrated by Bush to purposely start a war with Afghanistan. Some survivors recall that they heard separate explosions at the time of the attacks, which has led people to believe that there were pre-planted explosives inside the Twin Towers. It is a well known fact that the towers collapsed at one point, but this is seen as suspicious to many conspiracy theorists. A common known phrase among believers is “jet fuel can’t melt steel beams.” Another widely believed theory is that the Royal Family killed Princess Diana. There are a few versions, one of which is that they killed her to prevent her from exposing the Family for being awful and corrupt. The other is where she was killed for loving a man of color,
We have all heard of strange and gory stories that are supposedly true, experienced by a friend of a friend. Whether true or not these so called "urban legends" tend to circulate throughout society thriving on each individual's fears and curiosity. What most people don't realize is, within these tales lies the attitudes and values of a community. These tales do not survive throughout the years solely on the basis of their entertainment level, but due to the fact that they reflect society's fears and anxieties. In dissecting these tales one can indefinitely find the social fallacy against females that has existed for decades, as well as the fears women have against men. However, more importantly, the values that society hold are
Through many legal actions in several states administrators and parents have been trying to promote that there are other ideas and theory available to research. This opposition to the current information being fed to our children has opened up a title wave and helped to elicit curiosity in our students to seek other information and facts, not just rely on one method of information.