Hidden What?

Hidden narratives have recently been brought up to me in English class. I had no idea that this kind of term existed. I knew that hidden meanings existed, but apparently (not apparently, it's true...) there's something called 'hidden narratives.' I've learned this year that hidden narratives are actually really important in the this world. They show a lot about the different types of meanings that are actually being portrayed in all kinds of writings, medias, and etc.

I couldn't really find an exact definition of 'hidden narratives' when I tried to put this on Google search. There can be different ways in which hidden narratives could be defined by each and every person, but I feel like my definition of hidden narratives would be: the ways that media or pieces of writing are portrayed to make (unconscious or conscious) assumptions or show ideologies about each and every person. For example, in class, Caitlin showed us how words from an article changed everything about how each race was portrayed by using negative diction for African Americans and positive diction for White Americans of the same exact word.

I think learning about hidden narratives in my English 214 class has definitely opened my eyes and mind to so many truths behind different types of writings, medias, and etc. One of the craziest things that I have noticed about hidden narratives in class was about the egg and sperm. I found that the egg was described as weaker when compared to the sperm. Also that the egg was portrayed as lazy because the sperm had to come to the egg. Also that the egg was found to be wasteful, but in reality more sperm is made than eggs and more sperm is wasted than eggs. Diction is just used to show us the hidden narrative that the females are weaker, lazier, and much more.

One example that I have realized outside of class (actually, based on blogs from Blogger) that children's movies or TV shows actually are darker than what we think it maybe be. For example, I learned that basically a lot of Disney movies have so many different hidden narratives. Like in Lion King, I learned about race based on each character's skin color (Simba and Scar).

I also learned that in the Little Mermaid, Ariel losing her voice wasn't just merely part of the movie plot. It meant so much more. From someone's blog, I learned that Ariel losing her voice was just for her prince. But in order to be with her prince, she had to lose the tail, underwater life, and her voice at first. This shows male dominance and a lot about gender in our society. How we have to give up so many things for men. Same goes for changing last names to the male's last name, which is complete B.S.!

We see hidden narratives in our everyday lives. You start to notice that mostly White males wear business suits. You start to notice that mostly women work at company jobs, but never seen to be CEOs (not because of skill, but because of their gender). Why are magazines usually (almost always) full of skinny, White girls? Why are African Americans always portrayed as poor and starving on the news? There are so many hidden narratives if we just open our eyes and notice these things.