Invisible Narratives Do Exist

Doing different activities to analyze and learn about invisible narratives was very new to me. I don't recall a time when I actually looked for hidden meanings in texts, movies, or even in our society. The reason why I didn't was probably because throughout my whole life, I have been exposed to the social norms in our society, especially through the media.

Reading most of the blogs that my peers wrote, regarding analyzing an invisible narrative implicit in a text that we have not discussed in class, made me much more knowledgeable about what is going on in the world, how it is changing, and how we are unknowingly conforming to the social norms. I have learned that I should question everything and acquire all the information that I can before I believe it.

The blogs that my peers wrote were so interesting because they used examples of real life situations that I would have never guessed to have invisible narratives. For example, one of my peers analyzed the hidden narrative in the movie The Little Mermaid. This person came to the conclusion that the invisible narrative he/she found was that Ariel gave up her voice, which was her strongest trait, in order to get the man of her dreams. In reality, women sometimes degrade themselves in order to be acknowledged by men, which should never be the case.

We also had several readings in class that helped us identify some of the invisible narratives that were applicable to our lives. The reading that stood out to me the most was Ariely's "High Cost of Zero Cost" which he explains how we react to the words "free" and "zero". To illustrate Ariely's point that we humans make irrational decisions when we see those words, he conducted multiple experiments. One experiment was when he and a couple of his peers set up a table in front off a large building offering two kinds of chocolates: 15 cents for the Lindt truffles and 1 cent for a Hershey Kiss. They found that customers compared the price and quality of both chocolates resulting in  most costumers picking the Lindt truffles. However, when they decided to see how making the Hershey Kisses for FREE, they found that most customers chose chose the Kiss instead of the Lindt truffle. They gave up a better bargain for something that they didn't really want but the word FREE persuaded them to do so.

Furthermore, learning about invisible narratives have changed my perspective of the world. It's funny because whenever I read, see or watch something, I am now obliged to look for those hidden narratives. It is also very important to look for these things because we can easily be fooled if we don't educate ourselves to what is right or wrong. In order to distinguish between what is right or wrong, we have to separate ourselves from the social norms in our society and analyze its hidden narratives and what their true intentions are.