FutureLearn

Fairy Tales: Meanings, Messages, and Morals (FutureLearn)

Offered by The University of Newcastle, Australia,
Fairy Tales: Meanings, Messages, and Morals (FutureLearn)

Build your skills in literary analysis and creative writing by exploring the meaning of fairy tales. Discover the fascinating circumstances and meanings behind fairy tales. On this course, you will look deeper into the enchanting and surprisingly dark themes of several well-known European fairy tales. What were the authors thinking? What were the cultural and personal concerns that have shaped these stories? What are the readers being asked to believe?

Class Deals by MOOC List - Click here and see FutureLearn's Active Discounts, Deals, and Promo Codes.

By considering the historical context of fairy tales and examining the characters, styles, and plots, you will discover that the intended morals of the original stories may not be exactly what you first thought.

What topics will you cover?

  • Exploring fairy tales
  • Interpreting literary narratives
  • Cultural context in literature

What will you achieve?
By the end of the course, you'll be able to...

  • Demonstrate close acquaintance with three famous fairy tales.
  • Explain the significance of cultural contexts in shaping fairy tales.
  • Interpret narratives at basic level.
Go to Class
MOOC List is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Related Courses

Shakespeare: Context and Stagecraft (FutureLearn) FutureLearn
King's College London

Shakespeare: Context and Stagecraft (FutureLearn)

Languages & Literature

Explore Shakespeare’s stagecraft through three of his most well-known plays: Romeo and Juliet, The Merchant of Venice and Macbeth. Study fascinating theatrical and social contexts that shaped Shakespeare’s plays. On this course, you’ll explore the language, themes, and contexts of three of Shakespeare’s most widely studied and frequently performed plays.

Self Paced
2 Weeks
Literature William Shakespeare Shakespeare
Details
Shakespeare's Language: Revealing Meanings and Exploring Myths (FutureLearn) FutureLearn
Lancaster University

Shakespeare's Language: Revealing Meanings and Exploring Myths (FutureLearn)

Languages & Literature

Demystify renowned Shakespeare myths and get introduced to corpus-based methods for analysing his use of language in context. Debunk and discover common myths surrounding the language of William Shakespeare. William Shakespeare is a global phenomenon, yet there is actually relatively little work specifically devoted to his language, and even less deploying the latest techniques from linguistics.

Jul 12th 2021
4 Weeks
Language Literature William Shakespeare
Details
Reasoning Across the Disciplines (Coursera) Coursera
University of North Carolina

Reasoning Across the Disciplines (Coursera)

Humanities

Critical reasoning skills are a key success factor for students entering their first year of college. They must be able to think logically and form arguments. This course, designed with incoming college freshmen in mind but open to anyone, provides an essential grounding in critical reasoning skills. Faculty from multiple disciplines at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill offer guidance on applying critical thinking skills in the context of specific disciplines. By developing these skills, students will learn more, enjoy their courses more, and experience greater academic success.

Sep 7th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Psychology Chemistry Literature
Details
Shakespeare's Hamlet: The Ghost (edX) EdX
HarvardX,Harvard University

Shakespeare's Hamlet: The Ghost (edX)

Humanities Languages & Literature

Explore the haunting figure at the heart of one of William Shakespeare’s most famous plays. In the first act of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the Ghost of the dead King of Denmark appears to his son, setting off a chain of events that culminates in the play’s notoriously bloody finale. But how would this mysterious figure have been understood in Shakespeare’s time?

Self Paced
Self-Paced
Literature William Shakespeare Shakespeare
Details
The American Renaissance: Classic Literature of the 19th Century (edX) EdX
DartmouthX

The American Renaissance: Classic Literature of the 19th Century (edX)

Humanities Languages & Literature

Explore the writings of famous American authors from Ralph Waldo Emerson and Harriet Beecher Stowe to Mark Twain, and examine the historic role Dartmouth College played in their formation. What is the American Renaissance? How did Dartmouth help foster the formation of the American Renaissance and its reevaluation and reinvention in the twentieth? Why should we, as twenty-first century readers, concern ourselves with this literature?

Self Paced
4 Weeks
Literature American Renaissance Literacy
Details
Leer a Macondo: La obra de Gabriel García Márquez (FutureLearn) FutureLearn
Universidad de los Andes

Leer a Macondo: La obra de Gabriel García Márquez (FutureLearn)

Languages & Literature

Explorar por qué el autor de Cien años de Soledad es uno de los escritores más importantes del siglo XX. Gabriel García Márquez es un escritor colombiano que ganó el premio Nobel de Literatura en 1982 y ha sido reconocido como uno de los escritores más importantes del siglo XX. Sus obras han sido traducidas a más de 35 idiomas, han sido adaptadas para televisión y cine y han inspirado múltiples obras de arte.

No sessions available
5-12 Weeks
Literature Gabriel García Márquez Writer
Details
Gabriel García Márquez: Power, History and Love (FutureLearn) FutureLearn
Universidad de los Andes

Gabriel García Márquez: Power, History and Love (FutureLearn)

Languages & Literature

Identify the author’s contributions to world literature through the study of three of his obsessions: power, history and love. In this course you will be able to identify Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez’s narrative contributions to world literature through the study of three of the author’s obsessions: power, history and love.

No sessions available
5-12 Weeks
Literature Literary Novel
Details
Literature in the Digital Age: from Close Reading to Distant Reading (FutureLearn) FutureLearn
University of Basel

Literature in the Digital Age: from Close Reading to Distant Reading (FutureLearn)

Languages & Literature

Learn new ways of interpreting literary texts, from time-tested methods to computer-assisted practices such as distant reading. As we make sense of what we read, we construe meaning using the ancient cultural technique of interpretation. Only rarely do we actually reflect this process: what are the means that help us to understand literary texts? How does interpretation work? And how has our increasing use of e-books and tablets changed the way we read and interpret literature?

Available now
5-12 Weeks
Literature Digital Age Interpretation
Details
Samuel Johnson’s Rasselas: An Introduction (FutureLearn) FutureLearn
Ralston College

Samuel Johnson’s Rasselas: An Introduction (FutureLearn)

Languages & Literature

Explore the humane realism of Samuel Johnson in a deep dive into his only novel with Theodore Dalrymple as your guide. Explore the humane realism of Samuel Johnson in a deep dive into his only novel. Learn from Theodore Dalrymple. Theodore Dalrymple, the pseudonym of Anthony Daniels, is an English cultural critic of great distinction. He has written extensively on culture, its contemporary neglect, and its enduring potential.

Jan 24th 2022
5-12 Weeks
Literature English Literature Samuel Johnson
Details