Saturday, March 8, 2014

Book Analysis - The Story of Ping


The Story About Ping
Written by Marjorie Flack. Illustrated by Kurt Wiese.
Year of original publication: 1933.

This is a story about a little yellow duckling that didn't want to be last back on to his boat and get a spanking. So instead Ping hides and because of this his boat leaves him and he's not lost. He gets in to trouble but luckily finds his way out of it all and soon enough he sees his home again. This time he is still last to get to the boat but he takes the spanking anyway because he just wants to be back home.

The only characters in this story other than Ping the duck are humans and are all of Chinese decent. For the most part I believe the characters were depicted as culturally correct as in not in a negative stereotypical way.

In a way the story is both stereotypical and true to the culture. Shown on a few pages are fishing boats. Fishing boats are a part of the some Asian lifestyles and ways of occupation. Of course, this is something we associate Chinese culture with. So at first thought one would think of fishing and small boats with Asians. In the story, Ping has a huge family, I believe that's something stereotypical about the the Chinese culture - to have a big family. Also for the fact that Ping is the only duck with a name. It's a Chinese name and they made Ping the only yellow duck and a stereotypical and sometimes racist term is to call Asian's "yellow". Another stereotypical thing is that at one point, a little boy catches Ping and his family wants to eat him. Duck is one of the food we think about Chinese restaurants having. The little boy's mother tells him that she will cook the duck with rice and it's quite stereotypical to say that all Asian eat rice or always eat rice.

The owner of the boat has the power to call his ducks to him and get them back on his boat. As are the other humans in this story, like the little boy who catches Ping. Then his parents do as well as they tell the boy they are going to have the duck for dinner and take Ping and keep him under a basket for later.

The author Marjorie Flack was White and did not fit the cultural group she was representing in in her book. Kurt Wiese was the illustrator and he was born in Germany but spent a great deal of time in Japan. His art was highly influenced by Asian culture which was why a lot of his art is Asian themed.

The humans were drawn as drawn in a very stereotypical way, with very, very squint-y and small eyes, dressed in traditional Chinese clothing.  The language used is mostly in English. But there is one part where the master of the boat sings "La-la-la-la-la-la-lei" and I'm not sure if that's just the words the author decided to use or because she thought it would fit with a Chinese character.

To be honest I don't feel as if this book was that bad. I don't think I'd read it to my students unless I talked about the story afterwards. So if I decided to use it in a lesson I would have an activity to explain everything afterwards. But basically I don't think I would use this book, in my opinion it's just a 'fun' book. You don't learn much from it so I would have no reason to use it.

14 comments:

  1. We had this book out at our preschool last week as we were studying the letter "P". However I didn't get a chance to read it to the kids. I think you bring up a valid point about the book showing life in a typical Chinese family with the fishing boats and eating rice. This can be taken as typical for most families or as stereotypical.

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  2. I must disagree. I think the story has negative stereotypes about the culture. I believe the books illustration also provide stereotypes for the children to see. It also teaches low self esteem on children.

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    1. Sorry I feel you are way off base here. It's a wonderful international tale of universality of feelings courage and fear.

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    2. Agreed Katie. Most people would agree that showing a female in heels and an apron and a dress busy cooking in every book in our libraries is a stereotype. I hope for our girls we would want authentic representations of women working, eating, managing, planning, debating, driving, piloting, as police officers...there are some great books that reach beyond stereotypes to show courage: The Dot, Mother for Choco, Alligator Baby and so many of Robert Munsch’s books, and fear: Bear Island by Matthew Cordell, Wemberly Worried by Kevin Henkes, There Must Be More Than That by Shinsuke Yoshitake

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  3. I must agree with Katie. Note that that Ping happens to be one yellow duck of the group. I think it also depicts the stereotype that Asian families all live together in one house, the repetitive nature of the listing off of family makes it so the point is hard to miss and the children will catch on to it. Also, a point in the story which may have been easy to miss is the black fishing birds "fishing for their master" with rings around their neck. To me this sets up negative or possessive messages of the dark bird that may be tied back to people. Another thing to note is the boy with a barrel on his back, the story reads "as all boat boys are tied to their boats on the (yangzi?) river" This may cause the child reading to wonder, what? All assign children are forced to float in the river with a barrel on their back?.. There are simply to many distasteful elements in this book, I simply would not use it in a classroom or home.

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  4. Even the second illustration (the one with a Chinese man) already hints at the fact that there will be many cultural stereotypes in the book. The details connected with the Chinese culture (like big families, rice eating, fishing, etc) represent stereotypes, but what could be expected from a book published as early as 1933? Anyway, I don't think a Chinese would be offended by the depictions in the book. Still it is better to look for the better choices to be used in a classroom setting and at home.

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    1. Some Chinese people are offended. That is enough to find a better book if you have Chinese children in your classroom.
      If we are trying to teach about Chinese culture, this is not the book.
      If we are trying to show how negotiation works better than hitting or fear this not the book (spanking works here).
      If we are trying to show how varied Chinese people are this is not the book.
      Why not have a book about the many provinces in China if we’re teaching about Chinese culture, or a book with a character who happens to be Chinese living here if we want to show what one chinese American eats.
      We can shelve out of date books and use them as scholarly exercises to see how writers and illustrators from 1933 depicted Chinese people; they are not for teaching anything accurate about China now.

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  5. I think it's an ok book but as a kid, it was kind of distressing to read. I remember maybe a reading rainbow program of this book and the music was suspenseful, Ping is trying his hardest to get back to the boat, the pictures of course don't move and it all seemed like a bad dream and then, "Spank!" But I do now see that when it was published, that idea of serious consequences upon children was probably connected to the date.

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  6. Thank you for your analysis, I agree with you that this book has an stereotype in it that "it's quite stereotypical to say that all Asian eat rice or always eat rice". and another stereotype is that all Chinese have a big families. I don't think there is a need to bring on this subjects to a children book that makes children to stereotype for instance this book makes children to believe that all Chinese eat rice and they have a huge family.

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  7. Oh, brother. I heard the story in elementary school and don't remember being traumatized by it. And as for Chinese stereotypes, for Heaven's sake the story was written more than 90 years ago. Are we to not allow children to read Mary Poppins, Winnie the Pooh, or any of Beatrix Potter's books? So Ping has a big family, perpetuating that Chinese stereotype. At the time so did most Irish, Jewish and Italian families (Marjorie Flack was from Long Island). And the idea of Peter Rabbit's father being baked into a pie was a lot scarier than Ping being cooked. So the characters wear pre-Mao outfits but this was before Mao came into power. In Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books white people dress the way they did almost 150 years ago in America. Should kids not read those books, either? Ok, the human beings have yellow skin and slanted eyes but have you seen any Anime cartoons? Their Western characters are pasty, overly tall and long-long limbed with extremely round eyes. Is that not racist? As for his colour, Ping is described as a “beautiful young duck,” so he was probably not full grown, therefore yellow. And going through that hormonal period of adolescent rebellion. And yes, Chinese people eat a lot of rice. So do other Asians, Africans and Latin Americans. What would you have the mother cook? Mashed potatoes? And speaking of which, so the duck man calls "la-la-la-la-lei" to call the ducks. If the book were set in Austria or Switzerland and he were calling "yo-de-lay-dee-ho" or in the American South and he yelled "yee-haw" or "soo-ee" would that be racist? Give it a break.

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    1. Thanks for responding this is what I was thinking too.

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    2. You are right! It's a fabulous book for young children - a little dated but so what! Thank you for your conmmnet.

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    3. You just wrote my thoughts exactly. Jesus people need to stop bloody analysing everything to death. I read this book as a child and my heart broke for the wee duck. We have different cultures all over the world, if we cannot depict them in anything is that not being racist by not acknowleding their culture.

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    4. We want our children to be thinkers right? We want them to grow up to be inventors and people who have an opinion and this book limits them to an outdated limited picture of life long ago. We want them to know all the different ways moms work, different ways that children dress, all the different ways way we look, and this book does none of that. ....

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