Author Archives: Cassidy LeDonne

Journal 12 – Cassidy LeDonne

Posted by Cassidy LeDonne in Journal 12

Cassidy LeDonne

Journal 12

4/24/17

Marketing of Harry Potter

In the article “Truth is Stranger than Magic: The Marketing of Harry Potter”, author Anne Galligan talks about all the positive and negative things being said about the marketing of Harry Potter.  Galligan talks about the decisions J.K. Rowling made and she allowed or didn’t allow some things to be marketed.   J.K. Rowling created a global phenomenon in Harry Potter. As an author, she has the right to market her phenomenon the way she wants to.  I completely disagree that some parents, nutritionists and other health-advocacy groups were upset that J.K. Rowling allowed a partnership between Coca-Cola and Harry Potter.  Galligan states “One nutritionist declares that the partnership between Coca-Cola and Harry Potter ‘is a sad example of unconscionable marketing’.”  J.K. Rowling has a right to market the way she wants too and Coca-Cola were to offer that nutritionist a “three-year, eighteen million dollar campaign” for something that they published, I doubt that nutritionist would say no either.  Besides, just because J.K. Rowling agreed to the campaign with Coca-Cola, it doesn’t mean she’s promoting unhealthy eating just like some of the health-advocacy groups were claiming.  Kids shouldn’t have to worry about drinking Coca-Cola at a young age, and it’s not like J.K. Rowling was allowing Harry Potter to be in the drug market campaign.

Putting the negative thoughts about the critics of Coca-Cola aside, there were many other critics to J.K. Rowling’s global phenomenon.  Author, Anne Galligan, states that other people like conservative groups “charge that the books/films are anti-Christian, promoting witchcraft and Satanism.”  J.K. Rowling has defended her Harry Potter series time and time again, stating that she is a Christian herself and she actually puts hints of bible verses throughout the books.  I feel like people have nothing better to do with their lives but be jealous and constantly be a critic of someone else who is succeeding more than them.

Aside from the negative critics about how J.K. Rowling markets Harry Potter, there are many positive critics and other positive things happening from what J.K. Rowling is doing.  Anne Galligan states that J.K. Rowling has a “willingness to contribute to selected charities.”  At the end of the day, J.K. Rowling is benefiting herself by getting Harry Potter more globalized but at the same time she chooses to benefit others as well as herself.  From all of J.K. Rowling’s willingness to contribute to charities, she was then labeled as a hero author.  Galligan states “Rowling received an OBE and an honorary Ph.D. after HP4 for her services to literature.”  Though Rowling is doing positive things with her marketing of her Harry Potter series, she is also benefiting from it like no other.  J.K. Rowling is one of the richest females in the world.  With all the marketing she is doing, she has to be a billionaire by now.  Lego paid J.K. Rowling $100 million for the construction license and Coca-Cola paid $150 million for its food license.  These aren’t even counting how much money she made from all the movies, Harry Potter World in Florida and other various other Harry Potter items.

Rowling has done a brilliant job marketing her Harry Potter world. She has turned down the right people when she needed and has never said no to an amazing opportunity. Anne Galligan states in her article that “Twice a year she negotiates with Warner on possible Potter products and claims success in vetoing particularly crass prototypes.  The Moaning Myrtle Toilet Seat, for example, did not eventuate.” J.K. Rowling has, in her own way, made Harry Potter as famous as he is with help through marketing.  She turned Harry Potter into a well-known, any aged global phenomenon.

Reading Journal 6

Posted by Cassidy LeDonne in Reading Journal 6

Journal 6 – Heroes

By: Cassidy LeDonne

            Without heroes, children and adults wouldn’t be able to determine the difference between good vs. evil, light vs. dark, or Harry Potter vs. Voldemort.  Heroes give people a purpose to see the light at the end of the tunnel.  They allow people to see that heroes can make mistakes too, and even rise greater from them.  Heroes give children a story of how life can be difficult and an understanding that when life doesn’t go your way, there is always a better day ahead and hope.  Heroes give adults a way to understand life’s obstacles.  Through Sharon Black’s article: “The Magic of Harry Potter: Symbols and Heroes of Fantasy”, readers get a glimpse of two totally different people who have both come to the realization that heroes aren’t just fictional characters but are courageous, brave and give people a better understanding of life.

Children read about heroes in a completely different light than adults do.  Adults and children have the same general outlook on heroes, however when reading about heroes, children use their imagination.  In Black’s article, she talks about a little girl named Kallie who loves reading Harry Potter and exploring his world and comparing it to her own.  Through Harry Potter’s life, she’s able to witness how hardships can turn into something magical.  Children use their imagination while reading about heroes to experience their own reality.  As Black states, “The ever-changing magic of Harry Potter is in the magic of the child’s own experiences, feelings, and imagination”.  Children have the ability to use their imagination while they read in a completely different way than adults.  Maybe the lack of experiences that children have compared to adults could be the culprit.  Children haven’t experienced the hardships of life (at least just yet).  They haven’t experienced “life lows”.  However, heroes like Harry Potter, give children that small experience to understand that even heroes, like Harry, can have a hard life but then one day, it gets better.  Through the journey of heroes, like Harry Potter, children can relate and express their feelings in similar ways.  Children are able to experience their fears, their sorrows and their happiness through these such journeys.  As Black states “The child may find it easier to face these fears when the abstract feelings are given form by Harry’s experience”.  Though children haven’t experienced the life “lows” or even the life “highs”, they gain experience through reading about heroes such as Harry Potter.

Adults read about heroes, like Harry Potter, in a different way than children do.  Even though adults use their imagination, as well, to try to visualize Harry’s journey, they don’t necessary use their imagination to visualize Harry’s full experiences in their own life.  Instead, they read about some of Harry’s mistakes or “lows” in life and watch how he breaks out of them.  Through heroes such as Harry Potter, adults can understand that life may get hard but it won’t always stay that hard.  Black talks about her daughter, Sandra, who is a young adult, and how she viewed and looked up to heroes.   Black states “As we talk about our heroes, Sandra explains that she needs Luke Skywalker, Frodo Baggins, and Harry Potter because she needs to believe and to share her belief that the hero can emerge victorious, no matter how oppressive the uncharted darkness may be”.  Adults need heroes too.  Just like children, adults need someone to look up too.  The need someone to relate too.  They need a hero to show them that life can and will get hard, but it won’t stay hard.   In fact, it will get easier and will get better.  Heroes show adults and children that life has all these twists and turns but it also has moments that are great and are amazing.  Heroes give people hope.

 

 

Remix Ideas – Cassidy LeDonne

Posted by Cassidy LeDonne in Remix Ideas

So I was thinking more along the lines of remixing a well-known game.

One of my ideas which I am leaning towards is making a remix of the cornhole game.  It would be more of cornhole Quidditch. Instead of one hole on the wooden board, like normal cornhole games have, there will be three.  The three holes will be in the design of the three hooped goal posts from Quidditch in Harry Potter.  Each will be at different heights and worth different points.  I will make rules up so that the game is quite different than the original cornhole game.  I will also make an idea/rule up where the game can be over quickly if you get the golden snitch (whatever that may be).  There will be four wooden boards representing each house.

My second idea is a Harry Potter Quidditch pong.  This is a remix of the normal pong that people play.  There will be three hooped goal posts in-between the two teams’ 6 red solo cups.  There will be several different rules of the game as well so it’s more of a spin-off or remix of pong.  I will also add in another cup somewhere else on the table to resemble the golden snitch so the game would be over once that cup is made.

These are just two ideas that I am thinking about, however, I am leaning towards the first one because I can do more with the rules of the game.

Journal 3 – Cassidy LeDonne

Posted by Cassidy LeDonne in Reading Journal Three

Cassidy LeDonne

Popularity of Werewolves

Werewolf: a person who changes for periods of time into a wolf, typically when there is a full moon (“Werewolf”).  Werewolves are mythical creatures who has a Middle/Old English origin (“Werewolf”).  Though the origin of werewolves takes place in England, the population of werewolves and endless amount of stories about them, has expanded throughout the world.   Werewolves can be found in any culture, whether it be in their history, TV shows or movies.  That leaves the question, why are werewolves so popular?  In the reading “Hairy Snout, Human Heart: Werewolves in Harry Potter’s World and in European History” in the book, Harry Potter and History, Eveline Brugger talks about the idea of humans transforming into animals, specifically werewolves, in the magical world of Harry Potter and the history of the werewolf existence.

The popularity of werewolves stems from Europe.  “Of all European predators, the wolf probably has the most ambiguous reputation” (p 294).  But what’s so confusing about the wolf population?  Why is there so much curiosity about them?  Well, there is a weird appeal to people that you can be both human and animal.  For a while there wasn’t acceptance that humans could turn into animals, especially in the beliefs in religion in the early twelfth and thirteenth centuries.  Once the term “werewolf” was accepted and the idea that werewolves could exist, they were feared.  Fearing werewolves is what made the mythical animal so popular.  Most “wolves appear as threatening and dangerous” (p 294) and that attracts a lot of attention.  Wolves were viewed as very dangerous back in the day, as they appeared in horror genre movies.  However, current day, there are a lot of TV series that portray friendly wolves.  In the TV series, “Teen Wolf”, Scott McCall plays a wolf, who was bitten, but goes to extreme measure to save his friends and family.  Scott McCall is hero in a sense and is out to get the bad wolves or bad creatures that try to destroy his hometown.  As Eveline Brugger states, “In their wolf shape, some of them are murderous beasts, while others are tame and kind” (p 295).  In Harry Potter, Remus Lupin and Fenrir Greyback are great examples of the good and bad wolf concept.  Remus Lupin appeared as someone who struggled with their existence as a wolf and only wanted to do well, even if at full moon, he wasn’t his human self.  Fenrir Greyback appeared as someone who embraced their wolf-like behaviors, even in human form, and only wanted to create hectic and chaotic environments.  Since, in recent years, there was a good and bad wolf existence, it only furthered extended its popularity around the world.

The popularity of werewolves also comes from the idea that humans can turn into animals specifically on a natural cause.  The full moon plays a huge role in the curiosity behind werewolves.  Even though the full moon didn’t “play a prominent role either in pre-modern werewolf literature or in the werewolf persecutions” (p 301), it now plays a huge role in the popular culture today.  In every movie or TV show, there will be scenes that show the significance of the humans turning into werewolves on a full moon.  In the first season of the TV show, “Teen Wolf”, Scott McCall just recently got bitten by a werewolf and every full moon that happens, he tries to chain himself to his bed or chain himself to a pole to try to restrain himself from turning into a murderous beast, since he couldn’t control his powers at first.  Eveline Brugger adds, “In the Harry Potter universe, the full moon is crucial for the transformation, and most other modern werewolf stories also mention the influence of the moon in some form” (p 301).  In Harry Potter, viewers can see Remus Lupin struggling with his transformations whenever there was a full moon.  Through Harry Potter, and other TV shows like “Teen Wolf”, the popularity of werewolves has increased and is now a typical mythical animal that people will see in today’s entertainment culture.

The werewolf image has transformed since its original appearance back in the early twelfth and thirteenth centuries.  The werewolf image started out as something many religions weren’t willing to accept into their beliefs and since then, werewolves have turned into a huge culture popularity.

 

 

Work Cited

Reagin, Nancy Ruth. Harry Potter and History. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2011. Print.

“Werewolf.” Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, n.d. Web. 16 Feb. 2017.

Reading Journal One – Cassidy LeDonne

Posted by Cassidy LeDonne in Reading Journal One

Social Class in the Magical World VS. Muggle World; Same? Different?

Cassidy LeDonne

The magical world of Harry Potter sounds … magical … doesn’t it?  It’s a world filled with wizards, witches and of course, no muggles.  Here, in the muggle world, there’s people who were born into wealth, people who work hard for wealth, and people who just can’t ever become wealthy.  In the magical world of Harry Potter, could that be the case as well?  While reading “Marx, Magic, and Muggles: Class Conflict in Harry Potter’s World” in the book, Harry Potter and History, Susan Hall expresses the similarities between Great Britain’s muggle world of social class and the magical world during the early 18th century.

In the section of this chapter, “All Wizards Are Equal … but Some Are More Equal than Others”, Hall talks about how J. K. Rowling depicts wizards or witches as the lower class in the magical world.  Hall states “The magical underclass certainly exists” (p 285).  One of the ways Rowling portrays and labels wizards as the lower class is by having those characters, such as Stan Shunpike, have a strong accent.  These characters lines are often hard to read, as Rowling clearly makes Stan have some type of poor English accent, which labels him as an “other” and allows readers to give him the label as uneducated.  Stan is an example of those who don’t have wealth in the muggle world.  “Stan’s life follows a depressing pattern, one that is familiar in the Muggle world. We first see him trapped in a dead-end job, limited by his class and educational disadvantages” (p 286). Later, Susan Hall states, “Joining Voldemort’s gang of extremist thugs offers a chance of excitement and glamour that his life lacks otherwise” (p 286).  Hall is saying that in the magical world, Stan was trapped at a dead-end because he was uneducated and therefore wasn’t able to make any type of money which ultimately determined his social class as “other”.  Since Stan’s social class was determined by the education he got, he wasn’t able to ‘climb’ the social ladder … until he turned to the ‘dark side’ or Voldemort’s gang.  Thinking about the muggle world, people who don’t have a higher education, such as people who don’t attend college, aren’t able to make as much money.  This ultimately does determines someone’s social class because they aren’t able to ‘climb’ the social ladder since they never got the education that the need.  There are similarities in the social classes between the muggle world and the magical specifically having to do with education.

Susan Hall also talks about the importance of how much money you have both in the muggle world and magical world.  If you aren’t born into wealth or work for wealth, then you’re labeled as an “other” and you’re stuck at a dead-end in your life, just like Stan.  Social class in Great Britain is not all about relative wealth; the source of that wealth is important also.  “The source of that wealth is important, with “old money” (inherited wealth) conferring more stats on its possessor than money acquired through business” (p 287).  Social class isn’t just determined by your educational background, it’s also determined by the how your wealth became to be.  If you inherited your money or were born into wealth, that’s known as “old money”; while earning your money is “new money”.  According to Hall, in the magical world, “old money” versus “new money” doesn’t necessarily exist.  A witches’ and wizards’ social class is more based on pure-blood families versus half-blood families, with the exception of the Weasley family.   “The Weasley’s are poor, but their class status within the magical world is second to none.  The Weasley’s are pure-blood” (p 287).  Even though the Weasley family doesn’t have all the money in the world (probably because they have seven kids), they are still high in the social class because of their pure-blood status.  It’s an easy comparison to the muggle world.  It’s all about who you know.  If you know the C.E.O. of a company versus some other person who knows a regular worker of that company, you would most likely get the job over that other person.  In the magical world, Harry Potter gets out of a lot of trouble with nearly zero consequences because he is a pure-blood wizard and he knows higher end people in the Magical Ministries.

The magical world doesn’t seem so magical anymore, unless you were a pure-blood witch who has a decent social class and education.  The magical world seems just like the muggle world.  It’s all about who you know, where your money came from and how much education you have that ultimately determines your social class.

 

 

Work Cited

Reagin, Nancy Ruth. Harry Potter and History. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2011. Print.