Arab Open University Tutor Marked Assignment (TMA) FACULTY OF LANGUAGE STUDIES EA300B TMA COVER FORM (2015) Branch: Program: Course Title: Course Code: Student Name: Student ID: Section Number:: Tutor Name: Mark Allocated to TMA STUDENT MARK 20%

Arab Open University
Tutor Marked Assignment (TMA)

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE STUDIES
EA300B TMA COVER FORM (2015)
Branch: Program:
Course Title: Course Code:
Student Name: Student ID:
Section Number:: Tutor Name:

Mark Allocated
to TMA STUDENT MARK

20% for content : a max of 20 marks marks deducted for lang. & communication errors: a maximum of 6 marks Earned Mark


Notes on plagiarism:
A. According to the Arab Open University By-laws, “the following acts represent cases of cheating and plagiarism:
 Verbatim copying of printed material and submitting them as part of TMAs without proper academic acknowledgement and documentation.
 Verbatim copying of material from the Internet, including tables and graphics.
 Copying other students’ notes or reports.
 Using paid or unpaid material prepared for the student by individuals or firms.
B. Penalties for plagiarism ranges from failure in the TMA to expulsion from the university.

Declaration: I hereby declare that the submitted TMA is my own work and I have not copied any other person’s work or plagiarized in any other form as specified above.
Student Signature:

TMA feedback: (PT3)









EA300B: Children’s Literature (II)
TMA: Semester 2, 2014 - 2015

TMA: 20 points
Cut-off date: week 11
April 25th, 2015
Length: 2000 words


Explain and discuss the portrayal of mothers and motherhood in a literary work discussed in EA300 module material.



THEME: Explain and discuss the portrayal of mothers and motherhood in a literary work discussed in EA300 module material.

Notes:

1. The TMA is about the depiction/description/the representation of mothers and motherhood in literary works you studied in the course.
2. You can focus on a particular work, or you can compare two literary works to support your thesis.
3. The topic allows you to explore the representation of motherhood in different periods of the twentieth century.
4. Mothers are central figures in many of the works you studied: Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry, Tom’s Midnight Garden, Peter Rabbit, Voices in the Park as well as works and novels from the previous semester such as Northern Lights, Little Women, Treasure Island, Peter Pan, and many poems.
5. Poems you may find especially interesting in this regard may include ‘Matilda’, ‘The Story of Little Suck-a-Thumb’, ‘Wha me Mudder Do’, ‘Aunts and Uncles’.
6. You may find it rewarding to take an elastic/flexible view of the maternal and stretch it, for example, to aunts and grandmothers who may have taken a maternal role in the literary work under consideration. Some fairytales can offer you an indispensible resource in this regard.
7. In the course of your essay, you are expected to engage/use with the critical materials provided for the module, explaining where you are adopting critics’ views, and where you are refining them or challenging them. You are likely to find it helpful to contrast critical viewpoints, as well as to experiment with how far they can be aligned.
8. When it comes to planning your essay, you may find it helpful to set up an outline structure of points you wish to make, and then choose two or three scenes from the work(s) you are dealing with to write about in detail to flesh out your points. In this type of essay, it is essential to make detailed reference to the literary texts, as well as to the critical literature.

Students may find the critical works in their Reader: Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends about individual literary works helpful for writing their TMAs. But we advise you to do more research to write a substantial essay.




SOME HELPFUL NOTES:
The Image of The Maternal Figure Portrayed in Children’s Literature



1. Mothers are an important part of growing up; they carry their children for nine months, taking from their own bodies the nutrients their children need to survive. Such a symbiosis creates a special bond and, even after the separation at birth, the mother will look after her child so it can grow up to be a successful individual.
2. Mothers incite her child’s imagination by reading to it, but the books that she reads no doubt depict a distorted view of the maternal figure. Living in a patriarchal society, men see woman as the ‘other’; she is indefinable, and considered unstable due to hormonal changes brought on by the process of motherhood. If these irregularities are caused by motherhood, it is no surprise that children’s literature portrays mothers in such extreme ways.
3. Over the course of your essay, you should explore the maternal figure by looking at the archetypal roles mothers have played in some of the literary works you studied/ throughout the history of children’s literature.
Different images of mothers/women in children’s literature/fairy tales:
a) The Abusive Mother
b) The protective Mother
c) The idea of Mother as teacher later formed the image of the governess.
Example In Tom’s Midnight Garden (Pearce, 1958), Hatty’s aunt hates her, and provides no love; she even denies the simplest necessities such as food. Hatty wants a ‘forbidden’ apple from her ‘Garden of Eden’, but cousin Edgar warns her not to “leave the core on the lawn” or “you’ll get yourself into trouble” (Pearce, 71).
d) The Possessive/Oedipal Mother
In contrast to Hatty’s aunt, Tom’s aunt Gwen “intends to spoil Tom for food” (13) with rich delights such as “whipped cream, shrimp sauce, rum butter and real mayonnaise” (15). She has no children of her own, so over-compensates by giving Tom more than he needs. But smothering a child with love can be equally as detrimental as abuse. Cixous suggests the child becomes mutilated by too much food, just like when the pig-baby has too much pepper in Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland.
e) The Absent Mother

Peter Pan: Peter’s relationship with mother figures is complex. He says he hates mothers, but wants to be a “devoted son” (94) to Wendy. He craves the love and attention of a mother, but does not trust them because his own mother betrayed him. After his adventures, Peter flew home to find his window barred: “mother had forgotten all about me and there was another little boy sleeping in my bed” (101). Not only has he been abandoned, but he has been replaced. Peter, therefore, no doubt feels inadequate; he compensates by being cocky to hide his low self-esteem and he bans the Lost Boys from knowing more than he does, because it would undermine his worth. Rose suggests that because of his mother’s betrayal, Peter is unable to grow up. As Barrie states, “no one ever gets over the first unfairness” (82). Traumatised by the abandonment, Peter regressed to eternal infancy and consequently has a poor memory. He forgets everything so he cannot be hurt again. Unfortunately, the damage has already been done.
f) The Child-Mother

The child as mother is a recurring theme in children’s literature. Tom watches as Time turns Hatty “from playmate to grown-up woman” (Pearce, 196) She talks to Tom “as if he were a child and she were not” (141), so by their trip to Ely, she is no longer a companion, but a guardian. Tom’s Midnight Garden seems to show Time for males and females as different; girls grow up faster than boys, becoming more mature as they reach the stage of puberty. The Victorians treated girls as little women, but the Edwardians ‘adored impertinent boys and eager, adventurous, ever-young men’ (Chassagnol, 201). The adage, ‘boys will be boys’ (61) allowed them to remain care-free, while girls were brought up to be prim, proper, and obedient. (needs more analysis if you choose to discuss Tom’s Midnight Garden)

g) The role of motherhood is imbibed in /taught to girls from childhood; they are given dolls to play with as practice for becoming a mother. At seven, Alice, is already aware of “the proper way of nursing” (Carroll, 60) a baby, and Wendy even dreams of them when she is asleep.




Children’s literature has changed radically since its inception, particularly in terms of purpose and readership. While books were originally written to teach moral behaviour, thanks to writers like Carroll, they are now also for entertainment.
Nowadays, Children’s literature has verged into a teenage market, or in some cases has become all encompassing. Harry Potter (Rowling, 1997-2007), for example, appeals to children and adults alike. Despite these changes, the mother archetype is still very much in use. In Harry Potter, Aunt Petunia is the wicked stepmother who turns Harry into a male Cinderella. Molly Weasely is the over-protective, possessive mother, trying to shield Harry from knowledge even though it directly affects him, because she believes it is too gruesome to divulge. She is reluctant to let her children grow up because she would no longer be able perform her motherly duties. Lily Evans sacrificed herself to saver her son; she is an absent mother, but still holds the role of the Madonna. Finally, Hermione is the child mother, helping Harry and Ron with homework, and lecturing them on how to behave.

Mothers in children’s literature are represented in exaggerated ways. In many cases they are marginalised by the binary role of ‘monster’ and ‘angel’ (Wilkie-Stibbs, 87) because of a ‘male fear of femininity’ (89). The sexual woman is a threat, so becomes the abusive mother; in others cases sometimes enfeebling her to the point of being absent from the story all together. But whether absent or over-bearing, the mother is an important figure in children’s literature because she is the staple involved in growing up.

Examples: Roll of Thunder:
Mama Mary Logan, school teacher and mother to the Logan children. Soft spoken but not afraid to stand up for what is right. Starts the business of boycotting the Wallace store. Mary Logan is the mother of Cassie, Stacey, Christopher John, and Little Man and wife of David Logan. She teaches seventh grade at her children's school, Great Faith Elementary. She deeply cares for he four children, which is evidently shown through her actions and words.
Big Ma Grandmother of the Logan children on the father’s side. She actually owns the land but has it transferred into her sons’ names to protect it. Tells stories at Christmas time about her own background. "Big Ma" is the mother of Uncle Hammer and David Logan and the grandmother of Cassie, Stacey, Little Man, and Christopher John. She knows how to keep her grandchildren out of trouble and how to run the Logan farm. Big Ma evidently doesn't care for how her grandchildren are treated, but tries her hardest to educate them on how to handle things right while maintaining a polite manner.

4. Tom’s Midnight Garden,
5. Peter Rabbit,
6. Voices in the Park
7. novels from the previous semester such as Northern Lights, Little Women, Treasure Island, Peter Pan, and many poems.
8. Poems you may find especially interesting in this regard may include ‘Matilda’, ‘The Story of Little Suck-a-Thumb’, ‘Wha me Mudder Do’, ‘Aunts and Uncles’.
You can choose any of these literary works and discuss how mothers are depicted/portrayed/described/ represented…You must give clear examples from the novels you choose/ You must quote short statements/ events… to prove your point.