Harry Potter: Naming and Power

TEACHING TOLERANCE EARLY grADES ACTIVITY WWW.TEACHINGTOLERANCE.ORG K 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Harry Potter: Naming and Power GOALS • Students will compare the unique features of different groups, both in their school and community and in the Harry Potter world • Students will explore how and why people often like or dislike each other because of membership in or exclusion from a particular social group • Students will make connections between characters or simple events in a literary work and people or events in their own lives RATIONALE As in most cultures, witch and wizard culture at Hogwarts has some unfortunate group dynamics and name- calling. Some groups think they are better than others and try to control people they see as “different.” For example, characters like Draco Malfoy believe that the group of wizards they call “pure-bloods” are better than others and should be the only people with the right to attend Hogwarts. They place “half-bloods” second in power and importance and “muggle-born” witches and wizards like Hermione at the bottom, as though she has fewer rights, abilities or talent. Ranking groups from top to bottom is called a hierarchy. Using names and hierarchies sometimes results in bullying and attacking people’s personal identities. PROCESS • Explain to students that you want to compare behavior at Hogwarts school to your own school. • Write the terms “muggle,” “half-blood,” and “hierarchy” on the board; ask students to define the terms.H elp them with definitions, if necessary. • Give students the handout, letting them complete Part I, individually or in pairs; reconvene for discussion after Part I. • Repeat process for Part II; allow students to work in small groups, if appropriate. Allowing students to record their thoughts (in advance) on the handouts will enable them to participate more fully in the large group discussion. TEACHING TOLERANCE EARLY GRADES HANDOUT WWW.TEACHINGTOLERANCE.ORG Harry Potter: Naming and Power PART I PART II Consider the following list of names applied to Next, consider the names of these “minority” groups individuals or groups of characters. Write down your within the wizard community. Write down a definition of the name: description of the characters in each group: Muggle House-elves Muggle-born Werewolves Mud-blood Giants Half-blood Goblins Blood traitor QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION Squib 1. What do you think it would be like to be a member of this group? QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 2. Look at your written descriptions again; do any of 1. What characters use these terms most often? the characteristics you listed resemble stereotypes? 2. If the terms are used as insults, who insults whom, (For example, if you think of Kreacher as the first and why? example of a house-elf, you might have bad thoughts about house-elves in general. Dobby, however, is a very 3. Does this remind you of bullying or name-calling in good house-elf.) your school? Give examples. 3. What happens when Harry, Ron and Hermione befriend characters from these groups? What do they learn? 4. Does having groups of characters with distinct and unique qualities make the Harry Potter series more or less realistic? How so? 5. In “real life,” what makes people you meet seem different from you?C an you remember an experience you had that was similar to Harry’s experience meeting Hagrid or Lupin? How so? TEACHING TOLERANCE GLOSSARY WWW.TEACHINGTOLERANCE.ORG Blood-traitor — a witch or wizard who loves muggles. Giants — a species that human wizards and witches consider dangerous, rude, and violent. Hagrid’s mother was a giant. Goblins — a race of very intelligent magical creatures, some of them run the bank. Historically, they organized numerous rebellions against wizard society. Half-blood — a witch or wizard with one magic and one muggle parent. House-elves — magical creatures who, after living for hundreds of years in servitude, are generally afraid to leave their masters. They are not permitted to use wands when performing magic. Minority — in the Harry Potter series, communities of characters who almost all witches and wizards consider non-human; they usually look different and have different ways of using magic. Mud-blood — a derogatory term for someone with muggle parents. Muggle — a non-magical person. Muggle-born — a wizard or witch with muggle parents. Social hierarchies — ways of categorizing people from top to bottom, often unfairly. People at the top of a hierarchy often control those below them. Socio-political allegory — a story that often has magic or surreal elements and represents the politics and social issues of the author’s real-world experience. This gives the author a fictional way of talking about society and politics in a kind of code that has an entertaining surface story; if you read critically, you find that the author comments on important issues like the government, human rights, and the economy. Squib — a non-magical person born to a witch and wizard. Stereotypes — immediate reactions to a person or group of people, usually based on limited knowledge. Someone who looks at a person in a wheelchair and assumes that the person in the wheelchair is weak or not athletic might be reacting to a stereotype. Many people in wheelchairs play basketball, run marathons and can do as much as an athlete on two legs. Werewolves — people who, after being bitten by another werewolf, are permanently afflicted by a disease that causes them to change form at the full moon. .

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