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21st-Century American Literature Videos 15 videos
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The Kite Runner 23589 Views
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Description:
Yes, there are kites. Yes, there are runners. No, despite how much we love running and flying kites, this isn't a happy story by any stretch of the imagination.
Transcript
- 00:01
The Kite Runner, a la Shmoop. We hope you weren ⁴ expecting a heartwarming tale based
- 00:09
on the title.
- 00:11
The Kite Runner is heavy stuff. Like throwing your arms in the air and screaming ⁗WHY?? Heavy. Some people are less
- 00:18
than thrilled about the idea that students are reading it.
- 00:22
They think The Kite Runner crosses that fine line between uper depressing †and ⁷ildly
Full Transcript
- 00:27
inappropriate. Is The Kite Runner appropriate for high schoolers? The book is full of not-so-family-friendly
- 00:34
stuff like sexual violence, pedophilia, and your regular ol' garden variety violence.
- 00:39
The list goes on.
- 00:42
And it only takes one racially-charged rape scene to get parental censors cooking. Yikes.
- 00:47
But why stop there? The reasons go way beyond hand-wringing about mature topics.
- 00:53
The Kite Runner also raises the hackles of some native Afghans, who claim that the book
- 00:57
paints a too-simple picture of the people living there&
- 01:00
&nd the kids who played the lead roles in the movie adaptation actually had to go
- 01:04
into hiding to escape death threats from folks who weren't too happy with their work on the
- 01:07
film.
- 01:07
If the book has so many adults worried, are we sure that this story is a-okay for kiddos?
- 01:14
Well, maybe we shouldn't write it off just yet. Let put some brakes on the hate train,
- 01:18
shall we?
- 01:19
Sure, the book might ruffle some feathers, but it also brings a whole lot to the table.
- 01:27
Maybe it's worth getting past all the fuss to give it a read. First of all, would it
- 01:31
kill us to learn more about Afghanistan, the country we ⁶e occupied militarily for more
- 01:36
than 10 years?
- 01:37
Probably not.
- 01:39
The Kite Runner also has all kinds of things to say about how the U.S. and Afghanistan
- 01:43
get along& &nd what the whole refugee situation is
- 01:47
about& &nd hey, did you know who the Pashtun <<Pash-tuhn>>
- 01:49
and Hazara <<Huh-za-ruh>> were before you picked it up? Yeah, we didn ⁴ think so.
- 01:53
So while there might be some moments that make us a little uncomfortable&
- 01:56
&⁷e can still learn some valuable lessons.
- 01:58
Now that we mention it, maybe the discomfort is part of those lessons. So what do you think?
- 02:06
Is the Kite Runner way too intense for teens& &r is it too intense not to read?
- 02:11
Shmoop amongst yourselves.
- 02:16
�
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