Thursday 23 August 2012

Table Top Games



My inspiration for this week's tag is Snakes and Ladders. I remember a board that my mum and uncle had as children, which had little morals on it. If you were good you went up the ladder and if you were bad you went down the snake. The board had cute illustrations of the misdemeanors/good deeds and the consequences of both. While I was doing some research I came across this blog post with some interesting thoughts about the game http://elizabethmcclung.blogspot.co.uk/2008/01/evening-of-intimacy-and-lessons-from.html

Anyway I decided to use the theme of table top games to make morals for my snakes and ladders tag. The little girl on square 38 is cheating - she is holding cards behind her back. What an awful, sneaking cheat she is, so down the snake she goes. The little boy on square 18 is congratulating the little girl who has one the game of ludo they're playing - well done young man, up the ladder you go! I haven't thought about the consequences of these, but in the original they were very variable and didn't always reflect the crime. Little girls quite often ended up destitute for their bad behaviour, whilst boys got the cane! The crimes were also quite stereotypical - for instance, the boy chased a cat, while the girl skipped in the road! For my tag, I had the girl cheating and the boy being a good loser. (Not that I'm saying boys always cheat and are bad losers!)
Who knew Snakes and Ladders was such a minefield of morality and sexual politics?!

13 comments:

  1. I didn't! But it is a fun game, with or without morality, and I love your tag! Valerie

    ReplyDelete
  2. Interesting post Jo. We are surrounded every day by stereo types - but quite often we do live up to them! I like that your tag sparks debate.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Very interesting! I played "Chutes and Ladders" as a kid. Hmm... Wonder if it was stereotyped too! Cute tag!

    ReplyDelete
  4. This is a classic game with a lovely story Jo! x

    ReplyDelete
  5. I like the cleverness of your tag. Blessings!

    ReplyDelete
  6. What a fascinating post Jo and your tag is great. Thanks for the blog address it made for very interesting reading :-D

    ReplyDelete
  7. Great take on the challenge...Interesting post Jo...LOVE how these little tags make us think!!

    ReplyDelete
  8. A lovely tag thatbrings back memories of playing with my children. Interesting

    ReplyDelete
  9. I made a snakes and ladders game for Sunday School a couple of years ago. The children loved it.
    Well done Jo.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Really sweet tag and interesting post - I've been looking at Happy Families and that's all very un-PC too - they couldn't market it like that these days could they?! Love your tag though!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Wonderful tag!
    Best, Mary Ann

    ReplyDelete
  12. A cute twist on a familiar game, I remember playing this a lot as a child, Jane xx

    ReplyDelete


Great to have you here, thanks for commenting and hope to see you again soon! Please be aware that by linking to us you voluntarily enter your own name and link. To view the privacy policy of Mr Linky, please visit here. http://www.misterlinky.net/blog/