Acquiring ASEAN Cultural Knowledge through Cinderella Inspired Children's Literature

Abstract

This article aims to explore the construction of cultural knowledge in ASEAN countries through a qualitative content analysis of children’s literature that shares narrative elements of the Cinderella folktale. The stories were selected from six countries—Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia, and the Philippines. The analysis employs Vladimir Propp’s (1968) Morphology of the Folktale as a theoretical framework to examine the narrative structure and character functions in the stories, while also drawing on a cultural analysis perspective to interpret how each version reflects its local socio-cultural context. The findings reveal that these stories typically follow a common narrative structure: the protagonist, often kind and virtuous suffers maltreatment from a stepmother and stepsisters but ultimately achieves happiness and reward due to their virtues, while the antagonists face consequences for their wrongdoing. However, each story incorporates culturally specific adaptations in its plot details, character portrayals, and emphasized values. This study highlights the value of analyzing such literature as a means to understand the cultural diversity among ASEAN countries.