ShmoopTube
Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.
Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos
Admiration Videos 9 videos
“Happy Hunger Games!” Or not. Katniss’s Hunger Games experiences left a not-so-happy effect on her. This video will prompt you to ponder if...
You’re one in a million, buddy. Er...actually, more like one meaningless speck in a sea of billions. Makes you feel kind of insignificant, right?...
In Julie of the Wolves, a girl is thrown into the wild, far away from civilization. Find out how she fares by watching this video.
The Kite Runner 23588 Views
Share It!
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
�
Related Videos
This video defines utopias and dystopias, and investigates how a utopia might become a dystopia. Can a seemingly perfect world actually be a dystop...
We may all be fools when it comes to love, but thankfully none of us will accidentally switch places with our twin brother and fall in love with ou...
They say that honesty is the best policy, but Jack lies about his identity and still gets the girl. Does that mean we should all lie to get what we...
Ever wish you could remember everything that you ever studied? How about everything that everyone has ever studied? Yeah, pretty sure our brains ju...
Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man is an American classic. Hope you're not expecting any exciting shower scenes though. It's not that kind of book.