Fairy tales in gender-based violence campaigns

Abstract

Fairy tales are not mere bedtime stories. Originally conceived to convey a moral, these folk narratives often transmit and perpetuate gender stereotypes. They even serve to promote and legitimize, at times, violence against women. Their pernicious effects on fostering and justifying all forms of abuse against women have resulted in their use in several campaigns aimed at raising awareness of violence against girls and women. Drawing from Julia Kristeva’s key concept of “intertextuality”, this article explores the uses and functions of fairy tales in a purpose-built corpus of 32 gender-based violence campaigns taken from 15 countries in the last two decades (2005-2025). Through the lens of Discourse Analysis, the study shows how these campaigns resort to these folkloric stories for subversive purposes to denounce all forms of abuse against women and to break with the “social mythologies” (Roland Barthes) surrounding notions of romantic love that largely stem from these narratives.