The Wizard of Oz:  Dorothy’s Adventure to Self-Unification

What’s this exercise all about?  Well, I’d like you to watch the movie, “The Wizard of Oz.”  Yes, it’s a fun movie and I hope you enjoy it.  But don’t watch it solely for entertainment.  Watch it as if it were written as an elaborate illustration of the self literature we’ve been studying.

First, a few ground rules:

·     Your goal is to apply the self-related concepts in the distributed list to the ‘Wizard of Oz,” conjuring up as many examples of each as your imagination will allow.  The number of possible applications seems endless, so feel free to be as creative as you’d like.

·    There are no right or wrong answers, per se.  At the same time, each claim you make should be accompanied by a justification supporting it—a justification well founded in the self constructs we have covered.

·     You may want to approach the movie using the time sequence as given.  In this way, Dorothy’s journey remains intact.  Then again, don't feel wed to this idea.

·    This exercise is not meant to be a literary analysis of  “The Wizard of Oz,” nor does it suggest that Lyman Frank Baum intended his story to have any relation whatsoever to the self literature.  Sometimes an exercise is just an exercise.

I’d like to start by setting the scene, giving you a kick start as it were.  I’ll begin with a proposal, and follow this with questions for your consideration.  Please use these only as initial guides.  In other words, don’t stop your analysis with answers to these questions.

My proposal:

It’s hard to miss the fact that the film begins and ends in black and white, while Dorothy’s adventures in Oz are filmed in color.  What do you think’s going on there?  A camera malfunction?  The crew ran out of money while filming?  The director’s just trying to be artsy?  Too practical.  Think psychology of the self.

To get you to the mindset of this exercise I’d like to propose that the black and white scenes represent mundane reality, Dorothy’s unexciting, boring, teenage life, and all scenes portrayed in color are events taking place solely in Dorothy’s imaginative unconscious.  In addition, I propose that since Oz is a product of Dorothy’s unconscious, all the characters found within represent some aspect of Dorothy.  Yes, they can mirror people found in her everyday life, but since they are her fantasies, consider them projections of her wishes and desires, fears and anxieties.

Guiding Questions.

DOROTHY'S BORING REAL WORLD

     *   Who is Dorothy from Dorothy's point of view?  What role(s) does she enact?  What public image does she portray in the first scenes on the farm?  What appear to be her desires, her frustrations?

     *   What are others' images of and expectations for Dorothy?

     *   What do you learn about Dorothy's hopes and dreams from the song "Somewhere Over the Rainbow?"  Does her private self match her public self?

     *   How does Dorothy react to the threat of Miss Gulch, and what does this tell you about her?

     *   Have you made any speculations yet about Dorothy's level of general self-esteem or of her level of general self-efficacy from these opening scenes?

     *   What did it take to begin to move Dorothy toward self-unification?

DOROTHY'S FANTASY WORLD

     *   What does Dorothy say she wants, right from the beginning of her time in Oz?  What self-motive does this represent?

     *   What parts of Dorothy's self might be represented by Oz's cast of characters?

               -Glinda, the Good Witch of the North?                -The Tin Man?

               -The Wicked Witch of the West?                            -The  Cowardly Lion?

               -The Munchkins?                                                     -The Wizard?

               -The Scarecrow?                  

     *   Consider Dorothy's journey down the yellow brick road.  She begins at Munchkin Land, travels through the woods, and emerges into the poppy fields ("You're out of the woods, you're out of the dark, you're out of the night.  Step into the sun, step into the light, and open your eyes...").  What's going on here in relation to her self-unification?  What do these situations represent to Dorothy?

     *   What does the Emerald City represent to Dorothy?  What goes on there?  What does she expect to have happen there?  What happens to Dorothy and her companions before they are allow to visit the Wizard?

     *   The Wizard keeps himself hidden during Dorothy's initial visit, and he denies her wishes, sending her out to prove herself.  What might be going on here?

     *   Who are the more powerful characters in Dorothy's fantasy?  Who are the weaker?  Who triumphs in the end, successfully overcoming trials and tribulations?

     *   The Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion each claim to missing an important aspect of their personality.  Do their actions match their words?

     *   What's the significance of Toto's discovery when the troop returns to visit the Wizard?

     *   Why is it important that the Wizard float off into the air in the end, and that he be replaced by Glinda? 

     *   What's the significance of what Glinda reveals to Dorothy?  What are those glass slippers all about, anyway?

BACK TO A HAPPIER, MORE FULFILLING REALITY

*   How has Dorothy changed since being knocked unconscious?