Andrew
Allison
Brian
The Breakfast Club
(1985)
Claire
John
The Breakfast Club and Stereotypes
Stereotyping
• The act of reducing, essentializing, and fixing ‘difference’.
• Splitting between normal and abnormal; excluding and closing;
• The symbolic construction and fixing of boundaries – stereotypes
build and maintain the symbolic order;
• It occurs in sites of inequality of power.
• What examples in the film can we find of each of these categories of
stereotyping?
Discuss the typical high school clique archetypes present in the movie.
• How are stereotypes used to convey characters’ personalities in the
Breakfast Club?
• Which character can you relate to (their personal experiences, traits,
appearance, worldview)?
• Are the characters’ stereotypes still relevant in today’s high schools?
Were you part of a “clique” in high school?
The Breakfast Club and Identity
How are identities controlled/maintained?
• Authority is surely one of the strongest ways. Who are these
authority figures and how do they differ (or not) from one another in
how they discipline the lives of these adolescents?
• How does authority work? How is authority maintained?
• What boundaries/rules do the students abide by? Which ones do
they break?
• Who sets and maintains these boundaries and rules?
What are the different ways in which the students bond?
Homework
• Submit your Moodboards before class time on Thursday!
• Watch videos on identity and self-representation and read the article
from The New Yorker (Moodle).