Bluey is an award-winning animated children’s series centering on the titular Bluey: a curious, inexhaustible 7-year old (in human years) anthropomorphized Blue Heeler puppy, and her family - little sister Bingo, mom Chili, and dad Bandit. Although each episode is quite brief, usually between five and seven minutes long, they’re full of love, heart, and valuable life lessons for both kids and adults.
This book is part of the collection The Psychgeist of Pop Culture published by ETC Press. This book series highlights iconic pop culture content from television, film, literature and video games through an examination of the psychological mechanisms that endear us to these stories for a lifetime.
Chapters in this book will explore a psychological theme or concept related to the show Bluey. Several possible themes and topics are listed below but do not consider this list exhaustive. You can feel free to propose a different combination of episode/topic than those listed below:
Episode-specific topics:
- Bin Night: Dealing with bullies and conflict at school
- Copycat: How Children Process Grief and Loss
- Phones: Intergenerational Connection and Disconnnect Through Technology
- Born Yesterday: Embracing the Perspective of Childhood as Mindfulness
- Obstacle Course: Resilience, Persistence, and Competition
- Asparagus: Imagination, Magical Thinking, and Life Lessons
- Camping: The Trans-Linguistic Power of Friendship
- Dance Mode: Finding and Using Your Yes-No Button
- Calypso: Recognizing Strengths and Respecting Agency in the Kindergarten Classroom
- Baby Race: Learning to Run Your Own Race as a Mother
General psychology topics:
- Bandit Heeler: On Representations of Fathers and Fatherhood on TV
- I Just Need 20 Mintues: The Exhaustion and Expectations of Motherhood
- All in the Family: Exploring Family Systems Through the Heelers
- Sister, Sister: Portraying the Complexity of Sisterhood
- The Best Kids Show for Adults: Bluey Fandom
- Keepy Uppy: Making Difficult Topics Accessible to Kids
- Play Your Own Way: Neurodivergent Character Portrayals
- Heavy!: How Bluey Tackles Difficult Topics for Both Kids and Parents
In addition to academic-focused works, this call is also open to a select few memoir-style, introspective essays. These essays should be focused on personal experience on how Bluey has had a meaningful impact in the author’s life. For example:
- How Bluey has brought me closer to my kids
- I grew up in an unhealthy home - Bandit and Chili helped me learn how to be a supportive parent
- Chili gave me the words - and the permission - to take 20 minutes
- How Bandity and Chili’s relationship helped my own
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