The Seven Traditional Stereotypes In Disney Princess Movies

There are seven traditional Disney princess movies made between 1937 and 1995, and they all illustrate stereotypical gender roles (The Rhetoric of Disney). These movies include Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and Pocahontas. “...marriage was a natural and desirable role for a white woman… The typical portrait of the colonial woman depicts a strong, sturdy good wife, producing household necessities and plying her crafts and her plow besides a yeoman husband” (Kessler 4). The stereotypical woman characteristics as stated above, range from maintaining the household, being beautiful, to weak and powerless. These characteristics are seen in all the traditional Disney

It is assumed from the films that women are supposed to be beautiful, acquiescent, skinny, and perform all the duties of a housewife.” (Sawyer) In Sleeping Beauty, Aurora the main character is presented as a beautiful woman with blond hair, an amazing singing voice, a very thin waist etc. but it never mentions in the film her intelligence. Once again Disney sets a priority for beauty over integrity and intelligence, giving the image that young girls need to be beautiful and fit all of these criteria to be a princess, and they should only worry about their image. Beauty and The Beast is the only movie that has a female character with brains, because Belle is seen reading books all the time, she even disregards the most handsome man in town because he is egocentric and disrespectful to women. Although it does teach young girls to educate themselves, in the end it is the same storyline that we can find in every Disney movie. First, her name is Belle which means “Beauty” in French, the author could have given her any other name, but decided to go for the stereotypical feature that is expected of women. “A pretty girl with no money falls for a rich,

Snow White as soon as she enters a house in the middle of the forest and sees that the place is “untidy” she decides to clean it, and she does not know who lives in the house. In the movie she makes a deal with the dwarfs “If you let me stay, I'll keep house for you. I'll wash and sew and sweep and cook.” (Snow White) Snow white spends all of her time cleaning and cooking for these dwarfs, demonstrating that caring for men and being domestic is the only job woman should have, and it also demonstrates that women should not bother to get an education, or work to maintain themselves. Cinderella a young girl who is practically a slave, spends all her time cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, etc. for her evil stepmother and evil stepsisters. She never questions them or tries to stand up for herself, giving the wrong idea to young girls showing them that they should obey orders no matter the circumstances, and even if you are treated unfairly to always follow instructions. Next, in Beauty and the Beast, Gaston perseus Belle because she is the most beautiful in the land, and also views her as an object and not as a person. He will do anything to make him his wife, and when he sees her reading books he tells her “It's not right for a woman to read. Soon she starts getting *ideas*, and *thinking*...” This line is very sexist and disrespectful towards women, it shows how women were