Bambi, Spiderman, Buzz Lightyear, and Air Bud, those are just a few of my favorite Disney characters I used to enjoy watching in the old hit kids movies. Every child has their own favorite Disney production movie that they will always enjoy watching and remember forever as they get older. Disney used to just be about movies and television shows for young children all the way up to early teens. However as the years go by Disney has made changes to their target demographics and they try to produce movies that parents can find amusing while watching them with their children. Disney’s demographics have also changed in the sense of using more male characters as stars of the movies and shows and they have started to drift away from using female stars as main characters because they argue that male characters have a bigger impact on child viewers. Ken Gillam, writer of “Post Princess Models of Gender: The New Man in Disney/Pixar,” said, “With the strength afforded by these homosocial intimacies, the male characters triumph over their respective plots, demonstrating the desirable modifications that Pixar makes to the alpha male model,”(6). I would have to agree with this statement because kids don’t see nearly as many Disney movies about princesses anymore, now movies are about super heroes, or star male characters. Younger fans of Disney are typically interested in their movies and television shows, but the use of their interactive site helps them promote their products even further. Bright colors, and several characters in the Disney world fill up the home page of the Disney website. At first glance of the Disney home page I could tell that this website is directed towards the demographic of young children, because it has a changing he... ... middle of paper ... ...or playing games and watching movies. Then it changes to older kids by allowing them to watch movies and TV shows. It changes for a third time when children and adults of all ages can enjoy the music this site contains, because there is music that everyone can listen to. The demographic is also set for people of all ages when it comes to finding and purchasing Disney products from the online store. Using all demographics this website sells their products. Kids will use the website to find movies and items from their favorite movies and characters. They tell their parents they want these things and then their parents go to buy products for their children. Unsuspectingly, they also find items they like so they will end up purchasing more items from this website. This is how Disney sells products by setting their demographics from young children to adults of all ages.
Media is a powerful agent in entertaining children. It also influences and teaches the youth of society the suitable and appropriate gender roles that they inevitably try to make sense of. The power of media is very influential especially in the minds of the youth. Disney movies target the youth and plant certain ideas and concepts about social culture into the vulnerable minds of children. Media uses gender to its advantage, just like Disney productions. Humorous caricatures reveal some harsh realities about the portrayal of Disney Princesses in many movies made by the Walt Disney Company. Disney mixes innocence with the ultimate form of fantasy to capture an audience. Predominantly, Disney helps highlight the gender roles by showing the audience simply what they want to see. In the attempt to stick to the norm and portray stereotypical female characters, Disney created Princesses. Presented as damsels in distress and inferior beings to men, Disney Princesses give children an inaccurate portrayal of gender roles at a young age. Through Disney’s social success and intriguing films, such as The Little Mermaid, Snow White, Aladdin, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Beauty and the Beast, Disney Princess movies portray stereotypical representation of gender roles through the denigration of the female image, targeting and ruining the perception of youth today.
Since Disney’s Snow White appeared in 1937, Disney princesses have been a present in pop culture. With the release of new movies frequent and re-release of decades old movies inevitable, a continuous stream keeps Disney princesses in the foreground of adolescent society. It is with the value of entertainment they have been created and as entertainment they should be viewed.
In the 1930s, Disney’s first full length animated movie, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, was released. This movie set the pattern for future Disney movie plots, which continues for decades. In the 1940s, Disney released 3 animated movies: Pinocchio, Dumbo, and Bambi. However, these movies did not feature a main female character. In the 1950s, the two main movies that were released were Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. These movies picked the passive heroine trend back up and had a prince to rescue the princess from her troubles. In the 1960s, Disney brought us 101 Dalmatians, The Sword in the Stone, and The Jungle Book, none of these with a female heroine. The 1970s brought about The Aristocats, Robin Hood, The Rescuers, and The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. The only significant female character is Maid Marian from Robin Hood, who waits for Robin Hood to “sweep her off of her feet.” In the 1980s, The Fox and the Hound, The Black Cauldron, The Great Mouse Detective, Oliver and Company, and The Little Mermaid were released. With The Little Mermaid, Disney got back to the fairytale storyline. The 1990s brought us Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, Tarzan, Pocahontas, and Mulan. This is where Disney movies start to evolve with new, women-favoring, storylines. In the 2000s, Disney laid off the fairytales for a while and
Disney princess movies are inappropriate for young girls. People blame adult media for a child’s corruption, but they fail to see where it all started: Disney princess movies. Women should not see Disney princesses as their role model. They should accept themselves for who they are than comparing themselves to unrealistic Disney characters. If young girls continue to emulate Disney characters, it might affect their future. It is better to stop them at their early age. Therefore, they should not be encouraged to watch Disney princess movies for the betterment of their future and society.
...sms of Disney, these really can’t be validated as having any real effect on children and families. There is no harm in providing a fantasy and imaginative world for children to enjoy. Parents, along with the Disney Company, support the notion that a child should be a child. Children should have fun and enjoy the world of imagination while they are little. Parents also enjoy the world of imagination by providing it to their children.
In the past all of Disney’s Princess movies tend to follow a similar plot line. It was always the same formula, the princess falls in love with the first man she meets and relies on him for comfort and guidance as they go off to live happily ever after. This formula has worked commercially and financially for Disney with movies like, Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs (1937), Cinderella (1950), Sleeping Beauty (1959), The Little Mermaid (1989), Aladdin (1992), and Pocahontas (1995). While these movies have turned Disney a huge profit they have never given young girls a strong, independent role model to look up to. These films, while entertaining and visually appealing, have taught young girls nothing but to find the person that they will spend the rest of their life with as soon as possible. Not one of the princess movies allows the princess to be anything more than something of a housewife. These women did not pursue any type of dream or career, they just fell in love with the first man they saw. Now while the Disney princess movies of the past have only been about finding love and riding off into the sunset, there was a Disney release last year that broke the cycle. Frozen, released in November of 2013, was a box office hit grossing over $400 million domestically and $700 million internationally. It did not focus on finding love for the main female character. Instead it built two strong female lead characters while focusing on the importance of sisterhood.
Despite the tremendous steps that have been taken towards reaching gender equality, mainstream media contradicts these accomplishments with stereotypes of women present in Walt Disney movies. These unrealistic stereotypes may be detrimental to children because they grow up with a distorted view of how men and women interact. Disney animated films assign gender roles to characters, and young children should not be exposed to inequality between genders because its effect on their view of what is right and wrong in society is harmful to their future. According to Disney films, it is important for women to achieve the stereotypical characteristics of a woman, such as maintaining their beauty to capture a man, and being weak and less educated than male characters. The women in Disney movies are always beautiful, which helps them to find a man.
According to Giroux (1996), animated movies are a part of children’s culture. Children’s culture consists of entertainment, artifacts, myths, etc. that are based around the notion of what it means to be a child. Animated movies, particularly Disney films, encourages the child’s imagination and fantasy to be enhanced, creates a drive within them to go on adventures and helps them develop an aura of innocence. Animated films are “teaching machines” (Giroux, 1996, p. 66). Disney films teach children about specific roles, values and ideals and also take them through the world of enchantment. It helps them to understand who they are and what it means to be a part of the society and an adult environment (Giroux, 1996). Disney characters are a reflection
What many people don’t know is that Mickey Mouse wasn’t always a good influence to not only children but to many others also. Over the years Mickey Mouse has evolved into an icon that is worthy of children’s attention and their parents’ money. Through the use of movies, television shows, video games, theme parks and merchandise Mickey Mouse affects most children’s lives every day even if it isn’t noticeable. Mickey Mouse has also given rise to many big movie productions and sales. While being educational Mickey Mouse also entertains children and teaches them a lesson that children enjoy and find fun. Not only does Mickey Mouse have educational purposes he also tries to form a Utopia environment for all families that use and watch Mickey’s products.
Disney has made it his life 's goal to create home entertainment for both young and old. From the creation of Mickey to his work in films, Disney had made it clear that happiness is something that everyone should have. Disney had also know that animations is not just for the imagination of the children. Early movies such as Snow White and Pinocchio have clear messages for the younger views. “In Snow White- the main characters are victims of injustice who are eventually restored to their rightful place. In Pinocchio, the characters Pinocchio, Jiminy Cricket and Geppetto are faced with dilemmas, and their own actions result in them becoming victims of ev...
Disney films have always been a huge part of the pop culture. They featured instantly recognizable characters among every age group. These characters, especially the princesses, have been very influential, more precisely on young girls, from Belle to Frozen. However, the majority of these films revolve around the same plot with minor differences: it is always a tale about finding romantic love, a prince charming who saves the princess from a danger and they live happily ever after. However, in 2012, Disney and Pixar produced Brave, a movie that challenged the types of Disney movies we were used to. It favors feminism and gives girls a nontraditional princess model. Brave stars a strong female protagonist, Merida, and an influential plot that
Disney promotes sexisim by forcing young girls to live in a patriarchal world. Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The little mermaid, Aladdin, and Snow White are all examples of popular Disney movies that encourage young viewers that they need a man to save the day. Yes, it’s true that there are recent movies such as Moana and Frozen that prove otherwise, but how long will it take to completely get over the fact that women are mainly viewed as secondary citizens compared to the men? There are countless examples of how Disney movies influence this theme, and how much the female characters’ actions, ideas and thoughts are not included in a Disney movie.
Critics have warned the public audience about Disney programming’s affect on the “invasion and control of children’s imagination” (Ross 5). These movies express the typical gender roles “such as males being physically strong, assertive, and athletic, and females being prone to overt emotion, inc...
Disney and old fairytales threaten gender politics and ideal women roles by giving certain stereotypes for domestic and personality traits. Fairytales that have turned into Disney productions have sculpted domestic roles for women that consist of cooking, cleaning and caring for the children. Disney has also created these princesses with personalities that are shy, passive, and vulnerable. The cause of these stereotypes are making individuals obliterate their own identities and becoming clones from the mold that was prepared for
The market segmentation of Walt Disney is divided into five main segments as follows: media networks, theme parks and resorts, Walt Disney studios, Disney consumer products and Disney interactive (Carillo, Crumley, Thieringer, & Harrison, 2012). As Carillo et al. (2012) continues to explain, media networks encompasses cable, broadcast television and radio networks, aside from digital operations. ABC, ESPN, and the Disney channel are some of the constituents of media networks. Theme parks and resorts, as Russell (N.d) states, include the operation of the Disney World Resort, the Disneyland hotel, the Disneyland Park, the Hong Kong Disney resort, and the Disneyland Pacific