In conjunction to these questions, the study did not justify the choice for categorizing Belle as princess. To be factual, Belle is a village girl and daughter of a man who create a collection of music boxes. She was no princess. Despite the fact she married the Beast, Prince Adam at the end of the movie, it was never stated whether she became a princess. In addition, the stated masculinity trait were not further elaborated by giving specific explanation.
On the similar note, (The Mask of Beauty: Masquerade Theory and Disney's Beauty and the Beast, Lara Sumera, 2008) studied the femininity representation in Beauty and The Beast, and The Little Mermaid using Masquerade Theory. The concept of masquerade is a branch of feminist film theory.
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However, as stated before, a combination of masculine approach and feminist approach will serve as a complete perspective on gender role and character representations in Disney movies. Masculinity Studies is an interdisciplinary field of cultural, social, historical, political, psychological, economic, and artistic analysis that interrogates the constructions of masculinity in communities across the world and at various times in history (Prof. Helena Gurfinkel, 2012). Henceforth, understanding of feminism requires understanding of masculinity, and understanding of the two approaches is required in understanding gender …show more content…
Other male characters such as Beast, Maurice and Lefou was excluded. Interestingly, the study used a mixed methodology research approach compromising of both qualitative and quantitative methods to the research problem. The study used Chi square tests to calculate the occurrence of each variable of interest compared to the role of each character. The variables are character descriptions, physical descriptions, socioeconomic status, sexuality, family structures and practices, aggression and character role. The qualitative analysis is done on the masculinity historically. This paper explored a different aspect of masculinity studies and thus contributing to the masculinity studies. Nevertheless, the study would be better–rounded if all the male characters of Beauty and The Beast is
Women have been in movies since they first started playing on the big screen, they have played an assortment of roles, the damsel in distress, the first one to die, the poor scullery maid who ends up a princess, the evil witch, etc. While some of the roles have shed bad light on women, for example being a femme fatale, other movies have set positive examples for the future generations. As time has changed, the Disney princesses have evolved with it, each princess becoming more outspoken and independent, influencing the young women of today to want to grow up to be just like them, “They enact a shift from the "princesses" of ballet to the "heroes" of sport. Heroism, egalitarianism and autonomy are slipped into the conventions of Disney princesshood” (Do Rozario, R.,C., 2004, para. 34). In Mulan the movie, Mulan saves her father by disobeying him, and taking his place in the war by doing that she ended up saving her whole country. Disney isn’t telling young women to disobey their parents; they’re showing them that while you may be a girl, you can be brave and succeed.
For this engagement essay the article Mean Ladies: Transgenders Villains in Disney Films by Amanda Putnam and the chapter “Someday My Prince Will Come”: Disney, the Heterosexual Imaginary and Animated Films by Carrie L. Cokely will summarized, analyzed, and engaged with using the Queer analytical framework.
Disney princesses are fun for all ages, but their target audience is young children and “as children grow and develop, they can be easily influenced by what they see and hear”. Therefore, what they see and hear in Disney movies leaves an impression on them. The first princess, Snow White, was created in a time where each gender and race had a specific role in society. Recently, many believe that Disney has come a long way in regards to gender and race since Snow White, as several multi-cultural protagonists have been introduced subsequently, and gender roles do not appear to be as stereotypical as they once were. However, many of the apparent innocent messages about race and gender in these movies, can be exposed as otherwise. Despite their mask of progression, Disney princesses still have the potential to corrupt the minds of young children through sexism and racism.
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.
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.
In the article Construction of the Female Self: Feminist Readings Of the Disney Heroine, Jill Birmie Henke, Diane Zimmerman Umble, and Nancy J. Smith are looking at the female self and how it was developed based on two theories: Standpoint by Parker Follet and the psychological development of girls by Gilligam. That by examines gender identity especially girls and how media exposure affects them through analyzing five of Disney movies: Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Pocahontas. They segmented the article into three titles: The Oxymoron of Power and the Perfect Girl where they introduced the two theories in which they built their critic on, Construction of the Female Self where they talk about the evolution in the female character from Cinderella to Pocahontas, and Construction of Self in Relation to Others where they talk about the evolution of the self in relation to others from power-over to power-with until power-to. Finally they concluded that even if the female character in Disney’s movies was changing to become more
Disney attempts to show the feminist qualities of Belle. For example the movie portrays her as intelligent and not easily swayed by love, in the case of Gaston. However, the Beast is advertised as the possessor of ‘beauty’ and Belle must learn its nature; Belle’s fate is his. It is Belle, robbed by her traditional beauty, who is being instructed from the Beast in how to elicit beauty form beastliness. She must learn to love ugliness and literally embrace the bestial. Another problematic element might be Bell...
Social factors have always encouraged the idea that men embody masculinity and women embody femininity and, thus, certain gender-norms are expected accordingly. In the past, such expectations were traditional and to go against them was frowned upon by the general public. Contemporarily speaking, there is more freedom to avail oneself of today than there was once upon a time. Jeanne-Marie LePrince de Beaumont’s fairytale adaptation of ‘Beauty and The Beast’ was published in 1740. During this time, men and women were compelled by the social conventions associated with their gender. When analyzing the literary work, the reader can grasp what gender roles are eminent in the characters identity and motives. By exploring the choice of language being
Once upon a time, there was a 16 year old mermaid princess named Ariel who gave up her voice, an important part of her identity, in order to be with a man who she became infatuated with at just one glance. Ariel has a very traditional gender-stereotypical role in the film, as the helpless, clueless, naive, physically weak, submissive, and attractive female protagonist that Disney films, especially the classics, portray so often (England). There is a lot of controversy surrounding this film in regards to its patriarchal ideals. The Little Mermaid, like most media, is build for the ‘male gaze’, a term coined by Laura Mulvey that suggests that visual entertainment, such as movies, are structured to be viewed by a masculine consumer. I will argue that the male gaze perpetuates harmful gender-stereotypes in The Little Mermaid.
A little girl sits on the floor with her gaze fixed on the television screen in front of her, watching magical images dance before her eyes and catchy songs flow through her ears. Even though she had seen it at least twenty times before, she still loved The Little Mermaid just as much as she did the first time she watched it. As she watched it, she longed to be a beautiful mermaid with a curvy body and wonderful singing voice like Ariel. She longed to be saved by the handsome Prince Eric, and fall in love and live happily ever-after like Ariel did. In today’s society, women strive to achieve equality between the sexes. 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.
...present powerful characters, while females represent unimportant characters. Unaware of the influence of society’s perception of the importance of sexes, literature and culture go unchanged. Although fairytales such as Sleeping Beauty produce charming entertainment for children, their remains a didactic message that lays hidden beneath the surface; teaching future generations to be submissive to the inequalities of their gender. Feminist critic the works of former literature, highlighting sexual discriminations, and broadcasting their own versions of former works, that paints a composite image of women’s oppression (Feminist Theory and Criticism). Women of the twenty-first century serge forward investigating, and highlighting the inequalities of their race in effort to organize a better social life for women of the future (Feminist Theory and Criticism).
England, D. E., Descartes, L., & Collier-meek, M. (2011). Proquest. “Gender role portrayal and the disney princesses”. Sex Roles, 64(7-8), 555-567.
Feminism is a movement that supports women equality within society. In relation to film, feminism is what pushes the equal representation of females in mainstream films. Laura Mulvey is a feminist theorist that is famous for touching on this particular issue of how men and women are represented in movies. Through her studies, she discovered that many films were portraying men and women very differently from reality. She came up with a theory that best described why there is such as huge misrepresentation of the social status quos of male and female characters. She believed that mainstream film is used to maintain the status quo and prevent the realization of gender equality. This is why films are continuously following the old tradition that males are dominant and females are submissive. This is the ideology that is always present when we watch a movie. This is evident in the films from the past but also currently. It is as if the film industry is still catering to the male viewers of each generation in the same way. Laura Mulvey points out that women are constantly being seen as sexual objects, whether it is the outfits they wear or do not wear or the way they behave, or secondary characters with no symbolic cause. She states that, “in traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote it-be-looked-at-ness.”(Mulvey pg. 715). Thus, women are nevertheless displayed as nothing more than passive objects for the viewing pleasure of the audience. Mulvey also points out through her research that in every mainstream movie, there is ...
Beauty and the Beast is probably one of the most well known fairy tales that the Grimms’ reproduced. In it’s original form it was a long, drawn out story that was catered to adults. The Grimms’ changed the story to be more understood by children and made it short and to the point. Unlike many of the other fairy tales that they reproduced, Beauty and the Beast contains many subtle symbols in its purest form. It shows a girl and how she transfers to a woman; it also shows that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The one major thing that separates this story from all the rest is that Beauty gets to know the Beast before marrying him.
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