Examining Gender and Racial Stereotypes in Disney Princess Films

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Argumentative essay on Disney
Princess’s negative stereotype

Introduction
Disney princess are fun for all ages but target audience for such movies is young children and
children has the fastest grabbing trait that means they are influenced by what they hear and see.
Therefore, what they see and hear in Disney movies leaves the end impression on them. Parents
feel that what is displayed on the Disney is safe and gives potential knowledge to the children.
Movies show the depiction of gender, race and sexuality despite from the family entertainment.
One of the famous Disney princess movies would be studied that includes that princess and the
Frog (2009). They show the negative stereotype based on showing differences on the basis of
colour and race that display wrong picture in front of the children, women and men. Current
essay will present supportive argument with the statement that Disney princess movies reinforce
negative stereotypes among the individuals.
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Discussion
Gender stereotypes can be found everywhere in the growing society. Disney films are one of the
examples that mainly convey stereotypes about gender inequality and bring changes in the social
behaviour of the children. Generally in some stories female character is being portrayed as the
weaker sex. Cinderella, an older classic movie shows the domestic jobs of females. Cinderella
being the female was treated like the servant. However, looking at the career between Prince
Charming and the Cinderella it is seen that Charming has provided the character to rule the
kingdom (Coyne et.al. 2016). Cinderella is always shown for cooking and cleaning for her
family. However, Disney has provided less opportunity to female character as compared to
Prince charming. This can create negative concept about the female character that they are only
made for cooking, cleaning and doing household work. This gender stereotypes brings negative
impact on the children views about the gender differences between male and female.
Researchers have been found that 96% of girls and 87% of the boys are being interacted with the
Disney Princess media. And about 61% girls are playing with the princess toys and are assuming
of the dream as displayed in the movies. It harms the stereotype behaviour and brings negative
effect in the girls that girls with the worst body engage more with Disney princess over time and
feel disturbed and loser that they are not beautiful. This is because generally female character is
displayed beautiful with adorable and pretty dresses that are not affordable by some middle class
families (Fisher and Ma, 2014.).
In the Cinderella film, one she meets night she met the prince, fall in love and then live happily
ever after. This affects children at the young age to distract their mind from their career and
dreaming of such un-happening events. With this, the issues occurs regarding the education as
children with such movies are adequately not paying attention towards the education and
behaviour is being observed to change and they are focussing on the day dreaming (Padilla‐
Walker et.al. 2013). Films convey some of the unbelievable stereotype that creates the mindset
on the children that such activities will happen with them. With this, it can be argued that movies
of Disney convey negative concepts about the social behaviour of the children and the gender.
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Up to nowadays, in 2009, Disney launched the movie the ‘Princess and the frog’. In this, she
was the black princess and spends most of the time as the frog. She was one of the poor girls and
her mother always worked for the white people. This emphasised on the stereotypes that African
Americans are majorly the poor part of the lower class. In this, there is also the suitable gender
stereotype because the princess was helpless alone and always needed to gain help for launching
her dream of opening the restaurant. With all this, past Disney movies negatively influence the
children as it create the negative mindset of the children those unbelievable things can happen in
the real. In this movie, there was another white girl that was not chosen as the frog character and
the poor black Africa girl is being chosen and in the whole movie she was mostly the frog
(Ferguson, 2012). However, the movie shows the differences in black and white people and
among the difference between rich people and poor people.
Tiana was the black princess and despite the society it is being more diverse today than ever, the
large majority of the Disney princesses are being portrayed as white and black is not being given
the perspective role. However, these develop the concept in the minds of the young children.
Disney plays the important role to convey the happiness of the children that develop the mindset
of using the suitable concept and the philosophies (Morrison, 2014). Although, Disney has
slightly involved for both the gender and race roles and still the positive aspects are not being
driver out. For this, it is effectively important for the parents to have the monitoring check on the
understanding of the children and observe what the learning is being attained by the media.
Female characters are still facing the concerned inequalities in the movies because they are being
not allowed to attend the potential within the careers. This can develop the mindset of the
children that girls are just made for cooking, cleaning and being the wife. Disney needs to
broaden the bridge by offering the same opportunities for both male and female. Another
example can be considered in the Little Mermaid movie. Though the movie made to remember
the childhood year then she abandoned her family and gave up the strongest talents such as
singing, change her body in order to get the boy she loves (Robbins and Polite, 2014). This can
create the mindset in children to disobey and disrespect the decisions of the parents. Disney
teaches the children that they should not listen to the parents and they should change who they
are and their bodies of the true love.
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In this movie, the mermaid is portrayed to be beautiful, perfect and with no flaws. This develops
mindset on the children that they just want to look the same. However, family member is not
able to meet up the expectations of the children because middle class family cannot afford with
the same. One of the big problems, Disney body types is unrealistic and makes the children
furious to adopt the look. However, different types of negative impact are being observed among
children that they gain the concepts from such type of stereotypes stories.
The affection and the interaction that is being shown in the movies leaves negative impact on the
children to avoid their growth and opportunity stage and get attracted towards dreaming of the
princess and falling in love. The more the girls are involved in such Disney culture behave in the
stereotype feminine ways. Also when they are not having the good body and face they feel
disturbed and feel complex in the society. The ethnic princess in the movies is exotic and hyper
sexualised (Belkhyr, 2013). For example, in the movie Aladdin, princess jasmine performs the
seductive act that distracts Jafar while on the other hand Aladdin tries to steal the magical lamp.
This scene influences the young girls to think that they can use their body in the way they want.
However, parents in such situations need to explain and support the dangers that are associated
with exploitation of the bodies.
This will lead to restrict the child development and girls are attracted towards the dreamy world.
Sometimes, the messages and dialogues that are being used in the movies are not for good sake
of the children. These messages are consumed within the mindset of the children and lead to
cause negative effect on the society.
Disney movies show the negative cause of sexism as the costumes that are being given to the
character are far away from the culture. These lead children to adopt the same and hinder the
child to learn new things that is important for their future. In addition, it can be argued that the
story of Princess and the frog was the promotion of racism among the children. However,
heroines have extremely pale skin tones and unrealistic body types which create a multicultural
debate. The message that it conveys that black African is always poor as compared to the white
people (Johnson, 2015). Children that are white learn that only white are being given the
importance and black people are being avoided. Overall all the arguments are causing to give the
negative effects on the mindset of the children with watching the Disney stories.
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Conclusion
As per the analysis of the Disney stories, the essay have presented supportive stories about the
fact that character and stories of Disney lead to cause negative stereotypes. It can be concluded
that stories create the multicultural debate and cause the extreme insecurity among the women.
This give to give rise to some of the causes such as racism and sexism that is harmful for the
children’s future. In addition, parents are needed to be greatest supporter to teach and entertain
children regarding what is correct and what is wrong.
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References
Books and Journals
 Belkhyr, S., 2013. Disney animation: Global diffusion and local appropriation of
culture. Études caribéennes, (22).
 Coyne, S.M., Linder, J.R., Rasmussen, E.E., Nelson, D.A. and Birkbeck, V., 2016. Pretty
as a princess: Longitudinal effects of engagement with Disney princesses on gender
stereotypes, body esteem, and prosocial behavior in children. Child Development, 87(6),
pp.1909-1925.
 Ferguson, C.J., 2012. Positive female role-models eliminate negative effects of sexually
violent media. Journal of Communication, 62(5), pp.888-899.
 Fisher, R.J. and Ma, Y., 2014. The price of being beautiful: Negative effects of
attractiveness on empathy for children in need. Journal of Consumer Research, 41(2),
pp.436-450.
 Johnson, R.M., 2015. The Evolution of Disney Princesses and their Effect on Body
Image, Gender Roles, and the Portrayal of Love. Educational Specialist, (6).
 Morrison, D., 2014. Brave: A Feminist Perspective on the Disney Princess Movie.
 Padilla‐Walker, L.M., Coyne, S.M., Fraser, A.M. and Stockdale, L.A., 2013. Is Disney
the nicest place on earth? A content analysis of prosocial behavior in animated Disney
films. Journal of Communication, 63(2), pp.393-412.
 Robbins, M. and Polite, F.G., 2014. The most powerful mouse in the world: the
globalization of the Disney brand. Global Journal of Management And Business
Research.
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