Disney Movie With a Bear and Princess
Disney Princess Movie: Gender Roles and Stereotypes
Disney princess movies are good at showing us the typical gender roles and stereotypes between male a nd female. Sometimes they break gender roles but that is nowhere as often as showing us those typical gender roles stereotypes. I want to focus on nine specific Disney princess movies but I will also discuss some other Disney princess movies that break gender roles. The nine Disney princess movies I will focus on are Snow White and the Seven Drawves, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, Pocahontas, Mulan and The Princess and the Frog. All nine of these princess movies have different gender roles and stereotypes being portrayed with their dominant female and male characters with the female characters being the main characters in the movie.
These nine particular movies were talked about in the article, Gender Role Portrayal and the Disney Princesses by Dawn England. In this article, the author talks about the powerful, female characters. We have Snow White, Aurora, Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Pocahontas, Mulan and Tiana. In another article related to this one, the author also discusses Merida from Brave and Rapunzel from Tangled. Although there are strong, female characters in these movies, there is still a male counterpart in the main storyline. This study I am looking at focuses on feminine and masculine characteristics between both the female and male main characters in those nine movies. The nine movies creation dates range from the 1930s to more recent years and this study is looking at if movies were less stereotypical than after the 1930s.
In England's article, they predicted three different hypotheses which included whether or not princesses have more feminine or masculine characteristics and vice versa with the princes. The results were that princes or the male characters were twice as masculine as the female characters were. The male characters most common traits were being physically strong, being assertive and being athletic which are all typical masculine characteristic however they also had feminine common traits including being affectionate and showing emotions. The least common traits found in male characters were all feminine characteristics including crying, being ashamed, and worrying about their physical appearance. I find these gender roles very stereotypical and it is showing boys that they can be emotional but not too emotional, that they can affectionate but not too affectionate. In reality, boys care a lot about their appearance and are often ashamed of themselves for different reasons. There are also a lot of guys or boys who are very emotional people and will cry in front of others. This doesn't make them any less masculine in my opinion.
The princesses or female characters also had traits similar to the male characters in a way that they were mixed with masculine and feminine traits. The most common feminine traits were being affectionate, being troublesome, and being assertive while their masculine traits were being athletic and being fearless. The least common traits were all very masculine traits such as being unemotional, being a leader, causing fear in someone, and being the person who rescues someone. These gender roles are telling girls that they can't be the hero and that they need a boy to help them. It is also saying that they are always in some sort of trouble and are the ones that usually have to be saved or rescued when in reality there are some really badass women in the world who don't need help from anyone. Girls and women can be the leader, they can put fear in other people and they can be the hero. Women are looked at as being the ones who do anything for anybody with no questions asked. The Gender Role Portrayal article also discussed whether the men were the rescuers and the females were the ones being rescued and more times than not, this was true.
Newer Disney princess movies such as Pocahontas, Mulan, The Princess and the Frog, Tangled, and Brave actually have female characters who show more masculine characteristics rather than female characteristics. Mulan was more masculine and was actually in the army with all the men trying to prove herself to the men. The only problem was that she had to hide the fact that she was a woman by pretending to be a man. It wasn't until the end that the men realized that the women could be beneficial to them and could really help. Merida from Brave was also one strong, independent princess. She wanted to be out in the wilderness with her bear friend and. She doesn't care about a marriage to a boy who she doesn't even like or anything that has to do with being a princess. She just wants to shoot her bow and arrow and be her normal self. Tangled is also a good movie that somewhat breaks these gender roles. Rapunzel doesn't really need Flynn to save her. She has to save him a couple of times throughout the movie actually. Flynn also really cared about his looks, he would always do the "smolder" look trying to impress the girls. So newer Disney princess movies tend to break the gender stereotypes and roles while still having some typical gender stereotypes. These movies still have male characters in them that are with the strong female characters. So yes, they break some gender role stereotypes but they are still showing girls that they need a man in their life to be successful which is definitely not true. Girls need to grow up knowing that they are strong individuals who can have feminine as well as masculine characteristics. Young girls should know that being portrayed as someone who is weak is not what they really are. Young girls and boys for that matter need to know that they can do and be whatever they want and they shouldn't let gender roles and stereotypes stop them.
Disney Movie With a Bear and Princess
Source: https://medium.com/@alisha9193/disney-princess-movie-gender-roles-and-stereotypes-e2122b0c83c6
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