UNIVERSIDAD IBEROAMERICANA, CDMX.

HOW HAS THE PORTRAYAL AND REPRESENTATION OF

WOMEN CHANGED OVER TIME IN DISNEY PRINCESS

MOVIES FROM SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS

TO MOANA?

P R E S E N T A Alejandra Guizar Bistrain —198091-6 C A R R E R A Comunicación M A T E R I A Comunicación Aplicada Soporte de Trabajo de Titulación P R O F E S O R A Claudia Cirabel Arruñada Sala

1 Este trabajo no hubiera sido posible sin ustedes: Carlos, Ricardo, Claudia, Vanessa y Javier Gracias.

2 Index

Abstract………………………………………………………………………………………………….…5 1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………….6 2. Objectives……………………………………………………………………………………………….8 3. Subject of study.………………………………………………………………………………………..9 4. Theoretical Framework………………………………………………………………………………10 4.1. A Brief History of Feminism………………………………………………………………10 4.2. Patriarch..………………………………………….……….………….…….………………15 4.3. Romantic Love………….………….…….…………………………………………………16 4.4. The Bechdel Test……………………………………………………………………………18 4.5. Lack of female participation in film crews………………………………………………19 4.6. Disney Vault…….…….………………………………………………………………….…19 4.7. The effects of stereotypes and gender roles in young audiences due to cultivation theory…………………………………………………………………………………………….20 4.8. The context from a women’s stand view point……………………………………….…22 4.9. Julia T. Wood’s Archetypes and Holly Brewer list of Stereotypes………………….…26 5. Methodology………………………………………………………………………………………..…30 6. Analysis……….……………………………………………………………………………………….33 6.1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs……….…..…….……………………………………34 6.2. Cinderella…………………….……….…….………………………………………………35 6.3. Sleeping Beauty…………………………………………………………………………….37 6.4. The Little Mermaid…………..……….……………………………………………………39 6.5. Beauty and the Beast………………………………………………………………………41 6.6. Pocahontas………………………………………………………………………………….42 6.7. Mulan………………………………………………………………………………………..44 6.8. The Princess and the frog……………………………………………………………….…45 6.9. Tangled………….….….……………………………………………………………………47 6.10. Brave……………………………………………………………………………………….49 6.11. Frozen………………………………………………………………………………………51 6.12. Moana………………….….….……………………………………………………………53

3 7. Discussion and top findings…………………………………………………………………………54 8. Conclusion………………………………….……………………………….…………………………58 9. Future Work…………….…….……….………………………………………………………………60 10. Bibliography………………………..….……………….……………….……….….….…….………63 11. Appendix 1………………….….….…………………………………………………………………70 12. Appendix 2…….…….……….…….……….………………………………………………………..71

4 Abstract:

This study will analyse twelve Disney Princess movies, from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to Moana, to discover how have women been portrayed in these storylines over time and how has Disney changed the way they represent female characters. The analysis will start answering if this movies passes or fails the Bechdel test and why. To define the reason this movies passes of fails the test, I will study how does female participation in the film’s crews has an impact on how the female characters aspirations are portrayed and if they strengthen or weaken gender roles and stereotypes which can classify each of the female characters into one of Julia T. Wood’s Archetypes of women. This investigation will help me find if these movies reinforce certain gender roles and how it may affect the audience. Also, I will be able to develop digital and interactive material that will piece together every part of the analysis so it can be shared with the audience. The reason for this is to create awareness of how these movies reinforce certain stereotypes that contributes to the view of women’s place in society and how has this changed over the course of time. With this I will be able to determine if Disney has improved the way the portray women and supports a richer, more varied and diverse idea how woman can be. I will determine if Disney breaks the paradigm of the idea of the weak and naive princess with the most recent movies compared to the older movies and determine whether this movies support of break the idea of womanhood that was established by patriarchy.

5 1. Introduction:

“I want to be a princess,” said once my 6 year old self. Yes, I used to believe that being a princess was a girl’s destiny; well, that is what they told me. I remember my parents, specifically my dad, telling me that I was a princess and that I needed to be treated like one. At that time, it seamed like a good idea but with the things I know now, the last thing I would want is to be treated like a princess in one of those stories. This is something that is being taught to women from a younger age and I don’t only speak for myself. Throughout my life I have been put in different situations that have opened my eyes to the reality that most girls want to be princesses because they say it out loud and and don’t hesitate at all. They live in a bliss of ignorance of what being a princess really means. Little girls don’t get the ideas by themselves. Just like when I was younger, parents tell their daughters how to behave, how to act, how to talk, how to walk, how to eat, and so on, so they can be more feminine and look more like a princess. This schooling comes from a very distant past, where gender roles that were established and demanded women to behave, act and be a certain way. This ideas do not come out our nowhere. Since the beginning of human beings have had the need to tell stories to explain their past and their future. Many of these stories helped define and mould society Fairy tales have existed for a long time and have been part of our culture for many years. They have helped to shape our society. They have been a traditional way of explaining cultural aspects and context characteristics. These stories have ideological carriers that strengthen certain behaviours in our society. One of these ideological heritages is that female characters are submissive and weak and male characters are dominant and heroic. This has defined many ideas of how each sex should be defined. Women are taught to be pretty, kind, nice and men are taught to be brave, aggressive but at the same time charming. Women are taught that their major aspiration is to find a man, fall in love and get married and men are taught to peruse their dreams in any activity they want, as long as its masculine and fulfils the patriarchal ideas of gender. This stereotypes and roles migrated from simple stories to literature, cinema and the media which, now a days, reaches a larger audience and normalices that, men and women, have to base their actions and behaviours in the ideas that patriarchy has set for men and women.

6 Women are weak and men are strong; women are damsels in distress and men are heroes; women are inferior and men are superior; and the list goes on. The problem with the normalisation of these gender roles is that it encourages gender inequality, gender violence, misogyny and injustice which limits women in society. Children often identify themselves and aspire to be like these characters in every way. Princesses are portrayed as beautiful and good and Princes or heroes as charming and handsome. However, the majority of the storylines in cinema are about brave, successful men and the few that talk about women show them as weak, damsels in distress, not very smart and naive. One example, is female characters in the movie genre known as “Chick Flicks.” (Carlin, 2018) Disney has a catalogue of movies that have female protagonists. The Disney Princess movie catalogue that started at the end of the 1930’s with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and ends with the latest release in 2016 with Moana. This study aims to answer the question: “How has the portrayal and representation of women changed in Disney Princess Movies over the course of time from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to Moana?” The study will start answering if this movies passes or fails the Bechdel test and why. This test is a measurement that can clearly visualise if a women’s portrayal in a movie is poor and obsolete. To define the reason this movies passes of fails the test, I will study how does female participation in the film’s crews has an impact on how the female characters aspirations are portrayed and if they strengthen or weaken gender roles and stereotypes which can classify each of the female characters into one of Julia T. Wood’s Archetypes of women. The findings of this study are meant to help develop material for parents and guardians with young children to know the contents of these animated films an create awareness of how these stories have helped shape the perception we have of gender roles and to break the paradigm. When this structure breaks and these stories stop strengthening gender roles in our heads, the idea of gender roles would be considered obsolete and will help to weaken the gender bias look most people have of our society.

7 2. Objectives:

As I mentioned earlier, the main question im looking forward to answer is “How has the portrayal and representation of women changed in Disney Princess Movies over time from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to Moana?” There are more specific questions that will help me define it this chance over time has actually been accomplished. 1. Which Disney Princess movies pass the Bechdel test? 2. How does the female participation in the crew of Disney Princess movies affects how women’s aspirations and personalities are portrayed in each of the storylines? 3. How do these aspirations strengthen of weaken the patriarchal idea of gender roles for women? 4. How does the representation of the female protagonists define her socialisation with her context and her society? The objectives of these study are the following: 1. To find how women’s aspirations have been portrayed and represented in twelve Disney Princess movies; how this aspirations have strengthen of weaken the gender roles and stereotypes of women’s behaviour and how these cause the movies to fail the Bechdel Test. 2. Quantify the percentage female participation in the production of the film affects on how women are represented and portrayed and has an impact on how the story is told. 3. Classify each female protagonist into one of Julia T.Woods’ archetypes depending on her aspirations and the gender roles they satisfy or break. 4. Evaluate how these characteristics have changed over time and if Disney’s storylines are in the right track of giving a richer portrayal and representation of women’s characters with a more varied and diverse spectrum.

8 3. Subject of study:

The subject of this study are twelve Disney Princess films, that have female protagonists. Snow White (1937). Cinderella (1950). Sleeping Beauty (1959). The Little Mermaid (1989). Beauty and the Beast (1991). Pocahontas (1995). Mulan (1998). Princess and the frog (2009). Tangled (2010). Brave (2012). Frozen (2013) Moana (2016)

Films like Aladdin are not included in the analysis because the main character is a man.

9 4. Theoretical Framework:

4.1. A Brief History of Feminism Women have had a rough journey through history. Many had tried to change this fact and we keep working to generate a change. The feminist history is loaded with movements, ideologies and narratives that are aimed at an improvement on social ideals for the benefit of women. Nowadays, the movement has different goals depending on the aspects and ideas that are being studied but they are encouraged and fuelled by the fact that women had suffered due to patriarchal societies. The information used to describe the feminist movements is a general perspective of what a lot of women have gone through. I do not intent to enter in a discussion about the types of feminisms because its not the approach of this investigation. I recognise that feminism is divided into tree traditional perspectives that are defined as radical feminism; liberal, reformist or mainstream feminism; and socialist or Marxist feminism. Also I acknowledge that as time has gone by, many other branches have emerged from these three perspectives (Maryland, 1995). At this moment, the bibliography I used to describe the context feminism and all the movements that are involved its just to give background to my investigation so I can later decide of what would be the perspective that can better support my opinions and beliefs. Elinor Buckett and Laura Burnell define feminism as the “belief in social, economic and political equal of the sexes… and is represented by various institutions committed to activity on behalf of women’s rights and interests” (Burkett, E. 2020). There are many feminists groups that fight for diverse objectives and goals that are centred on the improvement of women’s position in society. The term feminism, Estelle Freedman specifies in her book No turning back: The history of feminism and future of women, is still relatively recent. She stipulates that it was first “coined” in 1880 in France as féminisme, combining the words femme (woman in French) and isme (referring to a social movement or political movement (Freedman, p3). The word and meaning started to spread across Europe and America and pushed different movements. Although it has been a powerful movement it was not always welcome. It has been a very difficult movement for women because it has been discredited many times. As Freedman

10 describes, many women do not associate with the word “feminist” because it had a very radical and often a negative connotation because being a feminist was someone who challenged the “prevailing gender relations” (Freedman, 2013), and at that time it was something unheard of because women were seeking to stop the oppression towards them.Their speech was often contradictory because they proclaimed “I’m not a feminist, but…” and insisted for equal rights (Freedman, p5). Even though this is a movement that has developed and and changed depending on the context and time, many studies and writers had defined and decided the feminist history in four parts, or as we know it, different “waves”: the first wave, the second wave, the third wave, and the most recent, fourth wave of feminism. The first wave of feminism developed during the late 19th century and the early 20th century through western societies. This first movement was focused on women’s legal issues, mainly on their right to vote, as well as property rights, education, marriage laws, employment and the dangerous situation for intelligent middle class women (Davis and Lorde, 2012). In 1848, feminists in the United States united to demand equal rights for women and joined a bigger movement that was already developing in Europe. According to Freedman’s narration of the first wave of feminism, it was laced as “the women’s movement” in which “many of its participants linked authority for women to motherhood. After 1910 however younger generations consciously rejected the maternal argument in favour of women’s common humanity identity with men as a basis for equal rights.” (Freedman p4). In the Mexican context, For Juana Inés de la Cruz was challenging the patriarchal society of the end of the seventeenth century (1690). It was a society reigned by men and women were only considered ornaments. She became a nun in the convent of Orden de San Jerónimo. Some argued that she became a nun so she could think and be independent because she did not wish to marry. If she had married a man she would not have been allowed to read and write. Instead she searched for the kind of life that would give her peace and quiet to do what she wanted, which was read and write. Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz was an incredibly intelligent woman who battled this patriarchal society with her poetry. She was very criticised because she had a very critical writing and people did not agree with her opinion because she was religious and she was a woman. She was someone ahead of its time and was marked in history as one of the first feminists minds in this territory. Her more famous poem Hombres necios que acusais a la mujer (Foolish men who accuse women), talks about de inequality and injustice situation that women

11 where living at the time because she argued that men were hypocrites, selfish, violent and impulsive with women. She was against this behaviour and that society justified this unfairness towards women. (Lira, 2017)

“Hombres necios que acusáis a la mujer sin razón sin ver que sois la ocasión de lo mismo que culpaís… (…) Combatís su resistencia y luego con gravedad decís que fue liviandad lo que hizo la diligencia.” (Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, 1690)

Translation: “Foolish men you accuse to the woman without reason without seeing that you are the occasion of the same thing that you blame …

(…) You fight their resistance and then with gravity you say it was lightness what did the diligence”

She shared this poem in a Theological debate which was leader by men. She read her Athena- gore letter to the public and she was stopped immediately because those were not considered words that a woman would say. (Hablar de poesia, 2020) The second wave of feminism is referred to the increase of feminist activity that occurred in the United States, Britain and many countries of Europe that started to develop at the beginning of the 60s and lasted for two decades (Davis and Lorde, 2012). The second wave was about many of women’s experiences in society which caused to broaden the debate that

12 included more issues like women’s sexuality and reproductive rights, family, politics and inequality in the workplace. (Buckett, 2020). Also, this movement was focused on the critique of the patriarchal, or male-dominated, institutions, and cultural practices throughout society. This challenged and changed the accustomed and accepted gender roles and drew attention to issues like domestic violence, and marital rape (Pierson, 1972, p49). In Mexico in 1953 women were just given the write to vote and feminism started to grow. And the During the 70s, women developed a national women’s movement where many women united to fight for their rights such as demanding the legalisation of abortion and medical care for women in this matter. Mexico has been behind in many things concerning feminism. The second wave or as it was known at that time “the new wave” in Mexico questioned women’s oppression and discrimination at home, in the workplace, in the media, in the street and in law enforcement (Jaiven, 1987). This gave the opportunity for many feminists groups to come together to create awareness and help eradicate sexism, sexual violence and discrimination that women suffered on a daily basis. Some of these groups were: Women in Action (Mujeres en Acción Solidaria (MAS, 1971)), Women’s National Movement (Movimiento Nacional de Mujeres (MNM, 1972)), Women’s Liberation Movement (Movimiento de Liberación de la Mujer (MLM, 1974)), La Revuelta Colectiva (Colectivo La Revuelta (1975)), Women’s Group and Feminist Action (Colectivo de Mujeres y Lucha Feminista (1978)). This groups reflected about things like maternity, double working hours, women’s sexuality, subordination, oppression and discrimination, among other things (Lamas, 2006), (Lebon, Maier, 2006). Ana Laura Jaiven states that this movement spread across the country during the seventies, however, it did not work because of the many differences and disagreements that each group of feminists had (Jaiven, 1987). But the accomplish to establish specific paths to take action that focused on sexual education, the fight against violence towards women, protection of women who suffer domestic violence, abortion legalisation, the right of a free sexuality and the demand for contraceptives (Lamas, 2006), (Lebon, Maier, 2006). The third wave of feminism was a repetition and elongation of the second wave feminist movement. It continued from 1990s until the early 2000s. This movement was possible because of the political, economical and professional growth and power that women achieved over time.

13 There was an impressive amount of opportunities that opened up many doors for women in many aspects of society. “These women and others like them grew up with the expectation of achievement and examples of female success as well as an awareness of the barriers presented by sexism, racism and classism. They chose to battle such obstacles by inverting sexist, racist and classist symbols, fighting patriarchy with irony… Rather than becoming part of the “machine”, the third wavers began both sabotaging and rebuilding the machine itself.” (Burkett and Burnell, 2020). These third wave feminist started to question, reclaim and redefine the speech and ideas of womanhood, gender, beauty, sexuality, femininity and masculinity. They rebuilt the perceptions of gender and question the characteristics that we “strictly male” and “strictly female” which lead to a sexual liberation and gave attention and concern to each one’s gender identity and and sexuality. This pushed the third wavers to acknowledge the way these characteristics shaped and constructed western society and justified male oppression. This helped them start to break with many fixed structures that have been underestimating and minimise women in society. (Burkett and Burnell 2020). The fourth wave of feminism is a phase that began at the start of the 2010’s decade and its main focus is the empowerment of women and the use of the internet and social media to have a bigger voice and sense of community. This fourth wave continues to boost and encourage a fight against the problems that gender norms had caused, like the oppression and the marginalisation of women in society. Fourth wave feminists ask for a more equitable society which incorporates the standpoint view and the perspectives of all people, this means a more inclusive environment in politics, business and social settings. Furthermore, fourth wave feminists, address for equal pay for equal work as well as equal opportunities for girls and women. In addition, they argue to extend equal opportunities to boys and men to overcome gender norms and break fixed gender roles, such as the macho stereotype. (Rampton, 2015, Grady, 2018, Merriam-Webster, 2020) The journey of feminism has been strong and persistent and many of us are still working to find gender equality. For the purpose of this study, I will take little fragments and purposes of each part of the movement to define my feminist standpoint view. In every part single part of the movement, women have fought for an equitable society were women are political,

14 economically and professionally treated the same as men because as human beings we have the same rights. We also have the right to be seen as people and not as objects that are only appreciated because of their physical appearance.

4.2. Patriarchy Throughout history, patriarchy has shaped society into what it is and that is what is trying to be changed. The Cambridge dictionary defines patriarchy as “a form of social organization in which fathers or other males control the family, clan, tribe, or larger social unit, or a society organized in this way” or “a society in which the oldest male is the leader of the family, or a society controlled by men in which they use their power to their own advantage". This type of social conducts that were set many years ago, justified the terrible treatment that women have received through time. Many philosophers like Aristotle had minimised women into a secondary thing that is not relevant. I want to emphasise in the word “thing” because women have been treated as if they were objects that ornament a man and because of that the man has the right to have power over their opposite sex. “The female is female by virtue of a certain lack of qualities. We should regard women’s nature as suffering from a natural defectiveness” (Aristotle, cited by Beauvoir, 1949). This are the ideas that patriarchy supports and use to justify that women are inferior to them, “humanity is male, and man defines women, not in herself, but in relation to himself; she is not considered an autonomous being” (Beauvoir, 1949). This are the ideas that have been set and strengthened thorough time and make the world such a difficult place for women. Carol Pateman in her book The Sexual Contract expresses that patriarchal societies were established by certain contracts that defined te behavioural patterns of people that were a part of them. “There has been a major revival of interest in contract theory since the early 1970s that shoes no immediate signs of abating. New, sophisticated formulations of the idea of a social contract are accompanied by some highly technical and, in many cases, very elegant developments of contract argument, some of which are presented by Marxists, once firm opponents of the theatrical assumption and practical implications of contract doctrine.” (Pateman, 1995)

15 This contracts were established by heterosexual, white, privileged men that wanted to distribute between themselves the free access to women’s bodies justifying patriarchy, hence, men’s superiority over women. “Men domination over women, and the right of men to enjoy equal sexual access to women, is at issue in the making of the original pact. The social contract is a story of freedom; the sexual contract is the story of subjection… men’s freedom and women’s subjection… The original pact is a sexual as well as a social contract: it is sexual in the sense of patriarchal — that is; the contract establishes men’s political right over women — and also sexual in the sense of establishing orderly access by men to women’s bodies.” (Pateman, 1995) This type of contracts and establishments that were made only by men — because women were not included— had justified the objectification of women underestimate their capabilities. By man taking the power giving and creating access to women’s bodies, diminishes women as a mere sexual object which men take advantage of. This has been represented in the media and in movies and have been reinforced in society. Patriarchy has justified men controlling every aspect of women lives, not only sexually, as Pateman describes, but intellectually because men have decided what roles women have in society. This roles are the ones that, in my opinion, men are not willing to do and use the established agenda of “inferior women” to do as they please. This is why women are so poorly represented in media because they are portrayed as men see them not as women see themselves, their relationships and their socialisation.

4.3 Romantic Love When women are represented poorly in media and in cinema there is a misleading idea of what her desires, aspirations and relationships are, which leads to the reinforcement of myths about romantic love. The idea of the romantic love is something that has been in our history for years. Many of the most famous pieces of literature talk about this idea and ir has helped shape how we see the world. Myths have been known as stories that have trascended overtime that are associated with the human experiences throughout history. Joseph Campbell suggests that one of the functions of myths is to support social order and integrate the individual in to it (1964), and they change depending on the context they are set on. Within the myth of the romantic love we can find many other narratives that build up the current idea of love stories. The first main

16 narratives of the romantic myth is the “Prince Charming” and the “Beautiful Princess,” which are based on the gender roles that are set for each of the sexes. This are models of femininity and masculinity that come from patriarchal ideas which contributed and created expectations of what characteristics romantic relationships should have. This is is why people tend to idealice someone they are involve with, and their relationship because the definition of “love” is only valid if the relationship is based on monogamy, fidelity, passion and marriage, according to a patriarchal norms (Herrera-Gomez, 2012). This ideas and myths are reinforced in cinema and the media because the content only supports one type of relationship and it has to be built with the characteristics mentioned above to be defined as love. Polygamy, freedom and other types of love are out of the question because they go against the patriarcal norms that justify that gender roles that are set for women. This upholds the idea that women have to do everything they can to satisfy others and if they don’t comply, they are considered selfish beings and punished for it. All of this ideas are shown in the portrayal and representation of women specifically in most of Disney princess movies. There needs to be an equal focus on women’s stories and aspirations in cinema and media so that there is a more varied and richer representation of women’s characters. Considering the speech of the third wave feminists, representation and portrayal of women in media and cinema has to be redefined because the idea of womanhood, femininity, beauty, sexuality and gender had taken a turn and had notably changed. The following analysis will describe if and how this representations had changed over time, but its important to stress that, even though there has been an improvement and Disney started to portray some of their characters as feminist symbols that break stereotypes and redefine the ideas of womanhood, some of the elderly representations on the first Disney princess movies are still being replicated and they need to be put into context so that society can take a step forward and advance towards women’s empowerment and elimination of oppressive behaviours from patriarchal societies and stop repeating old patterns that damage and discredit the movement. Considering this, from my standpoint view, I would consider a feminist symbol as a woman who fights to re-establish the idea of womanhood, femininity, beauty, sexuality and gender and give more power to her, her aspirations and goals and share this other women to generate the sense of sisterhood. This women fight to stop the objectification, sexualization of women as well as this ridiculous competition between them just to fit the standards of beauty

17 and personality of a patriarchal society. They break the stereotypes that have been set over time and they reevaluate and reinvent the gender norms to get closer to an equitable society.

4.4. The Bechdel Test To look at following analysis I will start by categorising the movies mentioned above into two categories. This first two categories are basically if the movies pass or fail the Bechdel Test. This analysis started in the 1980s when Alison Bechdel noticed that in many movies there was just one female character and if there were multiple characters, their storylines revolved around men. This alarming trend inspired her to create a comic called “The Rule”. This comic composes the graphic novel Dykes to watch our for. The main storyline of “The Rule” establishes the main points and characteristics that the movies have to fulfil, to pass “the Bechdel test”. In the comic, the character expresses, “I only go to a movie if it satisfies three basic requirements. One, it has to have at least two women in it who, two, talk to each other about, three, something besides a man.” (See Appendix 1) Alison Bechdel credited the idea to her friend Liz Wallace and Virgina Woolf’s essay, A room of one’s own, in which she expresses that, “all these relationships between women are too simple, and I tried to remember any case in the course of my reading where two women are represented as friends. They are now and then mothers and daughters. But almost without exception they are shown in their relation to men” (Woof, 1929). Alison Bechdel has argued that the test is not a way to measure if a film is feminist but it just points out the fact that there are not many storylines about women in films and this shows gender inequality in the film industry (No Film School, 2018). This pointed out that there is a very low percentage of named female characters and female protagonists in movies. In a study of 120 films by the Geena Davis Institute of Gender in Media (2017), it was shown that only 31% of named characters were females and that 27% had female protagonists. This shows that there is a lack of female presence of women in film and media and if there is any, their lives often revolve around a man. This is shown in many of the Disney Princess movies. Even tough, the majority of the movies have a female protagonist, in most films, their storylines revolve around men and fail the Bechdel test. This shows another side of Disney Princess movies because it displays that the female representation is not accurate because of how women’s lives and goals are portrayed.

18 4.5. Lack of female participation in film crews Disney is extremely popular because of the way they tell stories. Even though, the stories are fairytales and fantasies they represent certain stereotypes from society and most of them are gender bias. The way they have been representing women through time is based, mostly, on a male point of view. This happens because, unfortunately in the film industry, the percentage of women that work behind the scenes and in the creation of a movie is very low. A study made by the Centre for the study of Women in Television and Film showed that “Women comprised 20% of all directors, writers, producers, executive producers, editors, and cinematographers working on the top 100 grossing films in 2019, up from 16% in 2018. Women working in these roles on the top 250 grossing films experienced a slight increase from 20% in 2018 to 21% in 2019” (Lauzen, 2020). This shows that there is a major difference of women telling stories in the media. This is shown also in the crew of the Disney Princess movies. When a story about a women is told by a man, it is obvious that there is going to be inaccuracy because men don’t really know that what and how exactly women think and act in reality so they portray the ideas and roles set by men and patriarchal societies. Also the whole experience of being a woman is misrepresented because the story just shows men’s perception of women’s lives and not how they experience with feelings and emotions other than love. Also, the portrayal of women’s socialisation is completely misleading because most movies show women as completely innocent, nice and kind with an extremely charming personality that is not at al really. They are mostly shown as someone that is so “good” that they would tolerate humiliation, oppression, embarrassment, dismissal, domination, discredit of their speech and disregard of their feelings and needs. This gives a terrible message to the audience because it discredits the whole movement and communicates that women should not fight against this unfair oppression and humiliation.

4.6. Disney Vault The stories about Disney Princesses have been mainly that the main character, which is in many cases a female, has to defeat and overcome all the forces of evil so she can be with her prince charming and live happily ever after (or she has to wait for the prince to do it for her). There

19 have been changes in recent narratives but the stories that prevail are still the ones that portray women a damsels in distress. The oldest movies like Snow White, Cinderella and Sleeping beauty are still popular. They are remastered frequently so they can be consumed in different types of media and be available for a large audience. This frequent relaunch of movies comes from a business strategy defined as Disney Vault. This vault is where Disney keeps most of the movies when they are not in the market. After a while they decide to relaunch the movies as special editions and are “brought back”. Julia Alexander states that in her article that “Disney initiated the practice as a way to control its own market and drive up demand whenever it did release a new edition of an old classic.” (Alexander, 2020)

4.7. The effects of stereotypes and gender roles in young audiences due to cultivation theory This movies are from different times and they show a reflection of society. They show certain gender roles that were valid at those times and that now a days seem quite obsolete. Even though they are considered old movies, they are being adapted to the new playback formats. This generates a broader audience. As these movies are meant to be seen by kids they are not put in context and they are teaching this audience roles, conducts and behaviours that the feminist movement has tried to eradicate because of how women are portrayed and represented. This movies have an extensive significance in the western culture and have a lot of recognisable characters that can be seen as role models by the young audiences. As Danielle Morrison presents in her work “analysing the gender roles present in children’s films is particularly important because viewing the stereotypical depictions of gender present in these movies can have a truly negative impact on children” (Morrison, D., 2014). This negative effect is due to the fact that children are developing their cognitive thinking and this may “organise their views on gender into schemas driven by these stereotypes… From a very young age, parents regard many of these films as ‘safe’ for young children to view. Psychologically, however, the films may be systematically encouraging youngsters to see the world through a very narrow perspective.” (Smith, S.L., Pieper, K.M., Granados, A., and Choueiti, M., 2010.) This happens because television (and with this, movies) have become a primary source of learning. We are exposed to media content all the time and in a long term relationship with it,

20 we tend to absorb information that affects our behaviour. As Gerbner describes in his article Living with television: The dynamics of the cultivation process: “The repetitive pattern of television's mass-produced messages and images forms the mainstream of a common symbolic environment… Television today serves that function, telling most of the stories to most of the people most of the time… from the point of view of the cultivation of relatively stable and common images, the pattern that counts is that of the total pattern of programming to which total communities are regularly exposed over long periods of time.That is the pattern of settings, casting, social typing, actions, and related outcomes that cuts across most program types and defines the world of television -- a world in which many viewers live so much of their lives that they cannot avoid absorbing or dealing with its recurrent patterns, probably many times each day.” (Gerbner, Gross, Morgan & Signorielli, 1975 The television, for many years now, has been a very important part of our lives. Even though, technology has had a fast acceleration and we can now get information from smartphones, computers and tablets, historically television has been a prevailing way of entertainment and way to deliver information. It still gathers a very large audience and it's still considered as a primary common source. “The longer we live with television, the more invisible it becomes. As the number of people who have never lived without television continue to grow, the medium is increasingly taken for granted as an appliance, a piece of furniture, a storyteller, a member of the family” (Gerbner, Gross, Morgan & Signorielli, 1975). This is why media needs to be careful with what is shared with younger audiences. There needs to be more emphasis on stories about female empowerment and the rupture of gender roles for both female and male so that there can be a social change that is positive. I would like express that the problem is not focused on the display and exhibit of old Disney movies. They were developed in other times where the patriarchal speech was less subtle and more literal, which can be perceived as stronger, but, now a days, that we are trying to transform this society into an equitable and safe place for women, we need to put these movies into context and communicate that those were roles from another time, so that the young audiences don’t learn this toxic behaviour and reproducing these gender roles. There also needs

21 to be support in other stories that promote a positive perspective and portrayal of women so that those gender roles can be broken and society can move forward.

4.8. The context from a women’s stand view point The stories in the Disney Princess movies are very basic. They are representing the gender roles of other times but they are still present now a days and have been accustomed for years because, in many cases women are still considered inferior to men. This can be seen in the portrayal of women aspirations in movies, and not only Disney Princesses, but modern storylines known as “chick-flicks”. In all this types of movies, despite the fact that a women has a main role, her life revolves around a man or she is destined to end up with a man and fall in love (Watson, 2020). This gives a very misleading image because the movies are transmitting the message that women are only good at falling in love with men. Women are seen as if love was the only important thing in their mind and the only thing the want to have. Simone de Beauvoir in her book The second sex, in the chapter “The Woman in Love”, she describes the common stereotype of women in love. She describes this as one of the only or the only thing a woman wants in her life and that she will always be devoted to her loved one. “Love for the woman is a total abdication for the benefit of the master… Almost all women have dreamed of the “great love”: they have had imitations, they have come close to it; it has come to them in incomplete, bruised, trifling, imperfect, and false forms; but very few have really dedicated their existence to it… the young girl has dreamed of herself seen through the man’s eyes: it is in man’s eyes that the women believes she has at las found herself” (Beauvoir, 1949). The fact that woman have been defined by how they are devoted to a man is want shows how women have always been seen as inferior human being. It would seem that there is no other ending to a women’s story other than ending up next to a man. Movies and media, especially Disney Princess movies are reproducing and reinforcing this idea and are supporting the idea that man are the ones who “define women in relation to himself” (Beauvoir, 1949). Throughout history women have been seen and portrayed as beings with “lack of quality.” Philosophers like Aristotle as beings that are “suffering from natural defectiveness” and directly implying that women are inferior to men (Beauvoir, 1949, Aristotle quoted by Simone de Beauvoir). The problem is now what already happened, we cannot change the past.

22 The problem is that we keep reproducing this patriarchal behaviours and many keep implying that women less than men and this justifies the mistreatment and the oppression. One of the biggest problems is that the media keeps supporting this facts. The fact that we keep using the same storylines about women, shows a lack of improvement because the representation is still very basic and poor. It is scary that even though there have been a high number of movements to empower women, the media keeps taking the power away by portraying us as useless damsels in distress that only want to fall in love with a man because that is how their life is complete. As Simone de Beauvoir expresses in her book, “There have not always been proletarians: there have always been women; they are women by physiological structure; as far can as history can be traced, they have always been subordinate to men; their dependence is no the consequence of an event or becoming, it did not happen, Alterity here appears to be an absolute, party because it falls outside accidental nature of historical fact. A situation created over time can come undone at another time.” It is possible solve this problem and see social chance. Women have had a log way trying to make things better but there is a lot more that needs to be done and undone. Women are capable of countless things but there are certain groups of people and segments of society that don’t believe this is true and one of the main reason is that we are not represented as capable, talented and independent beings. In the 2011 Netflix documentary MissRepresentation, its explained who they lack of powerful women in media, referring to movies, journalism and government, communicates the message that women are not capable of being powerful and that they don’t have the capacity of having authority because they are mostly represented as sex objects and always judged by how they look and not by her thoughts, opinion, talent to accomplishments (Newsom, J., 2011). Judging women on how they look has caused that had very negative effects on women’s way of living and self esteem. Throughout many years, I have observed that women compete with each other in many ways and very often. I have observed for many time now that women are taught to be hypocrite and hostile with each other because they don’t have positive comments to say to each other. This is something that is not new. There have been many studies concerning women’s behaviour and it has been shown that women compete with each other over thing that they believe men value, like looking beautiful and sexy, according to certain standards of beauty and body types. This causes women to develop self esteem problems, self

23 hatred and they underrate themselves. This causes them to dissociate and distance themselves from other women because they see them as a rival (Tanenbaum, 2002). A study by Anne Campbell about female competition, states the many pressures that women have to face and that make them turn against each other. She explains that “a very strong factor in men’s preferences is not just faces but bodies… women use bras, corsets and surgery to “normalise” perceived size anomalies and to exaggerate the apparent narrowness to the waist” (Campbell, 2004). This supports the patriarchal idea that women have to fit the attributes of an “appropriate female appearance and behaviour” (Brown, 1998) that encourages raging misogyny (Campbell, 2004). This comes from the fact that men and women seem to universally agree on standards of female beauty (Cambell, 2004) which causes frustration on women because the majority of women cannot fit this beauty standard, principally it is not really inclusive. Even though, some of the characteristics may vary from culture to culture, beauty standards are based on specific characteristics focused on the European of Caucasian attributes and that has been elevated around the world as the “ideal beauty” due to globalisation (Tranchina, 2015). We can see this in most of the Disney Princesses because these movies set an impossible beauty standard due to their facial and body characteristics. They are set as the most beautiful and perfect being and show how other seek to compete with them because of beauty. Female competition studies found that there are two strategies that women use in this physical rivalry: Self promotion and competitor derogation with indirect aggression. As it is stated in a study by Maryanne Fisher et al., where she quotes other authors to define this concepts, “self-promotion is the process of rendering oneself more attractive or appealing relative to one’s rival. Since self promotion is performed in relation to rivals, and does nor involve a direct altercation. It can be viewed as indirectly aggressive behaviour” (Buss, 1988). This is a form of competition that a woman uses is so that they look better in comparison to their rival. They try to stand out and highlight that they have a better physical appearance, are in better body shape, have a more charming personality and that they are the “full package”. On the other hand, “competitor derogation, is defined as making rivals appear less attractive or appealing to oneself. Competition derogation may in some instances be indirectly aggressive since the individual does not always confront rivals by instead hopes to diminish their attractiveness to a potential mate in a more circuitous way” (Buss and Dedden, 1990). This form

24 of competition that a woman uses is to make their rivals look bad in comparison to herself. Due to the observation of the high/middle class Mexican society, I retrieved that this is a popular strategy used by women. They don’t only derogate other women in front of men, women talk to each other about other women and use competition derogation so that they feel better when they are criticising their rivals physical or personality attributes. All of these is done in relation to men and it causes the rivalry between women to be stronger and harder to reconcile. In this study, “Indirect aggression refers to behaviour for which a perpetrator tries to use harm while simultaneously attempting to make it appear as tough there was no harmful intention. Often, indirect aggression is used within the context of relationships. To damage or discredit someone’s reputation, or for the purpose of group exclusion” (Björkqvist, Lagerspetz and Kaukainen, 1992). The problem with this type of behaviour is that it becomes very difficult for women to have honest and healthy relationships with each other because they are taught to compete against one another all the time, and the only reason for this competition is so they can be attractive for a man. It is a worrying situation because women are divided and it's difficult for them unite if they are automatically seeing other women as a threat. It has been proved that this type of competition is due to the fact that most women want the attention of a man and they would do anything to get it. “Sexual selection theory predicts, therefore that women will compete with one another to embody physical attractiveness (Walters & Crawford, 1994), and those women successful in this competition will effectively attract men because they ill be strategically solving the problem of fulfilling men’s preference for cues to reproductive value (Buss,1988a)” (Schmitt and Buss 1996). This comes from the patriarchal idea that women have to fit the ideal beauty standards. This needs to be changed because it causes women relationship with each other to be torn apart and each of their personal well being because it causes women to be disappointed with themselves and this is definitely not healthy. Why should society keep promoting unhealthy behaviour that can lead to the discomfort with one’s self? This type of behaviour is seen repetitively in many Disney Princess movies and it reassures the beauty standards, the fact that they have to compete for a man and that the characters physical appearance is linked to their personality: Beautiful is good (protagonist), Ugly is bad (Antagonist).

25 4.9. Julia T. Wood’s Archetypes and Holly Brewer list of Stereotypes Many Disney movies have the same type of characters and the same type of storyline. The characters can be categorised in archetypes. According to the Cambridge Dictionary and archetype is a typical example of something, or the original model of something from which others copied. The Collins Dictionary defines an archetype as something that is considered to be a perfect of typical example of a particular kind of person or thing, because it has all their most important characteristics. Deborah A. Macey defines the archetypes as: “Frame works or structures, not specific content, that reflect latent, pre-existing patterns of behaviour. In television, archetypes manifest as the broad blueprint of the recombinant characters. Unlike stereotypes that are often negative, specific, and historical, these character types are fluid and shifting. While Jung asserts that archetypes are “empty and purely formal,” they are imbued with meaning that are often unconsciously assumed and rarely interrogated.” (Macey, 2012) This is a way to analyse the different characteristics of the female protagonists in the Disney Princess movies. There are many authors that have worked with different archetypes. I will work with Julia T. Wood’s archetypes for women in the workplace and base my analysis on the adaptation Deborah A. Macey develops for this archetypes in the media representation of women. Julia T. Woods four archetypes are the child, the sex object, the mother and the iron maiden. Each of these archetypes have specific characteristic that define them. These are gender stereotypes and broad generalisations that may or may not apply to particular women. I will give the definition that Julia T. Wood provides in her book Gendered Lives and complement it with the definition adaptation Deborah A. Marcey used in her adaptations to analyse women in media representation: The Sex Object: this archetype defines women in terms of their sex or sexuality. Frequently, it leads to judgement of women (workers) based on their appearance and actions… Stereotyping women as sex objects contributes to sexual harassment, which al least 50% of the women (the female workforce) have experienced. (Wood, 1993) These characters are reduced to their sexual exploits… and are often reduced to a sexual joke. (Macey, 2012)

26 The Mother: In institutional life, the stereotype of women as mother has both figurative and literal forms. The figurative version of these stereotype is expressed when others expect women (employees) to take care of the “emotional labour” for everyone—to smile, exchange pleasantries, prepare coffee and snacks, and listen to, support, and help others. Stereotyping women as mothers is one basis of (job) segregation by gender, subtle and pervasive form of discrimination…The women-as-mother stereotype also has a literal form. Women employees who have or plan to have children are often perceived as less serious professionals than men or women who aren’t mothers. (Wood, 1993) These archetype contain the most variance, although there are some similarities. The most defining mother characteristic is storytelling. (Macey, 2012) The Child: A third stereotype sometimes imposed on women is that of child, or pet— cute but not to be taken seriously. This stereotype reflects a view of women as less mature, less competent and less capable than adults. Stereotyping women as children often masquerades as “protecting” women. Even if women did not intend to have children, the company insisted on “protecting” them from the dangers of these jobs (which, incidentally, where higher-paying jobs in that company). The policy was struck down when a court ruled that the company was wrong in treating adult women as children instead of respecting their ability to assess risk and make choices. Stereotyping women as sex object, mothers and children contributes to the disparity between women’s and men’s earnings—a disparity that is not explained by qualifications, levels of education, amount of experience, or performance. (Wood, 1993) These archetype carries traditional values, marking back to a simpler time… it reduces women to little girls. Each child archetype os optimistic about life and love. The child archetype portrays a naiveté that seems ridicules in adult women. She is dismissed and disparaged even when her discourse is important. (Macey, 2012) The Iron Maiden: If a women is not perceived as matching one of the three stereotypes we’ve discussed, se may be perceived as fitting a fourth. A female professional who is independent, ambitious directive, competitive, and sometimes tough and may be labeled as an “iron maiden.” An example of this occurred in 1990, when Ann Hopkins sued the accounting firm of Price Waterhouse for sex discrimination. Ms. Hopkins brought more money in new accounts than any other of her 87 male peers, yet 47 of the men were made partners, where as

27 Ms. Hopkins was not. Describing Hopkins as “authoritative” and “too tough,” executives told her that, if she wanted to be promoted, she should look and act more feminine. (Wood, 1993) Macey defines the archetype of the iron maiden as the one that has the ideological function to carry a feminist perspective… their vocation upholds rather than challenges patriarchal systems. Serving as as the feminist archetype, these characters are progressive only in the sense that they depict women as highly pad professionals that can compete with men in the public sphere. (Macey, 2012) This archetypes are based different characteristics and patterns of behaviours. These behaviours can be also categorised into stereotypes. The difference between a stereotype and an archetype is that stereotypes often fixate on the negative and they are based on oversimplified ideas and are based on very blunt assumptions and prejudice. The Cambridge dictionary defines the word stereotype as “a set idea that people have about what someone or something is like, especially in an idea that is wrong.” The Merriam- Webster dictionary defines the word stereotype as “something conforming to be a fixed or general pattern, especially a standardised mental picture that is held common by members of a group and that represent an oversimplified opinion, prejudice attitude, or uncritical judgement.” I based my analysis and categorisation of the female characters on the stereotypes and gender roles they perform to classify them in the different archetypes. There are a large number of stereotypes for women because they have been modified and strengthen over time. This stereotypes became gender roles that women have to fit in. As Holly Brewer states in her article “gender stereotypes are generalisations about the roles of each gender. Gender roles are generally neither positive nor negative; they are simply inaccurate generalisations of the male and female attributes. Since each person has individual desires thoughts and feelings, regardless of their gender, these stereotypes are incredibly simplistic and do not at all describe the attributes of every person of each gender.” The problem is that it has become easier to keep clarifying women into stereotypes that continue this history of oppression. On the grounds of that, we can see that in the list of stereotypes that Holly Brewer specifies, non of them empower women. The problem with this is that it has become a normalised behaviour to enclose women into this stereotypes to support the idea that women are weak and inferior to men:

28 The list Holly Brewer provides is exactly why women are, in many situations, not taken seriously and dismissed really easily:

Women are supposed to have “clean jobs” such as secretaries, teachers, and librarians Women are nurses, not doctors Women are not as strong as men Women are supposed to make less money than men The best women are stay at home moms Women don’t need to go to college Women don’t play sports Women are not politicians Women are quieter than men and not meant to speak out Women are supposed to be submissive and do as they are told Women are supposed to cook and do housework Women are responsible for raising children Women do not have technical skills and are not good at “hands on” projects such as car repairs Women are meant to be the damsel in distress; never the hero Women are supposed to look pretty and be looked at Women love to sing and dance Women do not play video games Women are flirts Women are never in charge

Many of the Disney Princess movies and the majority of the mainstream media support these stereotypes. The fact that this information is still being shared, supports the oppressive ideas that women are still “damsels in distress” or that women “don’t play sports” or that “women are quite that men and not meant to speak out.” Some of these ideas and stereotypes had changed over time because women had demanded this change but there are still being reinforced by some of the content of mainstream media and in order for the oppression of women to stop, this portrayal and representations

29 have to change. Media have to start representing women as we really are and break this antique and obsolete stereotypes and gender roles.

5. Methodology:

To answer the question on how women have been represented and portrayed in Disney Princess Movies over time I needed to analyse many details to have an appropriate amount of information to start answering this question. In this study, my intention with this analysis and investigation is to describe the characteristics of the female protagonists, antagonists and storyline of the Disney Princess movies and how these communicate a poor representation and portrayal of women and how this have changed over time. This is made to give a deeper understanding on how the media reinforces female gender roles and stereotypes that are misogynistic and lead to persistence of gender inequality. The selection criteria of the Disney movies which were analysed was based on different characteristics. First, all movies had to emphasise that the female character was the protagonist. For example, in the movie Aladdin is based on the journey of a male protagonist. There is a female character, Princess Jazmin, who also defined a change in the stereotypes because she broke many of the gender roles that were set in previous movies. She was the first Princess who question the rules of marriage and the set gender sole of woman having to get married to have power. She needs to fight against her social context and her family to get what she wants. However, I did not consider this movie for the detailed analysis because the movie is about Aladdin’s journey. Secondly, they all have to be defined as “Princesses.” Even though they are not all defined as princesses since the beginning of their story, there has to be a hint towards the fact that they are indeed princesses. For example, from Snow White to Beauty and the Beast they were all considered princesses because they either married a prince of they come from a a family of royals. This happens again in The Princess and the Frog, Tangled, Brave and Frozen. However, Mulan and Pocahontas are not specifically defined as princesses but as they come from powerful families in their social context, I considered them as Princesses.

30 Thirdly, Disney Studies define all these films as Princess movies. This is important because, even though I use different selection criteria, the creator of these movies, Disney Studies, defined and confirmed this group of films ad Princess movies, so I have to base my data in how this movies are regionally defined as. (Disney+, Streaming platform catalogue, 2020) In the Disney+ Princess movie catalogue there is another Princess movie called Anastasia, which is based on the imperial family of Rusia. Even though, this is a movie which breaks many gender stereotypes, I cannot include it in the analysis because it initially was a move produced by Fox Animation Studios and not by Walt Disney. Since Fox was bought by Disney this movie became part of the catalogue (Homonof, 2017). So, that is why this cannot be part of the study. The type of data I used was qualitative and quantitative data considering that I decided to set seven categories of analysis. Six categories were qualitative and one category was quantitative. This categories were used to analyse the twelve movies listed above and all of them were based and supported by other studies that were made recently and feminist theory, specially Simone de Beauvoir’s book, The Second Sex. In other words, my primary data is the analysis I will provide of this movies based on the variables that I have chosen to study and my secondary data is other studies that were made about this topic as a support of my analysis and to strengthen my argument and opinion. The seven methods of data collection I used to analyse the Disney Princess movies were chosen carefully so the analysis could make sense and give opportunity to more investigations in the future. I chose the movies that had female protagonists and that they were seen or had the title of “Princess.” The characteristics that defined them as princesses, as I mentioned above, are that they marry a prince, come from a royal or powerful family within their context, they have to be catalogued as princesses by Disney Studios. To be able to analyse the change in time, I had to choose these twelve movies because they were made in different decades and there could not be less because I wanted to analyse how it changed gradually so it could be noticeable. After the selection of the data I used different theories, studies and methods to analyse the movies and have a complete view of what these movies are communicating about women and they are represented and portrayed in these stories.

31 First is started by observing if the movies passed or fail the Bechdel Test. To be more exact, I analysed it from a more specific point because I observed if the protagonist had a conversation with other women and how did that conversation develop. I did not analyse every little conversation with other characters that don’t involve the protagonist because the subject of study are the Disney Princesses. After this, I had to analyse the reason of why they whether pass of fail. Yes, the basic analysis of the Bechdel Test is that if there are two or more women in the movie, if they talk to each other about something besides a man but I wished to go deeper and see what was causing these movies to pass or fail apart from this first analysis. For this I started to analyse the crew of the movie and the percentage of women’s participation and how the lack of female participation had an effect on how women are portrayed. This was to show if there were men telling women’s stories. This has a tremendous effect because the male stand view point is different from the female stand view point and sometimes it can cause in representing a misunderstood idea of women’s actions, thoughts and socialisation characteristics. This can causes a misleading interpretation of women’s aspirations, which is another point of study. The idea was to find out if there was a relationship with women’s aspirations and the fact that there were more men or women telling the protagonist story. When looking at women’s aspirations in the movies I studied what were they exactly to link it to the percentage of men and women involved in the creation of the film. The aspirations are also linked to the Bechdel Test because if the aspirations were related to a man, the movie would have no chance of passing the test. Also, when looking at the aspirations of the female characters I observed how they developed or changed during the film. The I looked at the antagonist and what where the obstacles set to stop the protagonist from reaching her goal. The Antagonist sometimes were other female characters and others the society in which the princess lived in. These antagonists were chosen like this because it was a way to observe how the protagonist reach their goal and how was the controversy and the dispute presented. I catalogued the protagonists into Julia T. Woods archetypes depending on the gender roles and stereotypes they played or broke in the movie. I used the list of gender roles that Holly Brewer provides in her article because there are many actions that are considered stereotypes and gender roles so I had to define a specific list so that the method of analysis is equal for all films This archetype was defined when the storyline was analysed and depending

32 on what were the protagonists aspirations, how did the antagonist set obstacles and how the protagonists goals where reached. To be able to measure the protagonists aspiration I analysed what where was the storyline headed and what was the the thing that the princesses desired the most. This aspirations were mentioned receptively and were reflected in the endings of the movies as how they make their dream come true and achieved their goals. To measure who is the antagonist I observed how this person or situation was an obstacle in front of the protagonist that prevented her to achieve her goal and answered the question of “how is the antagonist trying to stop the protagonist achievements?” All of these measurements are link to show how have women been represented and portrayed in Disney Princess movies and if there have been changes over time. The changes were measured depending on the percentage of women who participated in the production, writing and directing of the movie; on how their aspirations were more focused on themselves rather than in a man; how they overcame the antagonist’s obstacles; if they followed or broke stereotypes and gender roles and their archetype was more linked to independence. This analysis measured if there were actual changes and if this represents a social development and a positive improvement for women. If their representation and portrayal changes in the media, it would probably encourage a wider range of storylines that would not diminish women into a basic being and will not classify them as a secondary being. With an improvement in the portrayal and contextualising the older representations the audience of these movies will have a better understanding on the diversity and variety of women’s personalities and characteristics like what are our real aspirations so we can break the gender roles that support feminine oppression.

6. Analysis:

For the twelve Disney Princess movies mentioned above, I did the same analysis to be able to see and study the changes in women portrayal and representation over time. This will help me see what are the strengths and weaknesses of each movie and of how Disney is portraying women in general. By completing the analysis I will be able to develop communication material that will help me share this information to the public. If more people are aware that there is a

33 problem, the easier will be to generate a social change that is directed towards a better future for women and the eradication of the patriarchal heritage.

6.1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs Snow White and the seven dwarfs is a movie from 1937. Snow White was the first Disney Princess ever It was based on the stories of the Grimm brothers. The beautiful and kindhearted princess Snow White charms every creature in the kingdom except her jealous stepmother, the Queen. When the Magic Mirror Proclaims Snow White is the fairest one of all, she must flee into the forest, where she befriends the lovable seven dwarfs. But when the Queen tricks Snow White with an enchanted apple, only the magic of the true love’s kiss can save her (IMDb, Snow White and the seven dwarfs, 1937). The movie has two female characters who talk to each other. However, the movie does not pass the Bechdel Test because the two female characters talk about a man, Snow White’s “special someone.” The storyline of the movie is very basic because it only focuses a woman who wants a man and in jealousy and competition between women. The female participation in the film crew was of 12%. Even though it has more female participation than other movies, the female personality is represented according to the stereotype that are set for women in a patriarchal society. This is seen in Snow Whites personality and aspirations. She is portrayed as this hyperfemenine woman whose only goal is for her prince to find her. That is her main aspiration in the story, there is no more depth to it. The antagonist, in this case, is her step mother, most commonly known as the evil queen. The antagonists aspiration is to be the “fairest of them all” and for this she has to eliminate the competition, Snow White, because, as the Magic Mirror tells her, “Snow White is the fairest of them all. This shows the stereotype that women are always seeking to look beautiful so that they can be looked at by men and encourages the competition between women. This type of portrayal also led to the stereotype that stepmothers are evil and are always jealous of their stepdaughters. This incites the fact that women should compete with each other and reinforces the stereotype that young is always more beautiful. This is a very negative and poor representation of women because and it communicates the female behaviour is superficial and does not encourage sisterhood. This type of representations have to stop because the fact that women and girls see this represented in the

34 media, it shows this behaviour as being acceptable because most of this movies approve of it. This kind of representation shows that its a proper behaviour for women to compete against each other and in reality its not. As I mention earlier, this type of competition does not only affect the relationship between women but also causes problems with one’s self-esteem because of the constant comparison with other women and the disapproval of one’s self and the self- hate. According to Julia T. Wood women archetypes, Snow White falls into the Child Arrchetype. This is because she always seems extremely optimistic about live and love. She seems helpless without the help of the seven dwarfs or the prince that comes and saves her from the horrible spell. This “archetype portrays a naiveté that seem ridiculous in adult women.” You can see this when Snow White acts extremely innocently about everything and she has this hyperfeminity that makes her seem like she is the nicest, kindest and the most beautiful in the whole world. Because of her kindness she wants to do everything to please men and this includes giving up her independence. This stereotype is a very frequent one in media and it is still represented today. The stereotypes and gender role she performs are being the damsel in distress, doing house work and cooking for men, being fragile and submissive and the fact that she always needs to be physically beautiful.

6.2. Cinderella The movie Cinderella is from the year 1950. As well as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella was another movie based on the Grimm Brothers’ tales. The movie tells the story of Cinderella, the beautiful and kind-hearted daughter, sees her world turn upside down when her beloved mother dies, and her pained father remarries. The other woman, wicked Lady Tremaine, has two equally cruel daughters, the jealous Anastasia and Drizella. But, once more, things will go from bad to worse. When Cinderella’s father also dies, it leaves her all alone in the Lady’s clutches to serve as her maid-of-all-work. Under those circumstances, a shabby and neglected Cinderella doesn’t stand much of a chance of attending the King’s royal ball—let alone, captivate the handsome Prince—unless she turns to her loving Fairy Godmother who has quite a few tricks up her sleeve. Nevertheless, will the wronged damsel ever find peace—and with it—her own Prince Charming. (IMDb, Cinderella 1950)

35 This movie has four female characters: Cinderella, the stepmother Lady Tremaine, and the step sisters Anastasia and Drizella. These characters do talk to each other but all they talk about is the prince, the ball and how to make a suitable bride for the prince. For this reason this movie does not pass the Bechdel test. For starters the female participation in the crew of this movie is 0%. There were only men who adapted the story and who directed the movie. This affects the representation of women in the movie because it is based on a male point of view for the most part. This has a negative effect because the way they represent women is not accurate. For instance, the aspirations of the female protagonist, Cinderella, is to meet her prince and get married. She does not say this explicitly, but she sings about the dreams that she has and when she dances with the prince she sings that this kind on love is the one she has always dreamed of. The whole story surrounds how she does whatever it takes, and how everyone helps her, to make her dream come true, and that dream is to find love. She does not do much to reach for her aspiration. She gets help from her animal friends and the fairy god mother. This shows that women don’t have to work to get anything and the fact that she is beautiful, nice and kind will help her. This communicates the message that women and girls can achieve and get things just by being nice and beautiful and no because of their talents and intelligence. The antagonists in these case are three other women: the step mother and the stepsisters. The only goal of these three women is to make Cinderella’s life miserable because they are all jealous of her. Again, we can see that the whole storyline of these movie is based on these competition between women to get men’s approval. This shows that stepmothers and stepsisters are evil. It is a stereotype that has been used for years and that it's being communicated to the audience. The stepmother and the stepsisters do everything they can to prevent Cinderella from going to the ball so that one of the sisters can be chosen as the Prince’s suitor. At the end, Cinderella is chosen by the Prince because he is swept off his feet because of her beauty. This also show how women are portrayed as very shallow and less competent because their only goal in life is to marry their prince charming and be the most beautiful. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Cinderella is most compatible with the Sex Object. She is always judged because of her appearance and actions. The whole movie revolves around her being beautiful and how her stepmother and stepsisters are jealous of her because of that. She is reduced to be appreciated for her looks and not for what she thinks. She

36 is always nice and kind and allows her family to harass her. Cinderella performs the stereotypes that back up the fact that women have to be pretty and be submissive because being strong is not something a lady has to be. Also, it reinforces the stereotype and gender role that women have to be pretty so they can be looked at.

6.3. Sleeping Beauty The movie Sleeping Beauty was released in 1959. As well as Snow White and Cinderella, the story of Aurora, the Sleeping Beauty is based on the fairy tales of the Grimm Brothers. The movie tells the story of Princess Aurora, also known as Rose. The narrative starts after the beautiful Princess Aurora is born into royalty and everyone gathers to celebrate. Everything is perfectly fine until an unwanted guest appears, the evil fairy Maleficent. Maleficent curses the young princess and announces that she will die by pricking her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel before sunset on her 16th birthday. Fortunately, one of the good fairies, Merryweather, changes the spell so Aurora will fall into a deep sleep instead, and the only way to wake her from her sleep is true love’s kiss. Finally the day arrives (IMDb, Sleeping Beauty, 1959). These movie has five female cheaters: Princess Aurora, the fairies Flora, Fauna and Merryweather, and the witch Maleficent. They all talk to each other but when Aurora talks to other women they only talk about how she wants to find her prince charming and love of her life. So because of this this movie fails the Bechdel Test. The female participation in the crew of the film is of 0%. The fact that there is no female participation on the film and that the story is based on a fairy tale written by men shows a representation of woman that is not really accurate because the movie shows a women who is useless and is a damsel in distress and has to wait for the prince to rescue her. She is waiting asleep in a tower so Prince Philip can go claim her as a prince after defeating Maleficent. This is a very basic story. Princess Aurora’s only aspiration is to find the one man she saw “once upon a dream” and there is no more to it. What Aurora (Rose) wants is to find the love of her dreams and get married and she does when she lives in the forest and she is frustrated when she finds out that she is already committed to another man. However, at the end of the movie we can see that the two lovebirds find their way back to each other and Aurora’s only goal becomes true; to be beside a man. The reason for this is that the whole story

37 revolves on Aurora’s beauty and the fact the she has to be protected and rescued from a horrible spell that will lead her to her death. She does not do anything on her own because she is seen as delicate and and weak. In this case the antagonist is Maleficent, an evil witch who curses Aurora to sting her finger in a spindle of a spinning wheel before her 16th birthday. This character does not express a direct jealousy towards Aurora but we can see that this type of antagonist reflects that there is competition between the two of them because Aurora is young and beautiful and Maleficent is older and does not have Aurora’s characteristics. This is a way to express a very interesting contrast that is seen very often between women. There are some ideas established by patriarchal societies that categorise women in a certain way when they do not fulfil the system’s idea of womanhood. Women who don’t fit in this ideas are often categorised as witches and evil characters. In this case, Aurora would be the women representing the patriarchal ideals of womanhood and Maleficent is the opposite to her, as if there was only one idea and way of how women should be. The obstacle Maleficent uses upon Aurora is a horrible one because she sentences her to death but the whole movie is focused on how other people help Aurora break this spell and she only waits to be saved. This gives a very misleading image because it supports the idea that women have to fit into a stereotype where they just waiting to be saved by a man. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Princess Aurora is most compatible with the Child Archetype because during the whole movie she shows the viewer that she is very delicate and innocent and she is extremely optimistic about love and life. When she realises that her dreams cannon come true, she just gets sad and cries and doesn’t do anything else about it. She is “dismissed and disparaged even when her discourse is important” (Wood, 1993). All for her life is decided for her and she is just a girl that its in danger because of her innocence and is the price of a prince. This can be linked to the gender role of the damsel in distress, where she is so delicate and innocent that she has to wait for her prince to save her. This gives a very poor image of women because it communicates that they are a price and cannot do anything on their own. This also reinforces the stereotypes and gender role of women being damsels in distress, that they have to be beautiful to be looked at, that they cannot raise their voices and have to be submissive and do what they are told to. This gives the idea that women have to be a certain way and they do not have an option to be different and sea for more fulfilling goals.

38 6.4. The Little Mermaid The movie the Little Mermaid is from 1989. Thirty years had passed but women are still represented the same even though it is a different time. The film tells the story of a rebellious 16- year-old mermaid Ariel is fascinated with life on land. On one of her visits to the surface, which are forbidden by her controlling father, King Triton, she falls for a human prince. Determined to be with her new love, Ariel makes a dangerous deal with the sea witch Ursula to become human for three days. But when plans go awry for the star-crossed lovers, the king must make the ultimate sacrifice for his daughter (IMDb, The Little Mermaid 1989). There are many female characters in the movie, such as Ariel, Triton’s daughters and Carlotta, Prince Erick’s house maid, and of course, Ursula. They all talk to Ariel but their talk is very simple, basic and superficial. Her sisters talk to her about being in love and Carlotta talks to her about Erick but not in much detail. But her talk with Ursula is much more deep because she talks about wanting to be with Erick and how Ursula can make that happen. It is clear that the only topic of conversation is about a man. The other conversations that Ariel has that have more depth she has with male characters, such as Sebastian, Flounder and Scuttle. Because of this, the movie does not pass the Bechdel Test. Being a movie from the end of the 80’s, we could expect that there would be a difference in the representation and portrayal of female characters and their relationships, since at that time the third wave of feminism was developing and many stereotypes, and gender roles for women were dismissed. Women were in a different place in society because of what the feminist movement had accomplished. Apparently it didn’t seem that this changed so much in thirty years. Female representation is still poor and that is why it fails the test. The problem is that, as well as other Disney Movies this film was based on one of Hans Christian Anderson fairy stale stories and as it is told by a man and the story is antique, the representation of women is poor and the movie still follows the same pattern with no modifications whatsoever. Also female presence the films crew is of 10%. There is only one women out 9 people that worked in the team that is in charge of telling the story and she was associate producer, she did not have a main role on the story telling and story adaptation. Even though there were more women in other parts of the cast, you can see that the one writing a woman’s story is a man.

39 What makes this representation poor is the fact that Ariel’s aspirations are still to be married to a man she fell in love with the moment she saw him. Her first wish at the beginning of the movie is to be independent and to be human to explore the human world. A the movie goes on her wish chinches when she meets Erick and her aspiration is now to be beside a man because she falls in love with him. She demonstrates that she is stubborn and persistent and she would do anything to make her wish come true. She gave up her independence and her dreams of adventure just to be married to her prince charming. We can still see the same storyline pattern where the woman is portrayed as someone that just wants to find her loved one and get married. In this case the antagonist is a witch called Ursula. Her ultimate goal is to have Triton’s power and she uses Ariel to get it. Ursula is quite miserable and lonely because she was vanished from Triton’s kingdom and she emphasises that she is not a very beautiful woman. So, we can see that there is some competition with Ariel because she is young and beautiful but this is not the main point of they relationship. I’ve noticed that the same happened in this movie and in Sleeping beauty because the antagonist is portrayed as the opposite idea of the patriarchal stereotype of womanhood. She is seen as evil and portrayed as a witch because she wants to have power over men and that in a patriarchal society is the worse a women can do because in this system, women are considered inferior and powerless. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Ariel fits into the Sex Object because she is reduced to their sexual exploits. She is objectified because of her beauty and her body and what she can do with it. Everything is focused on her appearance. For example, when Ursula takes her voice away she tells her to use her looks and her body language (being feminine and sexy) to get the Prince to fall in love with her. Those type of messages objectify women and reduce everything to their sexuality. This reinforces the stereotype and gender role that women be pretty and be looked as if she was an object with no other goal than to be attractive for men.

6.5. Beauty and the Beast The movie Beauty and the Beast is from 1991. This film tells the story of a young Prince Adam is cursed by a mysterious enchantress because of living a selfish life. He is transformed into the appearance of a monstrous beast. His only hope is to learn to love a young woman and earn her love in return in order to redeem himself. Ten years later, his chance shows itself when a young

40 maiden named Belle offers to take her ill father Maurice’s place as his prisoner. With help from the castle’s enchanted staff, Belle learns to appreciate her captor and immediately falls in love with him. Back in the village however, unscrupulous hunter Gaston has his own plans for Belle. This movie is slightly different from the others because in this storyline we can see that the spotlight is shared and by reading between the lines you can see that one of the movie’s main characters is Prince Adam/the Beast because we see that Belle helps him transform into a better person. This shows that women are responsible for the emotional disturbances that men have in their lives and that they have the duty to help them. This gives women a responsibility that is not theirs. They are forced to solve men’s emotional problems, which is something they should not do and they are punished if it's not done “right”. The story also focuses on the story of belle but as I mentioned earlier, it is a shared spotlight. In the movie there is more than one female character such as Belle, the bimbettes, Ms. Potts, the wardrobe and other women in the town, however Belle only talks to Ms. Potts and The Wardrobe, which fulfils certain standards that support the patriarchal view of femininity. Their talk is about the Beast and how she would never be related to someone like him. Again, the talk about the man. Because of this, the movie does not pass the Bechdel. Again the conversations of the main character with other women or female characters are about men. On the other hand, at the beginning of the movie we can see that there is a different approach to the female main character. This could be supported by the fact that there are more women in the films crew. Out of 20 there are 5 women, in other words there is a 25% female participation. This is a great difference from past Disney movies because not only there is more female participation, there are more women involved in the story development and adaptation. Also, the story they were based on was written by a women which a big differentiation from other Disney Princesses stories. However, the female representation is still quite inaccurate because it still seems that women are always falling in love with a man and with out this their stories are not relevant. This is shown in Belle’s aspirations because even though she wants to read and help her father out of trouble, one of her aspirations is to fall in love. Even though there are more things in her agenda, she still believes it's a priority because one of the topics she read about is love stories. This shows women have to prioritise the expectations that are imposed by others and not by herself. Belle is shown with a different personalty because she does not fall in love with

41 the first man that appears in front of her but as the story goes on, it is noticeable that she starts to fall in love with the beast and accomplishing one of her aspirations. In this case the antagonists are Gaston and the townspeople. They see Belle as a very odd lady because she likes to read and she is patronised because she is a woman. Gaston wants to marry her and force her to be by his side as an ornament because he says that he “wants her by his side” but only because of her beauty and not because of what she thinks. He even argues that “its not right for a woman to read, she starts getting ideas”, because she wants her to be ignorant to only be appreciated for her beauty. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Belle fits better into the child archetype. Even though she has the characteristics of other archetypes, through the majority of the movie she acts like an innocent child that is in danger and needs to be saved. She is extremely optimistic about life and love because the prefers to live in the stories she reads. Often she is “dismissed and disparaged even when her discourse is important” because she is not valued for the things she thinks. Even though she is more independent she is still represented as a damsel in distress that needs to be saved by the prince (beast) when she is in danger which is one of the strongest stereotypes and gender roles.

6.6. Pocahontas The movie Pocahontas is from 1995. This is the first movie that is set on a not Eurocentric context. She is the first Native-American character in Disney Princess movies. This is a big change in Disney’s movies because the storyline is set in a completely new context. This is the Disney animated tale of the romance between a young Native American woman named Pocahontas and Captain John Smith, who journeyed to the New World with other settlers to begin fresh lives. Her powerful father, Chief Powhatan, disapproves of their relationship and wants her to marry a native warrior. Meanwhile, Smith’s fellow Englishmen hope to rob the Native Americans of their gold. And Pocahontas’ love for John Smith save the day. (IMDb, Pocahontas 1995). This movie movie has many female characters that talk to each other and have conversation. There is Pocahontas, her grandmother Willow and her best friend Najoma. But the problem is that the majority of their conversations are about a man, either John Smith or

42 Kocoum, the man that, according to Pocahontas’ father, she should marry. This is why this movie does not pass the Bechdel test. The story again revolves around the main female character falling in love. The female participation in this movie is of 5%. In a team of 19 people that are focused on the story development and adaptation, there is only one woman. This is a shocking downfall because the story about a woman is again told by men and this gives and poor representation of women. She wants to be free and independent. She is a very strong, intelligent, wise and adventurous women and even though she falls in love she wants to follow her own path. This is a big change on women’s aspirations because they show the aspiration for love as something on the side and its not her main priority. But, women are still portrayed as someone that would fall immediately in love with a man. It’s interesting that Pocahontas talks about following her path and that path is a man. She is first portrayed as an independent and wise person with a free spirit but the “path” she chooses is far away from independence. The only good thing is that at the end of the story she chooses to what she wants and does not leave everything behind for a man and marriage. The antagonist in this case has nothing against Pocahontas specifically because he is and English colonialist who is a racist and xenophobic. This is shown when he says that people that are different from him are “savages”.But there is not specific sexist behaviour against her. This is a big change. However, the social customs of her context are pointing at the fact that she needs to be besides a man to be protected. She breaks this rule when she chooses to be independent when John has to return to England. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Pocahontas fits into the archetype of the Iron Maiden. She is the first Disney princess that is portrayed as a more independent character and that represent women’s freedom of choice. She is portrayed as an independent, free spirited woman that has the need for adventure. This type of portrayal challenges the patriarchal system because it contradicts that women have to be delicate and submissive. As she is shown as a wise and independent person she is the one that teaches John Smith everything about the New World. She is one of the first characters that are shown with this much initiative and independence. She breaks many of the gender roles and stereotypes that are set for women and

43 this is a big step for Disney movies towards a richer representation of women. Even though she falls in love, she follows her own path and stays with her family and her people.

6.7. Mulan The movie Mulan is from 1998. This is the second movie that is not set in an Eurocentric context as it is set in China. Also, the story of Mulan is a complete change in Disney’s paradigm. This retelling of the old Chinese folktale is about the story of a young Chinese maiden who learns that her weakened and lame father is to be called up into the army in order to fight the invading Huns. Knowing that he would never survive the rigours of war in his state, she decides to disguise herself and join in his place. Unknown to her, her ancestors are aware of this and to prevent it, they order a tiny disgraced dragon, Mushu to join her in order to force her to abandon her plan. He agrees, but when he meets Mulan, he learns that she cannot be dissuaded and so decides to help her in the perilous times ahead. (IMDb, Mulan 1998). Even though the storyline of this movie is completely different from past Disney Princess movies, it still communicates an image of women that is not really positive. The fact that Mulan has to dress up as a man to be taken seriously gives the message that this is definitely a mans world and that a woman has to have the same characteristics of a man and leave behind there feminine side to be taken seriously and be listened to. There are various female characters in this movie; Mulan, Fa Li who is Mulan’s mother, Grandmother Fa, The Matchmaker and the women who give Mulan her ´makeover´ and dress her up like ‘a lady’. There are conversations between Mulan and these women but there are all about being the perfect lady and be beautiful so that men can look at her and choose her as a wife so she can honour her family. They talk about being with the right man. This is why this movie does not pass the Bechdel test. The only conversation women have with each other is about men and getting married. The female participation in the crew is of 22%, in other words, out of a team of 23 people, there are 5 women who worked in the story development and adaptation. It's still a very low number but it is an improvement from past Disney Princess movies. Still there are more men telling a women’s story and the fact that Mulan has to turn into a man for her to be noticed is a way to say women are inferior.

44 Mulan’s aspirations are very different from previous princesses since she wants to be herself and prevent her father from going to war. He has a serious injury since he served in the army when he was young. She wants to prove that she can honour her family with other actions that have nothing to do with her looks or physical appearance but with her intelligence and physical endurance. The antagonist in this case would be social context Mulan lives in and the fact that woman cannot do anything else but be beautiful and be someone’s wife because she is not taken seriously only because she is a woman. She has to fight against this so she can be listened and be able to honour her family. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, fits in the Iron Maiden archetype because even though she is expected to fulfil certain gender roles, she is an independent, ambitious, directive and competitive. She can be described as “authoritative and “too tough” for a woman. She wants people to understand that she can do the same things a man does and that she has the qualifications, strength and intelligence for this. This breaks many stereotypes and gender roles that are expected from women. Even though I’m not completely satisfied with some of the communication, I do believe this was a turning point on how women are portrayed in Disney Princess movies.

6.8. Princess and the Frog The movie the Princess and the Frog is from 2009. Ten years have passed from the last Disney Princess movie and women are in another historic and social context in general (talking about the western way of life). This is another big change in Disney Princess storylines because Tiana is the first African-American princess. The story is a modern day retelling of the classic story The Frog Prince. The Princess and the Frog finds the lives of arrogant, carefree Prince Naveen and hardworking waitress Tiana crossing paths. Prince Naveen is transformed into a frog by a conniving voodoo magician and Tiana, following suit, upon kissing the amphibian royalty. With the help of a trumpet-playing alligator, a Cajun firefly, and an old blind lady who lives in a boat in a tree, Naveen and Tiana must race to break the spell and fulfil their dreams. (IMDb, The Princess and the Frog, 2009). This movie has various female characters, there is Tiana, Eudora who is Tiana’s mom, Charlotte le Bouff and Mama Odie. Tiana has a conversation with all of these women and even

45 though it is a modern story that focuses on Tiana’s dream to have a restaurant, the only thing that women talk about is about falling in love with a man because that is Charlotte’s dream, its Eudora’s wish for Tiana and Mama Odie’s instruction to break the spell of her and Naveen being frogs. So because of this, the movie does not pass the Bechdel test. We can see that even though is a more current movie there is 0% of female participation in the film’s crew. This is still men telling women’s stories and after analysing this film you can see that the movie still falls into certain patterns as the old movies. Tiana’s main aspiration is to cook and open her own restaurant. Her father taught her that she has to work hard to get to her goals and that’s what she does to get the money for her restaurant. However, as the story progresses, she falls in love with the prince and gets married. Although it seems like she accomplished all her dreams, I believe that her desire to have a restaurant was the dream of her father and not her own. This shows a new component that makes the female portrayal in this movie poor. She is trying to accomplish her father’s dream and not her own, as if her father’s dream was more important. This communicates that the wishes and needs of a woman have to be put a side to accomplish what men want. This is a negative turn because it still communicates that women are inferior to men and unable to have their own aspirations The antagonist in this case is the social context in which Tiana is set. Even though she wants to fight for her goal of having a restaurant, when she wants to buy the venue for the restaurant the owners tell her that she needs to top the offer another client offered. She argues that she worked really had and for a very long time to get that money and they tell her that “a woman of her background would have her hands full trying to run a big business like that”. They are limiting her because she is an African-American woman. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Tiana fits in the Iron Maiden Archetype. She is a strong, independent, ambitious and competitive women who is concentrated in reaching her professional goal to become a restaurant owner. She can be seen as “too tough” because she is a woman. Even though it’s a movie from 2009 there is still a lot of resistance from society towards strong, ambitious and independent women. According to traditional gender roles and stereotypes, Tiana does not fit in to any of them and she is a character that breaks many of these roles because although she likes to cook, she wants to own a restaurant and be the owner of her business. She is not cooking or doing anything to please a man specifically, she

46 wants to do it because she is a good chef, likes to cook and wants to be an independent business woman. However, there are still various hints of past patterns in the main character. They communicate that women have to fall in love if they coexist with a man and that is a contradiction to the idea of Tiana being independent Also, there is still a hint where you can see that women cannot do things without the help of a man because, even though she falls in love with prince Naveen, he needs to help her get the venue for her restaurant and that supports the stereotype and the gender role that women are never meant to be the hero and do things by themselves.

6.9. Tangled: The movie tangled is from 2010. The film tells the story of Princess Rapunzel, who, after receiving the healing powers from a magical flower, she is kidnapped from the palace in the middle of the night by Mother Gothel. Mother Gothel knows that the flower’s magical powers are now growing within the golden hair of Rapunzel, and to stay young, she must lock Rapunzel in her hidden tower. Rapunzel is now a teenager and her hair has grown to a length of 70-feet. The beautiful Rapunzel has been in the tower her entire life, and she is curious about the outside world. One day, the bandit Flynn Ryder scales the tower and is taken captive by Rapunzel. Rapunzel strikes a deal with the charming thief to act as her guide to travel to the place where the floating lights come from that she has seen every year on her birthday. Rapunzel is about to have the most exciting and magnificent journey of her life (IMDb, Rapunzel 2010). In this movie there are various female characters such as Rapunzel, Mother Gothel and Rapunzel’s mother, the Queen. But Rapunzel has deeper conversations with Mother Gothel and this is the first movie in which the conversations are not all about men and falling in love and getting married. They talk about it once when Rapunzel says she likes Flynn but the conversation does not revolve around that. They talk about how Mother Gothel has to protect Rapunzel from the horrible, dangerous and malicious world. She argues that people outside the tower will steal her to use her powers (just as she did). The movie focuses more on the relationship Rapunzel has with Mother Gothel and the fact that she falls in love with Flynn is a secondary occurrence. This is why this is the first Disney Princess movie that passes the Bechdel

47 Test. However, we can see that at the end Rapunzel falls in love with Flynn Rider so it shows that women have to fall in love with a man the spend time with. This can be seen as a consequence of only having a female participation of 11%, in other, words just one women who is associate producer in a film crew of 9 people. This is a major drop in female participation from older films but an increase since The Princess and the Frog. We can see that this may have influenced the storyline and the fact that the main topic is a toxic behaviour between women. This is the first movie since The Little Mermaid that we see the competition between women again and this is supporting the stereotype that only young women are beautiful and that older women are not. It also also sustains the fact that women need to everything so they can look young. Rapunzel’s aspiration is to get out of that tower and see the “floating lights”. She is looking for independence and adventure. She wants to get to know the outside world and find out what has she been missing. She is a very innocent character that is naive and curious. This is a change from other female characters with the same characteristics because protagonists like Cinderella, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty they are innocent and naive but they are not a bit curious about anything else other than a man. However, Rapunzel does not wish to be inside a tower all the time just waiting for someone to save her, she wishes for adventure. The antagonist in this case is Mother Gothel and her main aspiration is to stay young forever. There was a magic flower that was given to Rapunzel’s mother because she was extremely sick when she was giving birth. She keeps Rapunzel prisoner because her powers come from a flower that made Mother Gothel young for hundreds of years. Also , as I said earlier, Mother Gothel’s aspiration supports the stereotype that women have to be young and beautiful and that growing old is bad and encourages this competition between women. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Rapunzel fits in the Child archetype because she is very optimistic and enthusiastic about life and love. She is not taken very seriously by Mother Gothel. This makes her seem less mature, less competent and less capable than adults. Even though she has aspirations to be free and adventurous, she is reduced to the role of a little girl because of how she is treated during the whole film. She is dismissed and disparaged even when her discourse is important. Even though Flynn ends up falling in love with her, he treats her like a little innocent girl during most of the film.

48 6.10. Brave: The movie Brave is from 2012. This film tells a story that is set in Scotland in a rugged and mythical time. This movie features Princess Merida, an aspiring archer and impetuous daughter of Queen Elinor. Merida is told by her mother, Queen Elinor that her interests are not what a Princess should be doing, and that she has to marry. But Merida chooses to defy her mother. And when she and her mother have an argument, Merida rides off and meets a witch. She asks for a spell to change her mother. And the witch gives her a cake which she gives to her mother, but the change is not what she was hoping for. Merida makes a reckless choice that unleashes unintended peril and forces her to spring into action to set things right (IMDb, Brave 2012). This is the first movie that is completely focused on a woman’s story and does not include a woman falling in love. Merida is a young woman that wishes to change tradition so se doesn’t have to be betroth since her main interest is not to be besides a man but to be independent, seek adventure and do the things she likes. There are various female characters, Merida and Queen Elinor, Merida’s mother, Maudie the handmaiden, and the witch. They do talk about marriage and how it has been a tradition for the first born woman to be betroth, but Merida argues against that because it’s not something she aspires. She even mentions the fact that she is not ready and she might never be ready. The other conversations are about how the need to rebuilt their relationship as mother and daughter. The other conversation Merida has with another woman is the witch and they talk about how Merida has to change her mother to change her fate. This is why this movie passes the Bechdel Test. The female participation in the film crew that is focused to the writing, story adaptation, production, and direction of Brave is 36%, in other words there were four women in a crew team of eleven people. This is the highest percentage of women participating in the film crew of Disney Princess movies. It is still a low number but is a big change from past movies. Also, the fact that the storyline was developed by a woman and that the director is a woman shows a bigger and richer picture of how women can be like. There is more knowledge on a woman’s insight because women are the ones who are really telling this story. This is reflected on the development of the story because of how women are represented and portrayed. There is a completely different way of shaping the female characters and this is affected by the fact that the movie is an original story, not based on past fairytales and owing to matter that it was directed by a woman.

49 Merida’s aspiration is to be independent and free and she wants do convince her mother that she does not have to be married to be valued as a person and as a princess. She also wants her mother to respect her decision and have a good relationship with her. This is the only movie in which a good relationship between women is encouraged. Even though, the relationship is between mother and daughter, is a good way to portray that his relationship between women is possible because in other movies they showed that the main enemy of the female protagonist was a woman and it was always the image of a mother. Brave discourages this competition because they show the importance of this kind of relationship. Its a way of saying that if you have a good relationship with your mother you can have a good relationship with other woman and create this link and alliance of sisterhood. In this case, the antagonist would be the social conducts that Merida has to follow because she is a woman and a princess. The fact men have to fight for her hand and that she has no power over her decision is a very accurate portrayal of what a lot of women have gone through and some times have to face now a days. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Merida fits into the Iron maiden Archetype because she is independent, adventurous, competitive, strong, ambitious and tough. Her priority is not to be with a man but to be proud about herself and be fulfilled with her goals. She is not hyperfeminine, she is not submissive, she does not sing or dance, she is strong, she likes sports and more importantly she is not a damsel in distress waiting for her prince charming. She is a strong, intelligent, clever and astute character that is a richer portrayal of what women are in reality. She manages to break many gender roles and stereotypes that are set for women and give a broader image of what many woman are like.

6.11. Frozen: The movie Frozen is from 2013. This movie tells the story of fearless optimist Anna teams up with rugged mountain man Kristoff and his loyal reindeer Sven set off on an epic journey to find her sister Elsa, whose icy powers have trapped the kingdom of Arendelle in eternal winter. Encountering Everest-like conditions, mystical trolls and a hilarious snowman named Olaf, Anna and Kristoff battle the elements in a race to save the kingdom. From the outside Elsa looks poised, regal and reserved, but in reality she lives in fear as she wrestles with a mighty secret: she was born with the power to create ice and snow. It’s a beautiful ability, but also extremely

50 dangerous. Haunted from the moment her magic nearly killed her younger sister Anna, Elsa has isolated herself, spending every waking minute trying to suppress her growing powers. Her mounting emotions trigger the magic, accidentally setting off an eternal winter that she can’t stop. She fears she’s becoming a monster and that no one, not even her sister, can help her (IMDb, Frozen 2013). This movie is also focused on the relationship between women. These story is about two sisters and how they were torn apart because of Elsa’s powers and caused a breach in their relationship and what they had to do to rebuild their sisterhood. The two main female characters are Queen Elsa and her sister Anna. When they have a conversation, it's generally about their relationship and all the struggles that had to live because they were separated. Elsa mentions that she does not approve of Anna’s marriage because she jus met the man and its inappropriate and troubling. That is the only talk they have mentioning a man.They do not centre their conversation in that nor in the talk of romantic love. However, this shows that Anna follows a similar pattern from older Princesses because she falls in love with the first man she finds. However, since Hans is the antagonists and the story turns around completely, this communicates that appearances can be deceiving because Hans only used her to have power. The fact is that the idea of love at first sight and all the myths of romantic love portrayed in most Disney Princess movies are not real and this movie helps to break that because Anna does not have her “happily ever after” with Hans. This is why this movie passes the Bechdel Test. The conversations between them are about their relationship. The female participation in the film crew that is focused to the writing, story adaptation, production, and direction of Frozen is 25%. This is a big drop from the last movie but we can see that the story is still focused on the relationship between sisters. However, we can see again that women are represented as someone that cannot be with a man without falling in love with him. The positive thing is that the film focuses on the relationship between sisters and how can this encourage a better and loving relationship between women, where there is unity and support. Elsa’s aspiration is to be free, independent and she does not want to be afraid to show her true self. Anna, on the other hand, wants to be able to have a relationship with her sister but she starts to lose hope. Her other option is to find “the one for her”. Even though she wants to get along with her sister, she also wants to fall in love and be with a man. But even though Anna wants to fall in love and at the end she has to perform the famous “true loves kiss” to break the

51 spell, she demonstrates that an act of love is saving her sister. This is a huge change from past Disney Princess movies because the focus on how to make relationship between women stronger and better. This communicates that as well as you can save a sister you can save other women. in this case the antagonist would be Hans. His aspiration is to have power and attention. As he is the youngest of 12 brothers so he was never taken seriously in his family. So to obtain this power, he wants to take the power away from Elsa by making her feel inferior and by tricking Anna into believing he was in love with her. This is a new personality for a Disney Antagonist because it shows a man trying to control woman and make her feel inferior, but he fails because both sisters stick together and don’t let that happen. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Elsa fits into the Iron Maiden archetype because she is strong, independent, courageous, adventurous, ambitious and directive. She does not fit in any of the stereotypes portrayed in Disney. She is the first princess that does not end up with a man. She could be considered a feminist symbol because all she wants is to be her true self and be respected for that. She wants to have a good relationship with her sister, even though she is very different to her, she loves and respects her and wants to be close to her. She wants to be herself and not necessarily be with a man and be defined by that. She breaks many stereotypes that have been reinforced in Disney movies. She is shown as strong, with a dominant personality who will not be submissive and do what they tell her.

6.12. Moana: The movie Moana is from the year 2016. The movie tells the story of Moana Waialiki is a sea voyaging enthusiast and the only daughter of a chief in a long line of navigators. When her island’s fishermen can’t catch any fish and the crops fail, she learns that the demigod Maui caused the blight by stealing the heart of the goddess, Te Fiti. The only way to heal the island is to persuade Maui to return Te Fiti’s heart, so Moana sets off on an epic journey across the Pacific. The film is based on stories from Polynesian mythology. (IMDb, Moana, 2016) This movie focuses on making the female character the hero of the story because she is the one that solves the problem in the end. This story is very different from the others because Moana does not consider her self a Princess. When Maui tells her that she is a princess because

52 she “wears a dress and has an animal side kick” she denies it and clarifies that she is just the daughter of a chief. This breaks the idea of the princess completely. The movie focuses on how Moana must solve the problem to save her people and the world. As future chief of her tribe, she is handed many responsibilities and duties and even though her parents are terrified of her going out of the reef, she knows she should do it. This is the first movie in which the female character’s destiny is not related to marriage or men at all. This is a massive change in the Disney Princess movies and demonstrates that there is more depth to story and shows a big change in how women are portrayed in these films. There are tree main female characters in the movie: Moana, her mother Sina and her grandmother Tala. Moana has conversations with both of them and non of these are about men. They talk about Maui, the male demi-god but their conversation is about how she needs to find him to make him return what he stole in order to save life on the islands. There is never a conversation that relates to romance or romantic love. This contrasts in many ways with other movies because the female participation in this film is of 12%, in other words, there is only one woman in a crew of 8 people. The woman who is in the crew has participation in the story development and adaptation. Even though the majority of the cast are men, the few female participation helped to turn this story around and turn Moana into a Heroine breaking many stereotypes that are set for women. Moana’s aspiration is to be adventurous, independent and travel the world by sea and save her family from the mistake Maui made. There is never a hint that she is going to find “the one” or fall in love. Even though she coexists with Maui, she does not fall in love with him. This breaks many stereotypes that were set on the majority of the Disney Princess movies. For example, in Frozen, Anna mets Kristoff and after a while of being together and coexisting for a purpose, she ends up falling in love with him, communicating that we cannot help falling in love when we are with a man. Moana breaks this idea completely because she is only focused on her goal with is save her family. The antagonist in this case would be Te Ka, the lava goddess that prevents her from having the world. However, Te Ka only became Moana’s antagonist because Maui stole her heart. Maui stole the heart because he wanted to be seen as a hero and selfishly receive approval and not necessarily because he wanted to help. At the end Te Ka unites with Moana for her to become into the goddess Te Fiti once again. In quite a deep analysis I could see that Maui

53 represents patriarchy dividing women for his benefit, but as both female characters unite, we can see that women together save everyone. Even though Maui helps Moana to fix the mess he created Moana is the one who solved it. This also shows that when women help each other they can do wonderful things. According to Julia T. Wood women archetype, Moana fits into the Iron Maiden archetype. Moana is she is strong, independent, courageous, adventurous and ambitious something that breaks many of the stereotypes that are set for women in society and the ones set in the majority of the Disney Princess movies. She is also shown as very athletic, skilled, clever and astute character which breaks stereotypes that are set in a patriarchal society and enriches the representation and portrayal of women.

7. Discussion and top findings

It is clear that Disney has had a long journey and it will continue and after the analysis of these movies we can see that there has been some positive changes for the most part. For starters, more women are working in the crew of the movie which helps with the woman’s insight. This means that stories with female protagonists are more accurate and enriched representation of women’s image and aspirations are richer and have more variety. This gives the opportunity to the audience to see that there are many ways a woman can be and they cannot be defined by obsolete stereotypes and gender roles that don’t really apply anymore. Women have been through a difficult and long path so that we can have recognition for our intelligence and talent. This affects the movie because we can see that most recent movies pass the Bechdel test, for example, Brave and Frozen because the storyline of the protagonist does not revolve around man and they have deeper aspirations. From Snow White to Belle it's clear that their main aspiration is to find love. As time goes by the stories start have more depth and the audience can get to know better the personality of the Princesses but in the end, it seems like its the same template. This shows a lack of progress in women’s representation from 1937 to 1995 because all female protagonists are seen as they have to be beautiful, nice and kind and they have to wait for love to come knocking on their doors and when it does all they want is to be next to their prince. There is only one difference. Movies like Snow White, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty show a more simplistic portrayal of women because they don’t do anything apart from waiting

54 for their loved one and movies like The Little Mermaid, and Beauty and the Beast, the female character does have more purpose because she has to fight for their loved one. However, the main point is that in these five movies, women are portrayed as if the only things they are capable of are thinking about love and men, and falling in love. Although it may seem like the opposite, movies like Pocahontas, Mulan, The Princess and the Frog and Tangled have low possibility of passing the test. These female characters aspire to be independent and adventurous and their main focus is not to find love. In these movies the aspiration of the female characters and their storyline are more sophisticated and have more depth because they want to accomplish a personal dream that are limited by their social context and they have to break the rules to accomplish it. This makes forces the protagonist to break the gender roles that are set for women that categorise them as inferior beings to show the audience that they strong and courageous. However, the only problem with these three movies is that they show that when women spend time with men they are destined to fall in love with them as if women fell in love with every men they met. This contradicts the idea that is being set at the beginning of each of these movies becase they start wishing for freedom and independence and they end up giving everything to be besides a man. Movies like Brave, Frozen and Moana completely break the idea of women only seeking love. Merida, Elsa’s and Moana’s aspirations are far more complex and profound than the other princesses. Merida does not want to get married and wants her mother to understand her point of view; Elsa wants to use her powers freely and have a good relationship with her sister Anna; and Moana wants to travel the seas and save her family. The three characters focus on having a better relationship with another woman, in the case of Moana this can be seen in the relationship she has with her grandmother and her mother and how she accomplishes uniting with the goddess of life to solve the problems. This is a a big change because in older movies like Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and even Tangled show that a relationship between women is extremely difficult because there will always be jealousy and competition for beauty. Movies like Brave and Frozen stop making beauty a priority and discard completely the feeling of competition between women. This encourages sisterhood and a good and positive relationship between women and it is something that should be supported more often. Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and The Little Mermaid’s storylines is extremely basic. At the time the movie was released, women had to keep certain standards. This movies

55 support the idea that women have to be beautiful and because of this they don’t have to work for anything, nor accomplish any aspiration that is not being with a man and get married and limits women to be object defined by men’s desires and necessities. It also supports and encourages the idea that if women are beautiful they can accomplish anything using their physical attributes instead of their intellectual potential. This type of representations have to be completely eradicated because the fact that women and girls see this represented in the media, it shows this behaviour as being acceptable. Another characteristic of these four movies is that they express an interesting contrast between “good” and “bad.” Women that are portrayed as “evil” or “bad” are represented by characters that do not fulfil the established ideas of what patriarchal societies define as womanhood, which are women that are not in service to men’s needs and in this cases are the antagonists of the films. They are stoping the “good” women from achieving their aspiration, that can be interpreted as being in service to men and communicating that they have to be considered inferior and powerless. This is a clear representation of what patriarchal societies expect from women and the fact that these movies were mostly written by men show what Simone de Beauvoir argues, “humanity is male, and man defines women, not in herself, but in relation to himself; she is not considered an autonomous being” (Beauvoir, 1949) Another interesting finding was Princesses from Snow White to Belle in can enter in the Mother archetype apart from the one they were categories into because they show this “motherly” instinct that is one of women’s stereotypes and gender roles. They are represented as someone that needs to be kind and good with everyone and that they should have the instinct to take care of someone without even thinking. This starts to chance because more modern princesses do focus more on themselves and not on the fact that they need to have this “mother instinct” to take care of someone. This is a stereotype that needs to be broken because not all women want to have children nor consider that they would ever want to (like Merida). This type of things confine women to be as society expects them to be the fact that the majority of the Princess movies only have one type of women portrayed in their storylines, gives the idea to the audience that this is the way it’s suppose to be. This takes away freedom from women because they believe that they have to fulfil society’s rules and expectations and are not free to make their own decisions.

56 Another interesting detail was that every single Disney Princess except Merida are showed singing and dancing. According to Brewer gender roles women are expected to love singing and dancing but this is not always true. There are many women that do not consider this a priority and have their minds set in other things. It is interesting that the only movie that was directed by a woman (Brave), shows a completely different stand point of how women are represented because Merida breaks many of the gender roles set for women. This movie also breaks the pattern of all other Disney movies where the Princess has to end up with the prince. It believe it is a good start but still many movies show a very poor impression of what women are like and what they want. An additional finding was that Moana is the only princess and female character of the Disney movies that is represented as a true hero. She sacrifices her life to save her people and her family. For a moment it would have seemed that Maui, the male demi god was going to do all the work for her but when she notices that he is incapable of solving the problem, she steps up, takes initiative and saves the day. This is the first Disney Princess movie that shows a man failing and what it is suppose to be his duty. This also breaks many male stereotypes, like “men are always the heroes and women are damsels in distress” (Brewer, 2011). The roles are completely shifted putting the woman in the role of the hero giving more diversity to the stories. This is the first time a woman is represented and portrayed as a hero. Merida is also a hero because she saves her mother, but Moana is the first “princess” that sacrifices her life to save her town and family and takes responsibility as a selfless leader. Comparing Snow White and the seven dwarfs and Moana, I can say there is a definite change in how Disney has represented women over the course of time. From Snow White, that is extremely delicate, naive who exactly fits into the stereotype of the damsel in distress, to Moana who risks her life to save her family and takes the responsibility to be the leader of her tribe and accomplish her dream of sailing the seas. There are thousands of movies and stories about men that are very sophisticated and complex and show men as investigators, warriors, leaders, scientists, etc., and there are very few movies about women that can compare. This is a big problem because we can clearly see the inequality that women in society suffer. The negative thing about this is that this transmits the idea that women are not capable to do things men do. Disney movies have an enormous audience in which most of them are children and teenagers. As I have mentioned before, during

57 these ages, children and teenagers are very sensitive to things that happen in their environment and they acquire a big part of their knowledge. Disney has delivered powerful messages from their movies but some of them are not accurate for the time because they support outdated and old fashion stereotypes. Nowadays, messages from old movies have to be explained as obsolete and out of context and there needs to be more work in movies that explore more varied storylines for women that show what they are really capable of and what they are really like without classifying them into antiquate gender roles that limit them in every way.

8. Conclusion

Media has a very powerful impact on the audiences and if we want to see a change in society we need to see a change in what the media es broadcasting. It’s a vicious cycle because what happens in society is represented in the media and what is seen in the media is replicated in society. There needs to be a change in our social conduct so we can finally achieve equality for both genders and these can be achieved if people start seeing things from different perspectives, for example, if men start seeing how different society is for them than for women and this can be seen in how women are represented in the media specially in the Disney Princess movies that were analysed. The representation of women in Disney Princess moves has changed over time in most of the aspects that I analysed. It is fair to say that Disney has been contributing and helping this obsolete and antique gender roles disappear in their most recent movies, especially Brave and Moana. Compared to older movies, this two give a completely different impression and idea of what women could be like showing more variety and diverse types of personality. This type of analysis opens the possibility for a change because it proves the fact that women have been categorised and judged by very superficial characteristics and that have always been treated as inferior and less capable. It’s necessary to share this ideas with the public and not only in an academic atmosphere because in order to make a change in society its fundamental that we start communicating this information and create real awareness of these problems to start working on changing the actual situation. As a Communication bachelor, I can develop appropriate material that can accomplish the goal of transmitting this analysis to the public. I created a prototype model of a platform that portrays this analysis in a way that people

58 would consume it, enjoy it and learn about what these movies are really communicating to the society. This can help acknowledge that there is a problem that needs to be solved so that we can be freed from the stigmas, rules and stereotypes set by a patriarchal society that limit, diminish and dismiss women and generates a system of oppression. This needs to be done becase the older movies are still being viewed by the audience and they are still reinforcing stereotypes and gender roles that are trying to be eliminated. This information would help the audience understand that older Disney Princess movies are communicating ideas that are misleading. This will help acknowledge that patriarchy has to be eradicated so that women stop suffering from discrimination, injustice and violence. Instead relate with characters like Merida and Moana which break all stereotypes that were set by the patriarchal societies. The bottom line of specially this two movies is that it supports the idea that women are independent and free to choose what they want, that they have to fight and work hard to get it. When this ideas are communicated to the young audiences and to new parents, it helps to make a change because it breaks the gender roles. It’s important not to teach these gender roles anymore because it's the thing that keep society from moving forward. Children are born into gender roles just because of their sex and these types of movies reinforce and replicate these ideas. Children should have the change to choose from different representations of male and female characters and not be influenced by the “established” gender roles to build up their personality. This type of knowledge in young audiences helps to break these gender roles from earlier age to encourage the change so these audiences grow without prejudice of obsolete gender stereotypes. There has been a lot of change over time, as we can also see in the analysis of the movies, but there is still very long way to go to actually reached gender equality. Women in the majority of Disney Princess movies are still represented in very basic and superficial storylines compared to movies that have a male protagonists. The audience watches these movies it communicates and reaffirms that this is the way that society is and does not give any opportunity for change because these stories keep replicating this mistaken information to younger audiences. Change has to be encouraged by every part of society but media has to do an important modification in how women are being portrayed. This can be a start of the path because if gender roles and stereotypes are broken in the media, the vicious cycle would break and people will openly see a variety of ways in which “gender” can be defined.

59 9. Future work

The analysis is the beginning of an investigation that can be taken deeper. Each variable analysed can be extended and there are many other variable that can be studied to answer the question “How have women been portrayed and represented in Disney Princess movies?”, so more ways can be found to solve this problem. I am of the opinion that its my responsibility and my desire to make a deeper analysis of this investigation due to the enormous effect that Disney movies have in their audiences and how this can permeate to social behavioural patterns. These behavioural patterns would be analysed in Mexican society, specifically targeting people from Mexico City first and then the whole country. In this case I would analyse the effect of these movies in Mexican girls and women which have access to them and see how these representations have permeated society. To take this investigation to the next level I would take these analysis and share it with the current audience of these movies, that are girls from 9 to 12 years old, and study how they affect girl’s perception of gender. Then, analyse how women 22-26 years old perceived these movies and how it helped shape their idea of gender stereotypes and gender roles. This data will be gathered with interviews and focus groups. The next step is to compare the two points of view to see if both groups have the same idea of gender and determine if the poor representation and portrayal of women in these movies is affecting the audiences’ view of gender, society and themselves. Also I would take this same methods to other topics like how the Disney princesses have been sexualised in each of their movies and with this defined a stereotype of femininity and how this can lead to the (female) audiences’ aspiration to an impossible beauty standard. When these factor are clear I would do interviews and focus groups to audiences from 9 to 12 years old and other interviews and focus groups to audiences from 22 to 26. The idea of having these to age groups is to compare how girls now a days react to these type of information and analyse what older audiences learned from these movies and how has it affected their perception on gender and sexuality. This is important because there have been many other studies that prove women are affected by how they see other women in the media. Literature, cinema and media set an imposible beauty standard that women have to achieve to be considered beautiful. This

60 standards were set by men and form part of the gender norms that conform this patriarchal societies. Girls, teenagers and women lack from high self esteem because media has portrayed a beauty standard of how “the perfect woman” should be. Women do everything they can to meet these standards and if they can’t they get frustrated and they believe that they are not enough. This leads to depression and eating disorders because women are always being told they need to be beautiful, thin and sexy according to guidelines and requirements that are impossible. Requirements that are set by a patriarchal society. Women have been taught that they need to be beautiful for men so they can be appreciated and that if they are not they are not worth anything. This triggers a competition between women that has been a part of this society for years. Since a very young age, girls are taught that they need to compete with other girls for beauty and approval. This never stops because women keep competing thought-out their whole lives and this leads to the lack of sisterhood and union between women. It’s something I have observed over and over again. Women criticising and even hating other women just because they are more beautiful or they have other physical qualities. This is something that is seen in many Disney movies and they communicate that these behaviour is not negative and that women should compete with each other for the attention of men. This leads to women only focusing on their appearance and considering themselves as sexualised objects that need to be approved and used by men. I believe women’s part in society is much more important than how beautiful they are because they are capable of many things and sometimes they don’t even know it. By focusing on superficial details many women don’t pay attention to their education and intellectual capacity. This part of the study will help me develop different tools that can help share the findings to explain and advise women to build up their self esteem and collaborate with other women to break the obsolete stereotypes and stop the objectification of women. The idea is to give people this information as a wake up call for a social change. I would support this argument using Marx’s theory of control mechanisms and explain how the division of women helps patriarchal societies to have power over then and don’t encourage their empowerment. Another important point I would like to study is how these movies portray the idea of the romantic love. This is important because real relationships are nothing like they are represented in Disney movies. I would use the same method of comparison and analysis

61 between the two age groups mentioned above to see if the reaction to the myths and ideas of romantic love are the same and analyse their ideas of how romance works and see if these ideas were influenced by these movies. Another important point is to deepen the study of the effect of lack of female participation in cinema affects the portrayal of women. I would analyse the context of each movie and find what was women’s position in the film industry (if any) and how this affects how the story is being told. The fact that men are the ones that write about women distorts the reality and gives a poor image of womanhood because they are being described form a patriarchal point of view and this narration limits women to be according to the antique stereotypes and gender roles. This study is necessary to see what has improved over time and which are the areas that need improvement in the film and media industry. Encouraging gender equality in this sector would help improve the representation and portrayal of women in different storylines. Many girls and women aspire to be as women the see in the media so to encourage empowerment and eradicate low self-esteem, women need to be represented in a variety of ways and need to be shown breaking stereotypes. I would work with this subjects of study to start with and as the investigation goes on, start developing tools to communicate this information. I believe that the work that is being done in the academic field should be communicated in more ways because, specifically taking about the Mexican society, there are many women who feel lost and have no one to turn to for help and sometimes they don’t know they needed. Gender inequality and gender violence has been normalised in this society and women believe that they deserve to be treated this way. My idea is to create effective tools that are of simple access to the information I have found with this study and the ones I want to develop in the future. I have always been taught that information is power, so to break the paradigms and encourage change women should have access to this power so they can start leading their own lives and breaking obsolete and patriarchal barriers. With my work, I wish to inspire many women so we can start uniting against everything that has been keeping us down for years and seek a better society.

62 10. Bibliography:

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68 Clements, R. (Director). (2016) Moana. (Motion Picture): https://www.imdb.com/title/ tt3521164/?ref_=tt_mv_close

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69 Appendix 1: Bechdel, A. (2008). The Essential Dykes To Watch Out For. Boston, New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

70 Appendix 2: Prototype of the interactive platform where analysis is portrayed. This is how I will start sharing this information with the audience so create awareness of the problem.

LINK: https://xd.adobe.com/view/2a4271af-f8b3-4c92-9e7c-df12df8e7cdc-7f11/? fullscreen&hints=off

71 Real Women v.s. Disney Princess How has the portrayal and representation of women changed in Disney Princess Movies over the course of time from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to Moana?

Alejandra Guizar Bistrain Problemática • Vivimos en una sociedad que es extremadamente injusta con las mujeres.

• Machismo y misoginia. • Violencia de género. • Estereotipos y roles de genero anticuados. • Muchos estereotipos están representados y reforzados en los medios y en las películas.

• En su mayoría, las películas de Princesas de Disney refuerzan estos estereotipos y roles de género lo cual causa que las audiencias lo adopten.

• Hay muchos estudios psicológicos y sociológicos que prueban los niños pequeños de 8-12 años ven estos contenidos mediáticos y aprenden estas estigmas que hoy en dia son obsoletos.

• Esto está sustentado con la teoría del cultivo. • Esto se debe a que las películas se siguen remasterizando, relanzando y reproduciendo.

• Las más populares son las que refuerzan estos estereotipos y roles de género obsoletos.

• Efecto negativo en la audiencia. Análisis

• Realice una investigación y un análisis de 12 películas de princesas de Disney en donde las protagonistas fueran mujeres (Aladdin no entra en este análisis).

• En esta investigación se estudiaron las películas en diferentes aspectos para ver cómo se ha representado a la mujer en estas películas y si ha habido un cambio representativo a través del tiempo. Variables de Análisis

• Bechdel Test • Participación femenina en producción de películas

• Aspiraciones de protagonistas • Definición del antagonista y obstáculo que presenta

• Arquetipos de Julia T. Wood de acuerda a roles de género vistos en los personajes protagónicos. Y todo esto, ¿para qué?…

• Hacer una plataforma web donde se presente este analysis de forma interactiva para que sea una forma divertida de aprender para el consumidor.

• Esto es para concientizar a las personas acerca de cómo se esta representando a la mujer en estas películas y los estereotipos que refuerzan. Objetivos Smart

Specific: Crear un plataforma interactiva Measurable: El proceso de análisis comienza donde se analice cómo ha cambiado midiendo cuales de las películas cumplen con el test representación de los personajes femeninos de Bechdel y a partir de eso se miden las aspiraciones en las películas de princesas de Disney a de las personajes mujeres, a que se debe la rivalidad, competencia y violencia pasiva entre las mujeres, los través del tiempo, desde Blanca Nieves roles de genero que se reforzaban dependiendo de la hasta Moana. La idea es poner en un solo época. De acuerdo a esta información, definirá en lugar un análisis muy completo sobre estas qué arquetipo entra cada personaje. Posteriormente, películas para que las personas puedan que tanto afecta que la producción de las películas tener un fácil acceso a toda información. involucren a más mujeres que a hombres. Objetivos Smart

Achievable: Esto se puede realizar ya Relevant: Es relevante explorar estos que se harán análisis a las películas aspectos ya que muchas de las niñas y basándome en bibliografía feminista y niños que ven estas películas desarrollan distintos estudios de género que han su juicio sobre los roles de género que ven representados en los personajes. Además sido muy relevante y a distintos todas las películas, aunque sean mas estereotipos y roles de genero antiguas, siguen siendo populares y siguen establecidos por las ideas patriarcales. transmitiendo esos mensajes. Objetivos Smart

Time-bound: Se tendrá un prototipo del tablero interactivo para la ultima semana de noviembre/primera semana de diciembre. Audiencia

¿Quienes pueden consumir Principales detractores Perfil Principal (Hiper lo que mi proyecto propone? segmentación)

El proyecto comenzará como un piloto Personas que no estén de acuerdo con 1.¿Por qué deberían consumir mi plataforma? y se compartirá a madres de niñas y los movimientos feministas o que no Porque es una buena fuente de información en donde niños pequeños que tengan entre 9-12 están de acuerdo con criticar estas personas que no tienen mucho conocimiento de años de edad. películas. feminismo y padres que quieran enseñar a sus hijos acerca del tema pueden recurrir porque todo esta fundamentado con teorías existentes. También se compartirá a mujeres y 2.¿Qué necesidades tiene la persona que hombres que tengan conocimiento consumirá mi plataforma? acerca del feminismo o que quieran Tiene la necesidad de saber que está pasando en su aprender sobre el tema. Este grupo contexto para poder generar un cambio para resolver esta en las edades de entre 22-27 años la problemática de género hacia las mujeres de edad. 3.¿Qué beneficios tendrá esta persona al consumir mi plataforma? Obtendrá conocimiento acerca del tema y generara consciencia de lo mal que nos han hecho muchas de los contenidos mediáticos. 4. Audiencia principal: Padres de hijos pequeños de 9-12 años. Educación media superior con conocimiento básico del ingles. Audiencia…

Aspectos Aspectos Aspectos Hábitos Demográficos Psicográficos Tecnográficos Naciones: Género: Personalidad: Estar consciente del problema que tienen las México y más adelante más Indiferente. Son las personas que Mentalidad abierta, dispuestos a mujeres en la sociedad y países en America y Europa. tengan interés sobre el tema. aprender y a generar un cambio aspirar a un cambio. Ciudades y pueblos: Edad: de acuerdo al problema. Indiferente Padres de hijos de 9-12 años de Valores: Iniciativa de enseñar a sus hijos a vivir sin prejuicios Clima: edad (35-40 años de edad) Empatia, tolerancia, generosidad. basados roles de género Indiferente Estilo de vida: establecidos por el Intereses: patriarcado. Nivel Socioeconómico: Padres con hijos pequeños Ocupación: Gusto o interás por los temas de A/B, C+, C. género y un futuro mejor para las Acceso a internet y equipo de Indiferente mujeres. computo. Educación: Aficiones: Media superior. Indiferente Hablante intermedio de ingles Palabras clave: Padres, Niñas, como mínimo. responsables, curioso, consciente, educados, tenaz Paleta de colores y diseño

• Colores pasteles que transmiten Color: #583d72 tranquilidad y flujo y un color fuerte que contraste para que llame la Color: #bce6eb atención.

• Diseño de interfaz fácil de usar y con Color: #fdcfdf muy pocos clicks.

Color: #fbbedf

Color: #fca3cc Propuesta de Valor

Competencia Cualidades competitivas Ventajas competitivas

Como no es una plataforma que busca El proyecto comenzará como un piloto vender, realmente no tiene una y se compartirá a madres de niñas y Personas que no estén de acuerdo con competencia. niños pequeños que tengan entre 9-12 los movimientos feministas o que no años de edad. están de acuerdo con criticar estas películas. La meta de este proyecto informar sin que le cueste nada al consumidor. También se compartirá a mujeres y hombres que tengan conocimiento acerca del feminismo o que quieran aprender sobre el tema. Este grupo esta en las edades de entre 22-27 años de edad. Trabajo de campo

Comentario de alumna de la Comentario de madre de niños Universidad Iberoamericana: chicos:

“Está muy interesante! Da mucho de “Me pareció una herramienta super útil qué pensar. Me encantó ver el para estar informarnos acerca del porcentaje de mujeres en la tema. Ademas es una plataforma que participación de la película. Sólo como yo después puedo ver con mis hijas y comentario, no fue tan cómodo verlo explicarles los roles que aparecen en en mi celular (Android), como que la las películas y porque ya no son interfaz está complicada, pero en la vigentes.” compu se ve súper.” Plan de ejecución

• Compartir el link a la plataforma a través de redes sociales como Facebook e instagram.

• Mi meta es llevar este trabajo a otro nivel ya que busco que este análisis no solo se quede en un ambiente académico.

• Mi idea es llevar esta plataforma y usarla para dar pláticas al respecto de la representación de las mujeres en los medios.

• Después de ver cómo la gente reacciona a la plataforma en esos nichos, empezare a adaptarla para que más personas puedan interactuar con ella hasta que pueda ser un material que se use también fuera de México. Conclusión

• Ademas de seguir la investigación más a fondo, quiero que esta plataforma llegue a todas las personas posibles para dar a conocer el problema que estamos viviendo y generar un cambio.

• Se tienen que poner en contexto estas películas y dar a entender que las cosas ya no son así y que se esta empujando a un cambio positivo para poco a poco ir erradicando estos comportamientos injustos y de violencia hacia la mujer. Gracias