As a little girl, Disney was ingrained into my life at every point possible. And by every point, I mean everything. I’m talking about notebooks, mugs, school bags, princess dresses, anything Disney (and also Dora the Explorer themed) I wanted. And I think like most of my generation, watching Disney and dreaming of being Rapunzel or Mulan or Jasmine as my long-time career was an everyday activity.
However, being mixed heritage, I was always disappointed when the next princess or character came out being, yet again, another white, skinny, long-haired girl. Mulan was really the only character I felt even a slight bit connected to whilst growing up.
After having the film themed House Music Festival last Friday, my eyes were opened further to the reality of Disney and pop culture children enjoy today, and in the past. So now, in hindsight, I wanted to address the many, not only racist, but culturally appropriated and underrepresented aspects of Disney films a lot of us fondly grew up with.
Starting with one of the older films: Disney’s Peter Pan from 1953. Re-watching the film, I felt disgusted at the portrayal of the Native Americans through the song “What Made the Red Man Red”. Unfortunately, a lot, or, if not all of the time, Native Americans are portrayed fairly inaccurately in film – often with racist undertones or heavy stereotypes. In the case of Disney, off the bat the Natives characters are coloured red – a racist stereotype of the culture. Not only that, but the regalia or traditional clothing like the feather headdresses are worn by the white characters visiting their homes. This regalia is special to Native Americans – often worn for festivals or particular occasions signifying the person’s tribe or family. For a white person to simply wear it as a costume could be seen as disrespectful and often times as a white person myself, this culture and heritage behind their clothing goes completely unnoticed.
Later in Disney’s timeline: the movie Pocahontas released in 1995 – also with Native American characters such as Pocahontas herself. Again, Disney embarks on more stereotypes not only through costume, but the dialogue too. Mary Ann Buggs, who is part of the Cahto tribe, commented specifically how hyper-sexualised Pocahontas’ dress really was, especially compared to traditional clothing. Pocahontas’ real story was that she was forced to marry John Smith, who came to colonise the land where she lived. Unlike the real story, Disney portrayed the movie as a budding romance even though on her first encounter with the man he makes numerous remarks such as “savages “or “a term for people who are uncivilised”, referring to Pocahontas and her people. Even though most likely in the real account of the story, the Western people would’ve been racist and stereotyping anyways, featuring this in a film where the entire story is romanticised perpetuates this idea to children, (the targeted audience), that those stereotypes are accurate or ok to say.
Continuing the negative representation, let’s talk about the not only one, but two movies from Disney with heavy Asian stereotypes on cats. Firstly: the Siamese cats from Lady and the Tramp (1955). For me personally, this is one of the worst I’ve researched whilst watching multiple clips of the film. The cats have a whole list of racial stereotypes to their cartoons: slanted eyes, bucked teeth and more. Not only this, but they’re portrayed as the antagonists of the film – with villainous intentions and songs. A lot of the time, minorities are portrayed as villains and cruel, with the white characters being saviours or protagonists. Examples being Russians or characters with Eastern European accents in western films such as: Gru in Despicable Me or Yuri Komarov in A Good Day to Die Hard.
The other Asian stereotyped cat being the one from the later film Aristocrats (1970) called Shun Gon. Along with the repeated slanted eyes and bucked teeth, the cat has a ridiculously racist accent and even plays the piano with chopsticks singing random culturally Asian words such as “fortune cookie.” The Alleycats in this film also had Italian and Russian stereotypes ingrained too.
When I first saw The Princess and The Frog I remember being in awe of the beautiful Tiana and then later when re-watching, happy to finally see some Black representation reaching Disney. It took Disney until 2009 to have her as the first starring Black princess and even so, her romantic interest, Prince Naveen, isn’t even voiced by a Black actor. Additionally, I thought it was pretty ironic that Disney is considered progressive for this film, but three-quarters of it the main characters are frogs.
From these films alone (although there are others such as Aladdin, Song of the South, Dumbo and more) you can see just how offensive Disney has been in the past. I think, although these films were made around a time where racism was more normalised and these issues were looked past, it’s still so important to acknowledge and reflect on the obviously racist and offensive depictions from the nostalgia of Disney cartoons.
The underrepresentation in films in general is so looked over, and I’m frankly sick of it. It’s not a want, but a need for film to continue to increase the diversity in not only race, but sexuality and gender. Especially with the target audience being children, I hope that future children watching Disney will be able to see so much more variation and cultural appreciation for the beautiful, diverse people in society. As well, I hope we will end the normalised stereotypes and racial injustice and be able to give future children a notebook or mug or backpack with exquisite and proper diversity.
