Disney Princesses

The discussion about a princess culture really had me thinking “are we over analyzing such an innocent concept?” I never would have looked at Disney princesses with such scrutiny and dissection. But once the class began to further discuss the article the princess culture began to make more sense. I understood the difference between Walt’s princesses and Team Disney’s princesses. But there are also similarities between Walt’s princesses and Team Disney’s’. Walt’s princesses were the classic beauty who works hard but yet is oppressed in some way. Snow white is forced to live with her evil step mother after both of her parents die. Her step mother is very jealous of her beauty and fears her beauty will beat her own some day. Then snow white eventually befriends a group of dwarves who are outcasts in woods. Another princess with a similar story is Cinderella. Both of Cinderella’s parents die and she is forced to live with her step-mother and step-sisters that are all jealous of her beauty. Cinderella also befriends a couple of mice who are also outcasts.

Team Disney’s princesses have some of these very same situations as Walt’s princesses had mentioned above. Pocahontas is another Disney princess whose mother is deceased but this time her father is alive and the one raising her. She is also considered the first American princess since all of the previous ones originated from a different country. However, she does not have a character that is jealous of her beauty but befriends outcasts such as a raccoon and a hummingbird as friends. Ariel another Team Disney is also motherless and raised by her father. She doesn’t have anyone who’s jealous of her but has friends such as Flounder the fish and Sebastian the crab as outcast friends. And so when one compares the different Disney princesses there are definite differences but they all have very similar story patterns and characteristics.