MAPACA

Mid-Atlantic Popular &
American Culture Association

Because of their international reach, global influence, and reputation as a wholesome provider of family entertainment, Disney animated films have the potential to prime and shape beliefs about the gendered worlds they construct for young viewers. As many of the Company’s critics have shown, Disney targets children and their families with their seemingly innocent storylines and innocuous characters. What is often missed, however, is how Disney films foster audience identification.

In this presentation, I point to expressions of masculinity that young audiences may identify with either because of the repeatability of gendered norms or because of the seemingly real and relatable presentations of masculinity featured in a sample of G-rated Disney animated films. Given that animated film is both a meaning- and mood-producing medium that deploys various symbols to heighten identification with and to induce preferred reactions in viewers, I bring together a rhetorical analysis of symbol-use with a perspective that accounts for the material effects of film; the visceral reactions audiences are likely to experience whenever they see, hear, and feel the reverberations of these symbols.

Frowning faces, grunting noises, and acts of physical aggression are the sorts of symbols that must be further researched in Disney animated media directed at an audience of children. Through examples, I will show how the films in my corpus employ meanings and moods to pull audiences into narratives and to closely connect them to gendered characters.

Thus, this presentation provides a lens through which children’s media scholars can examine how young audiences might respond to animated constructions of gender.