Moving Foward?: Problematic Ideologies in Twenty-First Century Fairy Tale Films

Fairy tales, as a reflection of our values and belief systems, are crucial in shaping and maintaining cultural ideologies. In the twenty-first century, cinematic fairy tales have the unique position of representing such values in an expansive and expeditious manner. Audiences must therefore be critically conscious of the messages promoted by these tales. An analysis of the five most popular contemporary fairy tale films, Disney’s <em>Princess and the Frog </em>(2009), <em>Tangled</em> (2010), Universal’s <em>Snow White and the Huntsman</em> (2012), and Disney’s <em>Frozen</em> (2013) and <em>Maleficent</em> (2014), revealed minimal attempts to propitiate critical audiences in regard to changing cultural values, but each film ultimately fails to break away from hegemonic assumptions about gender norms, class boundaries, and Caucasian privilege.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts (MA)

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

English Literature

Year dc:date.available

2015

Author dc:creator

• Kilmer, Alyson

Contributors dc:contributor

• Patsy Callaghan
• Laila Abdalla
• Christine Sutphin

• gender
• class
• race
• Disney
• Universal Studios
• folklore
• American Popular Culture
• Other Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
• Other Film and Media Studies
• Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies
• Social Media

Language dc:language

English

Repository record dc:identifier

https://digitalcommons.cwu.edu/etd/73

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:digitalcommons.cwu.edu:etd-1078