During My freshman year of college here at RIC I took a gender class and it was gender in fairytales so this topic that Christensen talks about does not really come as a surprise to me. I grew up never really watching Disney movies or much TV in general. I was more of the child to be outside running around until bedtime came around. When I did watch these movies I never really picked up on the fact that the man was always the "prince" and most of the movies ended with a happy ending where the prince and princess live happily ever after. After taking that gender studies class, I began actually watching many of the Disney movies with my niece who is 2 and wants to be a princess when she grows up. As we watched them I started to notice all the stereotypes that were going on. Especially the ones where there wasn't a colored character in any of the Disney movies until recently. Many little girls grow up wanting to be princess and wanting to find prince charming one day but the sad reality is they do not realize that that will never happen. They grow up thinking men will always be the hero and that is not always the case because men can be the bad guy just as much as women can. Not every man that comes along into your life will be your super hero or your prince charming and save you from the bad in the world.
One quote that stuck out to me in this article is "The impact of racism begins early. Even in our preschools years, we are exposed to misinformation about people different from ourselves. Many of us grow up in neighborhoods where we have limited opportunities to interact with people different from our own families..." (Tatum). I really agree with this quote because we are all exposed to racism even if we do not notice it. I lived in a neighborhood in Western Cranston that was mainly all white people. A block family moved in with 5 little boys. My neighbor would not let her children interact with those children just because they were colored. Mind you her children were no older than maybe 7 years old. It is really sad how she was basically teaching her children to be racist towards this family and this race.
Another quote that stuck out to me was "Childrens cartoons, movies and literature are perhaps the most influential genre "read"". This quote is very accurate because children become influenced by everything around them. Like I said earlier I know many children that think these Disney stories are real and this stuff will happen in real life and it just won't
I am going to attach a youtube video about stereotypes in Disney Movies. Feel free to watch it!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pJLdzhFi0I
Growing up in an upper middle class neighborhood and going to a middle class class school meant that I thought education was quite standard. But between going to class here and going to my placement, I have learned that schools can be very different in different parts of a county or even neighborhood.
ReplyDeleteI 100% agree with you. Especially going to my placement and even going to work and visiting my mother who lives in Providence
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