Sunday, March 2, 2014

Unlearning the Myths That Bind Us

HYPERLINKS:

          This week we had to read "Unlearning the Myths That Bind Us" by Linda Christensen and I decided to make a hyperlinks post. The author raises the issue that children's movies and cartoons have had a negative effect on children. More specifically how children receive a "secret education" from the media, most won't admit that these movies and the media have manipulated us our whole lives. I like how Christensen involved students into her article and based it on what they thought as young adults growing up in a media driven world.
          An article titled Stereotypes in Disney mentions something called "disneyfication" its an idea of taking an environment and creating a fantasy world out of it by altering it and making it impossible for it to have any imperfections. They get this idea from the movies Disney has made where a fantasy world is created and it always ends with a happily ever after moment. We know what to expect when we watch disney movies and we turn to them for that happy feeling to put us in a good mood. There are real world places where we can get away from our problems and spend money, for example a shopping mall or restaurant. This article relates to the reading through its idea of "disneyfication", its the secret education that we get from these movies that make us want to "disney-fy" every situation.    
          I was born in 1995 around the time where Pocahontas, Hercules, Mulan, and Tarzan came out and I am not ashamed to say I have watched all of them on repeat, plus more (when I was younger). I like how Disney is coming out with movies that have defied the stereotypes that previous movies have set in place, for example "The Princess and the Frog" has a black princess and "Frozen" stars two sisters who display intelligence and courage all on their own. I found an article that talks about "Frozen" and its revolutionary ways called, Advance Perspective: Disney's Frozen Defies Expectations.
          One other movie that people might not know about is Cinderella staring Brandy Norwood as the lead, Whitney Houston as the fairy godmother and Whoopi Goldberg as the Queen. I loved this movie when I was a kid, it came out in 1997 and it follows the same story line as a regular Cinderella story but with a few alterations. As a young black girl growing up in a predominately white town this movie made me feel like I had a chance too, that I was not counted out of getting a happy ending just because of the color of my skin. Although this movie was the opposite of the stereotypical Cinderella it still had its traditional happily ever after.


 
This is the full movie of the (black) version of Cinderella from 1997 played by Brandy also staring Whitney Houston and Whoopi Goldberg. I didn't know if you all knew this existed so I thought I would share it. 

Since it's Oscar Sunday I thought this picture was appropriate


2 comments:

  1. I think you did a great job on your post and I couldn't agree with you more. I really liked how you included you personal view on it as well. One of my favorite things that I liked the most was the last picture post, that is unbelievably true! Great post this week!

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  2. Your paragraph centered on "Stereotypes in Disney" and "disneyfication" was really interesting. I had never really thought about the idea that a clearly fictional world creates impossible to meet standards for people and situations in the real world. As opposed to fiction, we can't control everything in our lives, so not everything will be perfect all the time. Great job!

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