The firstDisney princess was Snow White who appeared on the scene in 1937 as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Since her appearance there has been many Disney princesses that we have come to know and love. Although Disney is often times criticized for being racist because of some of their more questionable cartoons and characters( the black crows who spoke with ebonics), they have had ethnic princesses. Jasmine who was the princess from the Middle East was the frist ethnic Disney princess and then came Pochohantas and Mulan. In 2009 after years of creating Disney princesses they finally created a Black princess. When I first heard that there was going to be a Black Disney princess I honestly did not believe it and I was worried that Disney would not paint such a bright picture of Black people. The princess that Disney created is Princess Tiana who received her position as a princess by marrying a Hispanic Prince.
Although I was happy that Disney finally made a Disney princess that was Black, I couldn't help but to see the disparities between Princess Tiana's story and the other Princesses. The other Disnesy Princesses had glamour and glitz and magic and princes that swept them off their feet. Tiana was a workaholic who did not believe in magic. She worked all the time to attain her dream of owning her own restaurant and not even halfway through the movie she got turned into a frog. Tiana's love interest was an arrogant Prince who spent most of the movie fighting with her. In the end Tiana's story did have a happy ending, she was turned back into a person, she fell love with the prince, became a princess by marrying the prince and then finally got her own restaurant. This story was different from the rest of the Disney Princess' stories because I though it was missing that magical and enchanting feel that the other stories have. Many of the Princess like Mulan and Cinderella did not start off as princesses but the journey to royalty was a lot more magical or dramatic then Tiana's. I guess I was expecting the story to be more grand as with Pochohantas or Ariel. The other princess stories created a world that little girls could dream about where as Tiana had more of a common story on a smaller scale. I do not think that The Princess and the Frog will be as famous as the other princess stories and I was somewhat disappointed that there is finally a Black Disney princess and it turned out to be an everyday story with a little twist.
What does this mean for females in Cartoons? First just the fact that it took over 70 years for their to be a Black Disney princess can be related to the portrayal of female cartoons. There are far less Black females in cartoons than other races and when they are in cartoons they often times have that patented "Black girl attitude". If young girls cannot see themselves in the characters that they look up to then how will they start feel about themselves? Almost every little girl has watched Disney princess movies and fell in love with one of the characters. I wonder when Black girls see The Princess and the Frog and compare it to other Disney Princess stories will they see the differences that I saw and how will they feel about the portrayal of their race through this character.
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