Academic literature on the topic 'Little mermaid (Tale)'

Hans Christian Andersen’s tale, “The Little Mermaid,” has been adored by both children and parents for decades. The tale shows an astonishingly different quality to Andersen’s early genre of fairy tales, which allows the reader to sense his keenness on the meaning of human sexuality. The author used the short narrative form, becoming more conservative, cautious, and concise in his ideological compromise between religiosity and human nature. “The Little Mermaid” is a tale that draws the reader in about “universal preoccupations” of femininity, self-concept, and self-actualization. Andersen’s intentions and the authenticity of this tale should not be overlooked.

The purpose of this work is to study the image of the mermaid in Danish romantic prose of the first half of the XIX century. In accordance with this goal, the following tasks are formulated: to study the elements of romantic poetics that make up the structure of the image of the mermaid; consider the features of the functioning of the image of the mermaid in the Danish literature of the romantic era. To achieve this goal, we used descriptive, comparative, and contextual analysis methods. The image of the little Mermaid in the Danish romantic tradition combines the functioning of mythological, romantic and individual author's motives, the value space of the fairy tale by G. H. Andersen is built in accordance with Christian axiology.

This paper reconsiders images of the judge and, in particular, the position of the woman judge using fairy tale and myth. It begins by exploring the actuality of women's exclusion within the judiciary, traditional explanations for this and the impact of recent changes. It goes on to consider the image of the Herculean judge, arguing that whilst we may view him as an ideological construct, or even as a fairy tale, we routinely deny this to ourselves and to others. This both ensures the normative survival of Hercules and simultaneously constrains counter-images of judges, including that of the woman judge, who becomes almost a contradiction in terms, faced with the need to shed her difference and fit the fairy tale. Like the little mermaid, the woman judge must trade her voice for partial acceptance in the prince's world.This image of silencing which Andersen's tale so vividly captures highlights a paradox in current discourses of adjudication. On the one hand, women judges are viewed as desirable in order to broaden the range of perspectives on the bench, thus making the judiciary more representative; on the other hand, judges are supposed to be without perspective, thus suggesting there is little need for a representative judiciary. Feminists and other commentators negotiate their way uncomfortably through this territory, acknowledging a gender dimension to adjudication, but failing fully to confront its implications. This paper seeks to ‘undress’ the judge, to flush out images of adjudication which deter or prevent women from joining the judiciary and constrain their potential within it. It highlights both the role of the imagination in existing conceptions of adjudication and the increasing necessity for a re-imagined Hercules – an alternative understanding of the judge which women and other groups currently underrepresented on the bench can comfortably and constructively occupy.

AbstractIn her early work, the feminist legal scholar Erika Rackley uses the image of Ronald Dworkin's superjudge Hercules to shed light on the experience of the woman judge and on law and adjudication in the liberal legal order. She sees Hercules as representing the judge ‘who inhabits our legal imagination’, and as conjuring up problematic notions of unimpeachable wisdom, detached neutrality and super-humanism. This paper assesses Rackley's argument in light of the feminist judgments scholarship that has emerged in the meantime. It contests Rackley's claim that Hercules, or what he represents, is a patriarchal influence in the real world of law, and argues that he might instead be understood to accommodate, or even to encourage, principled evolutions in law along the lines of those suggested by the feminist judgments literature. This assessment is done mainly through the lens of Stokes v CBS Clonmel, a judgment of the Irish Supreme Court concerning indirect discrimination that was later the subject of a feminist judgment in the Northern/Irish Feminst Judgments volume. The broader aim of this assessment is to interrogate the insights and implications of feminist judgments scholarship.The paper is in four parts. Part 1 places feminist approaches to adjudication in broader theoretical context. Part 2 considers Dworkin's theory of adjudication and Rackley's critique. Part 3 sets out the approach taken by both the real-world and feminist judges in the Stokes case. Part 4 critiques Rackley's take on Hercules in light of the approach adopted in those judgments and draws on preceding analysis to interrogate the insights and implications of feminist judgments scholarship.

This paper focuses on the two contradictory themes of feminism and victimizing women in Disney Classics, a series of films which are based on famous fairy tales and the development of the changes undergone by these stories over time. The study is carried out through an analysis of the themes of the stories with a critical feminist approach in three chronological stages. Previous studies have explored these themes, but no report to date has used a chronological approach to compare the significance of the mentioned themes with the stages of feminism. These stories develop in line with developments in society and widen their perspective when examined through a feminist lens, and this change is also reflected in the Disney treatments of these tales. Despite the similarities in the plots of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella, The Sleeping Beauty, and The Little Mermaid, the representations of the voice and agency of the female characters in these films differs significantly, especially in the case of Snow White.

Most of us tend to encounter Greek myths in childhood as exciting stories brimming with heroes, monsters, and moody divinities. The story of Odysseus’ homecoming and the story about the Little Mermaid feature different characters, but their relationship to reality is understood to be the same: they are fantasy, and not real. If, like me, you were lucky enough to escape the Disneyfication of fairy tales in your childhood, perhaps you will remember the brutality and harshness of folktales, which puts them on a par with many Greek myths. My first encounters with ancient Greek stories about the gods and heroes were very similar to Sarah Iles Johnston's: we were both captivated by Greek myth as children, and the passion, once kindled, only grew stronger when we became mature enough to read the ‘real thing’. In my case, learning about ancient Greek culture and becoming a scholar of Greek religion required a thorough rethink, as I needed to readjust my stance towards Greek myths in order to understand the role that they played in ancient Greek society as formative narratives about the communities’ identities, early history, and human relationships with the gods. My process essentially required an emotional detachment from the beloved heroes of my childhood and a significant amount of distancing.

Swim Thru Fire, a web comic published in 2015 by Annie Mok and Sophia Foster-Dimino, takes inspiration from transgender interpretations of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid,” prompting an analysis of both the adaptation and its predecessor. A transgender reading of Andersen’s story highlights the identity binary of humans and mermaids, as well as the discrimination faced by the little mermaid when she tries to transition from mermaid to human, elements that are similar to transgender experiences. Mok and Foster-Dimino’s work then uses this interpretation to rewrite the story with a transgender mermaid as its protagonist, and draws direct attention to relevant transgender issues while pushing the tale further to advocate for gender diversity.

The Walt Disney Company has been creating magical fairy tales since the early 1900s and is a trusted brand synonymous with wholesome, family entertainment (Wasko). Over time, this reputation has resulted in the Disney brand’s huge financial growth and influence on audiences worldwide. (Wohlwend). As the largest global media powerhouse in the Western world (Beattie), Disney uses its power and influence to shape the perceptions and ideologies of its audience. In the twenty-first century there has been a proliferation of retellings of Disney fairy tales, and Kilmer suggests that although the mainstream perception is that these new iterations promote gender equity, new cultural awareness around gender stereotypes, and cultural insensitivity, this is illusory. Tangled, for example, was a popular film selling over 10 million DVD copies and positioned as a bold new female fairy tale character; however, academics took issue with this position, writing articles entitled “Race, Gender and the Politics of Hair: Disney’s Tangled Feminist Messages”, “Tangled: A Celebration of White Femininity”, and “Disney’s Tangled: Fun, But Not Feminist”, berating the film for its lack of any true feminist examples or progressiveness (Kilmer). One way to assess the impact of Disney is to look at the use of shape shifting and transformation in the narratives – particularly those that include women and young girls. Research shows that girls and women are often stereotyped and sexualised in the mass media (Smith et al.; Collins), and Disney regularly utilises body modification and metamorphosis within its narratives to emphasise what good and evil ‘look’ like. These magical transformations evoke what Marina Warner refers to as part of the necessary surprise element of the fairy tale, while creating suspense and identity with storylines and characters. In early Disney films such as the 1937 version of Snow White, the queen becomes the witch who brings a poison apple to the princess; and in the 1959 film Sleeping Beauty the ‘bad’ fairy Maleficent shapeshifts into a malevolent dragon. Whilst these ‘good to evil’ (and vice versa) tropes are easily recognised, there are additional transformations that are arguably more problematic than those of the increasingly terrifying monsters or villains. Disney has created what we have coined the ‘princess bubble’, where the physique and behaviour of the leading women in the tales has become a predictor of success and good fortune, and the impression is created of a link between their possession of beauty and the ‘happily-ever-after’ outcome received by the female character. The value, or worth, of a princess is shown within these stories to often increase according to her ability to attract men. For example, in Brave, Queen Elinor showcases the extreme measures taken to ‘present’ her daughter Merida to male suitors. Merida is preened, dressed, and shown how to behave to increase her value to her family, and whilst she manages to persuade them to set aside their patriarchal ideologies in the end, it is clear what is expected from Merida in order to gain male attention. Similarly, Cinderella, Aurora, and Snow White are found to be of high ‘worth’ by the princes on account of their beauty and form. We contend, therefore, that the impression often cast on audiences by Disney princesses emphasises that beauty = worth, no matter how transgressive Disney appears to be on the surface. These princesses are flawlessly beautiful, capable of winning the heart of the prince by triumphing over their less attractive rivals – who are often sisters or other family members. This creates the illusion among young audiences that physical attractiveness is enough to achieve success, and emphasises beauty as the priority above all else. Therefore, the Disney ‘princess bubble’ is highly problematic. It presents a narrow range of acceptability for female characters, offers a distorted view of gender, and serves to further engrain into popular culture a flawed stereotype on how to look and behave that negates a fuller representation of female characters. In addition, Armando Maggi argues that since fairy tales have been passed down through generations, they have become an intrinsic part of many people’s upbringing and are part of a kind of universal imaginary and repository of cultural values. This means that these iconic cultural stories are “unlikely to ever be discarded because they possess both a sentimental value and a moral ‘soundness’” (Rutherford 33), albeit that the lessons to be learnt are at times antiquated and exclusionary in contemporary society. The marketing and promotion of the Disney princess line has resulted in these characters becoming an extremely popular form of media and merchandise for young girls (Coyne et al. 2), and Disney has received great financial benefit from the success of its long history of popular films and merchandise. As a global corporation with influence across multiple entertainment platforms, from its streaming channel to merchandise and theme parks, the gender portrayals therefore impact on culture and, in particular, on how young audiences view gender representation. Therefore, it could be argued that Disney has a social responsibility to ensure that its messages and characters do not skew or become damaging to the psyche of its young audiences who are highly impressionable. When the representation of gender is examined, however, Disney tends to create highly gendered performances in both the early and modern iterations of fairy tales, and the princess characters remain within a narrow range of physical portrayals and agency. The Princess Bubble Although there are twelve official characters within the Disney princess umbrella, plus Elsa and Anna from the Disney Frozen franchise, this article examines the eleven characters who are either born or become royalty through marriage, and exhibit characteristics that could be argued to be the epitome of feminine representation in fairy tales. The characters within this ‘princess bubble’ are Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Tiana, Rapunzel, Merida, Elsa, and Anna. The physical appearance of those in the princess bubble also connects to displays around the physical aspects of ethnicity. Nine out of eleven are white skinned, with Jasmine having lightened in skin tone over time, and Tiana now having a tanned look rather than the original dark African American complexion seen in 2009 (Brucculieri). This reinforces an ideology that being white is superior. Every princess in our sample has thick and healthy long hair, the predominant colour being blonde. Their eyes are mostly blue, with only three possessing a dark colour, a factor which reinforces the characteristics and representation of white ethnic groups. Their eyes are also big and bulbous in shape, with large irises and pupils, and extraordinarily long eyelashes that create an almost child-like look of innocence that matches their young age. These princesses have an average age of sixteen years and are always naïve, most without formal education or worldly experience, and they have additional distinctive traits which include poise, elegance and other desired feminine characteristics – like kindness and purity. Ehrenreich and Orenstein note that the physical attributes of the Disney princesses are so evident that the creators have drawn criticism for over-glamorising them, and for their general passiveness and reliance on men for their happiness. Essentially, these women are created in the image of the ultimate male fantasy, where an increased value is placed on the virginal look, followed by a perfect tiny body and an ability to follow basic instructions. The slim bodies of these princesses are disproportionate, and include long necks, demure shoulders, medium- to large-sized perky breasts, with tiny waists, wrists, ankles and feet. Thus, it can be argued that the main theme for those within the princess bubble is their physical body and beauty, and the importance of being attractive to achieve success. The importance of the physical form is so valued that the first blessing given by the fairies to Aurora from Sleeping Beauty is the gift of physical beauty (Rutherford). Furthermore, Tanner et al. argue that the "images of love at first sight in the films encourage the belief that physical appearance is the most important thing", and these fairy tales often reflect a pattern that the prince cannot help but to instantly fall in love with these women because they are so striking. In some instances, like the stories of Cinderella and Snow White, these princesses have not uttered a single word to their prince before these men fall unconditionally and hopelessly in love. Cinderella need only to turn up at the ball as the best dressed (Parks), while Snow White must merely “wait prettily, because someday her prince will come" (Inge) to reestablish her as royalty. Disney emphasises that these princesses win their man solely on the basis that they are the most beautiful girls in the land. In Sleeping Beauty, the prince overhears Aurora’s singing and that sets his heart aflame to the point of refusing to wed the woman chosen for him at birth by the king. Fortunately, she is one and the same person, so the patriarchy survives, but this idea of beauty, and of 'love at first sight', continues to be a central part of Disney movies today, and shows that “Disney Films are vehicles of powerful gender ideologies” (Hairianto). These princesses within the bubble of perfection have priority placed on their physical and sexual beauty (Dietz), formulating a kind of ‘beauty contest motif’. Examples include Gaston, who does not love Belle in Beauty and the Beast, but simply wants her as his trophy wife because he deems her to be the most beautiful girl in the town. Ariel, from The Little Mermaid, looks as if she "was modeled after a slightly anorexic Barbie doll with thin waist and prominent bust. This representation portrays a dangerous model for young women" (Zarranz). The sexualisation of the characters continues as Jasmine has “a delicate nose and small mouth" (Lacroix), with a dress that can be considered as highly sexualised and unsuitable for a girl of sixteen (Lacroix). In Tangled, Rapunzel is held hostage in the tower by Mother Gothel because she is ‘as fragile as a flower’ and needs to be ‘kept safe’ from the harms in the world. But it is her beauty that scares the witch the most, because losing Rapunzel would leave the old woman without her magical anti-aging hair. She uses scare tactics to ensure that Rapunzel remains unseen to the world. These examples are all variations of the beauty theme, as the princesses all fall within narrow and predictable tropes of love at first sight where the woman is rescued and initiated into womanhood by being chosen by a man. Disney’s Progressive Representation? At times Disney’s portrayal of princesses appears illusively progressive, by introducing new and different variations of princesses into the fold – such as Merida in the 2012 film Brave. Unfortunately, this is merely an illusion as the ‘body-perfect’ image remains an all-important ideal to snare a prince. Merida, the young and spirited teenage princess, begins her tale determined not to conform to the desired standards set for a woman of her standing; however, when the time comes for her to be married, there is no negotiating with her mother, the queen, on dress compliance. Merida is clothed against her will to re-identify her in the manner which her parents deem appropriate. Her ability to express her identity and individuality removed, now replaced by a masked version, and thus with the true Merida lost in this transformation, her parents consider Merida to be of renewed merit and benefit to the family. This shows that Disney remains unchanged in its depiction of who may ‘fit’ within the princess bubble, because the rubric is unchanged on how to win the heart of the man. In fact, this film is possibly more troublesome than the rest because it clearly depicts her parents to deem her to be of more value only after her mother has altered her physical appearance. It is only after the total collapse of the royal family that King Fergus has a change of patriarchal heart, and in fact Disney does not portray this rumpled, ripped-sleeved version of the princess in its merchandising campaign. While the fantasy of fairy tales provides enthralling adventures that always end in happiness for the pretty princesses that encounter them, consideration must be given to all those women who have not met the standard and are left in their wake. If women do not conform to the standards of representation, they are presented as outcasts, and happiness eludes them. Cinderella, for example, has two ugly stepsisters, who, no matter how hard they might try, are unable to match her in attractiveness, kindness, or grace. Disney has embraced and not shunned Perrault’s original retelling of the tale, by ensuring that these stepsisters are ugly. They have not been blessed with any attributes whatsoever, and cannot sing, dance, or play music; nor can they sew, cook, clean, or behave respectably. These girls will never find a suitor, let alone a prince, no matter how eager they are to do so. On the physical comparison, Anastasia and Drizella have bodies that are far more rounded and voluptuous, with feet, for example, that are more than double the size of Cinderella’s magical slipper. These women clearly miss the parameters of our princess bubble, emphasising that Disney is continuing to promote dangerous narratives that could potentially harm young audience conceptions of femininity at an important period in their development. Therefore, despite the ‘progressive’ strides made by Disney in response to the vast criticism of their earlier films, the agency afforded to their new generation of princesses does not alter the fact that success comes to those who are beautiful. These beautiful people continue to win every time. Furthermore, Hairianto has found that it is not uncommon for the media to directly or indirectly promote “mental models of how a woman should look, speak and interact with others”, and that Disney uses its pervasive princess influence “to shape perceptions of female identity and desirability. Females are made to measure themselves against the set of values that are meted out by the films” (Hairianto). In the 2017 film Beauty and the Beast, those outside of the princess bubble are seen in the characters of the three maidens from the village who are always trying to look their very best in the hope of attracting Gaston (Rutherford). Gaston is not only disinterested but shows borderline contempt at their glances by permitting his horse to spray mud and dirt all over their fine clothing. They do not meet the beauty standard set, and instead of questioning his cruelty, the audience is left laughing at the horse’s antics. Interestingly, the earlier version of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast portrays these maidens as blonde, slim, and sexy, closely fitting the model of beauty displayed in our princess bubble; however, none match the beauty of Belle, and are therefore deemed inferior. In this manner, Disney is being irresponsible, placing little interest in the psychological ‘safety’ or affect the messages have upon young girls who will never meet these expectations (Ehrenreich; Best and Lowney; Orenstein). Furthermore, bodies are shaped and created by culture. They are central to self-identity, becoming a projection of how we see ourselves. Grosz (xii) argues that our notions of our bodies begin in physicality but are forever shaped by our interactions with social realities and cultural norms. The media are constantly filled with images that “glorify and highlight some kinds of bodies (for example, the young, able-bodied and beautiful) while ignoring or condemning others” (Jones 193), and these influences on gender, ethnicity, sexuality, race, and religion within popular culture therefore play a huge part in identity creation. In Disney films, the princess bubble constantly sings the same song, and “children view these stereotypical roles as the right and only way to behave” (Ewert). In The Princess and the Frog, Tiana’s friend Charlotte is so desperate to ‘catch’ a prince that "she humorously over-applies her makeup and adjusts her ball gown to emphasize her cleavage" (Breaux), but the point is not lost. Additionally, “making sure that girls become worthy of love seems central to Disney’s fairy tale films” (Rutherford 76), and because their fairy tales are so pervasive and popular, young viewers receive a consistent message that being beautiful and having a tiny doll-like body type is paramount. “This can be destructive for developing girls’ views and images of their own bodies, which are not proportioned the way that they see on screen” (Cordwell 21). “The strongly gendered messages present in the resolutions of the movies help to reinforce the desirability of traditional gender conformity” (England et al. 565). Conclusion The princess bubble is a phenomenon that has been seen in Disney’s representation of female characters for decades. Within this bubble there is a narrow range of representation permitted, and attempts to make the characters more progressive have instead resulted in narrow and restrictive constraints, reinforcing dangerous female stereotypes. Kilmer suggests that ultimately these representations fail to break away from “hegemonic assumptions about gender norms, class boundaries, and Caucasian privileging”. Ultimately this presents audiences with strong and persuasive messages about gender performance. Audiences conform their bodies to societal ‘rules’: “as to how we ‘wear’ and ‘use’ our bodies” (Richardson and Locks x), including for example how we should dress, what we should weigh, and how to become popular. In our global hypermediated society, viewers are constantly exposed to princesses and other appropriate bodies. These become internalised ideals and aid in positive and negative thoughts and self-identity, which in turn creates additional pressure on the female body in particular. The seemingly innocent stories with happy outcomes are therefore unrealistic and ultimately excluding of those who cannot or will not ‘fit into the princess bubble’. The princess bubble, we argue, is therefore predictable and restrictive, promoting female passiveness and a reliance of physical traits over intelligence. The dominance of beauty over all else remains the road to female success in the Disney fairy tale film. References Beauty and the Beast. Dirs. Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise. Walt Disney Productions, 1991. Film. Beauty and the Beast. Dir. Bill Condon. Walt Disney Pictures, 2017. Film. Best, Joel, and Kathleen S. Lowney. “The Disadvantage of a Good Reputation: Disney as a Target for Social Problems Claims.” The Sociological Quarterly 50 (2009): 431–449. doi:10.1111/j.1533-8525.2009.01147.x. Brave. Dirs. Mark Andrews and Brenda Chapman. Walt Disney Pictures, 2012. Film. Breaux, Richard, M. “After 75 Years of Magic: Disney Answers Its Critics, Rewrites African American History, and Cashes in on Its Racist Past.” Journal of African American Studies 14 (2010): 398-416. Cinderella. Dirs. Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, and Hamilton Luske. Walt Disney Productions, 1950. Film. Collins, Rebecca L. “Content Analysis of Gender Roles in Media: Where Are We Now and Where Should We Go?” Sex Roles 64 (2011): 290–298. doi:10.1007/s11199-010-9929-5. Cordwell, Caila Leigh. The Shattered Slipper Project: The Impact of the Disney Princess Franchise on Girls Ages 6-12. Honours thesis, Southeastern University, 2016. Coyne, Sarah M., Jennifer Ruh Linder, Eric E. Rasmussen, David A. Nelson, and Victoria Birkbeck. “Pretty as a Princess: Longitudinal Effects of Engagement with Disney Princesses on Gender Stereotypes, Body Esteem, and Prosocial Behavior in Children.” Child Development 87.6 (2016): 1–17. Dietz, Tracey, L. “An Examination of Violence and Gender Role Portrayals in Video Games: Implications for Gender Socialization and Aggressive Behavior.” Sex Roles 38 (1998): 425–442. doi:10.1023/a:1018709905920. England, Dawn Elizabeth, Lara Descartes, and Melissa A. Collier-Meek. "Gender Role Portrayal and the Disney Princesses." Sex Roles 64 (2011): 555-567. Ewert, Jolene. “A Tale as Old as Time – an Analysis of Negative Stereotypes in Disney Princess Movies.” Undergraduate Research Journal for the Human Sciences 13 (2014). Grosz, Elizabeth. Volatile Bodies. London, Routledge, 1994. Inge, M. Thomas. “Art, Adaptation, and Ideology: Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.” Journal of Popular Film and Television 32.3 (2004): 132-142. Jones, Meredith. “The Body in Popular Culture.” Being Cultural. Ed. Bruce M.Z. Cohen. Auckland University, 2012. 193-210. Kilmer, Alyson. Moving Forward? Problematic Ideology in Twenty-First Century Fairy Tale Films. Central Washington University, 2015. Lacroix, Celeste. “Images of Animated Others: The Orientalization of Disney's Cartoon Heroines from The Little Mermaid to The Hunchback of Notre Dame.” Popular Communications 2.4 (2004): 213-229. Little Mermaid, The. Dirs. Ron Clements and John Musker. Walt Disney Pictures, 1989. Film. Maggi, Armando. Preserving the Spell: Basile's "The Tale of Tales" and Its Afterlife in the Fairy-Tale Tradition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015. Orenstein, Peggy. Cinderella Ate My Daughter: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the New Girlie-Girl Culture. New York: HarperCollins, 2011. Parks, Kari. Mirror, Mirror: A Look at Self-Esteem & Disney Princesses. Honours thesis. Ball State University, 2012. Pinocchio. Dirs. Hamilton Luske, Ben Sharpsteen, Wilfred Jackson, Jack Kinney, Norm Ferguson, Bill Roberts, and T. Lee. Walt Disney Productions, 1940. Film. Princess and the Frog, The. Dirs. Ron Clements and John Musker. Walt Disney Pictures, 2009. Film. Richardson, Niall, and Adam Locks. Body Studies: The Basics. Routledge, 2014. Rutherford, Amanda M. Happily Ever After? A Critical Examination of the Gothic in Disney Fairy Tale Films. Auckland University of Technology, 2020. Sleeping Beauty. Dirs. Clyde Geronimi, Eric Larson, Wolfgang Reitherman, and Les Clark. Walt Disney Productions, 1959. Film. Smith, Stacey L., Katherine M. Pieper, Amy Granados, and Mark Choueite. “Assessing Gender-Related Portrayals in Topgrossing G-Rated Films.” Sex Roles 62 (2010): 774–786. Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs. Dirs. David Hand, Wilfred Jackson, Ben Sharpsteen, William Cottrell, Perce Pearce, and Larry Morey. Walt Disney Productions, 1937. Film. Tangled. Dirs. Nathan Greno and Byron Howard. Walt Disney Pictures, 2010. Film. Tanner, Litsa RenÉe, Shelley A. Haddock, Toni Schindler Zimmerman, and Lori K. Lund. “Images of Couples and Families in Disney Feature-Length Animated Films.” The American Journal of Family Therapy 31 (2003): 355-373. Warner, Marina. Fantastic Metamorphoses, Other Worlds. London: Oxford UP, 2002. Wasko, Janet. Understanding Disney: The Manufacture of Fantasy. Polity Press, 2001. Wohlwend, Karen E. “Damsels in Discourse: Girls Consuming and Producing Identity Texts through Disney Princess Play.” Reading Research Quarterly 44.1 (2009): 57-83. Zarranaz, L. Garcia. “Diswomen Strike Back? The Evolution of Disney's Femmes in the 1990s.” Atenea 27.2 (2007) 55-65.

Thesis (M.A.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of Humanities, Classics, and Comparative Literature, 2006.
Colored illustrations in electronic copy only. Includes bibliographical references (p. 136-142).

Fish Out of Water: A Transmedia Adaptation of The Little Mermaid is a critical examination of how by using transmedia approaches to storytelling we are able to make characters with less common background more relatable. In this project the story of Maria, a first generation student, is told through the mediums of vlogs, blog posts, tumblr, and twitter.

Simple content analysis methods, such as the Bechdel test and measuring percentage of female talk time or characters, have seen a surge of attention from mainstream media and in social media the last couple of years. Underlying assumptions are generally shared with the gender role socialization model and consequently, an importance is stated, due to a high degree to which impressions from media shape in particular young children’s identification processes. For young girls, the Disney Princesses franchise (with Frozen included) stands out as the number one player commercially as well as in customer awareness. The vertical lineup of Disney princesses spans from the passive and domestic working Snow White in 1937 to independent and super-power wielding princess Elsa in 2013, which makes the line of films an optimal test subject in evaluating above-mentioned simple content analysis methods. As a control, a meta-study has been conducted on previous academic studies on the same range of films. The sampled research, within fields spanning from qualitative content analysis and semiotics to coded content analysis, all come to the same conclusions regarding the general changes over time in representations of female characters. The objective of this thesis is to answer whether or not there is a correlation between these changes and those indicated by the simple content analysis methods, i.e. whether or not the simple popular methods are in general coherence with the more intricate academic methods.

Betyg VG (skala IG-VG)

碩士
輔仁大學
應用美術學系碩士班
103
Tong-Hua--fairy tales, also known as magic tales or wonderland tales, are as ancient as human imagination and one of the oldest genres of western literature. Fairy tales were originally folklores, survived orally through word-of-mouth until the German brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm collected and published the lores in the form of written words in 1812. Hans Christian Andersen then adapted and created his own modern fairy tales in 1835, which turned a new leaf for the genre. Fairy tales also have an important part in fantasy literature, which developed substantially in the 20th century. Much obliged to today's film and entertainment industries, fairy tales such as Snow White, Hansel and Gretel, and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland are widely adopted in the movies, TV series, stage drama, and even on-line games. They have major influence on popular culture, as well as various fields of art. In this study, text analysis method was used for The Little Mermaid, one of Andersen's fairy tales, to explore elements of imagery, story plot, characters and characteristics, creative implications, and forms of illustration. The results of the study are compiled and summarized, along with stylistic considerations of The Little Mermaid, for applications in the author's work.

碩士
國立臺東大學
兒童文學研究所
95
With the coming of 20th century, the power of changing took its form in Taiwan’s society. Can prince and princess in the fairy tales still live happily ever after? Is there a new interpretation of “happiness”? Since 1990s, there has been flourishing development of fairy tales in Taiwan, and fairy-tale writers have devoted their attention to different topics. These writers brought forth a different interpretation of the classic fairy tales about prince and princess in the West, subverting the roles of prince and princess as well as the ending that “prince and princess will live happily ever after.” In the 90s, some well-known classic fairy tales, Snow White, Cinderella, and The Little Mermaid, were re-interpreted by local female writers and given with new spiritual meanings, which revealed the perspective of love and marriage in this new age and displayed the values in Taiwan’s society. This was the main issue investigated in this study. In this study, comparisons between original editions of the above-mentioned fairy tales and the rewritten ones were made. According to the results, it could be inferred that the values of Taiwanese writers were: 1) the myth of beauty should be destroyed to help women face themselves from a new perspective; 2) adaptive love and marriage is the assurance of happiness; 3) being yourself and proactively pursuing your happiness. From the analysis, the key to happiness was also obtained – love, courage, and wisdom. Women in pursuit of happiness must free themselves from the myth of beauty, enhance self-worth, be confident, be courageous, be determined, and be responsible for their choices. Thus, the two genders could understand each other by being together candidly and select the most ideal partner to create better happiness.

Since its first feature, Snow White (1937), Disney musical films have often centered on the coming-of-age experiences of young girls; however, the reliance on fairy tale models has often meant a highly conservative structure in which the girl “is won” rather than “wins.” The modern rebirth of the Disney musical with The Little Mermaid (1989) prefigures the 1990s rise of stories of girls’ finding their voices (both literal and metaphorical), often based on literary sources or true stories. In these films, music has a significant narrative role, since the “journey” is so often inward and therefore difficult to portray in image and action. Brave (2012) and Frozen (2013) build on traditional inward/spiraling “girl” storytelling tropes by doubling them with more external, linear “boy” trajectories. In both, two female characters orbit each other along their journeys. Brave is a sense-and-sensibility tale in which Merida already has a strong sense of self, and she and her mother learn from each other and bond (established with parallel songs at beginning and end). In Frozen (loosely based on Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen), the elder of the two royal sisters was originally written as a villain; after the songwriters delivered “Let It Go,” they report that the producers’ response was that “Elsa could no longer be a villain.” The emotive power of the song had deformed the narrative and dominates the film’s reception. The younger Anna rescues Elsa to rescue their kingdom; however, the price is the symbolic palace of selfhood that Elsa constructs during the extended prolongation of the song’s bridge. “Let It Go” is also in a line of showtunes from “Nobody’s Side” from Chess to “Defying Gravity” from Wicked, all associated with singer Idina Menzel and sharing musical traits that suspend the tonic between the dominant and subdominant poles, blurring harmonic drive, and giving the voice particular agency. “Let It Go” is the simplest of these, sitting well in even untrained voices, making it particularly gratifying for the many young girls who sing along to the movie and, in astonishing numbers, on YouTube.

Chapter 7 explores Evelyn’s series of Symbolist paintings based on Hans Christian Andersen’s popular fairytale ‘The Little Mermaid’ in relation to early and more recent feminism, and shows how she employed the metamorphic mermaid as a model for socio-political transformation from captivity to liberty. Her paintings are compared with contemporary literary and visual texts in order to show how her work, often positioned in relation to male Pre-Raphaelite artists, dialogised with early feminist iconography. Chapters 6 and 7 reveal George Watts’s and Evelyn De Morgan’s statuses as suffragist poet-painters and/or narrative painters who re-presented women to promote socio-political reform.