Disneyfication of Culture
The subject of my most recent lecture was “Disneyfication of Culture”, discussing how Disney has shaped the world we live in, and affected more than we may realise. The vast Disney empire and every decision it has made over the last 80 odd years has had a huge impact on global culture, whether we’re aware of it or not.
It’s easy to be oblivious to the power that Disney has over you, when the stories of Beauty and the Beast, Snow White and Aladdin are mentioned, there’s a good chance the first imagery that comes to mind will be the Disney representation, with the wide eyed characters, fluttering eyelashes and some sentimental memories from childhood. We were introduced to some examples of the original fairytales that these beloved films base their story on, one of which being Pocahontas.
Above is the a depiction of the ‘real’ Pocahontas and John Smith, a far stretch from the bodacious looking characters that they are in the Disney version. The original Pocahontas story describes her as being only eleven years old when she stopped her own people from putting John Smith to death (who instead of being tall & blonde, was described as being short, with a full beard) who was then taken prisoner in England after a social visit and forced into marriage, she died at 21.
It seems that Disney has distorted this and many other historical events to form a misleading romanticised version that appeals to the masses, is this slowly overpowering the original tale? How much can they ‘disneyize’ history?
Disneyfication and Disneyization have both been penned to describe slightly different ideas, Disneyization refers to ‘structural changes in history, as examplified by principles associated with the Disney theme’, for example employees of the Disney corporation are referred to as ‘cast members’ not regular employees, they are acting a role, to further push the values Disney stands for. Disneyfication refers to the ‘cleansing of things’, all negatives are taken out.
It seems that it’s all part of this other worldly Disney Dimension. Personally a visit to Disneyland/world has never been something that’s appealed to me, perhaps when I was 6 or 7 and an advertisement for it fell out of the Video box, it’s never crossed my mind to want to go. It seems to be an alternate reality, built up towns with shops, roads and landmarks, that aren’t actually used or stand for anything, it seems people are drawn perhaps for the ‘safe’ value. You can cross the road and you know you’re not going to get hit by a careless driver (which could happen in your everyday life), everything is controlled around you, to keep you safe from harm and content with the ‘toy town’ environment you’re in.
This is taken even further when looking at towns such as ‘Celebration’ in Florida, a planned community project developed by none other than Walt Disney, where grass can’t be cut above/below a certain length, rocking chairs sit on every porch and neighbours ‘actually talk’. I made the connection immediately to ‘Stepford Wives’ and ‘The Truman Show’, where the environments are crafted to be nothing short of perfect but the reality of the people who live amongst this falls short. Does this create an unrealistic view of the world for children? Disney films usually put a child’s attention through its paces by creating characters that they relate/have a liking to then put that character in a situation where they struggle and have to save themselves/others in order for their world to be perfect again. Personally, I (like many others) grew up watching Disney and I don’t feel like it’s had any negative effect on my world view, obviously there’s a lot of pressure on Disney to cater to a child’s upbringing as so many hours are spent watching their films, but factors such as parenting, environment and education play a much bigger role. Disney has created this way of life, where a ‘perfect’ world is created and we so desperately want to live like the characters we see in the films, but we’ll never quite reach this state as it’s been exaggerated beyond actuality, should we expose this to children early on? I say let them have Disney films where they can get away from this reality before they start to grow up and realise the world isn’t filled with magical princesses and singing animals, it may be a disappointment but many things beyond Disney may turn out to be.
