A Literary Analysis Of Disney's Aladdin

In the year 1992 Aladdin was released by Disney, making it one of the fastest growing films. The movie is based off of a young thief whom seeks a better life in Agrhaba, a city that very much resembles those of Arab countries. Aladdin ironically was being produced “during the 1991 Gulf War under the Bush administration. The war lasted six months. It was conflict between Iraq and 34 countries in the U.N., including the United States, trying to return order to Kuwait.” (Nelson, 2009, p.1) With the release of this movie coming just one year after the end of the war, it is safe to say that perhaps Disney considered some current issues in the making of their films. Disney films have been around for more than 60 years; children of all ages have watched these movies and have looked up to many of the characters being portrayed. Ever since I was a child I have watched the classic Disney films, such as The Little Mermaid, Cinderella, Peter Pan, Mulan etc. As I get older, and watch these movies again, I start to view things much differently. I start to notice the many similarities that many of these movies have. Disney films are filled with gender stereotypes, racial stereotypes, and even comments about sexual orientation. “Images of Gender, Race, Age, and Sexual Orientation in Disney Feature-Length Animated Films”, an article written within the Journal of Feminist Family Therapy, analyzed 26

Our culture is full of fairy tales. Girls are taught at a young age about Prince Charming and happy endings while boys are taught to be the girls’ heroes. They are taught these dreams and desires through fairytales and movies. These fairy tales started out as entertaining stories, but as they were handed down from one generation to the next, they slowly became more than that. They became bedtime stories for children, and as such, they have great importance because they teach children how to be in the world. One such fairy tale I want to focus on is Cinderella.

Fairy tales are timeless entities that will always be relevant in people’s lives. Fairy tales and stories offer entertainment, advice, and moral examples. The creation of fairy tales is important in the development of social norms. Children everywhere would read fairy tales and learn from them. As a result, these fairy tales are translated into multiple languages and allows people with different backgrounds to understand and relate to the story. People take these stories and adapt them to life around them. Within these adaptations of the same story, it is normal to observe slight differences that contribute as evidence in identifying the culture or societies in which these stories come from. Whether it is the slang of the dialogue or the change of location, modern producers and writers are known to take these classic stories and adding a significant twist to adjust to their cultural agenda. The movie, The Princess and the Frog, is a modern example of writers and directors creating a modern twist to the popular story of the Brother Grimm’s The Frog King. The Princess and the Frog and The Frog King both encode the mores, values, and beliefs of the cultures of the societies from which they come because, even though they both have similar plot ideas, the differences of the location and the differences of the overall specific plotlines attribute to understanding how their own specific cultures influence the adaptation and the actual story.

Joyce’s “Araby” and Bambara’s “Lesson” pose surprising similarities to each other. Despite the narrators’ strikingly clear differences, such as time period, ethnicity, social class, and gender the characters have important similarities. Both narrators are at crucial developmental stages in their lives, are faced with severe adversities, and have a point of clarity that affects their future.

Even in the movies, sociology can be found. Most people think sociology is limited to just worldly problems, but it can be it can be a very broad term. Symbolic Interaction is a communication theory that states society and individuals are created based upon the interactions between each other. One Disney movie that stands out is Aladdin. I feel this movie does a great job of providing examples of symbolic interactionism. My plan is to discuss symbolic interaction and provide examples of the theory.

Connection: Pure originality is impossible when writing. When it comes to fairytales, ideas seem to often overlap. Often times in fairytales characters good overcomes evil. This is true for Aladdin, Cinderella, and Snow White. In Aladdin, Jazmine and Aladdin fall in love, but since Aladdin is not a prince, he cannot marry Jazime. When he discovers the Genie, he turns himself into a prince. In return, Jafar tries everything to kill Aladdin so he can marry Jazmine for her wealth. Ultimately, Jafar’s behavior catches up to him and he loses his freedom, as he is trapped in a lamp.

“Everything you see exists together in a delicate balance. As king, you need to understand that balance, and respect all the creatures from the crawling ant to the leaping antelope,” said Mufasa, a supporting character in the film depiction of Walt Disney’s: The Lion King (1994). The Lion King is a timeless archetypal work that time after time has given youth hope and has shown them that courage is not always innate, but can be learned from just living life with a little “hakuna matata”. The Lion King, through the use of classic archetype, vivid surrealism, and iconic symbolism, shows a coming to age story that shows children that life is an adventure worth the trouble.

Aladdin lives in poverty and is an young, idle boy. When the magician leads him into the Cave of Wonders and traps him, he discovers the genie in his ring. Aladdin can escape the cave and starts to reform after being fooled by the magician who claims to be his uncle. When he discovers the genie in the lamp, he uses his wishes to become wealthy and to win over the Princess. His life transforms drastically as he goes from living in poverty to marrying the Princess.

Traditionally, Disney tales have a common theme where their princesses or princes’ curses need to be broken by the spell through a kiss of love, so the dream becomes a reality. In the first feature-length animated film from Disney, The Snow White, and Seven Dwarves. Jasmine the princess and Aladdin the street boy both they had chemistry and realized their wishes against Jaffar and Middle-Est culture. Passing over the fabulous story of Ratatouille, Alfredo Linguini and Remy that is the story about rejected someone according is status. Disney animated movies blend social diversity through their tales, but they didn’t realize to go so far until they see the first African – American president in the White House, Disney made a First American princess who is black, The Frog and the Princess. Moreover, Disney animated movies are diversities whose people knew as The Jungle from Indian culture, Mulan is a Chinese tale, the Amerindian- Princess Pocahontas, and so on. Thus, Disney animated movies include more various cultures and teach children to know and appreciate diverse cultures.

The Chronicles of Narnia are veritably the most popular writings of C.S. Lewis. They are known as children’s fantasy literature, and have found favor in older students and adults alike, even many Christian theologians enjoy these stories from Lewis; for there are many spiritual truths that one can gleam from them, if familiar with the Bible. However, having said this, it is noteworthy to say that Lewis did not scribe these Chronicles for allegorical didactics of the Christian faith, but wrote them in such a well-knit fashion that young readers might understand Christian doctrine through captivating fantasy and thus gain an appreciation for it. With this in mind, and in the interest of this assignment, the purpose of this paper is an

When it comes to the illustrations of his popular characters in Aladdin, Disney proves to be quite racist. Most of the small-part, background characters and especially “the bad guys”, such as Jafar and the palace guards, all have incredibly distinct Arabic appearances. Every one of them stereotypically consists of “beards, large noses, sinister eyes, and heavy accents, and they’re wielding swords constantly” (Giroux, 104). In contrast, Aladdin the hero, looks and talks like an All-American man. His skin is pale and he wants to be addressed as Al, which is an American name rather than Arabic. He does not have a beard, big nose, turban, or accent. The key point in this illustration is that Disney is establishing that Aladdin looks right for the part of a hero, while Jafar looks right for a villain.” Jack Zipes, author of the essay “Breaking the Disney Spell”, clarifies that “though the characters are fleshed out to become more realistic, they are also one-dimensional. There is no character development because the characters are stereotypes, arranged according to a credo of domestication of the imagination”

Everywhere Aladdin adventured is like the journey of discovery. He discovers huge new things that a peasant boy has not even imaged. His journey also explains the role of the genie and his companions who help him overcome difficult and dangerous circumstances to become a hero. At the end of the movie, we can see his marriage because we all want to be happy in our lives. Therefore, the author wants human beings to be able to live in a happy life and get what we have dreamed

There are certain similarities in two variants of the story. Main characters are the same and basic plot is repeated in two versions with slight differences. Cinderella is a classical story, which exists, in many different cultures and countries. It reflects the story of poor girls who suffers different privations but finds the way out from different situations and becomes happy. The story about Cinderella is a story of hope and many people are fond of this story. It does not lose its popularity with the flow of time and light changes in the plot and depiction of the characters only reflect cultural and historical differences. The story of Cinderella passes

For those who are not familiar with Disney’s, Aladdin, the movie features a princess, Jasmine, and a “street rat, Aladdin. The two characters meet in the town’s marketplace and they create an overfriendly bond. Aladdin is later captured by the villain, Jafar, who convinces Jasmine that her new acquaintance is dead. Under Jafar’s capture, Aladdin is lead to the “Cave of Wonders”, where he discovers a genie in a lamp. He breaks free from Jafar’s capture and befriends the genie. After each other’s introduction, the genie grants three wishes to Aladdin. Since the genie cannot make people fall in love, Aladdin manipulates around his restriction and requests to be made into a prince in order to gain the princess’s love. With the help of the genie, Jasmine sees Aladdin as a prince, but suspects something

It is amazing how a seemingly educated woman that has won Oscar awards for her documentaries, could possibly be so far off base in her review of the Disney movie “The Lion King”. Margaret Lazarus has taken a movie made for the entertainment of children and turned it into something that is racist, sexist and stereotypes gender roles. She uses many personal arguments to review the movie but offers few solutions. The author is well organized but she lacks alternate points of view and does not use adequate sources. Lazarus utilizes the statement at the end of her review that “the Disney Magic entranced her children, but they and millions of other children were given hidden messages that could only do them and us harm” (118). She makes her