Authenticity And Cultural Identity In A Disney Story : Moana

Moana Disney’s creators address diversity in their 2016 film Moana by having the movie have non-white cast, a woman as the main hero, and a lack of love interest for the main character, Moana. This movie was a pleasant surprise making Moana, a strong independent woman who waited for no man to save her from despair, but did it herself and succeeded. Most princess movies that have been created always had a love interest where the princess always waited for her prince charming to come save the day so they both could live happily ever after. The other aspect of diversity Disney created was having the movie celebrate having a rich culture of colored people.

“Without my [fish] hook, I am nothing!” (Moana 2016). Moana is about a young Polynesian woman, who is the daughter of the chief of her tribe. One day, the island’s fishermen are unable to catch any fish and the crops fail. Moana learns that many centuries ago, a demigod named Maui stole the heart of Te Fiti, a goddess, and this is the reason why her island is suffering. The only way to save her island is to find Maui and persuade him to restore the heart of Te Fiti. Moana leaves her island and travels across the sea to find him, an act that is prohibited on her island. Moana contains the elements of transcendentalism, such as the idea of nature being an escape, and inner spiritual connections.

For my final paper where we had to pick a topic from current popular culture, I decided to write my paper with the focus on Disney movies. More particularly with the focus on the Disney princess movies. When it comes to the Disney movies they have always been and will always be such a huge part of our society. While growing up most children grow up watching these movies and get the idea that that is what they want to be when they grow up. When you ask a young girl what she wants to be when she is older there is a good chance that she will say that she wants to be a princess when she grows up. I have always been such a huge fan of Disney movies and I have a feeling I always will be. I found it very interesting this semester when we spend the short class period talking about the Disney female and male characters. It is rather interesting and something that I can say that I really never noticed before but the fact that the majority of all the female characters all had the same face shape. Whereas the males there were none two that were the same. However for this paper I will be looking into the relationship to cultural meanings about gender and other identity markers, such as race, sexuality, and cultural norms as seen in some of the more classic well known Disney movies.

Moana, a future tribal island chief, sets off onto a journey to save the world. She

Moana is a unique film that is released by Walt Disney in 2016. A typical Disney film consists of a beautiful princess who wants to find a true love in her life; however, Moana, the main character of the film, broke all the stereotypes and expectations of a Disney princess since Moana’s conflict does not arise from a love interest, but from a desire to save her island. The story of the movie is that there is a girl who lives on the island, but her island is dying because Maui stole the heart of Te Fiti. Therefore, her purpose is to across the ocean to find Maui and make him return the heart of Te Fiti in order to restore life on the Motunui Island, but the chief of the island “ her father “ wishes for their people to stay within the confines of the island’s reef because he thinks beyond the reef is dangerous, but Moana went against her father’s

[1] Disney’s first attempt to relay the Pocahontas story was filled with blatant falsities. The producers, who claimed to eradicate politically incorrect statements found in past films with the highly anticipated 1995 Pocahontas, found themselves at the center of criticisms from many vocal activist groups. Feminists, Native Americans, and religiously based Christian groups found the movie to completely overlook the true essence and spirit of the Powhatan Indian princess. In an attempt to curb many of its criticisms and appease

To begin, one thing I immediately noticed about this film; was the amount of social constructs that were shown. When taking notes, it felt like my penil never left the paper as I wrote down all the things I saw. The amount of racism that is present is just overwhelming. The first example of this shown in the movie, was when Farhad, and his Daughter Dorri, who are both Persian; are attempting to purchase a handgun. The shopkeeper becomes frustrated when they begin to speak in a foreign language. He then refuses to let Farhad buy a gun, gets extremely loud and forces him out of the store. Also very plentiful in the film; stereotyping. Within the first five minutes, there was already a dispute; between Ria, who is a Latina woman and an Asian woman who was unnamed. The Asian woman had just rear ended Ria, and she began to make remarks about how ‘Mexican’ women can’t drive. This was very offensive as to define Ria by her race, but also because she is not

The film “Moana” is a unique movie from Disney, that isn’t another one of those “helpless princess gets saved” movies. Disney’s two-hour film is about Moana - a strong Polynesian female protagonist that does her best to save her island from a demigod named Maui. Disneys film “Moana” is an improvement for Disney because they had Moana be an independent character, they took their time on the movie, and they tried their best to depict all the characters in an appropriate way. The main character in “Moana”, Moana, is unlike any other Disney princess.

Recently, three articles have been viewed to suggest whether or not the movie, Moana, stereotyped Polynesian people. Many feel that Disney designed Disney was justified in creating the Moana film and was not culturally insensitive to the Polynesian people because Disney went to the extent of perfecting the songs and voices for characters, Polynesian culture in the movie, and the characters’ designs. To commence, Disney hired Polynesian songwriters and actors to make the movie more accurate and realistic. Disney had even hired people with the most experience.

When most people think about Disney movies, their mind often goes to the stereotypical princess movies in which the protagonist wears a pink ball gown. Time and time again these princesses must fight their way through the story in a luxurious ball gown in order to end up with a prince. However, there are many Disney movies that work to challenge these gender stereotypes. The movie Moana is a recent example of a Disney production that works to break the imposed stereotypes placed on children from an early age.

Recently, Disney has changed the way they tell their story lines as well as bringing more diverse characters into their films. As we all can assume it’s better to add more multi-cultural worlds and diverse characters into the Disney movies to attract different groups of watchers and to show different cultures and other lifestyles people live in. This film might be one of the best diverse films that checks all the classic children’s movie expectations but adds a great story line that involves a strong Hawaiian teenage girl who goes on a journey to figure out the questions she has been trying to answer for her whole life, who she is meant to be and her purpose on the island being the daughter of the chief. Moana quickly figures out the truth of her ancestry from her dying grandmother then decides

Films have the power to both influence and reflect society. The stereotypes prevalent throughout American culture are reflected in most films. While the United States is becoming an increasingly diverse country, this diversity is not portrayed within American cinema. Minority figures often occupy

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Moana. Moana was forced to live in a tall castle by her The The father Maui. She was watching tv when she came across E! News talking about a ball that was happening that night. However, she knew that her father would never let her go. Later that night, she betrayed her fathers wishes and escaped, it was so dark that she got lost and fell into a rabbit hole and lost one of her shoes. When her father realized she escaped he sent his guard Mulan to find her. When Mulan was looking for Moana and she found one of Moana’s shoes by the same hole she fell in. When Moana reached the other side of the hole she fell into the ocean. She got soaking wet that her dress got destroyed and she realized that one of her shoes was missing.

The movie Moana is directed by Ron Clements and John Musker. The genre of Moana is Animation, Comedy, Adventure film, Family film, Musical and Fantasy. The main character Moana Waialiki is a sea voyaging enthusiast, her mission is to go and find the Demi-God Maui who stole the heart of Te Fetti. She is to bring Maui along her mission because he must be the one to return the heart. This movie is meant to leave the viewers

culture. This movie clearly brings out the cultural clashes and conflicts between the high context Chinese culture and the low context American culture.