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Race And Sexuality In The Road To El Dorado

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The articles authors’, Carmen R. Lugo-Lugo and Mary K. Bloodsworth-Lugo, provide an interesting and detailed account of the way race and sexuality are reinforced in Disney, Pixar and DreamWorks films. They do this through the analysis of four animated films, The Road to El Dorado, Shark Tale, Dinosaurs and Toy Story. The authors argue that these films teach children about the expectations of society’s normalized racial and sexual dynamics (166). The article does an excellent job of of describing these films as stories of socialization for both children and their parents (167).
Disney films use their characters as a vehicle to portray specific ideologies of race and sexuality to the viewer (168). For example, The Road to Eldorado depicts a fictionalized account of the Spanish Conquest. Using relatable characters, the film highly racializes both Spaniards and Indigenous American’s (169). The authors are able to explain this racialization by describing the Indigenous people as being in need of rescue and the Spaniards as the “bad or wrong” Europeans, who are incapable of rescuing …show more content…

Their research has shown that these films tend to reinforce the idea of heterosexuality whenever possible. For example, in The Road to El Dorado the main characters, Chel and Miguel reinforce their heteronormativity by sexualizing the Indigenous women (171). This point is also evident in Shark Tale when Lola is interpreted as a gold-digger and Angie is presented as not intriguing enough for Oscars attention (172). This generalization suggests that women are interpreted by men as either a “best friend” type or a gold-digger (172). The character Lenny also emulates ideas of sexual normativity in society. Presented as a vegetarian shark, Lenny displays signs of what society interprets as homosexual behavior (173). This character portrayal enables animators to reinforce the idea of heterosexuality as ideal to

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