Sexism In Snow White

Three plays, five movies, and two television shows. The story of Peter Pan has lived on for over one hundred years, dating back to the original play in 1906. Filled with mythical fairies, mermaids, and pirates, J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan is a beloved story centering around the adventures of Peter Pan, and the Darling Children. Wendy Darling, along with her two brothers fly to the island of Neverland, a place that had lived in their imagination for years, but the true story is unbenounced to most everyone who has read the text or seen the movie. How could such an innocent story have such a dark background?

However, as those who are familiar with the story know, this was not the end of Snow White. When the Queen finds out Snow White escapes death from the huntsman and ends up living with seven dwarfs, she still considered Snow White a

Snow White is a fairy-tale known by many generations; it is a beloved Disney movie, and a princess favoured by many kids. But did you know the fairy-tale was made to teach young children, especially little girls, their duties in life? It also values beauty over knowledge, portrays women to be naive and incompetent, and assumes that women cannot understand anything other than common household chores. Throughout this criticism, I will be using the feminist lens to analyze the fairy-tale, Snow White, through the perspective of a feminist.

Disney princesses are fun for all ages, but their target audience is young children and “as children grow and develop, they can be easily influenced by what they see and hear”. Therefore, what they see and hear in Disney movies leaves an impression on them. The first princess, Snow White, was created in a time where each gender and race had a specific role in society. Recently, many believe that Disney has come a long way in regards to gender and race since Snow White, as several multi-cultural protagonists have been introduced subsequently, and gender roles do not appear to be as stereotypical as they once were. However, many of the apparent innocent messages about race and gender in these movies, can be exposed as otherwise. Despite

Furthermore, Cinderella’s innocent and dreaming tendency shows that women are merely weak beings. They think with their hearts rather than with their brains and are easily influenced by their emotions. For this reason, women need men to protect and secure them. Due to this, girls are presented with the idea that they must be less than men in order to be saved by one.

Gilbert and Gubar describe Snow White’s experience with the dwarves as “an important part of her education in submissive femininity, for in serving them she learns essential lessons of service, of selflessness, of domesticity” (391). Compared to “The Princess in the Suit of Leather,” Juleidah was also forced into this lifestyle as she is now “a kitchen skivvy, feeding the fires and raking out the ashes” (177). The view of woman and femininity continue to be belittled down to domesticity.

In Disney films, there is a lot of misogyny amongst female main characters. Many people in our society have noticed a significant difference in the speaking roles between male and female characters that Disney created, as men had way more lines than the women. Because these movies were mostly created in the mid-late 1900’s, this was the time that there was plenty of prejudice against females. Now, in the year 2017, females are getting a little more equality than before to the point where many females now have jobs that were only for males in the 1900’s. Most Disney movies for that matter involve some sort of misogyny, even the ones that recently came out such as ‘Brave’ and ‘Frozen’. Examples of various levels of misogyny can be noticed in Disney films such as Ariel in ‘The Little Mermaid’ (1989), directed by Ron Clements and John Musker. The movie is about a 16-year-old mermaid who wants to live on land with a human Prince named Eric but is only able to after making a dangerous wish with ‘Ursula the Sea Witch’ to be a human for three days. In this movie ‘Ariel The Mermaid’, prejudice can be seen in Ursula, by a female having too much authority, Ariel cannot speak, and Ariel uses her appearance to attract others.

In Disney's version of Snow white, Snow White is an isolated princess who lives with her evil stepmother who is the queen of the land. The Queen became paranoid that Snow White will become more beautiful than herself, so she forces Snow White to work as her maid. Every day the queen would ask her magic mirror “who is the fairest one of all” and the mirror would respond, telling the queen that she was. One day, the mirror responded saying that Snow White was now the fairest. The queen, jealous of Snow White, orders her personal huntsman to kill snow white and bring her heart back as proof of her death. The huntsman, unable to bring himself to do so,

The original story Little Snow White uses the stereotypical idea that women cannot go out and make money for their families. For example, in the story when the dwarfs first find Snow White living in their home, they make a deal with her in return for her to be able to stay with them: “If you will keep the house for us, and cook, sew, make beds, wash, and knit, and keep everything clean and orderly, then you can stay here.” This agreement isn’t fair. They go out and make money while she does the chores. The stereotype they have shown is that all women can do is stay home and clean. Snow White is forced to stay home and clean the entire house everyday while the men go out into the world and make money. This is how Little Snow White incorporates gender roles and labels into the personality of the female protagonist.

Despite being the protagonist, Snow White is never given a chance to lead her own life. From the very beginning of the film, she is always owned by someone else. First her stepmother controls her life, then the huntsman orders her to leave, then it is the dwarfs (sic) who control and care for her well-being, and then it is the prince. Never once does she resist or attempt to go out on her own. By the end of the film, she does not even protest a near stranger kissing her as she sleeps. In fact, she figures that 's reason enough to run away with him!

Clarification of her beauty is there to aid the reader in understanding that she is good and valuable. Furthermore, her hair not only symbolizes beauty but fertility and sexuality; proving that she is an object. Once she loses her hair, it is evident that she also loses what makes her of value to men, which in this case is the innocence of her untouched beauty or her virginity (pg. 35). In addition, the story “Little Snow-White,” presents an initial description about Snow-white centered around her beauty: “as white as snow, and as red as blood, and her hair was as black as ebony” (pg. 124). Because of this description, the reader defines Snow-white’s importance with the base of her pure white skin, passionate red lips, and seductive black hair. These three characteristics show the value of Snow-White to the prince, who begs the dwarfs for her coffin. While persuading the dwarfs to give over Snow-white, he attempts to trade objects to compensate the dwarfs (pg. 130). To young women, values defined in fairy tales depict a horrid, demeaning view of

Over the years, Snow White’s story has been told in numerous different versions then its original version in 1812 by the Grimm Brothers. The main basis of the story has remained the same. Only a few minor tweaks to the story have changed. The three versions of the story that are going to be analyzed are the original story “Little Snow White” by the Brothers Grimm, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” by Disney, and “Mirror, Mirror” by Disney also. They each were created in very different times and the original story has changed over the years to appeal to the audience of that time. No matter how many versions there are Snow White is considered, one of the most cherished fairy tales of all time. They each use different methods to get their

The older mentality for the female was that their purity on the inside reflected their countenance on the outside. Thus, Snow White, being the fairest, was also the purest of them all. The plot relies heavily on the queen trying to remove Snow White. Yet, even though this is important to the queen, to the readers there is still the question of why. Why was it so important for the queen to be the fairest of them all when she had the highest status for a woman? The Grimm Brothers claim it was her envious heart at work, that her vanity filled every want and whim she had. They Portray her as Aphrodite, beautiful and fair for sure, but ready to destroy any girl who might take her place.

Once upon a time in a land not so far away, the society of man created the idea that it was a woman’s job to conform to the ideologies generated in fairy tales. From women depending on their prince charmings all the way to romanticized sexual abuse and lack of consent, stories like Cinderella and Snow White radiate sexism within an array of scenes of the stories and films. Not only does this affect the way that men view women, but it has had a relatively negative effect on the ways that many women view themselves. Many fairy tales have made their way into mainstream culture, and today many young girls and boys grow up hearing and seeing the subliminal messages in fairy tales. As more and more fairy tales make their way onto the big screen, it can be seen that all princesses seem to share a common feature other than their crowns and lack of self worth without a man by their side; their tiny waists. In recent years during the 21st century more and more people in the media have been calling out fairy tales for their anti-feminist attitudes with sexism, body standards as well as societal comments about women being dependent on men.

Stories like Cinderella and Snow White radiate sexism with every individual scene of the stories and films.