Representation of Feminist Discourse in the Heroism of Brave Animations (2012) and Moana (2016)

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Art University of Tehran

2 Faculty member

3 Faculty Member of the Department of Visual Communication, Faculty of Visual Arts, Isfahan Art University

10.30480/dam.2021.3284.1619

Abstract

Walt Disney Company's works have a special appeal to audiences, especially children and adolescents. One of the main axes of animation production in this studio has been the creation of works on the subject of female characters. These characters were mostly taken from folk tales and literature in the middle of the twentieth century. They are innocent, kind, and obedient girls who are often oppressed. In the shadow of cultural and social developments, the themes and content of heroism in the works mentioned at the beginning of the 21st century and after, have undergone significant changes. The main characters and female heroes in the mentioned works are represented in the form of brave and independence-seeking women with noticeable differences compared to the previous models. Now the main question is, what image does this representation present of the heroine in the pictorial texts of the last decade, and what is the ideological orientation of the text in this representation? The purpose of the research is to examine and analyze the tendency of the text to define feminist discourse in the creation of the protagonist of the target animations in the framework of representational approaches. The two animations of Dalir and Moana are the selected items of this research. The research method is an operational method called Pedam and is based on Fairclough's critical discourse analysis approach. In this native pattern, the three-dimensional Fairclough model, description, interpretation, and explanation are divided into five smaller levels of analysis. The visual actions in the main sequences of both films are the basis of the analysis. Resources have been collected through viewing works and reviewing library and digital data. The findings of the study indicate the presence of images in contrast to the clichéd and stereotypical representation of women, in line with modern and postmodernist views prevailing in the media space. In these two films, stereotyping and counterstereotyping simultaneously play a role in representing the protagonist. The result is that the text, in its constructivist representation of the protagonist, in its representation of the protagonist's childhood, seeks to define and identify a new discourse as opposed to the Disney Studio-centered discourse of feminist discourse.

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Volume 12, Issue 27
July 2022
Pages 101-117

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