The Lady and The Tramp

We all heard of a movie called The Lady and The Tramp. It’s about two dogs that are from different social classes meet and get married in the end. It’s a famous classical Disney movie which demonstrates The American Dream ideology and the clear division in social class. In the beginning of the movie it shows how and where the upper class dogs live in very sophisticated and luxurious houses. Then on the other side, the dirty, uncared for, the lower class dogs who lived in the muddy streets. In sociology we see the division in how each dog was behaving and the way they were talking. Each class was very different from each other, they made that very obvious in the movie. Other than where they lived and how they acted, there was another thing that separated the upper class from the lower class. It was the golden collar that was owned by the “elite” dogs. It was an example of conspicuous consumption and it was emphasized on a lot in the movie and how owning one is the dream of every dog. Moreover, the social inequality was present in this movie in terms of how each dog is treated. A dog with a collar is treated differently than a dog without a collar. The upper class dogs received the better treatment. In the movie lady and tramp meet and instantly Tramp is being misjudged by Lady’s upper class friends and they stereotyped him. There is a famous scene in the movie where Tramp takes lady to an Italian restaurant and tries to show her the street life and the real world, she enjoyed her time, but it wasn’t the life she wanted. In the end of the movie it was tramp that achieved social mobility and moved up in the social class. Which shows that it’s a more desirable class and that people shouldn’t give up and work hard and they will achieve social mobility. The American Dream ideology was achieved, that everything is possible, if a person or in this case a dog worked hard enough they will reach their dreams.

Disney's "stereotyped" land!

If you’ve watched any of Disney's classical animated movies then you probably haven’t noticed some of the misleading elements that appear within some characters.

If you’ve watched any of Disney's classical animated movies then you probably haven’t noticed some of the misleading elements that appear within some characters.

Disney corporation is one of the seven enormous companies that have a wide control over the mass media today. These cultural industries reproduce social inequality by reinforcing stereotypes in countless images for the mass market. So, as silly and childish these Disney characters may be, some of their descriptions could be listed under racism or social inequality. Examples of these inequalities and racism are shown in Disney's most famous movies such as; Aladdin, The little Mermaid, Pocahontas and Peter Pan.

When I was young, after watching Pocahontas and Peter Pan, I assumed that there was a gang called the Red Indians. The image that was drawn in my mind about those people was similar to the image of pirates. It wasn’t until I’ve studied them in history that I found out that Red Indians are native Americans, but the style which the movie portrait them in made it hard for me to think of them as civilized people.

However, native American or Red Indian characters were not the only ones accused of showing a racist image among Disney's cartoons. Aladdin is mainly taken from the Arabian Nights famous stories, but nothing in those stories mentioned that Arabs cut off your ear if they don’t like your face! Thats what the theme song of Aladdin says. As well as the represented image of the Arabian cities which was reintroduced in the movie Transformers. This stereotyped image that the Middle East is a piece of desert occupied by barbaric people is very common in most of the movies made by big corporations.

Its obvious that some of Disney’s characters portray different races and cultures in a negative way. Though these types of shows and movies are perceived as innocent entertainment products, they are successfully absorbed by children; making their knowledge of these real-life characters nothing but the negative stereotyped image they have portrayed.

This could be explained through the critical approach to popular culture, as it proves that radio and movies are no longer considered art, they are just business  made into an ideology to justify the rubbish they produce.