ANIMATING RACISIM (Brian Behnken)
For me this entire article makes me completely reconsider the media of my childhood. As a child, I loved watching Tom and Jerry, Popeye, Speedy Gonzales, and Merry Melodies. Upon reflecting back on some of these as I was reading this article, I realize how immensely racist they were — they would replay many of the animated shorts from the 1940s and 1950s during the 1980s. It would appear that at this time, anyone that wasn’t a white male (like the creators) were viewed as other and depicted that way in their cartoons. A particularly shocking part of the reading occurs on pages 87-88, when he describes the shorts attempting to make the horrors of the KKK humorous.
Silly Symphonies [Egyptian Melodies]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1j7uhwDGsc&t=104s
Mickey in Arabia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkYCMMXiqhw
The two above Disney shorts are engaged with the othering discussed in the Animating Racism chapter. The shorts other both groups of people by parodying the stereotypical aspects of their culture that Western people think of. A couple examples of this are by associating Egypt with mummies and Arabia with jars and snakes. The short Mickey in Arabia also deals with issues of orientalism as discussed in Leslie Felperin’s chapter on Aladdin.
The Siamese Cat Song [from Lady and the Tramp]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ly_vxI4nllA
The representation of the asian siamese cats in Lady and the Tramp follow the same offensive stereotypes outlines by Behnken. They feature slanted eyes, over the top accents, and are portrayed as being shifty and mischievous. Also, their song features the sounds of gongs and stereotypical asian instrumental music.
The stereotypical, racist representation follows along with Behnken’s article as in addition to slanted eyes, the asian cats are drawn with big front teeth and their whiskers function as a pseudo-fu manchu mustache. Dare I say the coloring of the cats seem to be tinted yellow, presenting an example of subtle yellow-face.
RESURFACED MIKE PENCE OPINION PIECE ABOUT MULAN…. (Jonna Ivin-Patton)
This short article is ridiculous for so many reasons. Well, the article itself isn’t the ridiculous thing, the statements made from Pence are. From what I know about Pence through the last presidential election and the news coverage of his VP endeavors, the level of short-sightedness and sexism evident in his statement shouldn’t surprise me, but it staggers me all the same. He says, “[h]ousing in close quarters, young men and women (in some cases married to non-military personnel) at the height of their physical and sexual potential is the height of stupidity…. Put together, in close quarters, for long periods of time, and things will get interesting.” This statement suggests that women (perhaps human beings in general) are similar to animals. As if people have no self control and more absurdly, as if every woman would find every man attractive (and vice versa). His viewpoints on the interactions between the sexes and indeed the capacity of women is extremely outdated.
THE THEIF OF BUENA VISTA (Leslie Felperin)
This article talks about how Aladdin is engaged with orientalism (as defined by Edward Said). That is to say, that Aladdin doesn’t offer a representation of the orient as it exists, but as the occident (the West) has assigned to it. In order to keep them as other (and thus inferior to Western ways, ideals, beliefs, etc.) the West represents the orient as a magical wonderland instead of a land of reason. Again, I found something that shocked me. I was surprised to read that the sources that the Disney designers turned to while producing Aladdin came mostly from the West. If you were going to portray a culture in a movie, wouldn’t you turn to what that culture says about itself instead of what the West says it is?