Diversity in Disney Films: Critical Essays on Race, Ethnicity, Gender, Sexuality, and

Disability

Johnson Cheu, Editor. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2013.

In the introduction to Diversity in Disney Films, editor Johnson Cheu

articulates the reason for his book: the necessity for examining diversity and a

wider range of it within Disney appears pertinent in our age of globalization (4).

How right he is. For better or for worse, Disney films form an important part of the

cultural landscape, and the images in them resonate. As scholarship on Disney has

proliferated in recent years, this topic has gained attention, notably in Douglas

Brodes Multiculturalism and the Mouse (2005), which argues that Disney films were

more forward-thinking than most people give them credit for. Cheus volume, which

takes a decidedly more critical approach, contributes to the dialogue. The book is

divided into four sections: race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, disability, and

reimaginings and new visions. It addresses classic films that Walt Disney himself

oversaw, as well as The Disney Companys more recent fare.

Some of the books sections cover familiar ground. Scholars have frequently

criticized Disney for its stereotyped portrayals of blacks, Hispanics, Native

Americans, Italians, and Asians, and this book follows suit. In the lead essay in the

volumes first section on race and ethnicity, Kheli R. Willetts takes a highly personal

approach that reflects the mindset of many in Disneys audience. Growing up,

she writes, I searched for characters who mirrored the people in my community

and reflected the values and aesthetics of the Other, in this case, African, Latino,

Asian, and First Nations Diasporas. Instead, Disney gave me caricatured

representations of the diversity of my world (9). Willetts laments that Disney

magic did not apply to her but hopes that one day, Disney will make new magic

that, complete with enough sparkle for everyone, and finally fulfill my wish for
images that look, and feel, familiar and beautiful (21). Essays on Disneys

representation of Latin Americans in Saludos Amigos and The Three Caballeros,

Indians in Peter Pan, Orientals in Lady and the Tramp, and interclass relationships in

Oliver and Company argue that Disney narratives perpetuated predictable patterns

of privilege and dominance. In the last essay in this section, Blackness, Bayous

and Gumbo: Encoding and Decoding Race in a Colorblind World, Sarah E. Turner

refrains from labeling The Princess and the Frog, the first Disney film with a black

princess, as yet another racist Disney production designed to further extend its $4

billion a year Princess line (83). Instead, she contends that the film represents a

complex moment in a culture steeped in political correctness and an adherence to

the politics of colorblindness (83). Collectively, the essays in this section reflect

up-to-date scholarship and thoughtful analysis of the Disney Studios images of race

over the past several decades.

Just as race is a hot topic for Disney research, so too are gender and

sexuality. The essays in this section of Cheus book look at topics such as the Cold

War representation of masculinity in Pinocchio, Bambi, and Dumbo, gender binaries

and liminality in Mulan, and alternative lifestyles in The Lion King. The strongest

essay in this section, however, is Amanda Putnams Mean Ladies: Transgendered

Villains in Disney Films, a delightfully written piece that looks at the popular

category of Disney villains in a new light. Beginning with her three-year-old

daughters request to watch the one without a mean lady, Putnam argues that

many Disney villains display transgendered attributesdepicted as women with

either strong masculine qualities or as strangely de-feminized , while the male bad

guys are portrayed as effeminate, often complete with stereotypical limp-wristed

affectation (147-148).
 Cheu specializes in disability studies so it is no surprise that he is able to

bring together a solid group of essays in a section titled Of Beasts and Innocents:

Essays on Disability. The first article in this section, Martin F. Nordens Youre a

Surprise from Every Angle: Disability, Identity, and Otherness in The Hunchback of

Notre Dame , explores the character of Quasimodo from the point of view of

disability studies, which has among its aims the deconstruction of disability

representations in order to lay bare their underlying assumptions and strategies

(164). This finely constructed essay addresses issues of identity, stereotyping, and

objectification and concludes that Disneys Hunchback is politically correct cinema

at its worst, preaching tolerance for societys Others while relying on stereotypes

and outdated thinking (174). Other essays in this section, Dopeys Legacy:

Stereotypical Portrayals of Intellectual Disability in the Classic Animated Disney

Films by Karen Schwartz, Zana Marie Lutfiyya, and Nancy Hansen and A Place at

the Table: On Being Human in the Beauty and the Beast Tradition by Tammy and

Viktor Berberi, provide sharp analyses of some of Disneys best known characters

and acknowledge the ways in which images of disability in film have progressed

over time.

The last section of the volume looks, especially, to Disney fare since the

1980s and points the way to the future. Of particular interest are two essays

looking at Pixar productions. Walter C. Metz, in A Womb with a Phew!: Post-

Humanist Theory and Pixars Wall-E, addresses the importance of the film, with its

wheelchair-like robot, for disability studies. Home Is Where the Heart Is: Pixars

Up by Dennis Tyler takes up the changing nature of family and suggests reasons

for Pixars phenomenal commercial and critical success.

 Diversity in Disney: Critical Essays on Race, Gender, Sexuality and Disability

takes a broad approach, addressing issues of continued interest in Disney films.

Like most edited books, this one is uneven: It contains some misspellings,

lackluster writing, and predictable arguments, but also substantive and eloquent

analyses of Disney fare linked with some of the most pressing social concerns of the

past century. Given the pervasiveness of Disney films, especially for impressionable

youth, the ideas in this volume are important. Johnson Cheu deserves praise for

contributing to Disney scholarship with a useful and engaging text that keeps alive

the debate on the ways in which popular cinematic narratives and images reflect a

dynamic and changing cultural milieu.

Kathy Merlock Jackson

Virginia Wesleyan College