Good Girls & Wicked Witches

Women in Disney's Feature Animation

Amy M. Davis

• Publisher: John Libbey Publishing
• Year: 2007
• ISBN:
  9780861969012
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Gender Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

An in-depth view of the way popular female stereotypes were reflected in—and were shaped by—the portrayal of women in Disney's animated features. In Good Girls and Wicked Witches, Amy M. Davis re-examines the notion that Disney heroines are rewarded for passivity. Davis proceeds from the assumption that, in their representations of femininity, Disney films both reflected and helped shape the attitudes of the wider society, both at the time of their first release and subsequently. Analyzing the construction of (mainly human) female characters in the animated films of the Walt Disney Studio between 1937 and 2001, she attempts to establish the extent to which these characterizations were shaped by wider popular stereotypes. Davis argues that it is within the most constructed of all moving images of the female form—the heroine of the animated film—that the most telling aspects of Woman as the subject of Hollywood iconography and cultural ideas of American womanhood are to be found. "A fascinating compilation of essays in which [Davis] examined the way Disney has treated female characters throughout its history." —PopMatters

Index

A

ABC Channel 145

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, (1949) 22, 23, 90, 97, 98, 147, 151, 225

Aladdin (1992) 8, 9, 14, 102, 171, 173, 176, 181–183

Aladdin 181–183

Alexander, Lloyd 156, 157, 160

Algar, Jim 140

Alice (Alice in Wonderland) 84, 104–107, 159, 225

Alice (TV Series, 1976–1985) 170

Alice Comedies 73, 84, 135

Alice Doesn’t Live Here

Anymore, (1974) 163

Alice in Wonderland, (1951) 14, 23, 24, 90, 104, 159

“Alice’s Orphan” (1926) 73

“Alice’s Wonderland”(1923) 71, 72

Ally McBeal (TV Series, 1997–2002) 7

Amelia, Captain (Treasure Planet) 207, 210–213, 218, 219, 225

American Dream Machine 20

American Society 180

– and women 2, 116–121, 161–167, 222–224

– depictions of women 5, 6, 7–15, 169–171

Amos (The Fox and The Hound) 153

An American Tail, (1986) 91

Anastasia (Cinderella) 172

Anderson, Bill 140

Anderson, Hans Christian 10, 13

Animation

– a brief history 33–60

– film 43, 171–176

– and spectatorship 88

– as an art form 41

– techniques 40, 42

– Golden Age 54–60

– mechanics of 17–33

– pre-cinematic 34–37

– how to make an animated film 40–44

– early cinematic 37–40

– the Fleischer Studio 44–84

Anita (One Hundred and One Dalmatians) 93, 97–100, 137, 224, 227

Anti-nuclear campaign 119

Ariel (The Little Merma...