Introduction: By the age of three, children are aware of race and already have prejudices. (Nigel Benson, 2012) Disney has a long history of making entertaining films aimed at children, but have we noticed racial and disability stereotypes within the films during that time? There is the ultimate racial aspect of people of color as they are still mistreated today because of their skin tone and during the time Disney started making his feature films, Walt Disney himself was racist and wasn't any kinder with people with disabilities. I decided to research this project because I didn't realize any stereotypes until I watched Aladdin again not too long ago; the opening title song, when released in theaters in 1992, had shocked many as it included extreme racial stereotypes of Arabs. This essay will describe the different “phases” of Disney films and how they illustrate stereotypes towards younger generations. Subsection 1: Disney Films from 1940 to 1970 During the early years of Disney Animation Studios, Disney released classic films that are still watched today. although some racial patterns are included. Dumbo, released in 1940, is about a young circus elephant who is born with comically large ears and is given the cruel nickname Dumbo. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay One day he is teased by some boys who anger his mother who then gets her locked up. Then he discovers he can fly with his ears, surprising everyone at the circus. This is a positive aspect of disabilities as it shows that Dumbo had overcome his insults about his big ears which could have given hope to young children with disabilities at that time, and who could have made good use of it as in that period, disabilities they were despised and seen as negative anomalies while Dumbo reveals the opposite. Some may argue that Dumbo's ears were not a disability but just a defect he was born with. This is true, but it depends on how you view Dumbo's anomaly and whether you think it is a disability or not. In my opinion, I think it was meant to serve as a disability metaphor to help young children grow up and to help them find good uses for their disability. In addition to this, the leading actor of the crow, known as Jim Crow, is named after state and local laws that enforced segregation in the early to mid-20th century (Wikipedia, 2018). There are other flaws in the film's cast of crows: white actor Cliff Edwards voiced Jim Crow, and the rest of the crows were voiced by black composer Hal Johnson and his all-black choir (IMDb, n.d.). This shows clear leadership roles with the main and highest ranking of the crows voiced by a white man and the rest of the crows voiced by black actors. Some might argue and say that stereotypes like these are coincidental and that Disney producers wouldn't have thought of racial stereotypes like these. In my opinion I don't think this is true because being a movie that was released in theaters and made a lot of money, the cast and plot of the movie should have been reviewed by many people so I think giving the choice of the crow for these voice actors is not it was random and was thought out by the producers. Fifteen years later, Disney released the beloved film Lady and the Tramp, known for its famous spaghetti scene. But like many films it consists of a negative racial stereotype. A rather funny song included in the film was the song We Are Siamese sung by the two catsSiamese, Si and Am. The animators designed the cats with almond-shaped eyes and noticeably broken English accents to fit the racial stereotype that suggested the cats were stereotypical Hollywood representations of Asians. This is supported by the fact that the Siamese cat originates from Thailand. In addition to this, in the song the two cats cause mischief, which coincides with the fact that at the end of the 19th century similar stereotypes were used to reinforce the fear of the so-called yellow danger. It was the idea that East Asians posed a threat to the rest of the world that led to strict anti-immigration policies to keep them out of the United States (Screen Rant, 2017). In the late 1960s, The Jungle Book had been released in theaters with its live action film to a huge box office hit of $966.6 million (Wikipedia, 2018), but it was an improvement over the film animated? Comparable to Lady and the Tramp, The Jungle Book also includes some racial stereotypes, but about black jazz musicians voicing monkeys in the song "I Wanna Be Like You". The monkeys speak in "jives", a form of slang associated with black jazz musicians. In addition to this, apes also want to become human, which may coincide with how black people were treated in this time period which was “non-human” and racism was still very much used by white Americans. However, not all of the monkeys were voiced by black musicians; white actor Louis Prima voiced King Loue, which may or may not be a coincidence as his character is a "king" and is voiced by a white man while the rest of the apes are not kings and are all voiced by people of color. Therefore, the film's song includes negative ideas towards black people even though this is only a small part of the film. Following cultural and racial stereotypes in films, 1970's The Aristocats portrays stereotypes of many races; Thomas' gang is all racially stereotyped. Please note: this is just an example. Get a custom paper from our expert writers now. Get a Custom Essay Pepe is the womanizing Italian cat and wears a red scarf and Billy Ross is a Russian cat who looks like Joseph Stalin (Screen Rant, 2017). Other than that, Shawn Gahan is a Chinese cat who has almond-shaped eyes, buck teeth, and plays the piano with drumsticks. From a recent poll I conducted, one person had pointed out that "Shawn Gahan also speaks nonsense to make fun of Chinese people and their language." As a result, the songs in the films were very negative in how they portrayed the Russian, Italian and Chinese races. Overall, Disney has not improved their racism stereotypes due to the fact that films such as Lady and the Tramp, The Jungle Book, and The Aristocats all have extreme racial stereotypes of races such as Black Americans, Chinese, and Italians. Instead, they did not include any disabilities described as negative, but showed how one had overcome the disability found in Dumbo. Although no one could predict the future and know that racism would not be tolerated in the future, they needed to improve their films otherwise, as time went by, they would lose a large part of their audience due to the fact that racism was used much less . . Subsection 2: Disney Films from 1992 onwards Disney's Aladdin, soon to be a live-action film, features one of the most troubling racial negatives in the film industry. His song Arabian Nights, as mentioned before, has a critical stereotype of Arabs. It has the lyrics: Oh, I come from a land From a distant place Where the camel caravans roam. Where do you, 2017).