Pretty much every term, I’m accused of ruining people’’ childhoods. And I think it’s really important to recognize that that’s actually part of Disney’s marketing plan, and their goal is to get folks when they’re babies, which is why they market products to babies, to get folks before they know that there is such a thing as a world without Disney, and to kind of inculcate themselves in this magical realm and this idea of nostalgia so that they actually don’t fall within the realm of critique. And so I think for students coming into the class, it’s really hard to critique Disney, right? Because Disney has been part of the vast majority of our lives since before we could remember a time without Disney. So I mean, I think it’s really important for us to acknowledge the kind of ways that Disney has influenced all of us, and I think that I feel like people either love Disney or love to hate Disney and oftentimes aren’t thinking about it in a holistic way. Did you watch a lot of Disney as a kid? And when did you start thinking critically about the way Disney uses animals, with an eye on race specifically? So I was hoping you could tell us about your history with Disney. So one of the requirements of your class on race and Disney films is for students to write a personal essay about their history with Disney. You can listen to the interview or read it below. She generously took the time to talk with me for the “Animal Friends” episode of Popaganda. Her class does a deep read on Disney, looking at the role that animated animals play in defining perceptions of race, class, and gender. She teaches a class on race and Disney films at Portland State University. Scholar, writer, and activist Walidah Imarisha is someone who’s been thinking hard about what stories Disney tells and why. In many films, Disney animals stand in for people of color-until the 2009 film Princess and the Frog, there were no major Black human characters in any animated Disney film since Uncle Remus in the infamously racist 1946 film Song of the South. Some of the crows are voiced by Black actors, but Jim Crow himself was portrayed by Cliff Edwards, a white actor and ukulele player better known for voicing Jiminy Cricket. Their way of speaking, their clothes, even their names are racial stereotypes: The main bird’s name is Jim Crow, in reference to America’s racial segregation laws. These crows are clearly standing in for Black people. Maybe you saw Dumbo as a kid and didn’t think too much about it, but listen again to that crow’s song (which, by the way, was uploaded to YouTube by someone who demands “PLZ NO COMMENTS ABOUT RACISM CUZ ITS NOT!!”) In the film, Dumbo is befriended by a group of crows. So the studio turned to the simple story of a flying elephant to make some money: Dumbo was born.
#Jim crow dumbo movie#
The movie was a financial loss, and Disney had exceeded its loan limits. In 1940, the studio had sunk $2.3 million into making epic musical work Fantasia. It’s hard to believe that Disney almost went bankrupt right after it got started. These days, Disney is one of the most influential media companies in the world. This story was originally published on September 1, 2015.
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