Over at Harlow's Monkey, Jae-Ran makes an astute observation about Disney's capitalist obsession with orphan-adoptions. Cut and pasting from her site, she critically lists all the movies with this theme:
• Aladdin (Aladdin) – orphaned and homeless; petty crimes for food and shelter
• Annie (Annie) – orphan adopted by rich single dad
• Ariel (The Little Mermaid) – dead mother, rebellious teen who runs away to be with a man
• Aristocats – Marie, Berlioz and Toulouse – three kittens raised by a single mother
• Bambi (Bambi) – raised by single mother who is murdered, has never met his absent father
• Belle (Beauty and the Beast) – dead mother, raised by single father
• Cinderella (Cinderella) – dead mother, raised by abusive Stepmother and neglectful, absent father
• Dumbo (Dumbo)– raised by a stigmatized, depressed single mother
• Elliot (Pete’s Dragon) – orphaned, runaway from abusive foster parents, adopted by single mother
• Hercules (Hurcules) – son of gods transracially adopted by humans
• Lilo (Lilo and Stitch)– orphaned, raised by older sister
• Mowgli (The Jungle Book)– orphaned, raised by 2-male heads of household (bear and panther)
• Mulan (Mulan) – cross-dressing teen girl with intact, multi-generational family unit
• Nemo (Finding Nemo) – dead mother, raised by single overprotective father
• Oliver (Oliver & Company) – orphaned kitten transracially adopted by rich girl
• Peter Pan (Peter Pan) – orphaned, troublemaker and gang leader of Lost Boys
• Penny (The Rescuers) – orphaned girl kidnapped from orphanage
• Pinocchio (Pinocchio) – wooden toy adopted by aged creator Gepetto
• Pochahontas (Pocahontas) – dead mother, raised by single father
• Quasimoto (The Hunchback of Notre Dame) – physically disabled male adopted by evil church minister Frollo
• Simba (The Lion King) – father murdered by uncle, raised by 2-male heads of household (meerkat and warthog)
• Sleeping Beauty (Sleeping Beauty) – parents transferred custody to 3 fairies
• Snow White (Snow White & the 7 dwarves) – dead mother, raised by abusive Stepmother and neglectful father
• Tarzan (Tarzan)– orphaned, transracially adopted by gorilla family
It is pretty amazing isn't it? I had to comment immediately to her blog post that she had forgotten one more Disney movie...Prince of Egypt. Here is what I said...
you forgot the prince of egypt which tells the story of moses from the old testament. i've always liked this biblical story because it tells a different sort of adoption story. in this story, we learn that moses was displaced due to religious/political oppression and eventually adopted by an egyptian princess. however, as i recall, he was cared for by his hebrew aunt, disguised as a nanny. so, in a sense, he grew up knowing he was jewish but also egyptian. then, as an adult, he sees an egyptian soldier mistreat a jew and he slays the soldier. later, he is ridiculed by two jews who were quarreling, signaling that he was not accepted by jews either. still, somehow, he overcomes all these things to eventually lead israel out of egypt.
To which, she replied that she has heard other people (oftentimes, ministers) make the statement that Jesus also was a transracial adoptee. However, I have to strongly disagree with this Jesus as adoptee metaphor. First, Jesus was not adopted given that he was conceived, birthed, and raised by his birthmother. Second, Jesus was born into a Jewish household and raised in a Jewish community. Relatedly, according to my understanding of Jewish law, ethnic heritage is passed down through the mother, so he is through and through Jewish. Third, even if we assume (for the sake of argument) that Jesus was adopted, he always knew his birthfather (God). In other words, there was no displacement, no ethnic identity confusion, no sense of loss or yearning.
To me, people who argue the Jesus as adoptee story are thinking about adoption and race in an uncritical manner and, worse (in my opinion), are using false reasoning to proselytize. That just irks me...a lot. As C.S. Lewis often argued (as did my philosophy/theology professors at BC), if you are gonna proselytize, use solid reasoning to make the case. Otherwise, you make Christianity look stupid.
Now back to Disney's obsession with adoption. They seem to have found a magic formula for attracting families and children because every child's greatest fear is losing their parents. Disney capitalizes on this basic developmental need and fear. Parents also buy into it because this imagery reinforces their importance as parents.
When I was a child, my mother sometimes would make the comment that I was found under a bridge. This comment usually would be made after I had done something inane to frustrate her (which was often). Other times, she would say this sort of thing when I would ask her about my birth. It was always said with loving humor and I never felt scared (though in my fantasy I did sometimes wonder if it was a true story).
Now why would my mother say such a thing? Well, first of all, I've heard from other Koreans that their mothers have told similar tales. In other words, I believe that this storyline is some sort of Korean birth tale...like the stork delivering the baby. More importantly, I believe that this story helps to reinforce the parent-child attachment by teaching the child the importance of a parent in his or her life. There is something archetypal about the idea of a child being found. It is a profound metaphor about family.
Disney clearly has embraced this archetype. I believe families (adopted or not) also embrace this archetype because it strengthens family bonds.
Posted by richlee at March 22, 2006 08:24 AMRich, loved the C.S. Lewis quote! I completely agree with your thoughts about using Jesus as a metaphor for adoption. I have often thought it has been used to squelch and/or comfort adoptees - i.e. as a way to say, hey Jesus shares your "pain" etc. etc. However, as you astutely pointed out, Jesus lived with his mother, always knew who his father was, although I suppose you could say Joseph was his "stepfather."
The bible is full of "adoption" stories - depending on how you define adoption. Esther is also an example sometimes used (she was raised by her uncle). However, from my social work-y perspective, most of these are forms of kinship/relative agreements, not truly considered adoption in the sense of stranger-adoptions most people think of.
Posted by: Jae Ran at March 22, 2006 10:31 AMI've been thinking about this topic for a long time, consciously since I became a mother over nine years ago.
In some ways, the dead mother syndrome is really a paean to the primacy of mothers; e.g. the worst thing that can happen to a child is to lose her or his mother. In other ways I think it speaks to a misogyny that tells us that the individual must symbolically kill the mother in order to become an adult, the hero of her or his own story. Disney is just capitalizing on old European fairy tales.
Can the dead mother (the subaltern in these tales) speak?
The father has all the screen time, he is generally the one to whom the child must prove her or his worth, loyalty, etc. Until she marries another man, or until he becomes a real boy/man/king.
Ah, we live in profoundly patriarchal societies. Apparently no true matriarchal societies exist on the planet right now, even though some are matrilineal. What do you know about this, Dr. Lee?
Also, by the 1930s, 84.6% of the planet's land mass were or had been colonies of Europe. Amazing, isn't it? We're in a time of resistance and recovery. There's some connections to be made of the killing of the female properties and the imperial forces that have held sway over our narratives (even though these European folk and fairy tales go back to medieval times).
The Grimm brothers actually loved their mother very much and were very close to her; they changed "public domain" tales to include an evil stepmother instead of a mother because they, perhaps, didn't want to show the mother in a negative light. I find it all fascinating.
As a mother I'm offended to be written out--killed off or denied back story at all--in so much popular culture narratives for children. I find it highly problematic, but I also think there's more to it than meets the eye. I'm reading an interesting theoretical book right now called CINEMATERNITY that addresses cinema as constructed as a maternal medium. Children's cinema is a fertile ground for these types of studies, I believe.
SY
Posted by: SY at March 27, 2006 11:35 AMHello I just posted a question to some friends and then I found this page.
Here is what I asked
Heavy on my mind the last couple day.
Actually it was something YDD pointed out to me when everything was falling apart. 2004
See when my sons father puts in a dvd to watch he plays it over and opver and over again. up to 5 times in a row before he put in another movie. Even the cartoons and kids movies for our son. He was a SAHD for alot of the time between 2001 and 2004.
Ok so one day daughter asks have I ever noticed that most of the movies he had son watch over and over again have the mother dying in the plot.
tHE MAIN ONES WERE Mighty joe young, Bambi, Nemo, Star Wars (by the way son is named Anakin)
DD and I sat down and started making a list. We had 11 movies on the list.
I haven't been able to find the list and wondering if you ladies can help me think of movies like this (where the mother dies)
I believe ex is planning on doing as he threatened and tell our son that I aM DEAD. i BELIEVE THE MOVIES WERE A WAY OF DESENSITIZING HIM Like with Bambi the first few times son watched he cried when the mother got killed but after 40-50 times it didn't even faze him anymore.
Is this my mind working overtime again?
you forgot Sonora Webster(Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken) Orphaned girl taken by her Aunt who is turning her over to the state. She runs away and joins a circus act, jumping horses as the dive from a tall platform into a pool. It's a great movie, and its Disney.
I am half Korean, and adopted. My birth mother was full Korean and adopted.
I have found your blog extremely intresting.
Thank you.
Well, the Government in UK seem to be running a social experiment on having as many children adopted as possible. SS are even rewarded in money as is the council who manages to fill the quota gets the biggest amount of money from the tax payers purse.
There is a clear demonisation of women and mothers. The Patriarchial system seems to be hell bent on DE-HUMANISING and DE-SENSITISING society in its effort for total control and creation of the zombies, with no feelings or emotions.
Forced adoption is a total shock to mother and baby, even if it is not physically visable for years. Most mothers I know are in PTSD for years. Adopted children are not inner bonded and feel abandoned as the memory it is always there until we deal with it as adults. But for most the self abandonment goes on for years and naturally failure to commit to relationships is endemic at the moment.
Just my observations of course.
Posted by: Catherine Sara at March 7, 2007 06:52 AMPerhaps it is fair to say that as the end of the Patriarchial System is nigh, and the return of the female consciousness is now quite obvious.
Then the old male king will fight as hard as he can to stay in control..in society and in each of us too.
Giving way to something new is scary.
But the feminine consciousness is one of love, peace, joy, freedom, abundance for all.
No one is short of anything, so why not give it a try and we all be equal and no kings dictating to us all the time.
Mother, virgin, crone, all doing their best to work in tune with nature and the rhythm thereof.
Posted by: Portia at March 7, 2007 07:02 AMI simply think that Disney is trying to comfort those of us who are adopted/living with one parent. Being a child whose life was torn by a divorce at a very young age, I know the way it feels to have a family broken apart and I think Disney is simply being compassionate and giving us stories of triumph and success to let us know that it can be ok and we can succeed. Well that the way I see it after reading the blog post.
Posted by: Mallory Legaspi at June 28, 2007 07:43 PMI simply think that Disney is trying to comfort those of us who are adopted/living with one parent. Being a child whose life was torn by a divorce at a very young age, I know the way it feels to have a family broken apart and I think Disney is simply being compassionate and giving us stories of triumph and success to let us know that it can be ok and we can succeed. Well that the way I see it after reading the blog post.
Posted by: Mallory Legaspi at June 28, 2007 08:05 PMYou know what i think? I don't think disney puts up these films or animations to help adoped children etc Disney cares about making money. So how do you make money out here in the capitalist system? Well you sell a product with emotion. You know these films sell? Coz they are emotional films. They make you cry. And that to disney is good coz that means the film will sell. So if you think disney has got a heart for kids without parents think again...
But that my 2 cents opinion(Thats how we say it where i come from)
You know what i think? I don't think disney puts up these films or animations to help adoped children etc Disney cares about making money. So how do you make money out here in the capitalist system? Well you sell a product with emotion. You know these films sell? Coz they are emotional films. They make you cry. And that to disney is good coz that means the film will sell. So if you think disney has got a heart for kids without parents think again...
But that my 2 cents opinion(Thats how we say it where i come from)
Is the adoption progam working?
Posted by: KC Jackson at August 8, 2007 05:07 PMBesides think about it if they cared so much about kids without parents shouldn't they have started a program to help these kids?
Has anyone heard about any program like that?
The day disney starts a program for kids and by kids i mean orphaned kids in Africa, that will be the day i will buy the whole disney cares. Until then they can produce films like lion king they ain't convincing me.
Besides the whole lion king thing was great for them because people have this whole fasination with Africa and safari and wildlife so it was just a great way to ensure that their movies sell.