Hegemonic Heteronormativity: How Children's Movies From The 2000s Use Archetypes To Reproduce Traditional Gender Roles

Abstract

Social science studies on film found that movies have the potential to act as agents for socialization. Although findings on the subject are extremely complex, this conclusion has opened up opportunities for a plethora of research questions. As a result, there have been many studies on film media through the lenses of, for example, gender and race theories. This study in particular focuses on how movie media targeted towards children released between the years 1999-2000 work to normalize hegemonic heteronormative structures of dominance. Through industry wide repetition of narratives and character developments, content creators use archetypes to affect the goal of normalizing hegemonic heteronormativity. In the context of movies, an archetype can be defined as a set of physical and non-physical attributes characters are created to embody that then later are developed in similar ways. Examples of archetypes are the good female characters that aren't like other girls, the childless overly thin and tall female villain who tries to steal children, and the hyper-masculine male celebrity who ends up falling for the good female character that isn't like other girls. Reviewing related literature on the subject of media influence and analyzing ten children's movies, this study was conducted to find how archetypes were used in the 2000s as a tool to socialize juvenile audiences.