Gender Stereotypes in Sleeping Beauty Social Sciences Essay (Essay Sample)

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Gender Stereotypes in Sleeping Beauty
With the tremendous world of fairies, witches, princes and princesses, Disney films have exerted massive influence on contemporary society. These bewildering characters portrayed in fairy tales affect a child’s mind and get established in the social psyche of the generation. Therefore, one can claim that children may adapt the values taught by fairy tales leading them to perpetuating patriarchal concepts and gender normative acts. “Little Briar Rose” made by the Grimm’s fairy tales in 1812 is a collection of folk tales transcribed by the German brothers which The Sleeping Beauty is the most famous. It is a classical fairytale which involves the characters of a prince, princess, king, queen, and the good and bad fairies. The goal of this paper is to examine and expose the gender normative aspects shown in the story of Sleeping Beauty through feminist criticism.
A patriarchal society can be viewed as a culture that advantages men. Traditionally, it is usual to view men as strong and powerful who are qualified for great feats. On the contrary, women are dominated by their emotions which makes them weak and submissive. Men are assigned to be powerful over women. An example would be when “The King, who would fain keep his dear child from the misfortune, gave orders that every spindle in the whole kingdom should be burnt” (2). These roles are principal to the society which result to inequalities suffered by women. Since most grew up in a patriarchal society, people valued this to the point that it became part of their identities making it harder to recognize the injustice in the society.