Princess Archetypes

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Are Princesses Really Fit to Lead?
When someone was a child, it is most likely that they watched a princess movie or a fantasy movie and had a desire to be like a character or even imitate the character. The princess fantasy is one of the most common and pervasive archetypes in popular culture and can be traced to ancient literary and oral mythological traditions (Isitt, “Princesses”). The fairy tale genre of fiction that emerged in Europe and North America in the seventeenth century continues to influence depictions of both male and female characters (Isitt, “Princesses”). The princess remains one of the most common depictions of women in fantasy, and elements of this archetype influence the way that “non-princess” women are depicted in film
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“Pretending to be a princess represents two important beliefs for the women who embrace it: that they deserve to be treated as special and that life has the potential to be wonderful… princesses teach lessons about kindness, forgiveness, the value of knowledge, and of perseverance through adversity” (Issitt, “Counterpoint”). In addition, princesses can also be good role models because they can teach people positive life lessons. Princesses teach young girls character traits that will help them in life, such as; self control, gentleness, friendliness, and confidence. Also the princesses that are known as empowering should be role models for girls to teach girls things that they will face in their daily lives or in the future. It may be understood why a parent would not want their daughter to be watching princess movies or become too attached to a certain princess because they might be showing content that is not healthy for a growing mind. Laha states that Disney movies should change the way characters appear because many young girls love to hold on to a movie character and use them as their role model. Having a girl depend on a ‘‘unhealthy’’ role model would result in a young girl who would be uncomfortable with the body they have and can possibly create confidence issues.. “Disney movies are a favorite with children, and whatever …show more content…
If Disney does not do anything to change princesses to be more imperfect and human-like, generations of girls could possibly have lower self esteem which could lead to depression very low confidence, and even self harm. Not one single person on this world is perfect so it is very unreasonable to make a character, that companies know children will want to be like or impersonate, a perfect flawless character. Although this might not seem like a big crisis, it actually is very important because a mother or a family member, would not like their own daughter or a sibling to call themselves fat because they do not look like someone or change themselves to be someone they are not. To resolve this issue there should be more princess movies of different races and ethnicities and princesses should be drawn and depicted to be more accurate and to reflect society