Someday, My Mom Will Come…

Absence & Apparitions: Lack of Mothers in Disney Princess Culture

Growing up, I looked up the most to the princesses of Walt Disney as role models and big sister figures.  Now with little cousins that are growing up in a new era of Disney (more diverse, more feminine-friendly), I wanted to know the methods behind the magic.  Reading MTV’s article on producer Don Hahn’s interview with Glamour, a heartbreaking issue has surfaced.  Recently being talked about but not tackled, our favorite royals are missing what many take for granted—their mothers.

Who was your favorite Disney princess?  Everyone had one.  These animated royals didn’t get on all the lunchboxes by themselves.  Ariel was my favorite because she was a dreamer and a singer.  My little sister loved Aurora (aka Sleeping Beauty) because they share the same nickname, “Rose.”  But isn’t it odd that the young women we looked up to as little girls—and now our little girls are looking up to as well—had no women of their own to look up to themselves?  Who were they able to carry around on their lunchboxes?  Disney producer Don Hahn reveals to Glamour that Walt Disney omitted mothers from his films due to his own hauntings of his mother’s tragic death by furnace leakage shortly after Disney’s.  This issue is also very much apparent in our favorite childhood fairytales penned by the Brothers Grimm, who also grew up without a mother.  Analysts and critics over the years have argued that this motif, though heartbreaking, is necessary.  Our heroines have to learn to stand on their own two feet.  And this cannot be accomplished; they cannot find themselves if under a parent’s thumb.  Such a speedy growth, like getting a prince to kiss you in three days to become human, is forced by making the character do it all herself.  But why eliminate the mother specifically?  Is this an acceptable bargain?

Could it be that our favorite princesses would actually be able to grow more in their films if a maternal figure were present?  Never mind the psychoanalysis for Walt Disney’s motherless career.  Why is this a problem for little girls viewing these films in 2014?  Well for thing, Our Disney princesses are thrown into their tasks, very much like their mothers would be if they were around.  Keep in mind also that these royals are only 16-20 years old, and the responsibilities of someone with more wisdom and experience have been placed on them without any warning.  Pocahontas must settle the feud between two cultures.  Belle must leave all she knows and tame a beast.  Mulan goes to war.  These young princesses are forced to find themselves without good feminine examples along their way, which leave room for them to be easily manipulated by villains like Ursula (The Little Mermaid) or—even worse—overly dependent on strange men like Prince Hans (Frozen).  Of course, this does not take away that they provide great examples of courage and gender defiance, as well as hope that dreams will come true.  But is killing off the mother really necessary to get this message?  Cinderella and Snow White are left in the clutches of their evil stepmothers. Pocahontas only feels her mother in the occasional Virginia breeze. Ariel, Jasmine, and Belle become overly sheltered by their fathers against their adventurous spirits.  And everyone’s new favorite princesses, Elsa and Anna, and are forced to take on an entire kingdom as politicians when their mother dies before helping them resolve their internal conflicts.  If the mother is not just deceased, she is an apparitional, dreamlike figure making short cameo appearances at the beginning and the end of the film.  They never join their daughter on her journey.  Rapunzel and Aurora do not even know their birth mothers until the near end.  Tiana and Mulan must leave their mothers to handle their business and reunite at the end once they have been married and receive their honors.  Arguably, Merida spends the most time with her mother in her journey, but she can hardly communicate with her because she’s a bear for 80 percent of the movie.

So how do we fix this problem for our little girls without ruining the magic of Disney for them?  Well for one thing, we can stop just sitting them in front of the television just to get them out of our hair.  Watch these movies with them to make your presence pick up for what the film lacks.  We must also expose our girls to other maternal figures of the public eye, to broaden their ideas on the possibilities for young women.  Take them to the play and ballets that surround relationships between mother and daughter, or even mother-daughter outtings/events in your area.  Take them to work.  Let them see mommies in action.  Disney as a corporation can produce what they please, but writing letters petitioning for mothers being present in future films gives leverage for it to happen because you are writing as a consumer.  Disney’s beloved princesses have taught the world a great deal about dreams, heroism, self-worth, and especially cultural diversity.  With that in mind, they have also taught us to cherish and appreciate our mothers, because we all need them.

By Jessica Wise