RACE — current posts — Fantasy/Animation

Representations of Femininity: International Perspectives - Liyana (Aaron and Amanda Kopp, 2017)

This blog post examines the 2017 film Liyana, directed by Aaron and Amanda Kopp, which describes itself as a “genre-defying documentary” that weaves together both animation and live-action scenes to tell the story of five orphaned children in the Kingdom of Eswatini. Yet its reflexive framing narrative focuses on the children’s creation of their own fictional tale featuring the fearless Liyana, who as part of the film’s story-within-a-story structure embarks on a treacherous quest to save her younger brothers.

EDITORIALRosie ThomsonFebruary 16, 2024GENDER, IDENTITY, RACEComment

Vonnworld: The Animated Series

On the evening of February 28th 2015 in an East Oakland neighborhood in northern California, Davon Malik Ellis was walking with a couple of his friends to the store from his football coach's home when he was stopped by a random stranger and shot to death. He was only 14 years old with a promising future in football. It was this random violent act that birthed the idea of the animated project Vonnworld: The Animated Series

EDITORIALBruce BowersJanuary 13, 2023TELEVISION, RACE, AMERICA, STORYTELLINGComment

The Story of O.J (Jay-Z & Mark Romanek, 2017)

In this blog post I will explore the ways in which Jay Z’s 2017 music video ‘The story of O.J’ (2017) evokes the problematic politics of representation in animation, and the damaging effects that these representations have historically had on understanding of American black identity and culture.

SEQUENCE ANALYSISMeghna JohalApril 28, 2022RACE, AMERICA, MUSIC, POLITICAL, CARTOON Comment

Feels Like Summer: A Forecast of Animation’s Political and Documentary Function in Music Videos

Childish Gambino’s animated music video “Feels Like Summer” (Childish Gambino, 2018) places many animated representations of hip-hop artists, actors and well-known celebrities in a fictional Atlanta neighbourhood. We see celebrities engaging in various fun summer activities in this fantasy community, including Migos playing basketball, Will Smith washing his car, and J Cole dowsing the hip-hop duo of Slim Jxmmi and Swae Lee with a water hose for annoying him with water guns.

SEQUENCE ANALYSISHrithvikaOctober 22, 2021RACE, REPRESENTATION, MUSIC, AMERICA, CELEBRITYComment

Orientalism and Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)

Eighty-four years after its first animated feature film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (David Hand, 1937) and fifty-eight movies later, Disney finally has its first Southeast Asian princess with Raya and the Last Dragon (Paul Briggs, Don Hall & Carlos López Estrada, 2021). The titular character, Raya, joins the ranks of their other princess-of-colour from the Disney canon including Tiana from The Princess and the Frog (Ron Clements & John Musker, 2009), Jasmine from Aladdin (Ron Clements & John Musker, 1992), and the titular characters from Pocahontas (Mike Gabriel & Eric Goldberg, 1995), Mulan (Tony Bancroft & Barry Cook, 1998) and Moana (Ron Clements, Don Hall & John Musker, 2016).

EDITORIALPrakash Krishnan and Patricia Petit LiangAugust 13, 2021DISNEY, ASIAN ANIMATION, REPRESENTATION, IDENTITY, FANTASY, GENDER, RACEComment

The Fantasy World of...Jessica Ashman

Jessica Ashman is a BAFTA in Scotland award-winning artist who works in animation, music, performance and arts education. In 2014 she graduated from the Royal College of Art with a MA in Animation and her work has been supported by Animate Projects, Jerwood Visual Arts Bursary, Arts Council England, UK Film Council and Channel 4's Random Acts.

THE FANTASY WORLD OF...Jessica AshmanApril 9, 2021GENDER, RACE, POLITICAL, REPRESENTATIONComment

Review: Lava (Ayar Blasco, 2019)

When I heard Lava’s premise, I was intrigued. Giant alien cats launching an attack on Earth? You’ve got my attention! (To be honest, anything that features cats will at least get a glance from me.) Though I was lured in by the promise of extraterrestrial felines and madcap entertainment, I was disappointed to find Lava poorly paced, dubiously constructed, and falling short of its loftier thematic goals.

FILM REVIEWAyanni C. H. CooperMarch 19, 2021MAGIC, MYTHOLOGY, FANTASY, GENDER, RACEComment

Review: Soul (Pete Docter, 2020)

If the narrative of Soul sounds complex, that’s because it is. In a similar vein to Pixar’s Inside Out (Pete Docter, 2015), which explores the abstract concepts of emotions (and, specifically, emotional development) through animation, Soul explores existentialism and the many manifestations of what having a soul can really mean, as well as how these connect to the idea of our lives having a specific “purpose” that we were born to fulfil.

Why I Dare to Dream

I was always described as a child with her head in the clouds. Mine was a military family that moved from place to place every few years, traveling across the country. I was too young to stay connected to old friends each time we moved, so being continuously friendless wasn't unusual. One of my earliest memories was learning to adapt and make space for myself. I learned quickly that the most consistent friend I would ever have was myself.

CREATIVE REFLECTIONJojo BlanOctober 30, 2020RACE, REPRESENTATION, GENDER, VISIBILITYComment

Re-examining “Friend Like Me”

There is considerable scrutiny of the politics of representation in Disney’s animated screen musicals. With appalling depictions of faceless African American workers in “Song of the Roustabouts” in Dumbo (Ben Sharpsteen, 1941), controversy about the representation of indigenous Americans in Pocahontas (Mike Gabriel & Eric Goldberg, 1995), and lightening the skin of Princess Tiana in Ralph Breaks the Internet (Rich Moore & Phil Johnston, 2018), there have been ongoing questions about limited, fetishized, and often racist characterisations of people of colour in the studio’s films.

SEQUENCE ANALYSISHannah RobbinsOctober 16, 2020MUSICAL, RACE, IDENTITY, PERFORMANCE, HOLLYWOOD Comments

#BlackGirlJoy: The Exuberance of Posthuman Black Girlhood in Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts

Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts (Radford Sechrist, 2020-) is a colourful, post-apocalyptic animated adventure series based on the webcomic Kipo, which debuted on Netflix in early 2020 to much critical acclaim (Fig. 1). The story follows the titular Kipo, a 13-year-old “burrow girl” who finds herself thrust from the safety of her underground home to a surface world filled with talking, anthropomorphized animals, or “mutes,” as well as titanic, kaiju-sized “mega mutes.”

Anti-Racism in Fantasy/Animation and Academia

At Annecy 2020, Women in Animation held a digital summit on the theme ‘Reimagining the Future: Race, Solidarity and the Culture of Work’. At the panel ‘Black Women in Animation: Looking to the Future’, moderator Jamal Joseph from Columbia University asked, ‘What needs to happen now? How do we get more women in animation and how do we get more women of colour in animation and film?’

EDITORIALKodi MaierOctober 2, 2020DIVERSITY, INCLUSION, RACE, CREATIVE PRACTICE, ACADEMIA Comment

An Anti-Racist Animation Syllabus

The resources below were originally compiled in response to an email my colleague Kodi Maier sent to the Society for Animation Studies listserv in order to begin a conversation and resource exchange aimed at defining best practices for creating an anti-racist classroom in our subfield. I would like to once again thank Kodi for taking the initiative to remind us of our collective responsibility as scholars, educators, and human beings.

EDITORIALMihaela MihailovaJune 19, 2020RACE, SCHOLARSHIP, DIVERSITY, INCLUSION, GENDER, EDUCATION Comments

Maleficent: Mistress of Evil (Joachim Rønning, 2019) and the Construction of Fantasy Spaces

The Walt Disney Company does not have the best record when it comes to diverse ethnic and racial representation. Despite spending the latter half of the last decade trying to rectify this problem across its Disney, Pixar, and Marvel Studio offerings, attempts to broaden on-screen representation still leaves both audiences and critics wanting.

EDITORIALMichelle Anya AnjirbagFebruary 7, 2020DISNEY, SPECIAL EFFECTS, RACE, REMAKE, FANTASYComment

Thoughts about Halo: Race and Violence and the Muslim Superhero

Set in the DC universe, North American animation television series Young Justice (2010-) follows a large ensemble of superheroes who undertake various covert missions. While iconic figures such as Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman do make fleeting appearances, the programme deliberately spotlights lesser-known characters and sidekicks (Fig. 1). The first season followed the first Robin, Aqualad, Kid Flash, Superboy, Miss Martian, and Artemis. The second introduced a plethora of new team members but mostly focused on the second Blue Beetle and Impulse, the Flash’s time-traveling grandson.

EDITORIALFrancis M. AgnoliJuly 12, 2019RACE, IDENTITY, TELEVISION Comment