Fiske,Television Culture and Disney

I found John Fiske's, Television Culture very interesting to read. His in depth analysis on the culture of television resonated with me because when I watch television, I like to analyze what I am seeing. Yes, Glee is a show about students signing in Glee club, but in actuality, it is a show about our society and culture. Fiske says that "A code is a rule-governed system of signs, whose rules and conventions are shared amongst members of a culture, and which is used to generate and circulate meanings in for that culture (1088)."

Additionally, Fiske's theory on television can also be applied to film. He mentions that "the middle-class and the white American is correlated with the more attractive, the more moral and the heroic. This displacement of morality onto class is a common feature of our popular culture...Walt Disney cartoons consistently express villany through characteristics..." (1093).

Several Disney movies like Aladdin during the early 90s are considered very controversial due to the plot and background of the stories. In Aladdin, the main characters Aladdin and Jasmine on the surface seem like a typical animated character. Yet, though Aladdin is supposed to be from somewhere in the Middle East, his skin is lighter than the villain Jafar, and the nonessential characters have darker features. Aladdin doesn't have an accent, but an American one, just like Jasmine's father, who could be considered more British than Middle Eastern. Lastly, Jasmine's characteristics are similarly lighter with an American accent. What is Disney saying here? That the dark guy is usually the villain, and the American is the hero? Aren't most Americans non-Caucasian? It is interesting to find how audiences respond to this, and whether they notice these stereotypical features, or set it aside as just a movie.



Fiske, John. "Television Culture." 1087-97. Print.