Spring 2011 marked the beginning of a multi-year project to explore the religious dimensions of Disney's films and theme park productions, and the ways in which Disney fans adopt, evade, transgress, and/or otherwise engage with the religious dimensions of Disney. This project was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. It has received ethics approval through the Interdisciplinary Committee for Ethics in Human Research at Memorial University.
Summary:
For many, the Walt Disney Company is synonymous with quality family entertainment, as exemplified by films, television shows, and theme parks such as Disneyland. However, in 1997, the USA's largest Protestant denomination launched a boycott of Disney, arguing that the company promulgated anti-Christian and anti-family values in its entertainment products and corporate policies. By contrast, some liberal culture critics have argued that Disney entertainment products foster a nostalgia for an imagined American past in which white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant values result in the perpetuation of racism, sexism, consumerism, and imperialism through the dissemination of Disney entertainment products to a global market.
Disney's potential to communicate ideological messages globally is undeniably strong: in 2009, combined attendance at all Disney theme parks surpassed one hundred and twelve million (TEA/AECOM 2009). Disney's 2009 revenue topped thirty-six point one billion dollars (The Walt DisneyCompany2009). Disney is the second largest corporate media owner in the United States (Free Press 2010). Ninety-seven point five percent of respondents in eighteen countries surveyed have seen a Disney film (Wasko, Philips and Meehan 2001:43). Given Disney's vast media holdings and the vast global audience for Disney entertainment products, it is not surprising that Disney has drawn ideological criticism. Such criticisms are predicated on the view that entertainment products shape the social, religious and moral beliefs of audiences, and yet neither Disney's conservative critics nor their liberal counterparts have established that such a link exists.
This research consists of an analysis of Disney ideologies as represented in films and theme park productions, and an investigation of the impact that Disney entertainment products has had on the worldviews of audiences through participant-observation fieldwork in Disney fan communities. Unlike any other study to date, this project seeks to identify the meanings fans take from Disney films and theme parks, what impact these meanings have on their religious and ideological worldviews, and what such potential impacts might say about the ideological positioning of Disney fans in global cultural and religious landscapes. Are Disney fans and Disney audiences passively absorbing a monolithic Disney "message" in their consumption of Disney entertainment products? Do Disney fans in various countries differ in their appreciation of, influence by, and resistance to Disney messages? Just what is Disney saying when it comes to religion, and what are Disney fans saying in response?
The project contributes to a more generalized understanding of religion in the twenty-first century, and points to new ways of being religious in a media and consumption driven world. The religious and ideological dimensions of Disney entertainment products will be decoded, and their varied impact on Disney fans explored. Using Disney fans as an exemplar, the project highlights how media has become a source for religious inspiration, and highlighst the ways that authoritative source texts are defined, negotiated, renegotiated, and transgressed by audiences for whom popular culture is meaningful.
My research:
Porter, Jennifer E. 2016 “Pirates of the Caribbean: Mermaids on Stranger Tides,” in Fan Phenomenon: Mermaids. Matthieu Guitton, ed. Intellect Books, 52-63.
Porter, Jennifer E. 2016 “The Ambiguous Captain Jack Sparrow: Destabilizing Gender, Politics, and Religion in Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean,” in The Disney Dialogues. Ed. Douglas Brode and Shea T. Brode. Rowman and Littlefield,151-162.
Porter, Jennifer E. 2018 “‘We are One’: Exploring the Mediated Oneness at Disney’s Pandora – the World of Avatar and Rivers of Light.” Text and Context Symposium, Memorial University, April 2018
Porter, Jennifer E. 2016 “Anthropomorphism and the Revenge of Mother Earth: Animistic Ecology in Disney’s Global Theme Parks” Text And Context Symposium, Memorial University, April 2016
Porter, Jennifer E. 2015 “Mickey Mouse and Mother Earth: Exploring animism, ecology and the supernatural at Disney Theme Parks.” Presented at the 2015 Annual meeting of the Canadian Society for the Study of Religion, held in conjunction with the Congress of the Humanities and the Social Sciences, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, May/June 2015.
Porter, Jennifer E. 2015 “Disneyland as Eschatology.” Presented at the 2015 Text and Context Symposium, Memorial University, April 2015.
Porter, Jennifer E. 2014 “Memento Mori and the Promise of Tomorrow(land): Disneyland as Eschatology.” Presented at the 2014 Annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion, San Diego, California, November 2014.
Porter, Jennifer E. 2009 “The Ambiguous Captain Jack Sparrow: Myth and Religion in Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean.” Presented at the 2009 annual meeting of the Canadian Society for the Study of Religion, Ottawa, Ontario, May 2009.
Porter, Jennifer E. 2008 “Implicit Religion in Popular Culture: The Religious Dimensions of Fan Communities.” Paper presented at the 2008 annual meeting of the Canadian Society for the Study of Religion, Vancouver June 2008.
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The Religion and Disney Project is an independent research project and is NOT affiliated in any way with The Walt Disney Company or any of its affiliates or subsidiaries.