Deciphering Pocahontas: Unpackaging the commodification of a native American woman

Abstract

This essay examines the commodification of Pocahontas surrounding the 1995 Disney film. Pocahontas. Through an examination of Pocahontas products and popular cultural discourses about Pocahontas, the essay develops a theory of the “cipher”; as a late‐capitalist commodity form. Theorization of the cipher helps explain how companies market a field of goods in relationship to a single product, such as a film. Marketing campaigns draw on generic forms and figures that can be easily reproduced and identified. Furthermore, through the marketing of Pocahontas goods and popular discourses, Disney and the general mainstream commodity culture construct a market for children versus parents. And while the commodity world of Pocahontas uses utopic appeals to sell products, through their appropriation of feminism and Native American culture and history, Pocahontas products and discourses contribute to the material oppression of women and Native Americans, generally, and Native American women in particular.