Princesses in the Classroom: Young Children Learning to be Human in a Gendered World

Abstract

For well over fifty years, girls as princesses has been a staple of child-hood play. In 2000, The Disney Corporation released its "Princesses" line of merchandise - - eight princess-es marketed together as a group for the purpose of creating a single brand which can be more easily mass-pro-duced. As such, the princess industry has grown significantly in the last ten years. This paper explores the heavily marketed princess motif on the devel-opment of gender identity in young girls. The messages of simplistic and traditional, hyper-gendered perfor-mances are powerful and ubiquitous, and such fixations need not be encouraged in primary classrooms. Primary teachers in particular could use alternative and varied metaphors for gender roles when choosing books, stories, and learning activities for their classrooms, and they can cre-ate space for critical discussions regarding young children's percep-tions of gender roles. Because chil-dren appropriate cultural material to participate in and explore their world, mindful engagements with their teachers seem necessary.