I replied that this “new” kind of princess had been on the scene for a while.\u00a0 Belle, from Beauty and the Beast<\/em>, according to imdb<\/a>, was “a bookworm who dream[t] of life outside her provincial village,” not of a prince charming.\u00a0 That was 20 years ago.\u00a0 Both Pocohantas and Mulan were adventurous and brave.\u00a0 Most princesses, these days, are not perfect embodiments of femininity, they balance their femininity with a bit of masculinity.\u00a0 It’s ‘cess + sass as a rule.<\/p>\n But, to be fair, these princesses aren’t radical.\u00a0 They aren’t pushing the envelope of femininity.\u00a0 They are only reflecting the fact that ideal femininity in the West has changed such that the perfect woman now incorporates some masculine character traits.\u00a0 “Some” is the operative word here.\u00a0 Today’s ideal woman is still feminine, but she works, wears pants, and plays sports.\u00a0 She may even be a sports fan and drink beer.\u00a0 But she also preserves her femininity, especially those aspects of femininity that mark her as “for” a (just barely and totally benevolently of course) dominant male.\u00a0 She still doesn’t disagree too vigorously or laugh too loud.\u00a0 She marries a man who is slightly older, more educated, larger, taller, and makes a bit more money at his job that is just slightly higher prestige.\u00a0 And, no matter what, she looks, dresses, and moves in pretty, feminine ways.\u00a0 Barbie and the Three Musketeers<\/em><\/a> is another, non-Disney example of this phenomenon:<\/p>\n Not a man in sight!\u00a0 But damn do they look good in those boots!<\/p>\n Simon O. also sent in a Barbie website<\/a> that fits this theme nicely.\u00a0 It asks “What Should Barbie Be Next?” and let’s us vote on her next profession: pet vet, race car driver, ballerina, baby sitter, “kid doctor,” rock star, pediatric dentist, or wedding stylist.\u00a0Barbie can be anything she wants, as long as she looks great doing it.\u00a0 Or maybe it’s that Barbie can be anything she wants because <\/em>she looks good doing it.<\/p>\n The new rule is: a girl can be anything, as long as she’s hot<\/a> (and deferent when push comes to shove).\u00a0 Whether she likes it or not, she always gets the guy in the end because, well, she’s so damn sweet and adorable (and, yes, those words are totally coded with gendered meaning).\u00a0 This fact, the fact that she always still ends up with the guy in the end, is a really important part of this story… it reminds us that getting the guy is still the happy ending… even the little girls in the bike commercial came away with a “prince.”<\/p>\n So, yeah, we can debate about whether these princesses are a qualitative and substantial break from previous princesses.\u00a0 I’m not sure they are.\u00a0 Or, if they are, I’m not sure the difference is all that fantastic, given that the ideal is still incredibly rigid and damn difficult to live up to.\u00a0 And I’m not even sure I like this new (impossible) ideal any better than the old (impossible) ideal.\u00a0 What we see today is a couple generations of women who are expected to be both masculine and feminine.\u00a0 As if staying fit, looking lovely, smelling great, volunteering, and having a clean house, a sexually satiated husband, and behaved, brilliant, well-adjusted children wasn’t enough of a job… women now have to be go-getters at the law firm and ass-kickers on the court. \u00a0 It’s called The Second Shift<\/em><\/a> and women work more<\/a> and relax less<\/a> than men.<\/p>\n For more examples of the ideal balance of femininity and masculinity, see these posts on pinkifying masculine jobs<\/a>, prints<\/a>, and hobbies (sports<\/a> and guns<\/a>), the “girl” ranchhand<\/a>, this ad suggesting that a girl’s razor should be “no girly man,”<\/a> the social construction of female athletes (here<\/a> and here<\/a>), and the color blue<\/a>.<\/p>\nLisa Wade, PhD<\/a> is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of <\/em>American Hookup<\/a>, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender<\/a>; and a forthcoming introductory text: <\/em>Terrible Magnificent Sociology<\/a>.\u00a0You can follow her on Twitter<\/a> and Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Is “princess” being redefined? One of the compliments aimed at the new Disney movie, The Princess and the Frog, is that the heroine isn’t just a pretty face, but in fact an entrepreneur who wants to open her own restaurant and is uninterested in catching a man.\u00a0 This observation was made to me, for example, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[55,2089,2103,2099,2095,129,23703,343],"class_list":["post-18887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-gender","tag-gender-beauty","tag-gender-bodies","tag-gender-childrenyouth","tag-gender-feminismactivism","tag-media","tag-marketing","tag-tvmovies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18887"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18887\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71223,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18887\/revisions\/71223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Barbie-and-the-Three-Musketeers-DVD-Case-barbie-movies-6758824-352-500\"](\"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/files\/2010\/01\/Barbie-and-the-Three-Musketeers-DVD-Case-barbie-movies-6758824-352-500.jpg\" "\\"Barbie-and-the-Three-Musketeers-DVD-Case-barbie-movies-6758824-352-500\\"")
<\/p>\n