Blackness, Bayous and Gumbo in The Princess and The Frog

In her article "Blackness, Bayous and Gumbo: Encoding and Decoding race in a colorblind world", Sarah Turner argues that Disney negated any potential backlash from The Princess and the Frog being portrayed as racist by adopting a colorblind approach. Contrary to many Disney critics, she believes that it is much too simplistic to view the movie as simply another racist Disney creation, driven by Disney’s desire for even more commercial wealth. While Turner does not necessarily agree with Disney’s decision to adopt the colorblind approach, she does acknowledge that Disney’s hands were practically tied if they wanted to appeal to both an African-American and white audiences while still maintaining political correctness. She describes the movie as being a “can’t win situation” from a Disney standpoint. I agree with her, as no matter how hard Disney tried, some critics would view Tiana as being too black and some would view her as being too white, with each perspective being viewed as ultimately racist. Therefore, she suggests that Disney attempts to “sublimate” race in the movie, while it was impossible for them to ignore race, they tried to minimize its influence in the movie. Disney somewhat achieved this by transforming both Tiana and Prince Naveen into frogs from quite early on in the movie. Turner points out that Tiana only actually appears as a woman for twenty nine minutes of the film, making it much easier for Disney to convey their message that race is irrelevant in a colorblind world. Throughout her article, Turner explores the concept of colorblindness primarily through the portrayal of Tiana, Disney’s first black princess. Turner gives her opinion on the highly controversial question of whether Tiana is a princess who just happens to be black or whether she is a black princess. Turner chooses to view Tiana from a colorblind approach and views her as simply a princess who is also black, her race does not define her. She praises Disney for not only creating its first black princess but also its first princess that is independent, confident and hardworking, something that Disney fans from all cultural backgrounds have been waiting for, for a long time.

From watching the film, it is quite obvious that Disney consciously tried to counteract and make up for some of the criticism that it has garnered over the past few decades. I liked the point that Turner made about Lottie’s room as being a homage to Disney princesses from the past like Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty and how Disney essentially poked fun as themselves by portraying Lottie as a stereotypical rich, spoilt and of course, white princess. I found the point Turner made about the illustrations in the fairytale book and the depiction of the married couple on Dr. Facilier’s tarot cards to be particularly interesting and very valid. She remarks how the characters illustrated in the book that Eudora reads to the children are white, as are the couple on Dr. Facilier’s tarot cards that he shows Prince Naveen. She suggests that these illustrations, while subtle, are Disney’s way of showing how their version of events is more progressive and more importantly, less racist than the originals and its previous work. However, in her closing paragraphs, she draws our attention to Disney's hypocrisy during the Academy Awards at which The Princess and The Frog was nominated for an Oscar. She points out how all of the other movies were represented by the actors who voiced the main character in the movie, which in this case should have been Tiana. In actuality, it seems that Disney's attempts to depict a colorblind world did not stop after the film was released, with Disney choosing the white actors that voiced Prince Naveen and the Louis the alligator, instead of Tiana. In Turner's opinion, this was to avoid any associations between the movie and race and reinforces the complexity for disney of creating its first black princess movie.