“Life Isn't Some Cartoon Musical”: Neoliberal Identity Politics inZootopiaandOrange Is the New Black
Year: 2018
Type: article
Abstract: PROGRESSIVES SEEMED TO HAVE REASON TO rejoice.Amidst the ongoing culture wars, representations of women and minorities had been slowly but steadily improving in American film and television: the latest Disney princesses provided role models that were no longer necessarily straight and white, the notoriously white Star Wars franchise was undergoing noticeable diversification, and activist groups like Black Lives Matter were once again putting issues like racial profiling and police departments' abuse of power on the national agenda.So even if the war had not yet been won, some crucial battles clearly seemed to have been decided, and with the appointment of the first female President of the United States seemingly a foregone conclusion, the long arc of history did indeed seem to be bending toward justice.Then a painful lesson was learned.The bizarre fluke that was Trump's election victory taught many people-on both sides of the political spectrum-that the word "inconceivable" apparently did not mean what they thought it meant, forcing many to re-evaluate their understanding of this increasingly surreal twenty-first-century political reality.If three decades of neoliberal doctrine had slowly accustomed people to the idea that no alternative is possible, Trump's political ascent and the European far-right antiglobalist movement now appear as the harbingers of a new, postneoliberal age.Whether it will be one of neo-fascist oppression or rejuvenated civic engagement and political dissent (or both) remains, of course, to be seen.
Source: The Journal of Popular Culture
DOI: 10.1111/jpcu.12658
Author: Dan Hassler‐Forest
Language: English
Subfield: Philosophy
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2886692947