The movie Aladdin has been an incredibly controversial movie since its debut in 1992. The misrepresentation of the middle east in the movie has had serious negative impacts on the middle eastern community. Orientalism is defined as how Asia and the Middle east are portrayed, specifically in a stereotyped Western view point. Throughout this movie you can see countless examples of this, especially throughout their portrayal of women in the film. Oriental women throughout Aladdin are portrayed as inappropriately exotic and provocative, and very overly sexualized.
On the surface level Aladdin is an enjoyable and funny movie for young children, but when you look closely you can begin to see how harmful this movie has truly been. In the scene “Jafar’s Third Wish,” where Jafar holds Jasmine captive, Jasmine is made to be very sexual and exotic.
Throughout the entire movie Jasmine wears an incredibly revealing outfit, that would not have been accurately representative of a middle eastern princess of that time. The usual attire for a princess would have been dressed very modestly, in a long, flowing dress with multiple layers of fabric, to protect them from the heat. Princess Jasmine’s attire could not have been further from accurate. Throughout the entire movie Jasmine is wearing a shirt that has the same coverage as a strapless bra, and some very low waisted pants. Her pants even outline the curvature of her hips. What makes this worse is that in the scene “Jafar’s Third Wish” her outfit is changed from a light blue color to a bright red. The color red is often used to connote sex and attraction. Disney took an already sexualizing outfit and made it even worse. Jasmine’s outfit in this scene suxualizes her to an inappropriate and unnecessary degree. Her outfit does no justice to how middle eastern women actually dress. It is an inaccurate depiction that has helped perpetuate the orientalist stereotypes about how women in the middle east are not respected and are thought of only for their bodies.
If the clothing in this scene was not enough, the scene gets significantly worse when you start paying attention to the dialogue. Throughout the entire film, especially in this scene, Jafar aggressively flirts with Jasmine, calling her things such as “pussycat” and “beautiful desert bloom,” even though she makes it abundantly clear she is not interested in him. Jafar is using very derogatory language to interact with Jasmine. While the term pussycat is not inherently sexual, when you put it in context with the sexual tension Disney has already created it takes on a very sexual connotation. This is just another example of how Disney has enforced this incorrect generalization about middle eastern women. They created a dialogue in which the man just continues to flirt with the women, despite her being not interested.
Disney made a lot of harmful choices throughout this scene alone. Throughout this scene they depicted Jasmine as a child-friendly version of a sex slave. Disney chose to show Jasmine chained up, in a very sexual outfit, being forced to do demeaning tasks for Jafar all while he is relentlessly and inappropriately flirting with her. I am not entirely sure Disney intended to portray Jasmine in such a wildly inaccurate and sexual way. I assume that the directors were trying to pique the viewer’s interest by making this movie seem to take place in an exotic, far away place. They even state this in the opening song “Arabian Nights” when the song says, “Oh I come from a land, from a far away place.” This line is logistically confusing, because if the character is from Agrabah, the setting of Aladdin, why would they refer to it as a far away place? I feel this is Disney’s way of creating more space between the setting and the audience. I also interpret this as the directors trying to add intrigue and a sense of exoticness to the film. This may also have contributed to Disney’s choice in outfits. The outfits in Aladdin are far from accurate. This may be because, again, Disney was trying to make the women in this movie seem more exotic and unique. Whatever their reasoning may be, this depiction of middle eastern women was and continues to be incredibly harmful. The representation of women throughout this film can be interpreted, by the uneducated mind, that women in the East are only used for their bodies. This image of eastern women is incredibly inaccurate. While women across the world have had to deal with oppression, oriental women have made tremendous strides towards equality. They are highly respected and very powerful throughout their society. The sexualization of Jasmine, in Aladdin, feeds into a harmful orientalist stereotype that needs to be stopped.
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I find the topic of your essay very interesting because it goes in depth about the sexualization of Jasmine with Aladdin. Princess are normally seen in modest clothing but in this particular movie they made Jamsine a sex symbol. They dressed her in skimpy clothing and used her as an object that could be gained. What I find most interesting in your writing is that you noticed the change in Jasmine’s outfit from blue to red. The color red in used to symbolize sex and they sexualized her even more when they changed her outfit from blue to red. This representation is not remotely accurate of middle eastern women and purpurates the stereotypes that middle eastern women are used as sex slaves. I did not even notice the significance of this change until I read what you wrote.