Abstract
Little Red Riding Hood, alongside her perennial nemesis the wolf, is undoubtably iconic. Despite centuries of revision, a narrative featuring a young girl traversing the forest whilst navigating predatory danger to deliver provisions to her grandmother remains instantly recognisable because its themes and motifs are so deeply ingrained within the fabric of Western cultural convention. As meaningful historic and cultural artefacts, the stories are often aimed at children, functioning as didactic transmitters of social expectations and moral codes, rendering them powerful tools of civilisation. Moreover, cultural familiarity with the predatory narrative provides a metaphorical hook that is prime for exploitation under the guise of entertainment. As a result, Red and the wolf have been subjected to centuries of ideological appropriation, which under the influence of shifting hegemonies, has shaped differing constructions of their gender, sexuality, and acts of violence over time.Foucauldian Discourse Analysis (FDA) seeks to examine how changing discursive economies produce knowledge and power in historical context, and how such discourses regulate ways of being in the world. This study’s FDA methodology further employed the novel integration of both visual and textual data sources to analyse how animated revisions of Little Red Riding Hood have differentially constructed Red and the wolf across the last century. Such holistic examination allowed the identification of problematised representations formative of the narrative’s genealogy, plus subsequent theoretical linkage to shifting ideologies in wider historical, socio-political, and cultural contexts.
Outcomes evidenced the historical mainstay of a central predatory relationship between Red and the wolf. The explicit depiction of sexual violence as motive for an older male overpowering a young female ceases post World War II, when the wolf’s representation shifts from sexual predator to ridiculed bumpkin, and to a more intelligent and sophisticated animal in recent decades. However, his compulsive behaviour to predate Red does not change. In response to his relentless threat, Red and her grandmother, the latter whose new found feist and prominence presents as unique to the both animated medium and this study’s findings, become increasingly more violent and avenging as the timeline progresses.
The female intergenerational alliance binarises youthful and aged representations of femininity, further problematised by contrast with the anthropomorphised wolf, whose age and masculinity are obscured. Animations normalise heterosexuality, whiteness, and able-bodiedness, plus socioeconomic positionings are inherent to narrative constructions. Gendered discourses of violence and retribution dominate all revisions, changing constructions of which are empirically linked to significant socio-political shifts across the century.
| Date of Award | 19 Sept 2025 |
|---|---|
| Original language | English |
| Supervisor | Sarah Jane Daly (Main Supervisor) & Kate Wood (Co-Supervisor) |