Burton Cayley
The University of British Columbia (UBC), Vancouver, British Columbia (BC), Canada.
Heliyon. 2021 May 19;7(5):e06994. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e06994. eCollection 2021 May.
Many children, but predominantly young girls, gravitate towards princess play. In response to previous academic findings suggesting that princess play is always detrimental to young children's developing perspectives of femininity, this qualitative study explores the potential for gender-creativity during this roleplaying game. In an effort to refute the pre-existing literature, the current case study asks the following question: To what extent does princess play offer creative or confining possibilities for childhood feminine expression? While much of the literature in early childhood education (ECE) indicates that Disney is the sole inspiration for every child's construction of this imagination game, the findings in this article indicate that Disney is one influence among many for focal participants. Using open coding to analyze data generated during play-based interviews with two cisgender girls, this article demonstrates that the creative possibilities of princess play remain underrepresented in research. Although princess play offers only partial potential for non-stereotypical feminine expression, gender normativity can be actively challenged, especially when adults support and encourage unconventional formats of princess play during early childhood.
许多孩子，尤其是年幼的女孩，喜欢玩公主游戏。针对之前的学术研究结果表明公主游戏总是不利于幼儿形成女性气质的观点，这项定性研究探讨了这种角色扮演游戏中性别创造力的潜力。为了反驳现有文献，当前的案例研究提出了以下问题：公主游戏在多大程度上为童年女性表达提供了创造性或局限性的可能性？虽然幼儿教育（ECE）中的许多文献表明迪士尼是每个孩子构建这种想象游戏的唯一灵感来源，但本文的研究结果表明，迪士尼只是主要参与者的众多影响因素之一。本文通过开放式编码分析在对两名顺性别女孩进行基于游戏的访谈过程中产生的数据，证明了公主游戏的创造性可能性在研究中仍然未得到充分体现。尽管公主游戏只为非传统女性表达提供了部分潜力，但性别规范性可以受到积极挑战，尤其是当成年人在幼儿期支持并鼓励非传统形式的公主游戏时。
