Think of the Children!

"THINK OF THE CHILDREN!": GENDER AND SEXUALITY IN NICKELODEON CARTOONS

Rebecca Grenier '18
Whittier College 
Whittier Scholars Program Self-Designed Major: Writing for Multimedia


The world of television cartoons has historically been, and largely remains, a space dominated by stories of straight male characters. Cartoons are written about boys, for boys, and even as live-action television is making dedicated strides toward on-screen gender equity, these animated programs continue to fall short. At least, that’s the theory. “Think of the Children!”: Gender and Sexuality in Nickelodeon Cartoons examines the amount and quality of representation of genders and sexualities in five culturally-significant cartoons that premiered on children’s television network Nickelodeon between 1991 and 2001: Rugrats, Hey Arnold!, SpongeBob SquarePants, As Told By Ginger, and The Fairly OddParents. These cartoons were selected according to a list of four criteria, including financial success, critical acclaim, fan following, and current network relevance. One to two sample episodes of each program are analyzed through the critical frameworks of gender theory, queer theory, and feminism as applied to film and media studies, and then put into perspective within the larger canon of Nickelodeon’s programming. The end result is a summary of Nickelodeon’s successes and failures in portraying diverse identities within the context of these five programs, presented here as a nonlinear digital essay.

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Contents of this path:

  1. The Introduction
  2. The Episodes
  3. The Gender Count
  4. The Representation Count
  5. WORKS CITED