Animation Industry in Saudi Arabia

3865 Words16 Pages
A Call for Endogenous Saudi Animations: Stop Cultural Imperialism! Ohud Rashid Alharbi PhD Student at De Montfort University, Leicester E mail o.r.w.a@hotmail.com Mobile 0044 7529743161 Postal address flat 36, Lyndwood Court, Stoughton Road, Leicester, LE2 2EJ Dr Emily Baines senior Lecturer, School of Design Faculty of Art, Design & Humanities, De Montfort University Abstract Animation industry is one of the emerging industry that developed countries have dominated and reaping benefits from the investment in this creative industry (Screen Digest,2009). One of these benefits is that animation films represented the national cultural identity to others nations. However, these benefits can have a negative effects on the receiver culture if they absorbed massive dose from foreign cultures (UNESCO,1980). Therefore, developing countries started to develop their own animation that can protect their heritages and convey their cultural identity to the world. In light of the above, this paper focuses on the role of animation industry in representing cultural identity by using contents analysis as a methodology to understand the misrepresentation of stereotype that embodied in animation films. Moreover, this paper spots light the landscape of Saudi Animation to find what is the current state of the animation industry in Saudi Arabia. Key Words Animation Cultural Identity Cultural Imperialism Misrepresentation Orieantalism Saudi Arabia Stereotype Introduction The animation industry is one of the creative industry tributaries that contribute to protect cultural identity and convey the national cultural identity to other nations. Moreover, animations can form invisible cultural domination if the receiver nation receives a massive dose of foreign animation films. Besides this, cultural imperialism can occur through media such as television, of
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