Keywords

Latinx fans, Latina fans, Disney Encanto, Fan Studies, Partial Recognition

Subject Categories

Communication | Film and Media Studies | Race and Ethnicity

Abstract

In this dissertation, I examine how Latinx and Latina audiences engaged with and interpreted Disney’s 2021 Encanto, an animated film celebrated for its representation of Colombian and broader Latinx culture. While scholarship on Latinx representation in media has expanded, less attention has been given to how Latinx audiences themselves respond to narratives that are meant to represent them, particularly within fan studies. Focusing on both a broader Latinx fan community and first-generation Latinas in the United States, this project explores how audiences negotiate representation and recognition using Encanto as a media text that centered a Latinx story. Drawing from scholarship in Latinx media studies and fan studies, I use a mixed-methods approach, including a discourse analysis of 531 TikTok comments across 25 videos, a survey of 146 responses from Latinas, followed by five in-depth interviews with first-generation Latinas. The findings from this project reveal that participants frequently describe Encanto as meaningful and culturally resonant, particularly through its depictions of food, music, family and generational trauma. At the same time, many repeatedly express frustration at the film's ambiguous representation of Latinx culture while recognizing its Colombian-specific setting. This tension between specificity and ambiguity from fans is a focal point throughout the project. Ultimately, I argue that Encanto resonated with Latinx audiences not because it perfectly represented Latinx culture, but because they recognized overlapping experiences within the film that represented fragments of their experiences. This leads to the concept of partial recognition that describes what happens when a media text gets enough cultural representation right that it feels meaningful to the viewer, but not so much that it fully represents the viewer’s specific cultural experiences. This idea emerged from participants’ many responses surrounding representation and offers a way to better understand how panethnic audiences negotiate mainstream media representation.

Completion Date

2026

Semester

Summer

Committee Chair

Stanfill, Mel

Degree

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

College

College of Arts and Humanities

Department

Texts and Technology

Format

PDF

Document Type

Dissertation

Language

English

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