“What Price Difference?”

Colored Francie 1967

“Groucho Marx said he wouldn’t want to belong to any club that would have him as a member. In the same vein, I’m not so sure that most of us really want to buy a doll that looks like us. We can criticize it’s unreality all we want, but perfect female beauty of the Barbie kind is a commodity we buy and buy and buy.”
-Ann DuCille
"Skin Trade"

Mr. McGuire: I just wanna say one word to you. Just one word.
Ben Braddock: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Ben: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: "Plastics."
-“The Graduate”

As a doll lover and enthusiast, I’ve thought about this every so often but the last time I thought about it, it disturbed me even more than usual. Would I like a doll that looked like women I see every day? Would I like a doll that looked like me, my friends, my co-workers, my boss, my neighbors, the cashiers at Pret a Manger?  I cringe. I don’t even get as far as trying to imagine what that would even look like, how the proportions would work, what kind  of costumes they would wear. What I end up doing is waving the idea away and dismissing it with the rationale that dolls are about fantasy and escape from the mundane. Who wants a doll to look like you or your neighbors?  But the thing is, doll companies, Mattel in particular do use significant elements of “reality” in the creation of their dolls. They do design Barbies with what they see as some every day gal attributes, and accessories right? They do this, they say, in order to relate more closely to the consumer, to allow young girls access to dream through a plastic avatar who can be and do anything.  But they pick and choose how these elements of our everyday life are skewed and are sure  always to fit them into a rigid mold that never varies enough to reflect “real” reality. And it is this selectiveness by those whose ideas of “difference” are viewed primarily as a marketing tool and promoted as “diversity”  which play an especially dangerous role in the way we see ourselves and each other.

My mother impressed upon me at very early stage of my devlopment that every doll I received was special, no matter the features,  size, color shape, and that the specialness imbued issues forth from the beholder, the player. With that knowledge firmly instilled, I would go on to make the hero of my playtime, dolls which one might never regard as “beautiful” in any way but which I regarded quite fondly and with love.

But those were baby dolls, stuffed dolls, animal dolls, dolls my mother made for me. That was before Barbie, before boobs, before plastic.

"Dyes and Dolls: Multicultural Barbie and the Merchandising of Difference"

The white missionaries who came to
Saint Aug's from New England were
darling to us. They gave Bessie and me
these beautiful china dolls that prob-
ably were very expensive. Those dolls
were white, of course. You couldn't get
a colored doll like that in those days.
Well, I loved mine, just the way it was,
but do you know what Bessie did? She
took an artist's palette they had also
given us and sat down and mixed the
paints until she came up with a shade
of brown that matched her skin. Then
she painted that white doll's face! None
of the white missionaries ever said a
word about it. Mama and Papa just
smiled. (Sarah Delany)

I've been told by friends who are aware of my Blythe Doll Obsession, particularly of my customizing of them into Black Dolls that I should read Ann Ducille for quite some time now. I was futzing around, doing a myriad of things online last night, after midnight when I decided to google her and came up this snippet of what appears to be a collection of essays she had put together by women and their experiences with dolls. I was instantly fascinated. I then ordered a cheap copy of her book "Skin Trade" on Amazon and I am dying to read it. I'm finishing Sidney Poitier's autobiography this week so I'm hungry as hell to sink my teeth into something new. Stay tuned.

Blythe Comes Home: The beginning of a beautiful friendship

Blythe is to Barbie what cats are to dogs. She never really looks you in the eye and when she does it’s with a straight on intense stare. She’s full of mystery, aloofness and intrigue a bit of melancholy and a ton of cool. All the things that an eight year old girl in the 1970s is not really looking for in a play doll. Her eyes turn four different colors! It’s like getting four different dolls in one! She’s a byproduct of 70s psychedelic marketing and just didn’t test well among children. I mean her eye color choices include blue, green, pink and orange! Okay yeah! Blythe is totally a stoner!
Welcome Home!!!