I had never heard of American Girl dolls (geared toward 8-12 year olds) until a few years ago when it moved into Northpoint Mall. Now, I hear about them quite a bit. There was even an American Girl event at my son's school the last couple years and every single girl in first grade (about 40 girls) had one. Keep in mind these dolls are about $100 in price.
On May 31, 2009 American Girl is debuting a new doll in their historical line. Her name is Rebecca Rubin. She is from 1914 and is a Jewish, Russian-American immigrant from the lower east side. This interests me, why? Well, My husband is Jewish and we are raising our children to be Jewish. OH! And I have a little 5 year old girl who loves... you got it.... DOLLS! They have apparently been working on this doll for roughly 9 years making sure they didn't piss anybody off by making any stereotypical remarks in her books (they come with a storybook series) or by making her features too... stereotypically Jewish... COME ON! They teetered on what color her HAIR would be... Auburn is too atypical, brown is too typical... OK! How about brown with auburn highlights! BINGO! I guess they got slammed a while back for the African American doll being a slave. Well... they are historical dolls right? Are we to forget our history just because our history contains awful things? NO! We learn from them and move on. Why wouldn't 8 year old girls learn the history of what African American girls in that day and age went through? Maybe I am wrong. Maybe I see things all backwards. I suppose it is possible.
2 comments:
I totally agree! I suppose it's nice that they are attempting to be sensitive, but they are historical dolls and not all history was giggles and gingerbread!
Our neighborhood girls went through the American Girl doll phase, but have mostly all outgrown them now. I once crocheted a little poncho and a hat for one of their dolls. It came out pretty cute!
ITA... I know which dolls Abby (cousin) will be getting next!
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