Barbie's Queer Accessories

Series Q

by Erica Rand

She’s skinny, white, and blond. She’s Barbie—an icon of femininity to generations of American girls. She’s also multiethnic and straight—or so says Mattel, Barbie’s manufacturer. But, as Barbie’s Queer Accessories demonstrates, many girls do things with Barbie never seen in any commercial. Erica Rand looks at the corporate marketing strategies used to create Barbie’s versatile (She’s a rapper! She’s an astronaut! She’s a bride!) but nonetheless premolded and still predominantly white image. Rand weighs the values Mattel seeks to embody in Barbie—evident, for example, in her improbably thin waist and her heterosexual partner—against the naked, dyked out, transgendered, and trashed versions favored by many juvenile owners and adult collectors of the doll.
Rand begins by focusing on the production and marketing of Barbie, starting in 1959, including Mattel’s numerous tie-ins and spin-offs. These variations, which include the much-promoted multiethnic Barbies and the controversial Earring Magic Ken, helped make the doll one of the most profitable toys on the market. In lively chapters based on extensive interviews, the author discusses adult testimony from both Barbie "survivors" and enthusiasts and explores how memories of the doll fit into women’s lives. Finally, Rand looks at cultural reappropriations of Barbie by artists, collectors, and especially lesbians and gay men, and considers resistance to Barbie as a form of social and political activism.
Illustrated with photographs of various interpretations and alterations of Barbie, this book encompasses both Barbie glorification and abjection as it testifies to the irrefutably compelling qualities of this bestselling toy. Anyone who has played with Barbie—or, more importantly, thought or worried about playing with Barbie—will find this book fascinating.

Genres: Queer, Feminism, Nonfiction, Theory, LGBT, Sociology, Philosophy

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Erica Rand is a writer, critic, activist, and Professor of Art and Visual Culture and of Women and Gender Studies at Bates College in Lewiston, ME. She also serves on the editorial board of the journal Radical Teacher. Her book, The Ellis Island Snow Globe, won the Alan Bray Memorial Book Award from the Modern Language Association's GL/Q Caucus.

Reviews

[Verity O'Connell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really wish Greta had read this :(

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a mixed bag. While the first chapter is a perfectly delightful digging into the sordid history of Barbie and a must read, the rest of the book wavers. The second chapter is very uneven. The testimonials from adults about how they played with Barbies is fascinating in and of itself, however her conclusions that the author draws are quite muddled. Sometimes she is off on a digression that should have been a whole other chapter and you loose the purpose of the entire chapter. But then the book comes back around with Chapter three -- otherwise known as the reason you probably picked up this book in the first place -- Queer Barbies! The different LGBT subversions, remakes, and queer readings of Barbie are awesome as well as the information about the weird wild world of Barbie collectors. And finally there is a conclusion that doesn't seem to have much to do with most of the point of the book. What you get are two great chapters, one ok one, and a trainwreck on the end.

So in conclusion, this book has some really great points, stories, and information but it is bogged down with muddled arguments, and overly scholarly prose at times. To be honest, I'm not sure who the audience for this book is. Those unfamiliar with Barbie criticism in feminist writing wouldn't be able to keep up with the writing style, however some of her points that Barbie is imbued with racist, sexist, and other fucked up messages will be a bit of a "duh" to those familiar with second and third wave pop culture criticism.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

AAAGHHHH!!! I ferickin LOVED this book when I read it years ago, and I wish I had it now. Most memorable moment: photo of a queered-out bondage-Barbie, with Barbara Krueger "I SHOP THEREFORE I AM" postcard as art hanging on her dream home's wall. LOVE! LOVE! Pink hearts are coming out of me right now.

I liked this book so much because a) I LOVE Barbie and find all things pertaining to her extremely FASCINATING b) I also love books that make the (SHOULD BE) obvious point that the consumption of pop culture is not just a mindless, docile, passive, one-way process for everyone who doesn't have a PhD. Like DUH, Jessica-Barbie! Right?! Kids and even adults are all doing wild stuff all day long with their Barbies, and that stuff is so IMPORTANT!

Okay, so I sort of have this feeling that once I got over my intitial joy, this book might not have delivered quite all the glory promised by its brilliant title (did you realize, at age five, while performing acts between your Ken dolls that were not even legal at that time in the state of Texas, that you were an accessory to something?), but hey, tall order, right? It's still the best book about Barbie that I know of, and I've read a few.

The thing I didn't like about this book is that it made me feel strange about the fact that I have no memories at all of my sister and I making our Barbies have sex. Unlike many other girls, we had no Ken dolls, and we only had one Barbie apiece, but after reading this book I felt like we could've figured something out, and now I have a whole new set of a developmental abnormalities to discuss with my analyst, whenever he turns up.

Anyway, along similar lines, please enjoy this political ad from some of Barbie's more recent queer accessories:

Lead Toys Ad

[Alice · Rating 4 out of 5]

Honestly, such a fun read! There was a lot of information in this book that I just did not know about Barbie, and I feel like Rand's analysis of Barbie through many different lenses was really adept.

Rand is also so so so good at throwing shade throughout the book, and as someone who read this book after watching the Barbie movie, the amount of shade (subtle and not so subtle) thrown specifically at Ken has provided me with some of my favorite out of context quotes:

" According to Schneider, 'Mattel was careful to give him boyish, clean-cut looks, and the overall, non-threatening, asexual appearance of a wimpy little Jerk.'"

"Barbie has a boy in every port to get hot for and a safe one to come home to; Ken himself never shops around."

"The statement 'Barbie turned my sister into a materialistic bimbo' has the same truth value as 'Barbie loves Ken'. Barbie cannot actually do either of those things."

"Ken's very existence meant that sex had to happen. His insufficiency signaled bad sex, not no sex."

"Barbie 'always forgave Ken when he had his little incidents. She knew more than him, so she was able to forgive him."

"Mattel either must confess to having intentionally made a gay Ken who uses sex toys or protest that the gay connotations were totally unintentional."

[B Panther · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of different theoretical accessories in this one. Some fit others don’t. Still, the approachable tone and human interest make this a breezy read.

[Merete · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,7, habs für meine Hausarbeit gelesen und an sich super interessant nur irgendwie an manchen Stellen zu unausführlich. Trotzdem empfehlenswert

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

rereading this book since I got it for my b-day and can't remember it very well. Ah, kent, seems like a blurry memory the longer I'm away.