How dolls still shape your self-image
Dolls are sold with accessories that girls are expected to buy over the course of their childhood
Often depicted with perfect facial features, flawless, poreless skin, and perfectly proportioned bodies, these exaggerated features can create an unattainable beauty standard
At the mature age of 10, my world was shaped by dolls. Packaged in pink skin with a hint of tan, they had shiny long silky hair. Their feet permanently tip-toeing because they were made for heels. Dolls are sold with accessories that girls are expected to buy over the
course of their childhood. My sister was equally obsessed with dolls. We were quite good when it came to sharing them. Dolls can take on a creepy tinge when they are collected by the hundreds and locked away in a room. Especially if they all seem to have the same aesthetic. Then, it can have serial killer vibes.
Dolls have also been known to haunt in film. Even so, as miniature representations of human figures, dolls can actually impact self-image owing to them being everyday playthings, but also because they seem to be quite perfect. Often depicted with perfect facial features, flawless, poreless skin, and perfectly proportioned bodies that cannot be measured to scale, these exaggerated features can create an unattainable beauty standard.
Dolls impact how individuals perceive their own bodies and self-esteem. When children play with dolls that embody unrealistic beauty ideals, they have a specific idea of beauty imprinted into their brains. I still remember wrapping a towel around my hair and pretending it was my hair, pretending to brush it for maximum effect.
Quite healthy
I half-thought that when I grew up, my eyes would turn blue and my hair would go blonde. I, of course, blamed my ancestors for my head of quite healthy albeit shoulder-length afro hair, faulting them for not making me prettier. For a long time, I was convinced this was the beauty standard.
You see, when I was growing up we did not have representation when it came to dolls. They were a single ethnicity: white. This Eurocentric beauty standard persisted on TV where soaps portrayed even more white people. The lack of diversity was, in hindsight, quite astonishing. It didn’t help that dolls come with extremely lean frames.
Their idealised body shapes were thin, while I had a rather rounded bottom in contrast. Again, I must emphasise the absence of black people on TV. Perhaps this is why I fell in love with music videos. They showed stunning women who had curves and some were dark-skinned beauties. It was here that I saw a variety from Foxy Brown to Mariah Carey (yes, she is black) to Toni Braxton.
It wasn’t until later that Mattel, the creators of Barbie, succumbed to the evolution of their beloved doll by transforming celebrities into dolls. It is an impressive list from J-Lo, Beyonce, Zendaya, Lady Gaga, Britney Spears to Christina Aguilera. My favourite is Diana Ross’ 2003 iteration with a flower in her voluminous hair and a Bob Mackie gown. Multiple award-winning Bob was one of the best costume and fashion designers.
In an article aptly titled The Barbie Effect - Dolls, Beauty Standards and Body Image Issues, dolls, which have done absolutely nothing to earn their hallowed status except be loved by girls, were described thus. “Since its invention in 1959, the Barbie doll has been setting unrealistic beauty standards, influencing a lot of young girls around the world to believe that being 5’9”, weighing about 50 kilos, having F-cup breasts and stick-thin limbs is the way to go! All while completely ignoring the fact that a real body with these dimensions will be physically incapable of supporting itself and will collapse.”
Over the years there has been a collective push to have dolls that were more representative of humans instead of dolls that were ‘aspirational.’ I mean, no matter how hard a human female tried they could never grow up to be Barbie.
This is such a contrast to the 1959 Barbie commercial that sang “Barbie’s small and so petite, her clothes and figure look so neat. Someday I’m gonna be exactly like you, till then I know just what I’ll do. Barbie, beautiful Barbie, I’ll make myself believe that I am you.”
It helps that we are in a generation where self-love is preached with a fervour only matched by the Gospel. 1980 saw the first African-American Barbie and Ken doll. Then Barbie went to college and became an astronaut because we dared whine about her unemployment and socialite lifestyle. Where was she getting money to buy all those pink things she owned? So now Barbie has been everything from a doctor, and an Olympian right up to the president of the USA.
Popular
In 2014, Mattel produced a chemo Barbie. It has proven to be extremely popular. But, let us not give Barbie all the glory.
In 2001, the world was introduced to Yasmin, Cloe, Jade, and Sasha aka Bratz Dolls.
Created by a former Mattel employee who must have felt stifled by all the unoriginality of Barbie, Carter Bryant’s collection grew and grew. Bratz, naturally, got spin-offs, was adapted into a TV series (yes, so has Barbie, I know, I know), and had a web series and a live-action film. The entire Bratz franchise grossed $2 billion by 2005.
Bratz, with their large winged almond eyes with a hint of a smokey eye had full glossy lips. They were immediately pitted against Barbie. By 2005, Bratz had inched their way into 40 per cent of the doll market, which is saying something. It did not stop Mattel from playing dirty miring both brands in a vicious doll war — a whole other story. Bratz are responsible for makeup trends where vloggers have attempted to recreate their facial features. Bratz doll lips are a trend right now.
What fuelled Bratz was their varied skin tones and hair textures. Interestingly, in A Brief Investigation Into The Complicated History of Bratz, wmagazine disclosed that in the beginning, the dolls were considered “ugly.” They were also considered too risque by some. Chloe was the popular one. She had blue eyes and blonde hair.
Bratz were blamed for sexualising children. That did not stop adults from leveraging the dolls with the Bratz makeup challenge. The article further states that “... the dolls were petite with notably small chests. Moreover, their faces exhibited undeniable ethnic markers: almond-shaped eyes, full lips. They were not always considered attractive by conventional, Eurocentric beauty standards.” It has not stopped them from being style icons despite their outsider status and supposed ethnic look.
Where have you seen dolls before? Easy! SnapChat, Tiktok and Instagram. Their filters are designed to turn us into caricatures. The fox eye trend seen on Bella Hadid, the world’s top model, is inspired by Bratz, which has influenced plastic surgery trends in the US. It is fascinating that dolls have not had BBLs considering their ubiquity. But, it is evident that even as adults, dolls still influence our beauty standards, self-image and self-esteem.
Wouldn’t you agree?
