'Barbie' is a best-selling
fashion doll launched in
1959. The doll is produced by
Mattel, Inc., and is a major source of revenue for the company. The
American businesswoman
Ruth Handler (1916-2002) is regarded as the creator of Barbie, and the doll's design was inspired by a
German doll called
Bild Lilli.
Barbie has been an important part of the toy fashion doll market for nearly fifty years, and has been the subject of numerous controversies and
lawsuits, often involving
parody of the doll and her lifestyle. In recent years, Barbie has faced increasing competition from the
Bratz range of dolls.
History
The original Barbie was launched in March 1959
watched her daughter Barbara at play with paper dolls, and noticed that she often enjoyed giving them adult roles. At the time, most children's toy dolls were representations of infants. Realizing that there could be a gap in the market, Handler suggested the idea of an adult-bodied doll to her husband Elliot, a co-founder of the
Mattel toy company. He was unenthusiastic about the idea, as were Mattel's directors.
During a trip to
Europe in 1956 with her children Barbara and Kenneth, Ruth Handler came across a
German toy doll called
Bild Lilli.
[1] The adult-figured Lilli doll was exactly what Handler had in mind, so she purchased three of them. She gave one to her daughter and took the others back to Mattel. The Lilli doll was based on a popular character appearing in a
comic strip drawn by Reinhard Beuthin for the newspaper ''
Die Bild-Zeitung''. Lilli was a working girl who knew what she wanted and was not above using men to get it. The Lilli doll was first sold in Germany in 1955, and although it was initially sold to adults, it became popular with children who enjoyed dressing her up in outfits that were available separately.
Upon her return to the
United States, Handler reworked the design of the doll (with help from engineer
Jack Ryan) and the doll was given a new name, ''Barbie'', after Handler's daughter Barbara. The doll made its debut at the
American International Toy Fair in
New York on
March 9,
1959. This date is also used as Barbie's official
birthday. Mattel acquired the rights to the
Bild Lilli doll in 1964 and production of Lilli was stopped. The first Barbie doll wore a black and white zebra striped swimsuit and signature topknot
ponytail, and was available as either a
blonde or
brunette. The doll was marketed as a "Teen-age Fashion Model," with her clothes created by Mattel fashion designer Charlotte Johnson. The first Barbie dolls were manufactured in
Japan, with their clothes hand-stitched by Japanese
homeworkers. Around 350,000 Barbie dolls were sold during the first year of production.
Ruth Handler believed that it was important for Barbie to have an adult appearance, and early
market research showed that some parents were unhappy about the doll's chest, which had distinct breasts. Barbie's appearance has been changed many times, most notably in 1971 when the doll's eyes were adjusted to look forwards rather than having the demure sideways glance of the original model.
Barbie was one of the first
toys to have a marketing strategy based extensively on
television advertising, which has been copied widely by other toys. It is estimated that over a billion Barbie dolls have been sold worldwide in over 150 countries, with Mattel claiming that three Barbie dolls are sold every second.
[2]
The standard range of Barbie dolls and related accessories are manufactured to approximately , which is also known as
playscale.
[3]
Barbie products include not only the range of dolls with their clothes and accessories, but also a huge range of Barbie branded goods such as books, fashion items and
video games. Barbie has appeared in a series of animated films and makes a brief guest appearance in the 1999 film ''
Toy Story 2''.
Almost uniquely for a toy fashion doll, Barbie has become a
cultural icon and has been given honors that are rare in the toy world. In 1974 a section of
Times Square in
New York City was renamed Barbie Boulevard for a week, while in 1985 the artist
Andy Warhol created a painting of Barbie.
[4][5]
Biography
Barbara Millicent Roberts
Barbie's full name is 'Barbara Millicent Roberts'. In a series of novels published by
Random House in the 1960s, her parents' names are given as George and Margaret Roberts from the fictional town of Willows,
Wisconsin. Barbie has been said to attend Willows High School and Manhattan International High School in
New York City, based on the real-life
Stuyvesant High School. She has an on-off romantic relationship with her beau
Ken ('Ken Carson'), who first appeared in 1961. Like Barbie, Ken shares his name with one of Ruth Handler's children. A
news release from Mattel in February 2004 announced that Barbie and Ken had decided to split up, but in February 2006 they were back together again.
[6][7]
Barbie has had over forty
pets including
cats and
dogs,
horses, a
panda, a
lion cub, and a
zebra. She has owned a wide range of vehicles, including pink
convertibles, trailers and
jeeps. She also holds a
pilot's license, and operates commercial airliners in addition to serving as a
flight attendant.
Barbie's careers are designed to show that women can take on a variety of roles in life, and the doll has been sold with a wide range of titles including ''Miss Astronaut Barbie'' (1965), ''Doctor Barbie'' (1988) and ''Nascar Barbie'' (1998).
[8]
Mattel has created a range of companions for Barbie, including
Hispanic Teresa,
African American Christie and Steven (Christie's boyfriend). For more details, see the
List of Barbie's friends and family.
Controversies
Barbie facing comparison with the Middle Eastern doll
Fulla
Barbie's popularity ensures that her effect on the play of Western children attracts a high degree of scrutiny. The criticisms leveled at her are often based on the assumption that children consider Barbie a role model and will attempt to emulate her.
★ In September 2003 the
Middle Eastern country of
Saudi Arabia outlawed the sale of Barbie dolls, saying that she did not conform to the ideals of
Islam. The
Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice stated "
Jewish Barbie dolls, with their revealing clothes and shameful postures, accessories and tools are a symbol of decadence to the perverted West. Let us beware of her dangers and be careful."
[9] In Middle Eastern countries there is an alternative doll called
Fulla who is similar to Barbie but is designed to be more acceptable to an Islamic market. Fulla is not made by the Mattel Corporation, and Barbie is still available in other Middle Eastern countries including
Egypt.
[10] In
Iran,
Sara and Dara dolls are available as an alternative to Barbie.
[11]
★ The word ''Barbie'' has come to be used as a
derogatory slang term for a
girl or
woman who is considered shallow, most notably in the 1997 pop song ''
Barbie Girl'' (see
Parodies and lawsuits below). In July 1992 Mattel released ''Teen Talk Barbie'', which spoke a number of phrases including "Will we ever have enough clothes?", "I love shopping!", and "Wanna have a
pizza party?" Each doll was programmed to say four out of 270 possible phrases, so that no two dolls were likely to be the same. One of these 270 phrases was "
Math class is tough!" Although only about 1.5% of all the dolls sold said the phrase, it led to criticism from the
American Association of University Women. In October 1992 Mattel announced that ''Teen Talk Barbie'' would no longer say the phrase, and offered a swap to anyone who owned the doll.
[12]
Barbie's waist has been widened in more recent versions of the doll
★ One of the most common criticisms of Barbie is that she promotes an unrealistic idea of body image for a woman, leading to a risk that women who attempt to emulate her will become
anorexic. A standard Barbie doll is 11.5 inches tall, giving a height of 5 feet 9 inches at
1/6 scale. Barbie's vital statistics have been estimated at 36 inches (chest), 18 inches (waist) and 33 inches (hips). According to research by the University Central Hospital in
Helsinki,
Finland, she would lack the 17 to 22 percent body fat required for a woman to
menstruate.
[13] In 1965 ''Slumber Party Barbie'' came with a book entitled ''How to Lose Weight'' which advised: "Don't eat." The doll also came with pink bathroom scales reading 110lb, which would be around 35lbs underweight for a woman 5 feet 9 inches tall. In 1997 Barbie's body mold was redesigned and given a wider waist, with Mattel saying that this would make the doll better suited to contemporary fashion designs.
[14]
''Oreo Fun Barbie'' from 1997 became controversial due to a negative interpretation of the doll's name
★ "Colored
Francie" made her debut in 1967, and she is sometimes described as the first
African American Barbie doll. However, she was produced using the existing head molds for the
white Francie doll and lacked African characteristics other than a dark skin. The first African American doll in the Barbie range is usually regarded as Christie, who made her debut in 1968.
[15][16] Black Barbie and Hispanic Barbie were launched in 1980.
★ In 1997 Mattel joined forces with
Nabisco to launch a cross-promotion of Barbie with
Oreo cookies. ''Oreo Fun Barbie'' was marketed as someone with whom little girls could play after class and share "America's favorite cookie." As had become the custom, Mattel manufactured both a
white and a
black version. Critics argued that in the
African American community ''Oreo'' is a derogatory term for a person like the chocolate sandwich cookie itself, meaning that the person is black on the outside and white on the inside. The doll was unsuccessful and Mattel recalled the unsold stock, making it sought after by collectors.
[17]
★ In May 1997 Mattel introduced ''Share a Smile Becky'', a doll in a pink
wheelchair. Kjersti Johnson, a 17-year-old high school student in
Tacoma, Washington with
cerebral palsy, pointed out that the doll would not fit into the
elevator of Barbie's $100 Dream House. Mattel announced that it would redesign the house in the future to accommodate the doll.
[18][19]
★ In March 2000 stories appeared in the media claiming that the hard
vinyl used in vintage Barbie dolls could leak toxic chemicals, causing danger to children playing with them. The claim was rejected as false by technical experts. A modern Barbie doll has a body made from
ABS plastic, while the head is made from soft
PVC.
[20][21]
★ In December 2005 Dr. Agnes Nairn at the
University of Bath in
England published research suggesting that girls often go through a stage where they hate their Barbie dolls and subject them to a range of punishments, including
decapitation and placing the doll in a
microwave oven. Dr. Nairn said: "It's as though disavowing Barbie is a rite of passage and a rejection of their past."
[22][23]
Parodies and lawsuits
Barbie has often been referenced in
popular culture and is frequently the target of
parody. Some of these occasions include:
★ In 1997, the
Danish pop-dance group
Aqua released a song called ''
Barbie Girl''. It contained lyrics such as "''You can brush my hair / Undress me everywhere''" and used graphics similar to the pink Barbie
logo. Mattel argued that this constituted a
trademark infringement and filed a
defamation lawsuit against
MCA Records on
September 11,
1997. In July 2002, Judge
Alex Kozinski ruled that the song was protected as a parody under the
First Amendment to the United States Constitution.
[24][25]
★ A commercial by
automobile company
Nissan featuring dolls similar to Barbie and Ken was the subject of another lawsuit in 1997. In the commercial, a female doll is lured into a car by a doll resembling
GI Joe to the dismay of a Ken-like doll, accompanied by
Van Halen's version of the song ''
You Really Got Me''. According to the makers of the commercial, the dolls' names were Roxanne, Nick and Tad. Mattel claimed that the commercial had done "irreparable damage" to its products, but lost the
copyright infringement lawsuit.
[26]
★ ''
Saturday Night Live'' aired a parody of Barbie commercials featuring the fictional "Gangsta Bitch Barbie" doll and a "Tupac Ken" doll.
[27]
★
The Tonight Show with Jay Leno displayed a fictional "Barbie
Crystal Meth Lab" which mocked how Barbie usually has a career that is "in keeping with the times or in this case, in keeping with society's current problems."
★
Malibu Stacy is a parody of Barbie in the cartoon series ''
The Simpsons''. In the 1994 episode ''
Lisa vs. Malibu Stacy'', a talking Stacy doll is introduced, speaking phrases such as "let's buy make-up so the boys will like us". Lisa is disgusted by the "
sexist drivel spouted by Malibu Stacy," leading her to market an alternative "Lisa Lionheart". The episode is based loosely on the controversy surrounding ''Teen Talk Barbie'' from 1992.
★ In 1999 Mattel sued the
Utah artist Tom Forsythe over a series of photographs called ''Food Chain Barbie'', which included a photograph of a Barbie doll in a
blender. Mattel lost the lawsuit and was ordered to pay $1.8 million in costs to Mr. Forsythe.
[28][29]
★ In November 2002 a
New York judge refused an
injunction against the
British-based artist Susanne Pitt, who had produced a doll called
Dungeon Barbie in
bondage clothing. Judge Laura Taylor Swain stated: "To the court's knowledge, there is no Mattel line of
S&M Barbie."
[30]
Collecting
Vintage #7 Ponytail Barbie doll from 1964-66. The doll's hair has been restyled and she is wearing a different outfit from the red swimsuit of the original.
Mattel estimates that there are well over 100,000 avid Barbie collectors. Ninety percent are women, at an average age of 40, purchasing more than twenty Barbie dolls each year. Forty-five percent of them spend upwards of $1000 a year.
Vintage Barbie dolls from the early years are the most valuable at
auction, and while the original Barbie was sold for $3.00 in 1959, a mint boxed Barbie from 1959 sold for $3552.50 on
eBay in October 2004.
[31] On
September 26,
2006, a Barbie doll set a world record at auction of £9,000
sterling (US $17,000) at
Christie's in
London. The doll was a Barbie in Midnight Red from 1965 and was part of a private collection of 4,000 Barbie dolls being sold by two
Dutch women, Ietje Raebel and her daughter Marina.
[32]
In recent years Mattel has sold a wide range of Barbie dolls aimed specifically at collectors, including
porcelain versions and depictions of Barbie as a range of characters from television series such as ''
The Munsters'' and ''
Star Trek''.
[33][34] There are also collector's edition dolls depicting Barbie dolls with a range of different ethnic identities.
[35] In 2004 Mattel introduced the Color Tier system for its collector's edition Barbie dolls, ranging through pink, silver, gold and platinum depending on how many of the dolls are produced.
[36]
Barbie versus Bratz
''My Scene'' Barbie dolls are the subject of a lawsuit from the creators of
Bratz dolls
In June 2001
MGA Entertainment launched the
Bratz range of dolls, a move that would give Barbie her first serious competition in the fashion doll market. In 2004 sales figures showed that Bratz dolls were outselling Barbie dolls in the
United Kingdom, although Mattel maintained that in terms of the number of dolls, clothes and accessories sold, Barbie remained the leading brand.
[37] In 2005 figures showed that sales of Barbie dolls had fallen by 30% in the
United States, and by 18% worldwide, with much of the drop being attributed to the popularity of Bratz dolls.
[38]
In April 2005, MGA Entertainment filed a
lawsuit against Mattel, claiming that the
My Scene range of Barbie dolls had copied the doe-eyed look of Bratz dolls. The lawsuit is currently pending in the court system of
California.
[39]
Mattel is also suing MGA Entertainment and Carter Bryant, a former doll designer for Mattel, claiming that company secrets were stolen by MGA.
[40][41]
Barbie product recalls
Mattel CEO Robert Eckert discusses the recall of some of the company's products due to safety concerns
On
August 14,
2007 Mattel announced a recall of more than 9 million toys made in
China due to safety concerns. This included 683,000 Barbie and Tanner playsets due to a possible choking hazard caused by loose magnets. The toy consisted of a Barbie doll and her dog Tanner.
[42]
On
September 5,
2007, Mattel announced the recall of a range of Barbie doll accessories due to the presence of high levels of
lead in the paint.
[43] The chairman and
CEO of Mattel, Robert Eckert, made a statement in an online video about the recall and the media coverage that it had generated.
[44]
See also
★
Barbie syndrome
★
Barbie Mini Kingdom
★
Further reading
★ Lord, M.G., ''Forever Barbie: The Unauthorized Biography of a Real Doll''. Paperback ISBN 0-8027-7694-9.
★ Rogers, Mary F., "Barbie Culture". Paperback ISBN 0-7619-5888-6.
★ Knaak, Silke, "German Fashion Dolls of the 50&60". Paperback www.barbies.de.
★ Beckham, Victoria (Foreword), John, Elton (Foreword), ''The Art of Barbie''. Paperback ISBN 0-9537479-2-1
★ Essays, ''Guys'n'dolls: Art, Science, Fashion & Relationships.'' Paperback ISBN 0-948723-57-2
References
1. In an interview with M.G.Lord, the author of ''Forever Barbie'', Ruth Handler said that she saw the doll in Lucerne, Switzerland. However, the book points out out that on other occasions Handler said that she saw the doll in Zurich or Vienna.
2. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/5370398.stm
3. http://miniatures.about.com/od/playscale/
4. http://www.goodbyemag.com/apr02/handler.html
5. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/theymadeamerica/whomade/handler_hi.html
6. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3484949.stm
7. http://edition.cnn.com/2006/US/02/09/ken.barbie.reut/
8. http://groups.msn.com/BarbiesSecret/barbiesmanycareers.msnw
9. http://www.adl.org/main_Arab_World/barbie.htm
10. http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2006/797/li1.htm
11. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1856558.stm
12. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0CE7DE103AF932A15753C1A964958260
13. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=1006032310828
14. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/32312.stm
15. http://www.mastercollector.com/articles/dolls/dollnews31301.shtml
16. http://kattisdolls.net/faces/christie.htm
17. http://www.authentichistory.com/diversity/african/images/2001_Oreo_Barbie.html
18. http://www.washington.edu/doit/Press/barbie.html
19. http://gallery.bcentral.com/GID4729088P1681774-COLLECTIBLES/BARBIE/SHARE-A-SMILE-BECKY.aspx
20. http://collectdolls.about.com/library/ucbarbieresponse.htm
21. http://www.webmd.com/news/20000825/malibu-barbie-holiday-barbie-toxic-barbie
22. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/somerset/4539862.stm
23. http://www.bath.ac.uk/news/articles/releases/barbie161205.html
24. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/2150432.stm
25. http://www.purelyrics.com/index.php?lyrics=fhjpacrk
26. After Aqua, Mattel goes after Car Ad MTV.com September 24, 1997
27. http://www.chillibomb.com/barbie/pages/gangsta-barbie_jpg.htm
28. http://www.out-law.com/page-4681
29. http://barbieinablender.org/
30. http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1242812002
31. http://scoop.diamondgalleries.com/scoop_article.asp?ai=6539&si=123
32. http://au.news.yahoo.com/060926/15/10osv.html
33. http://www.barbiecollector.com/showcase/product.aspx?id=1001084&t=modern
34. http://www.barbiecollector.com/showcase/product.aspx?id=150303&t=modern
35. http://www.barbiecollector.com/showcase/gallery.aspx?t=modern&y=tmp1
36. http://www.barbiecollector.com/collecting/tiers/
37. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3640958.stm
38. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4350846.stm
39. http://promomagazine.com/news/mgaent_mattel_041905/
40. http://www.associatedcontent.com/pop_print.shtml?content_type=article&content_type_id=90322
41. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/12/10/wdoll10.xml
42. http://money.cnn.com/2007/08/14/news/companies/mattel/?postversion=2007081413
43. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6979151.stm
44. http://www.mattel.com/safety/us/
External links
★
The Official Barbie Website — Owned By
Mattel
★
"Renaissance Woman: Artist, Inventor, Developer" -- interview with an ex-Barbie designer first published in ''Fashion Doll Quarterly''
★ New York Times:
"The Barbie Way of Knowledge" by Dave Cullen
★ Washington Times:
"Religious police take after Barbie" by Paul Martin
★ St. Petersburg Times Floridian:
"The doll that has everything - almost", an article about the "Muslim Barbie" by Susan Taylor Martin
★ BBC News:
"Vintage Barbie struts her stuff",
September 22 2006
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