The Trailer for Black Barbie
The first Black Barbie doll was created and sold in 1980. Black Barbie, a documentary streaming on Netflix later this month, tells the story of how the doll came to be and the impact it had on a generation of young people who were able to see themselves in a doll with the same color skin, perhaps for the first time.
The trailer opens with this line: “If you’ve gone your whole life and you’ve never seen anything made in your own image, there is damage done.” Which is then echoed later in the trailer when a little girl is describing her Barbie: “Really pretty, and has lochs, just like me”.
Shonda Rhimes produced the film and was recently on the Today show talking about the importance of representation. And here’s a tour of Sonya Larson’s collection of 1000+ Black Barbie dolls.
Discussion 1 comment
A different angle to the topic, but it made me think about the Black Dolls exhibit the Strong Museum of Play in Rochester, NY hosted a few months ago: https://www.museumofplay.org/press-release/the-strong-to-host-black-dolls-exhibit-from-september-23-to-january-7-2024/ (And if you haven't been to that museum in general before, highly recommend making a trip of it.)
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