Barbie Talks

BARBIEr TALKS! is a free-wheeling account of life at Mattel during the “Golden Age” of the sixties and early seventies. This is the first book written by two toy designers who actually worked in the wonderful, top secret circus of Mattel’s Research and Design. BARBIEr TALKS! relates the genius, the hilarity and the craziness that, Gwen Florea and Glenda Phinney encountered in the workplace and their roles in making Talking Barbie a reality. In their well-written intersecting personal memoirs, the authors reveal the inside story of how Barbie got her voice, and why Barbie’s figure took the unrealistic shape that it did. There are both humorous and poignant stories about the antics of the toy designers and executives of Mattel. These historical events are interwoven with an honest and very readable account of the loves, marriages, and the blindly sexist business world, which triggered development of a feminine consciousness in each woman. What do Barbie Dolls do when they grow up? They have amazing lives and achieve their goals! BARBIE TALKS! is a revealing account of two women who came of age in the shadow of Barbie, and reveals a lie to the notion that Barbie was a poor influence for young women. Visit us on the web, www.barbietalks.com and see some of the fun pictures that didn’t make it into the book. We’d also love to hear from you.

This book uses one of the most popular accessories of childhood, the Barbie doll, to explain key aspects of cultural meaning. Some readings would see Barbie as reproducing ethnicity and gender in a particularly coarse and damaging way - a cultural icon of racism and sexism. Rogers develops a broader, more challenging picture. She shows how the cultural meaning of Barbie is more ambiguous than the narrow, appearance-dominated model that is attributed to the doll. For a start, Barbie′s sexual identity is not clear-cut. Similarly her class situation is ambiguous. But all interpretations agree that, with her enormous range of lifestyle `accessories′, Barbie exists to consume. Her body is the perfect metaphor of modern times: plastic, standardized and oozing fake sincerity.

This book discusses the history of the Barbie doll and at the cultural reappropriations of Barbie by artists, collectors and especially lesbians and gay men.

The Secret Service met their match when they hired a blonde, spunky, Southern debutante from Atlanta, Georgia to join the Uniformed Division. With a mouth on fire and a will that never breaks, the one and only "Talk Back Barbie" brings chaos and laughter everywhere she goes. When rules are made to be broken and trouble is her middle name, that begs the question: what in the world will "Talk Back Barbie" do next?

This one-volume encyclopedia features around 250 essays on the varied experiences of social movement media over the planet in the 20th and 21st centuries. Examining the tip of a gigantic iceberg, this reference resource examines a sample of the dizzying variety of formats and experiences that comprise social movement media. The guiding principles have been to ensure that experiences from the global South are given voice; that women are properly represented among contributors; that the wide spectrum of communication formats is included; that further reading is provided where relevant; and that some examples are provided of repressive social movement media, not exclusively progressive ones. Thematic essays address selected issues such as human rights media, indigenous peoples′ media, and environmentalist media, and on key concepts widely used in the field such as alternative media, citizens′ media, and community media. The encyclopedia engages with all communication media: broadcasting, print, cinema, the Internet, popular song, street theatre, graffiti, and dance. The entries are designed to be relatively brief with clear, accessible, and current information. Students, researchers, media activisits, and others interested in this field will find this to be a valuable resource. Key ThemesCinema, Television, and VideoConcept and Topic OverviewsCultural ContestationsFeminist MediaGay and Lesbian MediaHuman Rights MediaIndependence Movement MediaIndigenous Peoples′ MediaInformation Policy ActivismInternetLabor MediaNewsPerformance Art MediaPopular SongPressRadioSocial Movement MediaRegions

Distinguished international scholars from a wide range of disciplines explore consumption and its relation to learning, identity development, and education. This volume is unique within the literature of education in its examination of educational sites – both formal and informal – where learners and teachers are resisting consumerism and enacting a critical pedagogy of consumption.

“A hair-raising account of a Barbie Dreamhouse-size Jarndyce and Jarndyce.”—Jill Lepore, The New Yorker This provocative work spotlights the legal battles between behemoth Mattel and audacious MGA over incredibly successful toys and the ownership of an idea. Law professor Orly Lobel deeply researched this riveting story, interviewing those involved, to draw attention to the contentious debate over creativity and intellectual property. She also explores female images and how we market cultural icons, from the doll that inspired all-American Barbie to the defiant, anti-establishment Bratz—the only doll to outsell Barbie in any year.