Lately, there has been an onslaught of feminist critique springing up in regards to pop culture . From Miley Cyrus to Robin Thicke, we have had just about enough of the average Facebook user angrily posting articles that barely skim the surface of the real issues.
Over the summer, artist Nickolay Lamm participated in his own feminist project; He revamped the Barbie doll. He recreated Barbie according to the bodily proportions of a normal 19-year-old woman. As you can see, “Average Barbie” offers a more realistic portrayal of the female body. She has shorter legs, a thicker waist and neck and ankles that seem as if they can actually support her weight. Lamm used actual data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to calculate the measurements he used for his doll.
In recent years, Barbie has been barraged with negative criticism due to her misrepresentation of the female body. She represents an artificial beauty that is virtually unattainable and she is being presented to young girls who are at their most vulnerable and impressionable. It gives young girls and boys a distorted conceptualization of beauty.
This unattainable vision of beauty is generous to the market economy and will continue to proliferate: girls will always attempt to achieve it by buying products that will only do so much.
Chelsea Kline, junior at UIUC, appraises the recreation, but has reservations. “It’s good that he is making an effort to create something that’s realistic, but at the same time, it still has the whole Barbie face – blonde hair blue eyes moderately thin – image of beauty that only some possess,” she said.
“Average Barbie” is one of many projects that has tried to reverse the negative effects that Barbie may have on young children. “If there’s a small chance of Barbie influencing young girls, why can’t we come out with an average sized doll? Average is beautiful,” Lamm told Time magazine.
Lamm’s invention is a vast improvement upon the Barbie doll. However, the name of the Barbie alone may pose an issue for modern feminism. “It would be a good idea if it wasn’t called the ‘Average’ Barbie,’” Corey Hutcheson, junior at UIUC, said. The mere fact that it is the “average” Barbie assumes a negative tone. Why is she average? Should we be teaching young children that average is okay? Lamm says “average is beautiful”. Why can’t beautiful be beautiful? To some buyers, it seems Lamm himself can’t conceive of his doll as anything but average and something to improve upon. Lamm has admitted to attempting to make his version of the doll more marketable.
At a time when Collegiates are constantly bombarded by the media with visions of beauty, this recreation of Barbie is especially poignant. Not only is it important because many students are reaching adulthood and starting families, but also because these conceptions of beauty are still proliferating around campuses. Psychology and English major, Morgan Sherlock, notices, “We go into college with these unattainable expectations. It becomes a realistic problem as your grow in college, especially if you are in a sorority or fraternity”.
Nickolay Lamm’s project has spurred a multitude of other recreations, some of different ethnicities. It is a significant revamping of such a long-existing staple of childhood toys. Yet, it may prove to anger some in its validation of its own inherent lack – the labeling of itself as “average.”