FC NOW: The Fast Company Weblog
August 31, 2007
Education: The Doll Test, From K-12 to Kmart
This month, Kmart began selling up to four dozen new ethnic dolls in its stores. Coincidentally, this is the year that Brown v. Board of Education was effectively overturned by the Supreme Court. A critical component of the Brown case was psychologist Kenneth Clark's "doll test," which showed black kids favoring white dolls over the black dolls that looked like them.
A 2005 mini-documentary called A Girl Like Me argued that the results of the Clark doll test might still ring true over fifty years later. Yet the success of brands such as Dora the Explorer prove that ethnic dolls, which have been around for quite a while, are more popular than ever before. What's most significant about the Kmart dolls, besides the sheer variety, is that they're not restricted to a specialized ethnic line but are dispersed throughout the store's generic offerings. If they weren't considered so already, ethnic dolls are definitely now mainstream.
So what does this mean for education? Past challenges to Brown and affirmative action have forced educators to rethink how to make their classrooms diverse. Perhaps Kmart's mainstreaming of the multicultural brand can offer a lesson for educators. One thing's for sure: with all the new varieties on the shelves, the doll test is dead.
Posted by April Joyner at August 31, 2007 6:39 PM | Category: education |
2 Comments
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1.if people want to buy ethnic dolls, let em. Let the market weed out what is popular and what isn't
2.the results of market demand might prove interesting.
3.there are no "good dolls or bad dolls." Only dolls. Putting them on the market for sale will drag that out in the open to prove that.
4.this is 2007, Don't you think we are beyond all this??
putting ethic dolls on sale is good for the market. Let the market decide what's popular and what isn't. The stats will be interesting.