Page 16 - Purchasing Power Black Kids and American Consumer Culture

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Consumption in Context

Natalia and Asia Do Barbie
New Haven, Connecticut, is known for its sweltering summers, and on
this July afternoon in 1992 the swelter was prodigious. Hot, gluey air
was slowly being stirred by an unenthusiastic breeze in Newhallville, a
neighborhood populated by working-class and poor African Americans.
The day wore on, and the air stilled. The sky became clogged with soggy,
gray clouds. In the living room of ten-year-old Natalia's home, I was
talking with her and her cousin Asia (also ten years old) when a sudden-
ly invigorated wind began to twist the leaves off trees and the sky
erupted downward, dumping down rain in drops the size of marbles,
overpowering our voices with thunder. The girls rushed out of the
house to sit on Natalia's stoop, braving the rain and lightning, hopping
about like gazelles when the thunder made the houses shake. A thrill!
Excitement! I spied a frazzle-haired Barbie doll beneath Natalia's seat
and, holding my tape recorder, asked the girls to tell me about Barbie.
Natalia held the doll's head under the drain spout to wash her face.
With the thunder jolting them periodically from their chairs, Natalia
and Asia delivered a dialogue keenly expressing their sense of cultural
and social location:
ASIA: You never see a fat Barbie. You never see a pregnant Barbie. What about
those things? They should make a Barbie that can have a baby.
NATALIA: Yeah . . . and make a fat Barbie. So when we play Barbie . . . you
could be a fat Barbie.
ASIA: Okay. What I was saying that Barbie ... how can I say this? They make
her like a stereotype. Barbie is a stereotype. When you think of Barbie you

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