Posts Tagged ‘Barbie’

Another Saturday Night and I Ain’t Got Nobody

Monday, February 8th, 2010

Yesterday, Tenured Radical discussed an article in the New York Times that was examining the dating situation for young women on the campus of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. The school is almost 60 percent female and that leaves many coeds “all dressed up with nowhere to go” on a Saturday night. Someone from the University explains they have this gender imbalance because they do not have an engineering school.

Many liberal arts colleges have a similar gender imbalance; the ratio tends to be 50 -50 or a higher amount of men when the school is strong in math,  science, and engineering. Historically when a profession became more than 50 percent female, it often became less valued. Of course, women now make up 50 percent of the workforce so it is not clear if that pattern will continue.

We spent a week in December at North Carolina State University, Raleigh. The whole experience had a retro aspect to it, which is similar to the feeling I got reading the New York Times article. Social and cultural life at NCSU appeared old fashioned, segregated, and more traditional in terms of gender issues. The same was true for the city of Raleigh.

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Posted in History, Raleigh, Women | No Comments »

A Day in New York City

Friday, February 20th, 2009

Yesterday I had to go to New York City for the day. After my appointment I had about four hours to kill before my train left. First I went to the Mount Vernon Hotel Museum which until 2000 was the Abigail Adams Smith House. I had chosen to go there because I thought it was the headquarters of the Colonial Dames of America. colonial-barbie

The CDA does manage the Museum but their offices and presumably archives are in the building next door. This was built in 1977 to look old. Oddly enough, this building looks worse than the museum, which was built in 1799 as a carriage house for the planned mansion of Abigail Adams Smith, John Adams daughter, and her husband. The museum does not have any artifacts pertaining to the Smiths which may be one reason they changed their mission.In 1826 Joseph Hart purchased the carriage house and turned it into a day resort, equivalent to a spa today.  Hart operated this business for seven years until 1833.

The museum only has a few things that are actually from the hotel. The rest of the artifacts are “of the period.”  This is often the case with small museums. No one was in at the CDA so I couldn’t talk to them.

After the 30 minute tour of the museum I ate lunch and then I went to Bloomingdales. I haven’t been in Bloomies in a very long time. The display windows  are full of Barbie doll mannequins because Barbie is 50 and Bloomingdales is celebrating her birthday. According to the New York Times the store is “leaning on Barbie to salvage its quarterly bottom line.”

On the third floor there must have been over one hundred Barbies from different years dressed as different careers including doctor and stewardess. There were also Barbies as different celebrity figures. Apparently the first one of these was Twiggy in the 70s but there is also one of Beyonce. Most of the dolls are from the 90s. The 1959 Barbie is a replica.I confess I still have my Barbie which dates from that time.

On the second floor the store is selling Barbie purses and replica dolls. There is also a display of life size mannequins in designer clothes. Although I didn’t plan on it, the day turned out to have a theme, Both the  Colonial Dames and Barbie represent American womanhood and ideals of femininity. Now I just have to figure out how they are connected.

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Posted in Future plans, History, New York, Women | 1 Comment »