Barbie Doll By Marge Piercy Summary

Launched on March 1959, the Barbie doll is a toy that was first put on display in New York. It quickly garnered a lot of attention with the target audience of the creators, young girls. This doll was different than its previous dolls because it was a doll that was an ideal representation of a woman. Thus allowing young girls to use their imagination to create and act-out what this doll’s life is like and what their future would potentially be. To successfully understand this toy, we must think like C Wright Mills, a sociologist who asks to use our sociological imagination, the intersection of one’s biography and history. This artifact reflects and perpetuates the dominant ideology of how to perform your gender the “right” way in the early 1960s. I will argue this demonstrates West and Zimmerman’s concept of “doing gender” which is clarified with Judith Butler’s concept of socialization of gender.

From the time they are born, girls are influenced by society as to who they should be, how they should look, and how they should act. Americans believe that women should be to a certain standard; pretty, feminine, and especially, thin. The pressures derive from family, media, and friends. Marge Piercy’s poem, “Barbie Doll” depicts a girl who was never recognized for her character and spent her life trying to be accepted for who she was, rather than how she looked.

Sandra Cisneros addresses poverty and unrealistic expectations of women through the lens of adolescent girls, using their youthful perception of a Barbie Doll. Through Barbie’s image of ideal beauty, Cisneros foregrounds the struggles that women, especially those in poverty, face in their attempts to amount to the unrealistic standards of female beauty. Cisneros’s main argument through her short story “Barbie-Q” is that it is impossible to expect women to meet this manifest of beauty, and somewhere along the way of escaping and covering their imperfections they become damaged.

The poem, "Barbie Doll," written by Marge Piercy tells the story of a young girl growing up through the adolescence stage characterized by appearances and barbarity. The author uses imagery and fluctuating tone to describe the struggles the girl is experiencing during her teenage years, and the affects that can happen. The title of this poem is a good description of how most societies expect others, especially girls to look. Constantly, people are mocked for their appearance and expected to represent a "barbie-doll"-like figure. Few are "blessed" with this description. The female gender is positioned into the stereotype that women should be thin and beautiful. With this girl, the effects were detrimental. The first stanza describes the

The Poem “Barbie Doll (1969)” by Marge Piercy describes the life of a young girl who fell victim to society’s idea of beauty. Marge Piercy was a known social activist and uses this poem to bring attention to serious issues facing young females in society. “Barbie Doll” by Marge Piercy is a narrative poem; the poem is written in free verse. The author selects a free form of poetry and other devices to help get her point across.

Like Georgiana in “The Birthmark”, women often find themselves striving to reach society’s expectation of beauty and perfection. In Marge Piercy’s poem “Barbie Doll”, a young girl is finally able to reach society’s version of beauty but she must die to do so. Piercy criticizes the ways “women are socialized into stereotypical feminine behavior” (“Overview: “Barbie Doll”, para. 1) in this poem and suggests that the pressure put on women to meet certain standards of beauty and behavior is destructive. The poem opens with the birth of a “girlchild” and all the “typical toys” that go along with it. When the girl hits puberty, her classmates begin to make fun of her big nose and fat legs. The girl is intelligent and healthy, but the other children only see the imperfections in her appearance. She is told she should behave “coy” and always wear a smile, but the teasing takes its’ toll. She cuts off her nose and legs and offers them up

Negative self-image among women has been a struggle in society for a long period of time. Social media, magazines, and the pressures of society has caused many young girls to feel bad about themselves because they do not look like the clothing model on the runway or the bathing suit model on the front of a magazine. Females grow up with the pressures of having to be in shape, wearing the best clothes, and putting on a full face of makeup for a male to find them attractive. Society has deemed that only "fit" women are beautiful, and that idea has caused women to harm themselves, develop anorexia, and feel insecure of themselves daily. Two works of literature that discuss the struggles women face from society is Marge Piercy's poem "Barbie Doll"

In Marge Piercy's "Barbie Doll" a young girl is troubled by the classification of what it takes to become a beautiful woman. "Barbie Doll" details the image that society projects upon women. From an early age young women struggle to conform to the standards that society has defined for them. Beautiful dolls such as Barbie are frequently the first source of association that young girls have with the image that society has placed upon them.

In Sandra Cisnero’s short story ‘’Barbie-Q,” a Barbie doll is used to portray the author’s inner struggle to achieve perfection, and how her young age and innocence clouds her identity. Throughout the text it is very clear that the author, a young girl, had come from an underprivileged family and faced the issues many families of lower socioeconomic background typically face. In the short story it is also evident that her gender plays a massive role in damaging her self-esteem and confidence, as both the media and the author’s social background have continuously portrayed women as weak, powerless figures. Similarly, in “The Story of an Hour” by Annie Chopin, the protagonist, once again a female figure represented the life of domesticity a woman is expected to hold by society. Although Chopin’s story was written in the late 1800s and “Barbie-Q” is a very modern story, both depict the protagonist females as very helpless, incapable figures that trail after the overpowering men.

“Barbie Doll” by Marge Piercy is about a girl who is a normal child growing up; playing with dolls, miniature kitchen items and pretend make-up. It quickly takes an interesting turn when a pubescent child makes fun of her nose and legs and she was advised to exercise and diet despite the fact that she was intelligent and healthy. The poem continues on by the girl cutting her legs and nose and a bizarre visual of her laying in a casket with an ending that states “to every woman a happy ending”( Piercy 791). This poem was written by Piercy in 1969 a year in which many women liberation groups were forming and the breaking of womanly roles was taking place. The poem “Barbie Doll” by Marge Piercy,

The poem “Barbie Doll” by Marge Piercy in relation to diversity alludes to specific aspects of gender, mainly targeting the female gender perspective and expectations. In the poem, Piercy is writing about a young girl transitioning from a child to a women and how society and its idea of beauty affects her. My interpretation of the poem is that the girl is basically crying out for help saying look I am healthy, intelligent, and strong but no one sees or cares about those things because the only thing they see when they look at her is her outside appearance and what society considers to be the flaws that she possesses. Although this was written in 1936 Piercy accurately describes the feeling of being defined or constricted by society to think, act, and look a particular way which is similar to that of todays society which is fueled by social media, where some find personal gratification and self confidence fueled from likes and retweets they receive.” Barbie doll “ is the perfect title for this poem because for the longest time a Barbie was a sign of something perfect and beautiful, a toy enjoyed by everyone and a conventional symbol for little girls all over the United States. Similarly the girl was conforming to be sort of like the Barbie doll in a way because of societal expectations and the want to be viewed in a particular light by ones peers.

The poem starts off just saying how the main character was “born as usual”. There is nothing wrong with the main character and she is just a normal girl that played with Barbie dolls. It is not until the fifth line that “the magic of puberty” finally hits the author. Sadly, it is during this time when the human mind is so fragile, that the high standards of the mass media on how a women should look start to bear down, crash, and take over a lot