Feeling Barbie: mothers, daughters, and white feminist genealogies

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DOI:	https://doi.org/10.1177/14647001251330624
URL:	https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/146470012...
URN:	urn:nbn:de:bsz:180-madoc-698411
Document Type:	Article
Year of publication Online:	2025
Date:	27 April 2025
The title of a journal, publication series:	Feminist Theory
Volume:	tba
Issue number:	tba
Page range:	1-5
Place of publication:	London
Publishing house:	Sage
ISSN:	1464-7001 , 1741-2773
Publication language:	English
Institution:	School of Humanities > Amerikanische Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaft (Schäfer, S. 2024-)
Pre-existing license:	Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
Subject:	810 American literature in English
Abstract:	In Greta Gerwig's record-breaking blockbuster Barbie, feminism is popular and popular culture is feminist: the film engenders a plethora of commentary on the (feminist) present. It deploys a narrative of feminist generations as Barbie's quest for true womanhood (a vagina!) is set in motion by a mother–daughter conflict. Our contribution critiques Barbie's intergenerational feminist nostalgia and its sentimentalising of white feminism. We show how, despite its nods to diversity and inclusivity, Barbie reinforces Anglo feminist genealogies with a penchant for girlhood play, for biologist notions of womanhood, and for mainstream, neoliberal feminist ideas and contemporary popular feminism. The doll thus becomes a vehicle for pop culture empowerment that bolsters the heteronormative American family and the romance of matrilineal feminist relations.

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