Covering The Coverage: Material Girls Rule At The Premier Of Kit Kittredge: An American Girl

As anyone who has been a little girl at some point of another can tell you: Little girlhood is not an easy thing to go through unscathed - particularly in a world increasingly filled with Bratz dolls and hair extensions for six-year-old baby prostis. The New York Times‘ A. O. Scott, being a father of a little girl, knows this all too well and, like us, was excited by the news that the American Girl company was putting Kit Kettridge on the big screen. [Bonus! Check out Scott's interview with his daughter and her friends, about the movie.]

Little did he suspect the movie could turn into something of a horror film:

For those not familiar with American Girls, the company, er, uh. “Lifestyle Brand” puts out books, dolls, clothing and accessories based on different characters who live during specific periods of time in American history. There’s Felicity, a redheaded little girl who is living in the colonies during the time of the American Revolution. Addy escapes slavery at the close of the Civil War. Josefina is brown and wears a serape. Samantha lives in a big, old house with her grandmother during the turn of the century. And so on and so forth.

We adored these dolls — and their stories — growing up. It was so endlessly fascinating to catch a glimpse into the lives of girls our age going through experiences that mirrored our own (dealing with younger siblings, being forced to eat turnips) and that expanded ours beyond our own place in history (fighting off bears to get a honeycomb, growing a Victory Garden). But as we read through Scott’s description of attending Kit Kittredge: An American Girl in theaters and of watching it through his daughter’s eyes as her own little doll tagged along, stiff and unblinking, we shared in his growing unease about the whole enterprise:

It celebrates, in the midst of hard times, an appealingly ordinary brand of heroism. Kit is brave, smart, determined and kind, but never off-puttingly full of herself or intimidatingly superior. You would want her for a friend. You could easily imagine yourself in her place.

Which may be at least some of what girls want, and what they get from American Girl. As the son and husband of feminists, I can’t entirely suppress a tremor of unease. Is the brand reflecting tastes, or enforcing norms of behavior? Is it teaching girls to be independent spirits or devoted shoppers?

It was an unease we first encountered attending our younger cousin’s birthday party at the giant, multi-level American Girl Place, complete with fancy restaurant and doll hospital, on 5th Avenue.

The setting was completely incongruous with, say, Scandinavian immigrant Kirsten’s sparse pioneer upbringing or with Molly’s tense but loving household during times of war and rations. This said nothing of hard work or hope or friendship or independent spirit - all, we though, hallmarks of American girls. But not, we guess, of American Girl. Instead, emphasis was placed on frills and fluff: Pink bows and over-priced chicken fingers. In a place that we had thought was supposed to epitomize the confusion and joy of being a young girl, we saw nothing but tiny, lip-glossed, tear-streaked faces tugging on mothers’ and fathers’ hands, pointing to little, expressionless faces behind plastic, in boxes. And the whining. Oh God, the whining.

It was lavish. And beautiful. And sensational. But it wasn’t fun and, furthermore, it wasn’t an experience that could be shared with little girls whose parents were on the same economic level as, say, Addy’s or Molly’s mothers. So what makes an American Girl?:

I have spent a lot of time, over the years, with Felicity and some others of her kind, and I still haven’t figured her out. She doesn’t say much, and even though her expression is always fixed in a pleasant smile, she seems to change according to the moods and interests of her playmates. She is an athlete, a musician, a clothes horse, a bookworm, a pet owner, a loner and a confidant. A typical American girl, as far as I can tell.

Add “wealthy” to the list and you might get what it means to be an American girl, in a world dominated by American Girl, where “I Can” is replaced, at an alarming rate by, “I Want.”

A Girl’s Life