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A doll named Bhumi

Why can't we reject the Barbie and create a truly Indian doll?

Barbie is now body positive. Photo: AFP.<br />
Barbie is now body positive. Photo: AFP.

Barbie, the world’s most famous doll, is now a body-positive toy. The three new versions launched last month—petite, curvy and tall—sell alongside the original blonde, thin-waisted, big-boobed, high-heeled one that has captured the imagination of little girls for the last 57 years. With this, the Barbie enterprise embraces the changing perceptions around the female body in popular culture. Particularly in the US.

Socialite Kim Kardashian’s emphasis on her big butt, the not-so-slim figure and skin colour of music sensation Beyoncé, the hair-raising hues of singer Katy Perry, the rebuttals to body-shamers from a younger brand of feminist bloggers and the acceptance of “plus-sized fashion models" in global fashion have corrected past fixations. It’s a long haul from 1963, when toy maker Mattel, which manufactures the doll, sold Barbie baby-sits with a toy book titled How To Lose Weight that said: Don’t Eat. Lyrics such as Life in plastic, it’s fantastic from the song Barbie Girl by the group Aqua further glorified Barbie as a bimbo.

Cultural commentators say girls are directly influenced by their dolls. When they go out as young women into the real world wearing frilly frocks and insane stilettos, they may realize that their merit is often overshadowed by their body image. An article in a recent issue of Time magazine by Eliana Dockterman aptly quoted a Barbie biographer: “Barbie was designed to teach women—for better or worse—what was expected of them in society."

That’s why, partly at least, Barbie’s plummeting sales in the last few years were attributed to the body-positive consciousness sweeping across consumer groups. Millennial moms—as focused research discovered—were not happy with their girls obsessing over a doll with an unrealistic body. The research, labelled Project Dawn, paved the way for the new Barbies.

Go to Barbie.com and you will see the New 2016 Fashionistas Line. The evolution of the Barbie narrative became clear last year when Mattel launched 23 new dolls with eight different skin tones, 14 different facial structures, 22 hairstyles, 23 hair colours and 18 eye colours. Sometime back, the doll was also given rotatable ankles so that she could wear flat footwear.

Turn the lens to India, one of the 150 countries where Barbie sells in huge numbers. The India Barbie, with dark hair, clothed in blingy saris, lehngas and assorted decorative garments, made it to our local market more than a decade ago. Even before the Katrina Kaif Barbie arrived in 2011, these dolls beat the sales of local Indian dolls, which either looked caricaturish when made as lame copies of Western toys or were too folksy as decked-up brides from Punjab, Odisha and Gujarat. Others were made of painted wood or were restless puppets with foldable spines. The diversity of look in Indian dolls has long been a given—a Kashmiri doll obviously looks different from a Rajasthani one.

Body positivity has been retained in contemporary Indian dolls made by small brands such as Almirah, for instance. The fabric dolls wear simple organic cotton frocks, have hair made of pure wool, a cute, friendly face (not a glamorous one defined by fake eyelashes and lipstick), and black buttons for eyes.

I want to argue the case for an Indian doll that rejects the Barbie prototype. One that is made by a local design innovator, is directly inspired from our fashion, wearing clothes by Aneeth Arora or Manish Malhotra, and represents the body diversity of Indian women. “Curvy" is a cop-out word. Why not have some fat dolls as well as some beautifully mature ones? And a Sonam Kapoor doll must only be sold with a dozen garment changes while a Priyanka Chopra interpretation in pointy shoes should hold a crystal trophy. We must certainly have a handloom sari-clad Vidya Balan, the too-tall Deepika Padukone and the curly-haired Kangana Ranaut. Kalki Koechlin could be another variant, adding a global-Indian mix.

For a name, I propose Bhumi (not India Barbie, please) after Bhumi Pednekar, who went affably overweight for the film Dum Laga Ke Haisha, then turned up at film award functions last month slimmer, in high heels and glamorous clothes.

Any takers?

The Body is a monthly column on the body’s language in fashion.

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