Barbie turns 59
IF BARBARA Millicent Roberts could speak, she would have audiences in awe.
With her innate charm, charisma and confidence, she would command attention as she recalled anecdotes of her nearly 60-year career in the fashion and modelling industry, being an aerobics instructor, a ballerina, an architect, entrepreneur, film director and an Olympic athlete, among others.
Roberts didn’t shy away from male-dominated fields either. She was a marine corps sergeant, firefighter and an airline pilot. She was an astronaut who went to the moon before Neil Armstrong and even ran for US president six times, years before Hillary Clinton won the Democratic ticket.
Better known as Barbie, her enduring legacy is that she has been the companion of little girls around the world for generations, igniting imaginations and inspiring creativity.
This month, the blonde, blue-eyed beauty turns 59, but for her creators, Mattel, she will for ever be 16.
“We try not to emphasise that it is her birthday, but speak about the anniversary of the Barbie brand,” says Mattel and Blue Horizon, the licensing agency for Mattel consumer products in South Africa.
“Barbie allows little girls to be anything that they want to be, from a ballerina to a president. Role play is a large part of the focus of the Barbie brand and empowering little girls to experience this through play gives the brand a unique selling point.”
But she has critics, with many arguing she is essentially a “fashion model”, which over-emphasises beauty and could harm girls’ body images.
Her “parents” recently gave Barbie three new body moulds, and she also shines in more racially diverse skin tones, facial shapes, hairstyles and eye colours. “As with any 59-year-old brand, to stay relevant, evolution, change and reinvention are necessary.”
But even though the world and Barbie have changed, one thing remains constant: “You can be anything. And to a little girl, that’s everything.”