children/youth

Lorë P. sent in examples of two stamp sets. She writes:

They are clear plastic you peel and put on blocks in order to stamp images… They are both made by a company called Sassafras Lass and are being sold at Joann Fabrics. One of the stamp sets is called “Girl Talk” and the other is “Boy Talk.”

“Girl Talk”

“Boy Talk”

Lorë did such a wonderful job describing these, I will leave it to her:

One of the first things that struck me was that both of these is that they have stamps that mention dad — “daddy’s girl” and “like father like son” but only the female one mentions mom (I guess it would be considered too emasculating to have “mommy’s boy?”)

Another interesting part of these stamps is that the “Girl talk” emphasizes the sweetness of girls – their giggles, their silliness, their angelic qualities (not to mention princess..). On the other hand, the male version has more objects – trucks, rockets, robots and “strong” traits – being brave and embracing adventure (and what does “all boy” mean anyway?).

The one overlap that I can see is the word “Laughter” – which on the girls segment is in very frilly cursive handwriting and on the male version written in an old cowboy font. This also points to the difference in fonts, where the male versions are more square and has no cursive. The girl version is almost all cursive, except for some very curly printing.

While I am not particularly shocked at finding this kind of stamps available to scrapbookers and cardmakers – I always wonder why we have to make the lines of difference so distinct… Of course these stamps are probably not being used by children, but by adults making things about or for children… of course, these stamps are couched in (from my experience) a predominately female dominated (although pretty conservative) hobby.

Thanks Lorë!

See also this post on gendered Disneyland T-shirts.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

This excellent documentary documents the powerful interests behind Disney and criticizes the extent to which young American children’s childhoods are influenced by the company. The comments on the messages behind Beauty and the Beast are particularly troubling.

A Cracked article compiled their candidates for the Nine Most Racist Disney Characters. Select stolen clips and liberal quoting below:

American Indians in Peter Pan:

Why do Native Americans ask you “how?” According to the song, it’s because the Native American always thirsts for knowledge. OK, that’s not so bad, we guess. What gives the Native Americans their distinctive coloring? The song says a long time ago, a Native American blushed red when he kissed a girl, and, as science dictates, it’s been part of their race’s genetic make up since. You see, there had to be some kind of event to change their skin from the normal, human color of “white.”

The bad guys in Alladin:

“Where they cut off your ear if they don’t like your face” is the offending line, which was changed on the DVD to the much less provocative “Where it’s flat and immense and the heat is intense.”

In a city full of Arabic men and women, where the hell does a midwestern-accented, white piece of cornbread like Aladdin come from? Here he is next to the more, um, ethnic looking villain, Jafar.

NEW: Miguel (of El Forastero) sent in a post from El Blog Ausente that compares an image of Goofy, a character generally portrayed as sort of dumb and lazy, to a traditional Sambo-type image:

The post suggests that Goofy is a racial archetype, built on stereotypical African American caricatures. I can’t remember ever seeing anything that suggested this, but that doesn’t mean much, and I certainly don’t put it past Disney to do so. Does anyone know of any other examples of Goofy supposedly being based on African American stereotypes? On the other hand, is it possible to depict a character eating watermelon in an exuberant manner without drawing on those racist images? When I look at the image of Goofy above, I have to say…that’s pretty much what it looks like when my (mostly White) family cuts a watermelon open out on the picnic table in the summer and everybody gets a piece and they all have ridiculous looks on their faces as they dribble juice all down themselves eating big chunks (I say “they” because I’m a weirdo who doesn’t really care for watermelon, so I rarely eat any, and even then only if I can put salt on it). I’m fairly certain that I couldn’t put up a photo of my family eating watermelon like that without it seeming, to many people, to draw on the Sambo-type imagery. It brings up some interesting thoughts about cultural and historical contexts, and how and in what circumstances you can (or can’t) escape them, regardless of your intent.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

(Image found here.)

Ballgame at Feminist Critics writes:

The assertion, “children do better with parents together” could mean a number of different things, so let’s go through the possible ways the statement could be interpreted:

The notion that “Children ALWAYS do better with parents together” is almost certainly false. If one of the parents is abusive, it seems pretty non-controversial to assume that the kids would be better off with the non-abusive parent alone.

The notion that “Children SOMETIMES do better with parents together” is almost certainly true, but so banal and useless an observation that it’s not worth the expense of a billboard or worth discussing at any length.

That leaves “Children GENERALLY do better with parents together.” This, itself, has two entirely different meanings which are easily confused. Take 100 couples with children. Of those couples, 75 are (at the moment) happily married, while 25 have marital difficulties — some severe — and are on the brink of divorce. Let’s say 20 of the 25 couples actually go through with the divorce.

The notion that “Children GENERALLY do better with parents together” could be taken to mean that, out of the 100 families described above, children from the 80 non-divorcing families end up being mentally and emotionally healthier (as a group) than the children from the 20 divorcing families. That is very easy to believe. Indeed, there are any number of studies that show this, and these are the studies that are typically trotted out to misleadingly imply that divorce hurts children. In fact it’s just another rather banal observation that children from happy families do better than children from emotionally fraught ones, and hardly worth the price of a billboard. It’s almost like saying, “People with money are less likely to have difficulties making ends meet.”

But the other meaning of “Children GENERALLY do better with parents together” is quite different: namely, that the children in the 20 divorcing families would have been better off if those parents hadn’t gotten divorced. THAT notion is purely speculative as far as I know.

Via Alas.

Velanie W. sent me this video (found at here), in which the parents clearly think it’s funny that when their toddler daughter says “sparkling wiggles,” it sounds like she’s saying something very different:

(after the jump b/c it automatically plays and that gets annoying)…
more...

Ben O. sent us this 1941 ad for Fletcher’s Castoria (found at I’m Learning to Share), in which mothers are warned (by a bratty kid) that they better give their children Fletcher’s laxatives or their children will hate them:

Text from section 2:

It all started when Mary needed a laxative. She hates it, and this time she simply refused to take it. I tried to force it down her and she splattered it all over the carpet. So I slapped her and said she was a bad girl. Then came the tantrum!

I’d say slapping her daughter is more of an indication of what type of mother she is than which laxatives she chooses, but whatever. Apparently the company liked to use corporal punishment in its ads; here are some more examples (both found at Corpun). In this first one, we learn that even parents who don’t believe in spanking may be driven to it if they use the wrong laxative (in section 2, she gives him an “unmerciful spanking”):

Text from sections 1 and 2:

I don’t believe in spanking children. But darn it all, sometimes a youngster can sure drive a grownup wild. Like mine did me–yesterday. It all started innocently when Billy wouldn’t take his laxative. At first I tried coaxing. But that didn’t work. Then when I started to force it on him, he sent the spoon flying out of my hand. So I lost my temper and gave him an unmerciful spanking.

From section 1:

Whenever Tommy gets a spanking, our whole family is upset. Big Tom hates to do it and mopes for hours afterward. And Tommy’s little nervous system gets so upset he can’t eat. So last Friday I decided to put an end to spankings…

Fletcher’s Castoria: the way to digestive and family harmony. Without it, you might end up slapping the kids around (though I have to say, that girl at the top would probably test to the utmost my opposition to violence).

Just a question: I’m not a parent, but I don’t hear my friends talking about giving their kids laxatives all the time, and I don’t remember being forced to take them as a kid (though I do remember us forcing a horse to drink a lot of castor oil once). Was this just a health fad at the time that people thought kids needed that has fallen out of favor? Did kids in the ’40s have some unique digestive problems we’ve, um, eliminated since then? Or do my friends’ kids go around constipated all the time because they don’t know to make them take senna laxatives?

Thanks again, Ben!

NEW! Sarah N. sent us another example of an add that implies laxatives lead to happier moms and better family lives:

Part of the text:

“My mum loves me now. I can tell because her hands are gentler…her voice is sweeter…and her kisses are softer. I know know what I did. But all of a sudden she just started loving me!”

Linda, dear, you didn’t do anything. It was Mum’s chemist. He gave her Bile Beans…

Aaron B. sent in this 1947 video clip (found here), titled “Are You Popular?”:

Notice the caution to women: if you go “parking with all the boys,” you might think you’re popular, but you’ll ultimately find yourself ostracized and friendless. To be really popular, you need to be well-dressed, have the respect of girls at school, and carefully guard your reputation.

Thanks, Aaron!

Gwen Sharp is an associate professor of sociology at Nevada State College. You can follow her on Twitter at @gwensharpnv.

In a comment a while back, Elena pointed out that Diego Velázquez’s painting “Infante Felipe Próspero” (from 1659) provides a good example of how pink was acceptable for males to wear…as were, in some cases, dresses, which the young prince is wearing:

Elena says,

…until the late 1700s little boys would wear dresses or petticoats for as long as they could until they could dress as miniature adults…This was mainly for ease of bodily functions.

Of course, today most parents would be appalled at the idea of dressing toddler boys in dresses–dresses with frills and ribbons, at that.

The painting “Pope Innocent X,” also by Velázquez (1650) shows the Pope in light pink clothing:

Both images found at the National Gallery’s Velázquez page.

You might also check out Kent State University Museum’s Centuries of Childhood exhibit for examples of how children’s clothing has changed over time.

Thanks for the tip, Elena!