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Feb 4

Why Can’t I Like the Pink One?

When I was a kindergartener, there was nothing cooler than the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers TV show. The Power Rangers, which debuted on Fox in 1993, were a gang of teenagers who defended planet Earth from invading aliens by using sweet martial arts moves and teamwork.

The six Power Rangers were defined their colors: there was Jason the red one, Kimberly who wore pink, Zack in black, Trini would be in yellow, Billy donned blue, and Tommy was the green Ranger. By displaying the Power Rangers in such a manor, the show’s producers easily enabled children to pick their favorite character based on their favorite color.

The 6 Original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers

But there was a catch. If you were a boy in my kindergarten class, you could not like the Pink or the Yellow Ranger. Those two girls characters were reserved for girls to like only, although I do recall girls being allowed to like the boy Power Rangers without penalty.

This gender separation of selection of favorite character reminds me of Elizabeth Segel’s article, “‘As the Twig is Bent…’ Gender and Childhood Reading.” In the article, Segel describes children’s literature and the division of stories between boys’ and girls’ books, and also the readiness of girls to read about male characters and the unwillingness of boys to read about females (Segel, 73).

Laura McGrath also noticed the separation of the boy and girl Power Rangers, especially in the opening credits that would air before every episode. She describes, on her blog, how the male characters would be portrayed doing physical actions such as karate kicks or wrestling aliens, while the female Rangers were seen stretching and doing gymnastics.

I do not believe that the Power Rangers were sexist or gender separatists, rather it was the children themselves who created the separation. Every child was free to chose whichever Ranger they wanted to be their favorite, but it was the fear of being ridiculed in the classroom that restricted the choices.

Feb 3

Indulgence on Black Friday

Considering the current economic state, people would believe that Christmas would take on a different meaning. Maybe, it wouldn’t be all about the children and what presents they get. Maybe it would be about families spending time together, a time of reflection, or maybe a day for a people to just relax a little. Unfortunately, I have noticed that this is hardly ever the case. If anything, Christmas has become a time when people (mostly parents) indulge children while attempting to snag a few deals here and there. While the recession has led to people tightening their belts here and there, the overall trend has been to continue indulging children at Christmas. A great example of this is Black Friday.

The popularity of shopping on Black Friday (the day right after Thanksgiving, usually beginning before the sun even rises) has increased so much that many retailers this past Black Friday began their sales at 12:00 AM on Friday forcing many families who have a family member working at a participating retailer to have to cut their Thanksgiving festivities short so that they could go in and get prepared for the oncoming storm.

Many families who have shopped on Black Friday know the crowds.They line up at ungodly hours. They are dense and often pushy and they are rude.

credit to somarbar.wordpress

Black Friday crowd

And what is all that for? It is for the daughters and sons. So that they can have the nicest things and parents can show off the love for their children without having had paid as much. The sad truth is that more families are turning to Black Friday as way to buy their children all the things they couldn’t without having to break the bank. Which is just sad.

Feb 3

G.I. Joe: Great American Heroine?

Modern model of G.I. Joe's "Action Army" figure.

At a young age boys are easily intrigued by action and aggression, two general characteristics that often can be considered when describing what it means to be a man. One toy during my own childhood that embodied both of these attributes was the G.I. Joe. In 1964 Hasbro began production of the G.I. Joe line, creating four different variations of the toy to represent the four branches of the military: Action Army, Action Navy, Action Pilot, Action Marine. The fact that boys didn’t want to be accused of playing with dolls, a very effeminate pastime for girls, Hasbro made it a point to call the toys “action figures”. Today they retail for about twenty dollars, but back then they were inexpensive. These action figures weren’t like the little green army men portrayed in the movie Toy Story which could be so easily destroyed by demented toy torturers like Sid. G.I. Joes were tough. Measuring a foot in height, these action figures were harder to break, allowing boys to be more “playful” with their toys. Not only were they tall in stature, they were also bulky—G.I. Joes sported big muscles in order to carry big guns and heavy equipment—appealing to children’s early notion of “bigger is better”. In class we discussed how boys who play with toys specifically targeted for male children could possibly affect their ability to absorb a female’s perspective later on in life. I personally disagree with this statement as it regards G.I. Joes because action figures are aesthetically very similar to dolls played with by young girls as well. G.I. Joe has even launched a female version of the action figure, G.I. Jane, to target girls.

Feb 3

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“Mommy WOW! I’m a Big Kid now”

Pull-ups for Toddler

  In 1989, a new brand of disposable diapers appeared in stores called Huggies.  They were made for children to put them on like underwear and protect clothing in such a way as a diaper would.  My mother, along with millions of other mothers, switched to “Huggies” when I matured from an infant to toddler.  But, why would so many people switch from the diapers that already shielded their children’s accidents away from their clothes?  Once you have seen one Huggies commercial you will understand that it’s all in the slogan and advertising.

Shown in one Huggies commercial aired in 1994, only five seconds of the whole commercial focused on the material and effectiveness of the pull-up.  Much of the commercial shows cute toddlers using the restroom on their own.  The slogan, “I’m a big kid now” is sung by a child-like voice at the end of every commercial as well.  The objective of the commercial was to show children that wearing these types of pull-ups will actually make them a big kid (or at least feel that way).  It also gave parents the idea that the actual pull-ups could help potty train a toddler.  This type of advertisement could be compared to the “Revolution in Marketing and Childrearing explain by Gary S. Cross in “Modern Childhood, Modern Toys.”pg50  With the advance of toy manufacturing, Cross believed that advertising agents created new forms of persuasion that used “nostalgic themes and colorful personalities in order to establish a friendly image.”  He believed many Americans were sold on the idea that those new, modern products would create a happier and more well off family.  Would one believe that a regular pull-up could help potty train a child rather than making it easier for them to wet themselves and get away with it?  Well, “Huggies” made millions a believer.

 

Feb 3

Model Airplanes

I’ve been in love with airplanes from the moment I was born. The hospital in which I was born lies on the approach path for my city’s international airport. A straight line from the center of the runway’s north end to the hospital would cover about 2 miles. My mum says that after I was born I cried incessantly, and the only thing that would soothe me was the screech of aircraft as they passed overhead. My first word was “avión”, Spanish for airplane. With this in mind, it came as no surprise to my family when toy airplanes became the toys I cherished the most.

The Approach to Toncontin Airport. The hospital where I was born is about 2 miles behind where this picture was taken. Photo credit to William Decker.

I liked every kind and brand of model plane, but had a particular fondness (granted, obsession) for models of Honduras’s national carrier, SAHSA. Planes in a Honduran airline’s colors are not exactly in high demand, so there wasn’t anyone making the planes other than the airline itself. They had models custom made for them by a model maker in Miami, then used them as displays in their local offices and in travel agencies. My grandfather was a stakeholder in the airline, so armed with that and the help of my charming smile I saw to it that a considerable amount of these models found their way into my possession. Back then (early 90’s) the models should have been about 75 bucks a pop, but considering SAHSA went bankrupt in 1994 they are virtually priceless now.

Model SAHSA Boeing 727 courtesy of ModelBuffs.com

Gary Cross mentions in the first paragraph of page 37 in “Modern Children, Modern Toys” (course packet page 55) that

“Toys were both vehicles to introduce the ‘real world’ and fantasy objects shut off from that world in the child’s ‘secret garden’.”

This perfectly sums up my experiences with my model planes. My playtime consisted of this: I would set up two “airports” on opposite tables across a room. I envisioned the floor as an ocean, and both the tables represented islands. I would then proceed to micromanage each “airport” using my imagination and my recollection of airport infrastructure. Each plane would “land” at an airport, then would be given time to unload its passengers on “stairs” (Honduras didn’t have jet ways at the time); the cargo would be taken to the imaginary terminal (usually a box of cereal lying flat), the jet would be refueled, new passengers loaded, then it would take off once again with the other “island” as its destination. As Cross mentioned above, I was in my own world of sorts, however I tried to make that world as similar to the real world as possible. During my playtime I did more than just mimic the real world though; I began to understand it. I realized why airplanes used radios to communicate with a control tower one day when I attempted to land one of my jets while another was just lining up with the runway for takeoff. Something that was easy for me to fix there, but would likely end in a horrifying accident in the real world.  Through having a line of models waiting to unload their passengers as a result of me not balancing out the arrivals and departures, I realized why airlines’ timescales were so dependent on the efficiency of many moving parts.  Keeping track of how many routes a particular plane had flown that day taught me to add. Balancing the routes flown so that all my “fleet” participated equally taught me to multiply, divide, and subtract. To quote Cross, I was learning “how to be productive through purposive play” (course packet, page 55). The creation of my own little world in which I could move all the pieces without any repercussions ultimately allowed me the freedom to understand and thus prepare for the world ahead on my terms. At least the airline world…

Feb 3

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The “American Girl” Franchise

The original line of historical "American Girl" dolls.

When I was little, one of my favorite book series was the American Girl series. This collection of chapter books followed the lives of several young girls from different time periods and classes in American history – all hinging upon the common denominator of their titular national identity and exploring the story directly through the girls’ viewpoints. These books were created chiefly to advertise to children (more specifically girls) the line of character dolls upon which the American Girl company was originally built, in the same vein of such toy lines as Transformers and My Little Pony. Selling for upwards of a hundred dollars (and initially only available by mail-order) when you factor in toy accessories and doll dress-up, the American Girl dolls were expensive enough to require additional persuasion in the form of books, movies, and even games. After all,  parental resistance in the face of cost to satisfying a child’s preference for a particular character or story tends to wane the more enamored the child becomes with the pageantry of  a full product line.

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Feb 3

The resurgence of layaway and Xmas Consumers

Santa and Kmart save the day for cash-strapped consumers

 

Recent economic trends in this stalling economy have seen the resurgence of layaway programs throughout the U.S.’s major retailers.  This phenomenon is described here in this ABCNews article:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/PersonalFinance/layaway-makes-comeback-retail-sales-rise/story?id=14955027

The underlying theme to all of this is the fact that even in times of economic woe and recession, consumers still have to get their shopping craze in for the holidays.  Retailers like Kmart and Walmart have had to reformat their business trends to match the lack of spending money many consumers are facing.  Veblen’s theory of vicarious consumption still powers consumers to go forth and spend, especially at Christmas time, because it has become embedded in middle-class American culture.  Consumers are defying their interests because of the norm of Christmas time spending.  Layaway, once left to the dustbin of history and outmoded shopping models, is back to accommodate these new trends.  Though the U.S. economy is suffering in many ways, ways it hasn’t for some time, the phenomenon and expectation of the commercialization of Christmas, and the newly refounded layaway programs, keeps consumer spending up.  This flies in the face of many consumers best interests.  Vicarious consumption proves to the consumer, however, that things are still normal and people are still doing well.

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