Tag: american girl

  • Meet Julie

    Meet Julie

    No turning back now

    Author: Megan McDonald

    It’s the 1970s. Bust out your mood rings and pet rocks!

    The American Girl series is starting to feel more decades day at school and less about American history. Yes, it is important to remember that recent history is still history for kids, but it’s not like Julie’s mood ring is something kids would never see today. Heck, kids today still see fights about who gets to play on the gendered sports teams… it just looks different in 2025.

    Julie’s personality

    We are introduced to Julie as she is doing cartwheels. She is spinning, her life is turing upside-down. Like the other American Girl introductions this is Julie’s theme: Jukie is tumbling through the world looking for the right way up. Julie is struggling for identity. She doesn’t even know her favorite color!

    Julie’s parent’s just got divorced, she’s moving and starting a new school, it’s the 1970s! Any of those alone can shake up your self-image, and Julie has to deal with all of it. She is very unsure of who she is and where she belongs in the world. Julie is also a Gen Xer, so not feeling like she belongs is to be expected.

    Julie’s Family

    Julie’s Mom is introduced to us taking down a hanging geranium plant. Geraniums symbolize folly. Is this telling us that the marriage was folly, or that Mom is a foolish person?

    I like the representation of Julie’s parents. Something that bothers me in children’s media is when divorced parents are so united that you have to wonder why it didn’t work out… It’s very clear why Julie’s parents are divorced. Her dad is a straight laced kind of guy, her mom is a hippie. I get why it didn’t work out.

    Basketball

    So I did the math, Julie would have been born in 1965, and according to the generally accepted generation breakdowns, that is the very first birth year of Gen X. Like most Gen Xers, Julie is a latch-key kid. Julie takes up basketball as a way of avoiding the empty house. Julie’s fight to get on the basketball team feels very Gen X, she refuses to blindly trust authority figures, and she questions everything.

    I think the school should have started a girl’s basketball team. Julie being the ONLY girl on the team is going to cause her social problems. She can’t bond with her teammates in the locker room, and she will be ostracised by the other girls. The other girls will be jealous that Julie found a way to stand out, and being yourself and standing out is not how you make friends as a pubescent girl. Yeah, girls are like that.

    Best Friends

    Speaking of girls why did Ivy apologize? She just didn’t want to spend her whole Saturday getting signatures for Julie’s petition. Julie never asked Ivy to help her, she just blindly assumed Ivy would. Poor Ivy was dragged around the streets of San Francisco, and her best friend Julie was completely clueless about Ivy’s obvious discomfort… I seriously want to know why Ivy owes Julie an apology.

    All in all Julie is a fun character, but you can start to see the cracks in the original American Girl concept starting to form: it’s not like Julie is wearing a shift and stays, she wears blue jeans and tanktops, the cut and colors might be different, but kids still see those cloths today. Julie’s world just isn’t so different from the world today that tactile play (dolls) will help kids understand it.

  • Meet Kaya

    Meet Kaya

    Magpie!

    Author: Janet Shaw

    In my ongoing quest to reread the American Girl series, we have reached Kaya. Maybe it’s just the horse, but I get a Felicity vibe from Kaya. I have this idea that if Felicity and Kaya met, they would be instant friends, talking horses and making friendships bracelets… or trigger happy Ben would shoot poor Kaya…

    Anyway, American Girl gave Janet Shaw the opportunity to redeem himself from the cringy depiction of native americans in Kirsten’s series by letting her write Kaya’s. How did that go?

    Kaya’s Personality

    Kaya is very impulsive. Kaya clearly craves attention, and will grasp at anything to feel accomplished. She loves her horse, but she is desperate to prove themselves as a horsewoman, a runner, and a swimmer. I want to give poor Kaya a hug and tell her she is valuable just as she is and she doesn’t have to prove anything to anyone.

    Kaya’s Family

    I am trying to remind myself that this story takes place in a culture and setting that is very different from my own… but I still don’t like Kaya’s parents.

    Kaya’s grandmother chastises her “You’re not a little girl any longer. You are growing up.” She’s nine. I know the modern western world often coddles our children too much, but I wouldn’t ask a nine year old to babysit two four-year-olds. It’s just too big an ask in my opinion.

    Kaya is the stereotypical forgotten middle child. She fluctuates between responsible and impulsive. She wants to be a daddy’s girl, the opposite of her big sister Brown Deer, but she’s not a carefree wild child like her little brothers. The text wants me to think Kaya’s main problem is pride, but I think Kaya’s main problem is that she wants attention and she’s not getting it.

    It seems to me that Kaya is a normal nine year old girl, she doesn’t deserve to be switched or called names just for being a nine year old. I understand the point Whipwoman makes about how with thier way of life the stakes for screw up can be life or death, I just think that, developmentally, it’s too much to expect of a nine year old.

    Symbolism of Speaking Rain

    I see Speaking Rain as more of the Yin to Kaya’s Yang. She is the part of Kaya that focuses on caring for others, family and loyalty, while hot headed Kaya focuses on defining herself and being seen, Speaking Rain is the part of Kaya that Kaya can’t see… hence the symbolism of her being blind… Or maybe I’ve studied too much Greek Mythology.