feminism, femininity?

I've chosen to write about American Girl dolls for my next essay on "the consumer gaze." I think I talked about it here already so I won't go into what I'm writing about. What I want to talk about and perhaps rant about is the sources I have to use. We have to use at least two sources, so I spent some time researching in the library and came up with some stuff. There's actually quite a bit out there about AG, how they're marketed, the effect they have had on girls, even stuff like the political ideologies embedded in them. I was a little surprised. But that's all good for my purposes, more sources to quote, right?

Well, the one book I interlibrary-loaned is called "Debutantes and Delinquents" and is basically a collection of essays by women on girlhood, girls, how they're portrayed, what types of media are aimed at them. What annoys me most is the emphasis on how all the depictions of girls are "traditional." Needless to say most of the authors in there are really liberal/progressive and want us to rise up against motherhood and all that good stuff.

I read one line that complained about the dearth of literature for girls, and I was like, really? Are you kidding me??? Because growing up I had no trouble finding plenty of interesting books with female protagonists - Little Women, P&P, Anne of Green Gables, Little House books, Betsy and Tacy. Seriously. When Stephen was looking for good books to read, I couldn't think of much because these were all "girly" books. Then I read a bit more and realised that the author was talking about how all these books still depicted girls "traditionally" and encouraged them to fall into conventional roles - mothers, demure, secondary to men.

[continued on the next day]

So I don't exactly know where I'm going with this. I haven't thought through gender roles and feminism and all that stuff well enough to discuss it intelligently. To be honest, it's always been one of those topics that I just dismiss because I find it too troubling. So maybe this paper will be good for me because it will force me to think more about some of these things.

I pray for discernment.