When I pulled out the wooden dollhouse for my youngest child (she’s three), I needed some new dolls. So, I went to the toy store only to discover that the boxes of the African American family read: Family Affair II–African American family. Three was Asian, four Hispanic.
Although on the website the Caucasian family is Family Affair I, this isn’t the case on the box. They just are. The family. No race, no number.
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I think sadly that we still live in a culture where Caucasian is very much regarded as the “default”, to the point where dolls from other backgrounds are regarded as “specialty” items. I’ll also go out on a limb–and correct me if I’m wrong–and guess that none of these doll families consisted of same sex parent dolls? Or single parent dolls?
Absolutely, there are two parents (male & female) & two kids (male & female) & two grandparents (male & female). Fortunately, my daughter likes to pretend we are both the mamas (a perk of living in a very lesbian-friendly town). Unfortunately, most people don’t have that perk in their towns & neighborhoods. And certainly not in the marketplace.