Today we welcome a guest post from Tara, who is writing from Kenya. You can follow her adventures in parenting at mamamgeni.com, where she blogs about raising her family with one foot in the expat world and the other firmly planted in her husband’s homeland. As she recently discovered, finding a black doll was no easy task–in either place.
“Mommy, there are three black people and one white person in our family.” My eldest daughter enjoys pointing out the obvious. She’s referring to me (white American), my husband (black Kenyan), and her baby sister (mixed-race, just like she is). She fully identifies as black, and has recently been expressing interest in race and skin color. We want our kids to explore their cultural and racial identities, and we try to ensure our toys and books reflect the richness of both of our cultures.
My youngest recently turned one, and we decided to get her a baby doll for her birthday. More specifically, we wanted to get her a black baby doll. Should be easy, right? We live in Kenya. No, not easy. THERE ARE ALMOST NO BLACK DOLLS HERE. Whenever you see Kenyan kids playing with dolls, they are almost always little white dolls with blonde hair. White baby dolls, white Barbies, white, white, white. You can find some nice black dolls handmade out of cloth, but they tend to be mommy dolls with babies on their backs. I was looking for a realistic baby, something she could cuddle and take care of, a baby of her own.
Since I was having no luck finding what I was looking for in Kenya, I decided to look for a black baby doll while I was in the US on a recent visit. My family lives in a greater metro area that is over 50% African American. I went to a local department store, and sought out the doll section. I expected to see a choice of dolls from different ethnicities (at least black and white dolls, given the racial make-up of the city). I was wrong – there was nothing but white dolls. Row upon row of white dolls. Blonde-haired, blue-eyed white dolls. Dozens of pink boxes with white dolls inside. Not the kind of dolls I was looking for.
Why was this so hard?
In the end, I decided to search online for a black baby doll, and found one that I loved. My daughter loves it too… She walks around the house, patting her baby’s back, swaying back and forth with a big grin on her face. I had some Kenyan colleagues at my house recently, and they asked where I had found our black doll. I told them my story, and together we lamented the fact that there were so few black dolls available in a predominantly black country.
There is a market for this kind of toy here, and someone is missing out on a serious business opportunity!
It is really important to me that my children have dolls and books that reflect who they are. My eldest is always looking for people who have skin like hers, or hair like hers.
She yearns to identify with a group of people. Having black baby dolls and books featuring black characters makes a difference. Dolls may be “just toys,” but they can mean so much more to a young girl who longs to connect and identify with others like her. What are dolls like in the country where you live? Do they reflect how the people look, or are they different in any way?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog by Mama Mgeni of Kenya.
Photo credit to Mama Mgeni.
Tara Wambugu
Tara Wambugu is a wife, a mother of two, and a Kenya-based lifestyle blogger covering parenting, family life, travel, and more. A former aid worker, Tara has worked in various countries in Europe, Central Asia, Africa, and Central America. She is now a stay-at-home mom living in Nairobi with her husband and their two sassy little girls. You can follow Tara and her family’s adventures on her blog, Mama Mgeni.
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I think it is important for a child to have a doll that looks like themselves! I’m so glad that you found the doll that you were looking for, but it was so interesting to read that it was difficult to find in Kenya.
In the US, my kids play with dolls of different skin colors. As a kid, I did, too.
I remember reading recently about the Queens of Africa dolls that were outselling Barbie in some African countries. They are for older kids, but it would be great, and I think it’s necessary to see more diversity in the doll aisle and in toy boxes!
Thank you for sharing this post on World Moms Blog!
Jen 🙂
I have Tanzanian friends who have experienced the same problem here in Dar. They have mixed race daughters who love playing with Barbies, but only white Barbies are aold here. I have brought back 4 black Barbie dolls from the US for them.
I think all children yearn to confirm different aspects of their identity in their surroundings. I’m sorry that wasn’t easier for you to provide for her, but great job on your search!
I’m glad you found a lovely doll for Sugarplum. She looks very happy with it.
We also had a hard time looking for a doll that looked like my little girls i.e. not blonde hair/blue/eyes/white and haven’t yet found a baby doll that fits that criteria on the shelves in Kenya/the UK or Jordan where we are now based. The search continues ahead of our youngest’s second birthday! I will look online 🙂
I love this! My daughter is biracial too so I don’t want to only give her white dolls, which are far easier to find. I searched high and low and ended up buying her a handmade doll from a lovely organisation called Amani Ya Juu which helps african women find gainful employment for fair wages.
Such an interesting article. Hopefully highlighting this issue might bring some change here in Nairobi.
My eldest is 16 and i struggled to find a doll that looked like her, I needed up just having teddy bears for all my children.
Recently a client asked me to make a doll cake and I went on the search for an black african doll and I was not able to find one. I asked the store that has several branches why they don’t have any and they were unable to give me an answer. Sadly we do have a society where the parents wanting non-white dolls are a very small minority, I hope that this will change.
Great article 🙂
I agree- it is TOUGH!! In addition to wanting to find dolls that look like my daughter (mixed white/ Indian), I also want both my girl and boy to have dolls that reflect a range of races. I was lucky to find cute little black (BOY!) baby doll made by Corolle in the U.S. that my son loves. I also found an Indian Barbie with a sari, dark hair, and olive-toned skin at the Dubai airport that my daughter had to have (even though I wanted to vomit over the Barbie proportions)! But, I have the same challenge here in ZAMBIA…no black dolls– all white/ blonde awfulness. My daughter has a hard enough time wanting to look like me (her white/ blonde mommy), and I want her to value/ appreciate how beautiful her dark her and brown skin is…which is hard when she is surrounded by white as the sign of beauty. You’d think in this day and age things would be more forward-moving!
I will definitely be checking out the Queens of Africa dolls when my girls get old enough to be interested in Barbie-type dolls! So many Kenyan women have the same interest in finding black dolls for their kids – it’s amazing that no one has filled that demand yet!