Wow ... this has been a pretty busy place! And so many good debates/conversations to track. I'm impressed with how much work you've managed on such little notice. Here are some thoughts in response to some of your messages:

--I think we should start thinking about the female body as a rhetorical space which is written upon in portrayals of it in advertising, the media, etc. In what ways does the female body tend to be used to convey particular kinds of messages?

--It's tough to say whether or not the absence of Barbie's anatomy has an "effect" on kids until we see what happens with an anatomically-correct doll. What concerns me about the absence of genitalia on the doll is that it seems to be obliterating this "detail" of her existence while focusing in on her as a real person in so many other details ... fingernail polish, hairbrushes, cell phones, etc. And the erasure/silencing of what actually makes the doll female is a little disturbing to me ... she can be a woman in all of these other ways, but not by having a vagina or functional breasts ... the things which most concretely identify her as a woman.

-- About Liz's observations in Message 20: I think you're right: we are trained to see concern for dieting, obsession with calories/weight as feminine concerns ... "Of course you're worried about your hips: you're a woman and all women are worried about their hips." Someone else pointed out that being overweight is unhealthy, which is true, as is being underweight and (worst of all) wild fluctuations in weight caused by dieting and gaining, dieting and gaining.

--On the question of who controls the media, I'd say it is the top 5-6 companies who control a very large majority of our media sources, and it is the government which plays a very large role in shaping our senses of what's acceptable and what's not (look to changing views on Iraq and Afghanistan and Israel over the last two years for more obvious proof of this), and it is the consumers who watch the TV programs and buy the products advertised during them. I think all of this leads to recognizing that the social and political climate of our country is controlled by a SYSTEM.

--I think that Katie raises an excellent point about the type of "diversity" on shows like "Saved By the Bell." Why didn't most girls want to be Jessie? Is it just a coincidence that the smart girl was also annoying? Or that Velma, the smart girl on Scooby Doo, is also dorky-looking? What messages does this send about girls who are more interested in being smart than in being beautiful?

--"Does a little girl really even want to play with a perfectly proportioned doll?" If not, why not? Once we realize that many little girls idolize Barbie and fantasize about being her, why can't we use Barbie's power along these lines to inspire girls to be something more attainable? Yes, Barbie and 95% of TV shows are marketed to a mostly white audience, but why doesn't the variety here reflect the real diversity of the consumers they are reaching? It seems to me that "Barbie" isn't the problem so much as not having many alternatives to the "Barbie" image (in TV, film, music, literature, advertising, etc.) is ... and this is why I think the problem is larger than just "Barbie" or "media" or "advertising."

--And to McKibben's comment (#31), I say, "Right on!" Thinking about what women can do to resist the dominant system is the obvious next step ... and it's what we'll be doing for the rest of the quarter ... seeing how women have taken rhetorical control of their own bodies again.

Great job on this discussion board, everyone. Feel free to keep posting here throughout the weekend, if you're so inclined. And check out the links Laura included in her messages (18 & 19) ... spooky, but not all that surprising stuff.