Mis(s) Education: Narrative Construction and Closure in American Girl

Abstract

While American Girl markets itself as a brand that teaches girls about our nation’s history and empowers girls to "stand tall, reach high, and dream big," this dissertation, "Mis(s) Education: Narrative Construction and Closure in American Girl" challenges this widely held belief. The American Girl Historical Character Series (hereafter AGHC series) is a textual site that writes a history that relies more on national myths of freedom, independence, and the pursuit of the American Dream through struggle. To dig deeper into this book series, I analyze how intersections of power in particular, nation, gender, race, and consumerism are constructed within the pages of the AGHC series. I assert that these books create a narrative construction and closure within the series. In place of a dialogic history that allows the reader to question historical and/or contemporary issues of power, a dominant narrative of history-one that relies on national myths prevails. While AG prides itself as a brand that first and foremost celebrates and empowers girls to become their very best, the historical series also imposes traditional gender roles for girls. It is this "rhetoric of empowerment" that this dissertation uncovers. Such an imagined empowerment is infused with ambivalence. AGHC series readers are also constructed as consumers who are being taught to celebrate consumerism and the Almighty Dollar.