Yes. I am talking about Rugrats, the early 1990s Nickelodeon cartoon that we all feel in love: Tommy, Chucky, Phil, Lil, Angelica, Dill, and the rest of the gang. Yes, I am talking about Dora the Explorer. Why? Because in looking at the two allows for a discussion about race in America, past, present, and future without staying in the stratosphere of theory and big words.
Two months ago, I asked my niece if she wanted a Dora shirt for her 5th birthday. She said no. Asked why, she replied “Dora’s grown,” meaning that Dora acts and dresses beyond her years. I had to stop and think why someone who loves Dora would abandon her. I got my answer that night while watching the news at dinner at the Queen’s Head Pub: Dora was getting a makeover. This made headline news. The silhouette of Dora shows longer hair, new shoes, and a dress that looked a little short. Again, this was the silhouette. The discussion that followed accuses Dora of being, like my niece said, “too provocative for little kids.” These were claims that the new Dora was too sexy. However, in looking at the picture above, there is nothing “grown” or “sexy” about Dora. Hell, she couldn’t stay a little girl with a backpack forever.
These criticisms of being too sexy or too grown did not pop up when the Nickelodeon finally aged the Rugrats and adopted the “Rugrats All Grown Up” theme. Angelica, the spoiled brat of the show, grew up too. She was not considered too grown or depicted as sexy after creative maturation. And she actually has make up on her face, while Dora goes o’ natural.
What was one of the main differences? Race. Dora was seen as being depicted as sexy because she is, I argue, Latina. Angelica, even though constantly in a horrible mood and doing evil things to the kids (yes, I watched the show) was white. These discussions did not happen around making Angelica look older but for Dora to be aged just a few years instantly makes her an object that is no longer a children’s cartoon character but rather has relegated her to category of sex object. I think it interesting as even something as innocent as growing up transformed Dora, with the help of mainstream media, from a cute and cuddly character adored by all to an object demeaned and degraded because of stereotypes placed upon her ethnicity and gender.
Now, please excuse the lack of sociological theory about effects of the transmission of images, stereotypes, and perception dealing with race and gender. That is for a paper, not the blog. What I just wanted to bring one’s attention to is the reality of race, gender, and the media with the background of America’s history of race relations, the political and the social. In many ways, comparing the Rugrats to Dora and the backlash over the aging of the characters is like rereading the footnotes of Brown v Board of Education again: Clark’s famous Baby Doll test. Using these two example, yes of two different time periods, yes of two different type of cartoons, shows the ways in which race still places constraints (or removes them depending on the race of the subject) for how one speaks, acts, and particularly in this case, dresses. Am I taking this too far? I don’t think so. How else would you explain the criticism launched against the new Dora when her fan base is as dedicated and as large as (or at least was) Hannah Montana’s with kids of a certain age group?
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