The Pandora doll was the must-have item for any European woman who wanted to remain at the forefront of fashion. In the17th and 18th centuries, as France grew to assert its position as the source of style, the dolls were manufactured and dressed in the latest designs and then sent to women keen to see how they should be dressed.
Their production coincided with the growth of the wealthier middle class with more money to spend on fashion, and an easing of laws that had restricted spending according to social rank, particularly on products deemed as luxuries.
Made of wood or wax, they varied in size from 2.5 centimetres all the way to life size. At the higher end, they had sparkling glass eyes and painted faces, and their hair was styled to match their outfits in the latest look. So desirable were these dolls that wealthy women would display them in their boudoirs or shops and charge a viewing fee.
These dolls served as the perfect advertising method for the French fashion industry. They were also representations of France asserting its cultural superiority.
Fast forward several hundred years and the Pandora has been replaced by Barbie. Both act as ideals of female beauty and assert a certain kind of status by being aspirational consumer items.
For 56 years, Barbie shipped its western ideal of blonde, blue-eyed hyper femininity around the world dressed in the latest American fashions. It wouldn’t be a stretch to call Barbie an icon of western cultural imperialism, just as the Pandora asserted French consumerism and cultural superiority. But times are changing.
Barbie has been affected by a global change in the willingness of women – particularly non-white women – to accept only one kind of beauty image. Women are increasingly fed up with seeing perfect femininity as something other than how they look. In particular, when that imagery is translated into the first depiction of femininity through dolls given to their daughters, they are fighting the fact that it inevitably denies those children a sense of self-representation.
It’s no wonder that toymaker Mattel has reinvented Barbie this year, with a range of dolls in a variety of sizes and skin tones. There was a collective hurrah when they were announced.
Yet it was 24-year-old Nigerian Haneefah Ahmed’s reinvention of Barbie that has caught the collective imagination. Her Hijarbie has specially designed hijabs and other modest clothes, and is featured on her own Instagram account.
Ahmed says her creations are about improving self-esteem by giving children toys that adopt your religion and culture, and show them in your own likeness.
Hijarbie is fashion forward. And it reflects the growing Muslim fashion industry that has been born of Muslim women asserting their faith and fashion credentials as going hand in hand. But she’s more than a toy; she’s a witty response to Muslim women being ignored – sometimes wilfully – from depictions of beauty today.
Both Pandora and Barbie stem from eras where cultural power was tied to a central source of production. With less willingness for passive consumption, the days of the manufactured beauty that Pandora and Barbie imposed are numbered.
Shelina Zahra Janmohamed is the author of Love in a Headscarf and blogs at www. spirit21.co.uk
Company%20Profile
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COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
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Company%20Profile
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The Penguin
Starring: Colin Farrell, Cristin Milioti, Rhenzy Feliz
Creator: Lauren LeFranc
Rating: 4/5
The specs
Engine: 6.2-litre supercharged V8
Power: 712hp at 6,100rpm
Torque: 881Nm at 4,800rpm
Transmission: 8-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 19.6 l/100km
Price: Dh380,000
On sale: now
Email sent to Uber team from chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi
From: Dara
To: Team@
Date: March 25, 2019 at 11:45pm PT
Subj: Accelerating in the Middle East
Five years ago, Uber launched in the Middle East. It was the start of an incredible journey, with millions of riders and drivers finding new ways to move and work in a dynamic region that’s become so important to Uber. Now Pakistan is one of our fastest-growing markets in the world, women are driving with Uber across Saudi Arabia, and we chose Cairo to launch our first Uber Bus product late last year.
Today we are taking the next step in this journey—well, it’s more like a leap, and a big one: in a few minutes, we’ll announce that we’ve agreed to acquire Careem. Importantly, we intend to operate Careem independently, under the leadership of co-founder and current CEO Mudassir Sheikha. I’ve gotten to know both co-founders, Mudassir and Magnus Olsson, and what they have built is truly extraordinary. They are first-class entrepreneurs who share our platform vision and, like us, have launched a wide range of products—from digital payments to food delivery—to serve consumers.
I expect many of you will ask how we arrived at this structure, meaning allowing Careem to maintain an independent brand and operate separately. After careful consideration, we decided that this framework has the advantage of letting us build new products and try new ideas across not one, but two, strong brands, with strong operators within each. Over time, by integrating parts of our networks, we can operate more efficiently, achieve even lower wait times, expand new products like high-capacity vehicles and payments, and quicken the already remarkable pace of innovation in the region.
This acquisition is subject to regulatory approval in various countries, which we don’t expect before Q1 2020. Until then, nothing changes. And since both companies will continue to largely operate separately after the acquisition, very little will change in either teams’ day-to-day operations post-close. Today’s news is a testament to the incredible business our team has worked so hard to build.
It’s a great day for the Middle East, for the region’s thriving tech sector, for Careem, and for Uber.
Uber on,
Dara
The%20specs
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Recycle Reuse Repurpose
New central waste facility on site at expo Dubai South area to handle estimated 173 tonne of waste generated daily by millions of visitors
Recyclables such as plastic, paper, glass will be collected from bins on the expo site and taken to the new expo Central Waste Facility on site
Organic waste will be processed at the new onsite Central Waste Facility, treated and converted into compost to be re-used to green the expo area
Of 173 tonnes of waste daily, an estimated 39 per cent will be recyclables, 48 per cent organic waste and 13 per cent general waste.
About 147 tonnes will be recycled and converted to new products at another existing facility in Ras Al Khor
Recycling at Ras Al Khor unit:
Plastic items to be converted to plastic bags and recycled
Paper pulp moulded products such as cup carriers, egg trays, seed pots, and food packaging trays
Glass waste into bowls, lights, candle holders, serving trays and coasters
Aim is for 85 per cent of waste from the site to be diverted from landfill
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Company%20profile
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Al Jazira's foreign quartet for 2017/18
Romarinho, Brazil
Lassana Diarra, France
Sardor Rashidov, Uzbekistan
Mbark Boussoufa, Morocco
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Sweet%20Tooth
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COMPANY%20PROFILE
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The Specs
Price, base Dh379,000
Engine 2.9-litre, twin-turbo V6
Gearbox eight-speed automatic
Power 503bhp
Torque 443Nm
On sale now
How%20champions%20are%20made
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THE APPRENTICE
Director: Ali Abbasi
Starring: Sebastian Stan, Maria Bakalova, Jeremy Strong
Rating: 3/5
The Perfect Couple
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Liev Schreiber, Jack Reynor
Creator: Jenna Lamia
Rating: 3/5
