Thinking Outside the Doll House

Dolls are everywhere. Turn on any TV show or play a movie in your DVD player and you will find dolls as props. Articles about dolls pop up everywhere. The internet is bulging with studies of Barbie, articles on Cabbage Patch Kids, advertisements on dolls, sites that sell dolls, doll blogs, doll videos, etc. There are even phobias connected with dolls and their cousins, automatons and robots. Mystery writers weave novel stories about dolls; poets pay them attention in verse.

There is no house without a doll! Even those who claim they have no dolls or don’t like them have had a doll or a doll-related object in their lives. Doll-related objects that fit the doll theme or what Lea Baten calls “The Doll Motif” are basically anything figural, portrait-related, loved as a doll or toy, a paper doll, or a stuffed animal.

Dolls rock! Read on!

Ellen M. Tsagaris, JD, PhD, has collected dolls since age three. She gives lectures, stages museum exhibits, appraises, and makes dolls. Dr. Tsagaris writes books and articles about dolls, including With Love from Tin Lizzie; A History of Metal Dolls and A Bibliography of Doll and Toy Sources. Her articles are found in Antique Doll Collector, Antique Trader, The Midwestern Journal of Victorian Studies and The American Journal of Play. She was also the doll collecting expert for About.com. She blogged for R. John Wright, Ruby Lane, and Antique Doll Collector and was a guest columnist for the Argus/Dispatch. She has won several writing awards and has appeared on radio and television programs.