Stereotypical Black cloth doll with a pink dress and white apron: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

A female Black cloth doll with a pink dress and white apron with stereotypical features. The doll has a soft, brown cloth head and body with rounded cloth hands and feet. The doll's facial features are embroidered. She has round, side glancing, black eyes, thick bottom eyelashes, and short, thin eyebrows. She also has a black embroidered upturned nose and a thin, red, U-shaped line for a mouth with black smile lines on either side. Her black yarn hair is parted down the middle down the back of her head with three short braids along the back part. The rest of her hair is arranged into three pigtails on either side of her face. The pigtails and braids are secured with pieces of white and light pink plaid ties. The hair is pulling away from the head on the proper right side of the face. She is wearing a long sleeve, light pink dress with a purple and white fern pattern. The dress extends over the top of the legs and has a U-shaped neckline opening at the back. Over the dress is plain white apron with a square bib, a ruffled shoulder halter straps, a thin waistband, and gathered body. Both the shoulder straps and waist straps are tied into bows at the back. At the bottom of the proper right shoulder strap is a pink and blue cloth flower embellishment. She is also wearing white bloomers secured with a small safety pin at the back.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: mid 20th century
• Manufactured by: Unidentified
• Type: cloth dolls
• Medium: thread and yarn on cloth with batting and metal
• Dimensions: H x W x D: 18 13/16 × 9 5/8 × 2 3/8 in. (47.8 × 24.5 × 6.1 cm)
• Place used: Texas, United States, North and Central America
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Amusements
• Topic: Children
• Topic: Domestic life
• Topic: Families
• Topic: Race relations
• Object number: 2023.11.2
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Linda M. Sheffield
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The underlying object's rights statement is: Unknown – Restrictions Possible Rights assessment and proper usage is the responsibility of the user.