By MARTY LEVINE

 

Rachel Maley’s office in the Cathedral of Learning has almost as many toys as books: Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls, plastic cowboy and Indian figurines, Pokémon Battle Academy cards, double-dutch jump ropes, marbles and jacks, a Sing-a-Ma-Jig and a Webkinz, a Frozen castle travel set and copies of Little Fanny paper dolls from 1810 that she made herself. 

It’s all part of the new Childhood Material Culture Teaching Collection that English faculty member Maley started for her Childhood Games course – but also for many other departmental courses and those throughout the Dietrich school that use hands-on experiential learning to show the influence of childhood on our lives.

 

She picks up a talking pink mirror that gushes about how much the child user looks like a princess, then a very colorful Sing-a-Ma-Jig from 2010, which, when squeezed, sings “Oh Suzanna” through exaggerated oval lips, disturbingly reminiscent of images from older era in America. She shows how children of the past once played with the Little Fanny dolls, placing Fanny’s head atop a succession of variously clothed bodies as Fanny’s story is read in a companion book. 

 

Fanny doesn't listen to her mother, at first, and has to fend for herself in the world. ending up in dire circumstances. “She eventually sees the error of her ways,” Maley says, “and is restored to her home and is tamed: she will listen to her mother.” In one of the costume cutouts, Fanny herself is holding a story book: “So it is not only a book about listening to her parents, it is a book about listening to the stories you read. It is a cautionary tale.

 

“What's social messages do they carry?” she says of all these toys. “Are there opportunities where we can resist or challenge these?”

 

Maley began studying toys by focusing on books written for children from the late 19th century, and the blurred lines between books and toys – especially books with parts that can be turned into dolls. Acquiring examples to bring into classrooms for students to examine and even play with, she said, “that type of engagement with my students worked really well. I find value in being able to give students the chance to look at, examine and hold the object.”

 

She was also inspired to start the collection when she saw other instructors creating experiential lessons through the Vibrant Media Lab on the fourth floor of the Cathedral. It offers 3D printing, an electronics workbench, die cutting, virtual reality setups and more – including many vintage games and videogames.

 

But to acquire such class materials, Maley also realized that instructors would either have to “bring in their own collections, buy it with their own money or apply for discretionary funding.” To make vintage materials more readily available, the Childhood Material Culture Teaching Collection was born, funded by a Pitt innovation in education award. She hopes it can be used by instructors at every level and in many disciplines and sees its use already in her department’s film and media program and in digital narrative and interactive design courses. Many in her department and school have been helpful in starting the collection, she added.

 

“It's a lot of fun to interact with these objects but also imagine what play looked like” in the past – and what each toy must have been trying to teach the children, directly or indirectly. 

 

Her current class starts with handclapping and jump-roping games and songs, and proceeds through jacks, marbles, vintage board games and war toys such as GI Joes, as well as California’s no-war toys movement of the Vietnam War era. She gives students the chance to build their own games and doll sets, which have new meanings to impart.

 

These students don’t need to look hard for instructive moments with some toys. A Little Pretty Pocketbook, from 1740s Britain, was one of the first such toy/book combinations, sold with either a pin cushion or a ball (geared, of course, for your girl or boy). Maley has brought more modern examples of such toy/book companions to her class, from American Girl dolls to The Indian in the Cupboard, a story about a plastic Native American figurine who comes to life. Students also read an indigenous author who challenges the kind of play the book scripts.

 

Some of the toys have now-forgotten histories that students discover in class. “Close looking gives students the ability to analyze,” Maley says – akin to the close reading of a text. Raggedy Ann and Andy’s pasts are enmeshed in minstrelsy, for instance, now “sanitized and tucked into children's literature, so we're able to be nostalgic about it and feel good about it.”

 

But messages about toys and play are not hard to find in other, more modern media. The original Toy Story movie’s main character, Andy, represented good play in his treatment of the Buzz and Woody figures: Taking care of your toys and sharing them. The movie’s villain – another boy, Sid – takes apart his toys, which the movie depicted as not only bad play but the result of a bad upbringing. The story ends much better for Andy than for Sid.

 

Many toys may invite you to play a certain way, Maley said, “but you don't have to follow through.” She recalls her own childhood play with her sister. Traditionally, boy and girl dolls are supposed to end up in some sort of romance, their stories say. She and her sister had Aladdin and Jasmine dolls, from the Disney cartoon movie Aladdin, in which the male genie ends up saving the girl. But Maley and her sister would usually place the Aladdin doll in trouble and have Jasmine save him. “Children don't always go along with the script,” she says.

 

Maley is still looking for the Barbie “happy family” set that included a pregnant Midge with pop-off belly, from which her baby emerged. The Childhood Material Culture Teaching Collection is accepting contributions; Maley is especially seeking gently used dolls, Barbies, Monster High toys, action figures, Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars.

 

 

Marty Levine is a staff writer for the University Times. Reach him at martyl@pitt.edu or 412-758-4859.

 

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