Student 1 (male): “Did you see Barbie, sir?”
Me: “Yeah. Dressed up in pink and went with my daughter. Loved it.”
Student 1 (male): “Really? In pink? You thought it was good? I thought it was too anti-men.”
Student 2 (woman): “Anti-men? Anti-men? I presume you think Hamlet is too anti-women.”
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Student 3 (woman): “You’re all missing the point. It’s nothing but a piece of capitalist ideology dressed up in pink, leftist, language. Let’s all go out and buy a Barbie!”
This was one of many conversations I had when Greta Gerwig’s Barbie was released. Since then I’ve bought a Barbie poster for the classroom, students have dressed up as Ken and Barbie for Halloween costume day, and the song “I’m just Ken” has greeted my sixth years as they came in ready to read some Emily Dickinson.
I’m a fan of the movie.
But should it be on the Leaving Cert English curriculum? Does it reach the same literary heights as Shakespeare’s Macbeth? Does it have the lyricism of Yeats’ Lake Isle of Innisfree? Does it have the seemingly simple perfection of Keegan’s Small Things Like These?
No.
But what texts do?
Barbie brings something completely different to the party (she does love to party) and that’s where the power of the film comes in, and that’s why we should study the film at second level.
It’s important to note that students will not HAVE to study Barbie. Gerwig’s feminist rallying call is one of eight films on the prescribed text list for the Leaving Cert exam in 2026. But you don’t even have to study a film, there are also eight plays to choose from, and 20 novels/memoirs. From this list of 36 texts students will study three. And then only as comparative texts.
Don’t worry, Barbie is not replacing Shakespeare, the CEO of every English text list in the English-speaking world (although that would make an interesting sequel, once our William isn’t played by Will Ferrell!).
The reality is that Barbie will be studied with texts like Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, or Chandler’s The Big Sleep, or maybe even Shakespeare’s Macbeth.
Imagine that class. You’re a student studying Lady Macbeth, how she has to deny her femininity, how that destroys her. And then Barbie comes along, embracing her femininity. The contrast with the last line in the film and Lady Macbeth’s “unsex me here” is worth the inclusion of this “controversial” text all by itself.
And that’s before we look at Macbeth and Ken. Could we get the students to do some creative writing, a short story where Macbeth meets Ken? Or maybe Barbie goes for a mocha with Lady Macbeth, Elizabeth Bishop and the wife from Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca (also on the text list)? How would that meeting end? Presumably, in the background, we’d get Macbeth quietly singing “I’m just Macbeth” as the three women head off to another party at Barbie’s dreamhouse.
All of this is to ignore the film itself. Greta Gerwig’s film isn’t dumbing down the English curriculum. Gerwig has a firm control over the language of the film, the use of space, the complexities of blocking, the power of colour, of costume. The issue seems to be that the themes are handed to you. But the film is about a plastic doll, how subtle should it be? The overt messaging of the film fits in with the brand.
The brand.
There’s the rub.
The senior cycle English classroom is centred around critical thinking. We look at every text and try to see what’s actually going on beneath the surface. Barbie is perfect for this.
We want our students to read a film and realise what is actually happening, how the film might be trying to manipulate you. And all the better if it’s a modern film, a film they think they know.
We have the lovely sheen of feminist theory but what lies beneath all that smooth plastic? The film is a finely balanced product that has its product placement so obviously front and centre that we can easily miss the merchandising. Leaving the cinema, myself and my daughter immediately wanted to buy an Alan doll (we couldn’t, nobody wants Alan). We want our students to develop these skills, to read a film and realise what is actually happening, how the film might be trying to manipulate you. And all the better if it’s a modern film, a film they think they know.
And, of course, bringing a text that so overtly challenges the patriarchy is valuable in itself, especially one that does so in such a joyous fashion.
The sheer unrelenting darkness of many of the English texts is one of the recurring complaints from students, parents, and teachers. Yes, strong emotions often make for good writing, for an interesting examination of the human condition, but can’t we also have a bit of joy? A bit of intelligent delight? Isn’t delight an aspect of the human condition?
After a class discussing Yeats moaning about getting old in Sailing to Byzantium, can’t we have a dance off between two Kens? After the homely bacon and cabbage of Heaney, why not have the artisanal candyfloss of Barbie?
Conor Murphy is an English teacher at Skibbereen Community School
