LECTURES

When journalist Peggy Orenstein published an essay in The New York Times Magazine about the “princess-mania” that has overtaken a new generation of little girls, she was not prepared for a firestorm. But “What’s Wrong with Cinderella?” swiftly shot to the top of the Times’ website’s “most emailed” list.
Clearly, she had touched a cultural nerve: many parents, she discovered, shared her concerns about the significance of this seemingly-retro trend toward the ultra-feminine, and the role the ubiquitous marketing machine plays in packaging and promoting it.
In her latest book, Cinderella Ate My Daughter: Dispatches from the Front Line of the New Girlie Girl Culture, Peggy Orenstein sets out to discover the origins and ramifications of this cultural shift. With the keen perceptions of a seasoned journalist, the emotional investment of a mother, and a wittiness that’s all her own, Orenstein ventures to the land of Disney and American Girl Place, visits the toy industry’s largest trade show, even braves a Miley Cyrus concert. She talks with historians, marketers, psychologists, neuroscientists, parents and children themselves. She returns to the original fairy tales, seeks out girls’ virtual presence online, and ponders the meaning of child beauty pageants. In the process she faces down her own confusion as a mother and a woman about issues regarding the raising of girls.

Orenstein is a contributing writer for the New York Time Magazine, Peggy has also written for the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Vogue, Elle, Discover More, Mother Jones, Salon, O: the Oprah Magazine, and The New Yorker.

This event will be held at the Lexington Depot on Sunday, November 13th from 2:00-3:30pm. The cost is $10.00. Pre-registration is required. Please call Lexington Community Education at 781 862 8043 to register using a MasterCard or VISA. Full details at www.lexingtoncommunityed.org