American Girl is an American line of 18-inch (46 cm) dolls released in 1986 by Pleasant Company. The dolls portray eight- to eleven-year-old girls of a variety of ethnicities. They are sold with accompanying books told from the viewpoint of the girls. Originally the stories focused on various periods of American history, but were expanded in 1995 to include characters and stories from contemporary life. Aside from the original American girl dolls, the buyer also has the option to purchase dolls that look like them. The options for the line of Truly Me dolls range from eye color, eye shape, skin color, hair texture, and hair length. A variety of related clothing and accessories is also available. .

Pleasant Company was founded in 1986 by Pleasant Rowland, and its products were originally purchasable by mail order only. In 1998, Pleasant Company became a subsidiary of Mattel. The company has been awarded the Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Award eight times.

Dolls and accessories

The Historical Characters line of 18-inch dolls were initially the main focus of Pleasant Company. This product line aims to teach aspects of American history through a six-book series from the perspective of a girl living in that time period. Although the books are written for an eight plus target audience, they endeavor to cover significant topics such as child labor, child abuse, poverty, racism, slavery, animal abuse and war in manners appropriate for the understanding and sensibilities of their young audience.

American Girl is a 2002 American film directed by Jordan Brady, starring Jena Malone, Michelle Forbes, Brad Renfro, Alicia Witt, and Erik von Detten. The film premiered on October 16, 2002 at the Austin Film Festival. It was later released to DVD on January 11, 2005 under the title Confessions of an American Girl.

Plot

The movie revolves around a teenage girl named Rena, a suicidal teenager whose father is serving a long prison sentence. The boy she likes only uses her for sex and other teenage girls tease her relentlessly.

Rena and her family travel to the father's prison for the annual family picnic. Things seem to be going just fine, but he eventually becomes abusive and angry. Rena's brother Jay, who is secretly gay, wanders off to tour the prison with another inmate named Buddy. Rena's half-sister Barbie sneaks off to the conjugal visit trailers and engages in sexual intercourse with her stepfather (Rena's father), unbeknownst to the family. After this activity is witnessed by Buddy and Jay, the other inmates watch as Buddy makes her squeal like a pig in exchange for not reporting it to her mother. Jay and Buddy bond, and when the tour is over they secretly kiss passionately.

"American Girl" is the second single from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' self-titled debut album. The single did not chart in the U.S. (until it was re-released in 1994, it only managed to peak at nine in Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles though), but in the UK it peaked at #40 the week ending August 27, 1977. The song was ranked 76th on the list of "The 100 Greatest Guitar Songs of All Time" by Rolling Stone.

Music

"American Girl" uses standard rock instrumentation of electric guitars (Petty and Campbell), electric bass (Blair), drums (Lynch), and keyboards (Tench). The tempo is fast and "urgent", and is built on a repeated jangling guitar riff based on a "Bo Diddley beat".

As described in Rolling Stone, "The supercharged riff set the template for decades of Petty hits, but it was also an homage to the Byrds: Petty and Mike Campbell's twin guitars mirrored Roger McGuinn's 12-string, infusing the folk-rock sounds of the 1960s with New Wave energy."

Lyrics and rumors