New doll honors Turkish Para swimmer
ISTANBUL – Anadolu Agency
A new doll modeled after World Para Swimming World Series champion Sümeyye Boyacı made its debut on March 4.
Celebrating the achievements of the Turkish swimmer, Barbie, the doll’s producer hopes to help inspire a new generation of young athletes.
The toy company is releasing the newly designed dolls in honor of International Women’s Day on March 8, and to raise awareness of female role models in the sporting world.After winning two successive gold medals in the 50-meter backstroke at the 2019 World Para
Swimming World Series in Indianapolis and the 2018 World Para Swimming European Championships in Dublin, Boyacı became a silver meda-list at the 2019 World Para Swimming Championships in London.
“When I am told that I was chosen as the “Inspiring Woman of the Year” and they were going to make my Barbie doll, I wanted to scream from happiness, run from there and jump,” said the 17-year-old Boyacı.
“l may not have arms but I have wings no one else sees,” she said.
In a tribute to female athletes, Barbie launched a series of dolls including Boyacı, as well as Ukrainian five-time world champion saber fencer Olga Kharlan, British 200 m world champion sprinter Dina Asher-Smith, German long jump world champion Malaika Mihambo, National French Football captain Amandine Henry, Lithuanian European indoor athletics champion Airine Palsyte and European junior surfing champion Teresa Bonvalot from Portugal.
Previously, Turkish champion windsurfer Çağla Kubat and Turkish actress Gülse Birsel have also had a Barbie made in their likeness, as part of Barbie’s “Role Model” project dedicated to honoring role models of the past and future.
Launched in 2018, the campaign aims to inspire future generations of women to push their limits, break out of the traditional roles assigned to them by society and reach their true potential.
Since 2015, Mattel has been trying to pursue a more inclusive approach, spreading messages of diversity by reflecting different body types, skin tones and hairstyles, as well as permanent disabilities and medical conditions like vitiligo, instead of its pink-obsessed, unrealistically disproportional classic dolls.
