Gender Product Research Assignment

You will complete a gender analysis of a product commonly available and write-up your findings in a 4 – 5 page paper. Then you will “present” your findings to the class via the Discussion. To do this you will post a short summary of your findings and add at least a couple of pictures to illustrate your findings. SAVE FINAL PAPER AS

PDF WITH PICTURES IN IT. This should ease upload of document.

RESEARCH

The product should be one that is available to men and women. Find one specific product for which there are multiple versions for sale in a store. The product should be one that many different companies are selling and which both women and men can use (not, for example, jock straps or nursing bras). Past students have done prepackaged diet programs, toys, TV dinners, Hallmark cards (birthday and otherwise), liquor, jeans, kids clothes, soft drinks, wedding rings, tools, boots, shoes, bicycle seats, bikes for kids, guitars, cars, Halloween costumes, razors, shampoos, other personal care products, and more. Be creative. You can ask me in advance if you are unsure about a particular product.

DETAILS ON COMPLETING RESEARCH

Use your knowledge about the stereotypes of masculinity and femininity to “read” the product packaging, shape, color, and text for implicit and explicit messages about what men and women are, or should be, like. Remember that the categories of masculinity and femininity are relational, so a comparison of the messages for men and the messages for women might be useful. YOU SHOULD PROVIDE PICTURES IN YOUR PAPER AS EVIDENCE AND TO SUPPORT AND ENHANCE YOUR ANALYSIS.

You need to provide some background information or history on your product. The internet is an easy way to do this, but be certain that your information on the product is legitimate. Also always cite your sources, and be sure that your sources are legitimate.

Write an analysis of that product in which you describe (1) how the product is marketed differently to men and women (if it is), (2) how the product is marketed to different kinds of men and different kinds of women (if it is), (3) whether the product is also racialized or imbued with class, sexual orientation, or some other category of identity, and (4) how the products position men and women in relation to one another. You can note if the product portrays heterosexual images only.

Think about consumption from a critical perspective, and think about how your choice of products is shaped by manufacturers’ decisions.

Be very specific in your descriptions: What exactly is the range of product titles? How exactly does the color scheme vary from category to category? What exactly is the range of shapes and sizes of the product? How exactly does the shape and size of the product tell a story about masculinity or femininity? How exactly are the products marketed with text? How are the products arranged as a group on display? Can you buy this product as purely “gender neutral?”

Include a discussion of “so what” in your paper. This means once you have identified a product that is marketed differently to men and women, you need to take your analysis one step further. You need to think about how these different approaches to the same product shape and influence our ideas of gender. For instance, if packaging for men is dark and uses language of toughness, how is that linked with our ideas of masculinity? And how do these images reproduce what we think of as appropriate masculine traits?

Conclude with your reaction to completing this research assignment. (i.e. had you noticed the “gendering” or “racing” of products before, will you going forward, why is it important to examine products in this way?)

NOTE: This is not a marketing analysis where, for example, you find floral scented shampoo for women and musk scented for men, and then you claim that “women like floral and men like musk” thus this is why we see these kinds of products. You are to think about these products in a different, and sociological way. You are approaching this like: “How does only seeing floral for women reinforce, create, and encourage people to believe/think that women prefer floral?” And furthermore, if this is what is (exclusively) offered to and for women, how does that shape our preferences so that in fact we LIKE these “choices”?