practical exploration development

After researching and deciding on what type of poster i wanted to create i decided on the idea of a poster that was to show how easy people stereotype and how easy it is to be stereotyped by your gender. To present this ideas i decided to use symbols as i found these were the most basic from of stereotypes as the women is shown to be wearing a dress and the men trousers and they are also used in pink for the women and blue for the male. To break this stereotype i choose to address the issue by showing that the women figure is now always a women that it can be male and point out that sometimes men do wear dresses and that is acceptable. As well as the male figure i decided that i would tackle the issue of the male figure as well presenting it as a women as women today wear trousers just as much as men and it is not a cannon thing that all women wear skirts and dresses everyday.

To represent this in a humorous and cleaver why i decided to turn the symbols into super hero of the opposite sex. This portrays the idea that the way known stereotype can sometimes be wrong from first glance and that people do not always fit into the stereotype that you think of them straight away.

I decided to create the women figure are super man as he is a strong figure that wears a cape that as a silhouette looks like the dress of a women.

I then decided that i should also include a figure of a strong women to fairly present both genders equal, because of this i decided that the men figure would be turned into cat women, as this lead to the slogan ' it was never a men, it was always cat women without her ears'.

After creating the characters/illustrations i started to experiment with how i could turn them into a poster and what text i would use along side the image. I decided that i would stick to black and white as these colours have no association with gender so the poster would be as gender neutral as possible.

below are my experiments of layouts and text:

The above poster ideas a i found the over all effectiveness successful as the information i wanted to portray was clear, but i thought the look of the posters was simple as it was not eye-catching and didn't attract attention, because of this i decided to experiment more this the wording of the text and also the use of the colours.

Above are my designs using more of a contrast of black and white to make the design more eye catching. i also altered the text from 'it was never a dress, it was always supermans cape' to 'it was never a women in a dress. It was always super in his cape' by simply changing the wording of the quote it emphasised my point lot clearer by stating the stereo type. 

Similar to the design before design i changed the wording from 'it was cat women without ears all along' to 'it was never a men. it was always cat women without her ears' once again to emphasise my point of gender stereo types and that only men are seen to wear trousers.

Gender stereotypes

Below are a select ew images that show just a few of the stereotypes that are thought of for males and females, Unfortunately there are not just these many of stereo types there are many more that are put on both genders .

stereotypes for women

• Women are supposed to have "clean jobs" such as secretaries, teachers, and librarians 
• Women are nurses, not doctors 
• Women are not as strong as men 
• Women are supposed to make less money than men 
• The best women are stay at home moms 
• Women don’t need to go to college 
• Women don’t play sports 
• Women are not politicians 
• Women are quieter than men and not meant to speak out 
• Women are supposed to be submissive and do as they are told 
• Women are supposed to cook and do housework 
• Women are responsible for raising children 
• Women do not have technical skills and are not good at "hands on" projects such as car repairs 
• Women are meant to be the damsel in distress; never the hero 
• Women are supposed to look pretty and be looked at 
• Women love to sing and dance 
• Women do not play video games 
• Women are flirts 
• Women are never in charge

Stereo types for men

• All men enjoy working on cars 
• Men are not nurses, they are doctors 
• Men do "dirty jobs" such as construction and mechanics; they are not secretaries, teachers, or cosmetologists 
• Men do not do housework and they are not responsible for taking care of children 
• Men play video games 
• Men play sports 
• Men enjoy outdoor activities such as camping, fishing, and hiking 
• Men are in charge; they are always at the top 
• As husbands, men tell their wives what to do 
• Men are lazy and/or messy 
• Men are good at math 
• It is always men who work in science, engineering, and other technical fields 
• Men do not cook, sew, or do crafts

Once again is it not the full list of stereotype that women and men alike are categorised.

Discussing idea's on how to make adverts un-sexist

As part of idea development i thought that i would discuss how i would take an advert and change it to be unsexist as a way of again ideas for my my poster and ways in which i could present it.

the above advertisement is one of american apparels campaigns, the advert is to show off the socks but shows a women blowing bubbles laying on a bed. If i was to recreate this image in a non sexist and idolisation way i would picture a women and men wearing similar style socks and just focus in on the socks with the caption 'socks on point' as this would not idolise men or women as there would be no provocative imagery and would show diversity as the men and women would be wearing the same product.

The above advertisement for peta is very sexist towards women as not only is the image used very idealistic and sexualises the women it also implies the women to be an 'animal'. If i was to re create this advertisement i wouldn't use imagery of women or men i would use symbols as this will not contain images of people, and i would change the slogan to 'We all have the same parts at animals'.

The above image for dolce and gabbana is showing idolisation of women and men but also showing how men idolise women as there is a group of men and one women, the aim of this image is to show attraction between men and women. If i was to re create this image i would include 3 more women so that the ratio of men and women was equal and to show the attraction between have them dancing in couples as this would have the same effect just in a more sensitive and equal manner.

Ruling out stereotypes posters/campaigns

After researching sexist and stereotypical advertisements and deciding that i would like to create a poster that suggests to rule out these stereotypical roles thought it was important to research already existing campaigns/posters that also try to fight this issue and make people aware that it still about in the modern day.

Below are a few images of campaigns that i looked at:

After looking at the above campaigns about fighting the stereotypes and sexism i found that most of them used image to try portray their idea and message as well as fairly neutral colours to try and stay away from the gender associated colours of pink and blue.

After this research i think that i will base my posters on something similar to the last post. i think it will be effective if i was to take the men symbol and women symbol and turn them into the opposite sex to break the categorisation and the stereotype of men not being able to wear dress and only men that wear trousers.