URCAD Sneak Peek: Theo Reinert

Thu, 06 Apr 2023 08:13:28 -0400

The Language of Toys: Transmission and Circulation of Gender Ideologies

Theo Reinert
Mentor: Jason Loviglio, Media and Communication Studies

This research explores what makes a toy gendered, how it is gendered, and what it means for a material object to carry ideology. Toys are given to children to entertain and educate them on things such as gender roles. For a long time, separate toys were marketed and sold to girls and boys, until large chains such as Target and Walmart, two of the largest toy distributors in the country, removed gendered signage from their toy aisles. Despite these changes, many toys continue to reinforce the gender binary through their designs and marketing. 20 toys purchased from Walmart were analyzed through Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA) and ideological analysis to see what gender ideologies they carry and how they are instantiated. Gender ideologies code toys to emphasize certain values, such as mobility for boys and socializing for girls. For example, toys that move, such as a fire engine, are more likely to be marketed towards boys. It is Walmart’s careful marketing that contributes which toys are sold and therefore which ideologies are circulated, affecting the lived experiences of the people who play with them.

This work was funded, in part, through an Undergraduate Research Award from the UMBC Division of Undergraduate Academic Affairs.

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