from: Carrie
Despite being near identical in appearance including their facial features, size, body stance and age, one can still assume that the infant on the left is a baby girl and the infant on the right, a baby boy. Although we know nothing about the newborns to indicate otherwise, we conclude this just based on a brief observation. This observation emits only one visible difference; their clothing, as one is wearing purple and the other blue. I believe this to be a key example in the socialization of gender in our society. If we were to switch around the outfits and resubmit this picture, upon first glance one would concur that the infant on the left was the baby boy and the infant on the right the baby girl, based solely upon their attire. In a study performed by Rubin, Provenzano, and Luria in 1974, the perception parents made about their newborns could be assessed before the babies were even developed enough to have a personality. The parents described their daughters as soft, little, pretty, and beautiful while the boys were big, strong, and handsome. It was also observed upon further inspection that babies were given gender specific gifts, wrapped in gender specific blankets in a whole assortment of gender specific colors just hours after birth. So, in addition to the color variation, one would also notice that the purple outfit has flowers and the blue a dog in the far right corner. This would in turn only justify our belief upon the babies' sex; seeing as in a wedding party a bride would pick her flower girl, and it has always been said "a man's best friend is his dog." This color specific bias has enabled us to avoid gender confusion. For example, if I was in the supermarket and I saw a
baby in blue overalls and a green shirt, I would automatically assume he was a boy, and I may comment to his parents how cute He is. This relationship between color and gender would in turn save me the embarrassment of calling this families' daughter a He and/or vice versa. Softer, lighter colors such as pink and violet are designated to girls, while boys are usually clad in stronger tones of blues and variations of green or orange, a perception that is deeper than just the appearance of colors and more in sync with the findings from 1974. This principle of color categorization, to me, is the most blatant form of gender socialization found in our country today.
2 comments:
I think this is a great example of the socialization of gender. When I first looked at this picture i could tell right away which one was the boy and which one was the girl because of the colors they are wearing. If you were to have them switch clothes I would not be able to distinguish the sex of the baby by looking at the picture, I would have been wrong by just assuming that the one in the purple was a girl and the one in the blue was a boy but I would have been fooled. It is rare for parents to put their newborn babie girls in blue because then people may think it is a boy when they want people to know it is a girl. It would be even more rare for a baby boy to be wearing pink or even an adult male because pink is known as a "girly" color.
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