Clothing and Gender

In your essay you will do a sociological analysis of your experiences/identity or of a set of observations you make. Your goal is to analyze your examples/observations in a way that demonstrates your understanding of the sociological perspective. You will be assessed largely on the depth and accuracy of your sociological analysis, including how well you utilize Key Concepts (KCs) in your discussion. You will go to a retail store that offers a large selection of children?s clothing and analyze the styles, images,and/or textual messages on the clothing. Spend some time (30-?‐40 minutes)looking at the gendered aspects of children?s clothing. It?s a good idea to choose an age range(e.g., infants/toddlers, young kids,or teenagers). Identify themes regarding gender in the clothing. You may look at how the clothing is styled, the images that are pictured, and the printed words. You may also take note of the layout of the store and how the clothes are displayed. How might the presentation of the clothing reinforce our social ideas about gender, or encourage shoppers to think or behave in particular ways? Record your observations in the store. In your essay,you?ll discuss the sociological importance of the themes you noticed. Think about what kind of thoughts and behaviors these clothes may encourage in children (and/or in adults) and how those thoughts and behaviors are related to adult gender roles and norms.In your conclusion you are welcome to write about alternative ways of designing or presenting clothing that you think may be more representative of children or may send more productive or diverse messages to children growing up in the U.S.today.