food/agriculture

Tennille N. sent in this Australian commercial for NutriGrain cereal:

Transcription:

Boys need protein for growth and muscle development.
NutriGrain is one of the highest protein cereals, so as part of a balanced diet and regular exercise, NutriGrain has what it takes to help build your son into an Ironman.
Thanks Mum.
NutriGrain, Ironman food.

As Tennille noted, I guess she doesn’t need NutriGrain, since she’s a girl and, accordingly, does not need muscles, nor athletic aspirations.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Shayna over at Food, Farms, and Famine posted about what the label “organic” means. The specific wording, and where on the package the statement is placed, is an indication of just how “organic” the product might be,

This video also discusses the meaning of various organic labels (put after the jump because it starts playing automatically):

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Mickey C. sent in this ad for the convenience store, Racetrac.  It’s fascinating in how overtly they take the good girl/bad girl dichotomy and apply it to food.   You are a good girl if you eat fruit, white meat sandwiches, and spinach wraps; you are a bad girl if you drink soda and eat cookies and hot dogs.

This is a narrative that we largely take-for-granted.  We are bad when we “indulge” in “sinfully” delicious treats and good when we do not.  Parallel is the narrative: you are a good girl if you resist your desires, a bad girl if you do not.

It reminds me of an NPR audio slide show about teenagers trying to lose weightwho confess, with guilt and glee, one night of indulgence at Taco Bell.  It’s not sinful to have a cookie, for goodness sake, or to eat at Taco Bell now and again.  And women cannot be separated into heaven-bound angels and hell-bound broads.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Christopher R. noticed that the sibling sites www.youngwomenshealth.org and www.youngmenshealthsite.org had nearly identical advice for being vegetarian or vegan, except for one small detail.  He writes:

Both pages are generally the same (pretty much word for word), except for the last section on convincing parents to let you be vegetarian. The female version includes the suggestion “read vegetarian cookbooks or nutritional information with your parents and offer to help with the shopping and cooking,” as well as an extra article titled “What are some healthy meals that I can prepare?” I guess the difference between male and female vegetarians is their ability to cook and shop.

Screen shot of the male version:

Screen shot of the female version:

Also, pink and blue!  Of course!

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Lynne S. clipped this coupon for a “lovers special” at Cassano’s Pizza.  Notice it both presumes heterosexuality and genders meat as masculine and veggies as feminine.

We saw the same gendering of food in the Brick House Tavern Menu, TV dinner categories, and a vintage Campbell’s soup ad.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Mihai L. sent in a Romanian commercial for wafers that suggests that women have been slowing down progress and re-writing history since the cavewoman days!

With subtitles:

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Katrin noticed something interesting about the coverage of the Farmer’s Weekly competition for Britain’s sexist male and female farmer, Pete Mortimore and Anna Simpson.

The coverage focused almost exclusively on Simpson.

She writes:

Of the (so far) 12 newspapers mentioning this, 11 focus solely on Anna Simpson: She’s the only one mentioned in the article’s title, there are huge pictures of her, videos of her and there is NO picture of Pete Mortimore, he is barely mentioned at all, never in the title (in some of the texts there is a half sentence in the middle of the article mentioning him: “Pete Mortimore, 25, has been voted Britain’s sexiest male farmer”, but that’s ALL).

For example, the Telegraph:

More examples of the focus on Simpson include the following headlines:

Blonde is UK’s Sexiest Farmer (the Sun)

Blonde Named Sexiest Female Farmer (UPI)

Welly-Wearing Blonde Named UK’s Hottest Farmer (GardenXL)

The Barnyard Beauty… UK’s Sexiest Farmer (Express)

Katrin continues:

The single exception, which has a tiny picture of him, is his own local newspaper.

Katrin thinks this is a great example of the way that the straight, male gaze shapes news coverage.  The coverage in these newspapers, ostensibly for both male and female, gay and straight readers, nevertheless covered the competition as if all of the readers are primarily, or only, interested in the hot chick.

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Roisin O’R. sent in a great example of the heteronormativity pervasive in Valentine’s Day marketing.  These “dark chocolate dippers” are designed to be dipped into hot milk and melted into hot chocolate.  Seeing them at a UK health food store, Roisin noticed that they came packaged in boy-girl sets:

She sent a note to the company and asked why they don’t just sell the sticks individually so that the product would be open to gay and lesbian couples (and, for that matter, polyamorous relationships or people who just want to include their kids or grandma).  Roisin writes that the company said that:

…they were “following the market” and if I knew of any stores that would want “his n his or hers n hers” to let them know. They missed my point.

Sometimes it’s the little things that make people feel excluded, invisible, unimportant, or unwelcome.

For more examples of heteronormativity, see our posts on sea monkeys and more, cell phones for kids, and signing up for Trillian.  Also see our post destabilizing heteronormativity with birdies!

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.