{"id":46787,"date":"2012-05-15T11:20:49","date_gmt":"2012-05-15T16:20:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=46787"},"modified":"2014-02-02T22:58:32","modified_gmt":"2014-02-03T03:58:32","slug":"part-ii-historical-perspective-on-the-lego-gender-gap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2012\/05\/15\/part-ii-historical-perspective-on-the-lego-gender-gap\/","title":{"rendered":"Part II: Historical Perspective on the LEGO Gender Gap"},"content":{"rendered":"

The\u00a0splashy introduction<\/a>\u00a0of the new LEGO friends line earlier this year\u00a0stirred up a lot of controversy<\/a>. My goal with this set of posts is to provide some historical perspective for the\u00a0valid concerns<\/a>\u00a0raised in this heated debate.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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1989-2003: Gender Ahoy!<\/strong><\/p>\n

I discussed the introduction of LEGOs the invention of gendered minifigs, and early efforts to market separately to girls and boys in Part I of this series<\/a>, covering 1932 to 1988.\u00a0 The segregation of LEGO into feminine and masculine sets would escalate beginning in 1989. \u00a0That year the LEGO group introduced gender to the minifig in a big way with\u00a0the new\u00a0Pirates<\/a>\u00a0theme. The masculine figs sported\u00a0copious facial hair<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0lone feminine pirate<\/a>\u00a0had lipstick and a curved shirt that implied a busty chest.<\/p>\n

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This pioneering pirate was the first in a\u00a0long<\/a>\u00a0line<\/a>\u00a0of\u00a0token<\/a>\u00a0females<\/a>\u00a0in otherwise male-dominated action-centric themes.\u00a0The imbalanced ratio of masculine to feminine minifigs persists today, though it has lessened over time. I have seen several different numbers for this ratio, so I decided to do\u00a0my own count<\/a>. I gave TLG the benefit of the doubt and counted as gender neutral any minifigs lacking definitely masculine (facial hair) or feminine (lipstick, eyelashes, cleveage) traits, even when LEGO marketing materials clearly delineate them as male or female.<\/p>\n

The following graphs represent masculine minifigs in blue, feminine minifigs in red, and gender neutral minifigs in gray. I have also calculated the masculine to feminine ratio (m\/f ratio). Ideally this should be 1, indicating that there are equal number of masculine and feminine figures. This chart shows the aggreagate across all themes for the five key years between 1989 and 1999. The m\/f ratio for this data is 3.74 (which is a lot better than the initial 13.5 it starts at in 1989, but not exactly something to celebrate).<\/p>\n

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The trend to unrepresent feminine figures in the main LEGO product line is mirrored by a tendency to overrepresent them in the “girls only” lines.\u00a0LEGO released four major “girls only” themes through this time period:\u00a0Paradisa<\/a>,\u00a0Belville<\/a>,\u00a0Scala Dolls<\/a>, and\u00a0Clikits<\/a>. \u00a0Here’s a quick run down of the “girls only” themes:<\/p>\n