Deodorant Gender Roles

1. The role (Lenkeit 2012: 8) each gender plays in society are essential to American culture. Roles are assigned behaviors and expectations for a person’s social position. As I was in Walmart the other day, I noticed the various differences in men and women’s objects, clothes, toiletries and etcetera. Specifically, for women I noticed deodorants that were designed to appeal to their eyes. It’s pink or purple with frilly fonts. As for men in this same department, the deodorants look dark and have no frilly fonts. They scream, “I’m a man!”, with the dark colors and bolded letters that are somewhat appealing to men. Another thing I want to point out is the face masque’s that they have at Walmart. They are indeed intended for women but I noticed that they had a special face masque especially for men. After all, both sexes acquire different skin. People have different statuses (Lenkeit 2012: 8) in society. Men having some and women having others. The pattern I saw when …show more content…
The items force the cultural expectations upon us. I mean it would be odd if I got axe deodorant, but actually it works great. As for the smell it smells like a man would in our American society. As for women, the scents are fruitier and soft with a blend of freshness. Most women often have an achieved status (Lenkeit 2012: 8) of becoming a girly-girl or a tom boy in society. By buying girly items we can assume that women want to be more feminine but when a “tom boy” girl buys a more masculine smelling deodorant it is different and is questioned. How did they acquire personalities in which they choose what they want? Who are we to say what is an ascribed status (Lenkeit 2012: 8) and what is not. An ascribed status would be that they were born as females but the difference years later are that the learned behaviors they develop which is an achieved status. The items we choose determine how we feel in some ways. They want women to know their place (pink), and for the boys to know theirs as well