Gendered Design

Gendered Design: An Interdisciplinary Framework is concerned with the feminist question of how products, both digital and physical, are and can be gendered by design. It proposes "gendered design" as a conceptual framework for the use of design researchers, educators and practitioners to analyze, critically reflect on, challenge and transform the ways in which design processes and methodologies contribute to the prevalent gender power relations. Presenting a comprehensive review of the extant feminist work, this book distinguishes between the normative and interventional gendered design practices. It identifies the explicit and intentional as well as the unreflexively and ultimately careless practices, which lead to, respectively, gender-stereotypical and gender-blind products. This book stresses that the prevalence of such practices should not prevent us from exploring the interventional forms of gendered design. Drawing on four case studies, Gendered Design attests that, if products have such an important role in gender relations, then they can also be shaped in ways that advance gender equity in society by integrating gender-sensitive, gender-responsive, gender-inclusive, and gender-transformative considerations into product design processes and methodologies.

Pinar Kaygan is senior researcher at the Art Academy of Latvia, Institute of Contemporary Art, Design and Architecture.

List of Figures
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1 Gender in Cultures of Design
Chapter 2 Unfolding Gendered Design
Chapter 3 Complicating Gender-Stereotypical Design with Hegemonic Masculinity: Fountain Pens in the Workplace
Chapter 4 Can User-Centered Design Challenge Gender-Stereotypical Design? The Mismatch between Prevalent Gender Scripts and User Expectations in Two Vehicle Design Projects
Chapter 5 Making the Gender-Blind Public Transport Gender-Responsive in a Multi-Stakeholder Project: Designers' Interpretation of a Feminist Design Brief
Chapter 6 Gender-Inclusive Game Design as a Compromise: Negotiations on the Desired Impact through a Collaborative Design Project
Conclusion
References
About the Author