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Abstract
Industrial design is a male-dominated profession, though the reasons for its persistent gender disparity have not been as well-researched as in other STEM disciplines. This work analyzes recent podcast discourse for insights regarding gender dynamics in the US industrial design industry. Feminist critical discourse analysis was applied to episodes from two popular industrial design podcasts in which the podcast hosts, who are industrial designers or design educators, interview professional industrial designers. We found that women designers were given less airtime in the podcasts, mentioned less frequently, and spoken of less positively than men designers. Areas where women industrial designers more commonly work, such as toy design, were devalued, while design consultancies focusing on consumer electronics were highly valued. Skills in design that were more closely linked with manufacturing engineering, such as computer-aided design, were also valued more highly than ‘softer’ design skills like user research. Thus, the podcast discourse contributed to the masculinization of the industrial design profession and the devaluing of women in the field. We conclude that in order to foster a more inclusive culture within the discipline of industrial design, the devaluing of women designers and feminized subdisciplines should be acknowledged and addressed.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Dr. Sharra Vostral for providing feedback on early drafts of the paper, and for her guidance and direction regarding the theoretical framework.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 IDSA HQ, “Toward a Data-Informed Future.”
2 Coroflot, “Design Salary Guide.”
3 IDSA HQ, “Toward a Data-Informed Future.”
4 Ibid.
5 Silverstein and Sayre, “The Female Economy.”
6 Hewlett, Marshall and Sherbin, “How Diversity Can Drive Innovation.”
7 Cook and Kongcharoen, “The Idea Gap in Pink and Black.”
8 Herring, “Does Diversity Pay?”
9 Temm, “If You Meet the Expectations of Women, You Exceed The Expectations of Men”.
10 Ensmenger, “‘Beards, Sandals, and Other Signs of Rugged Individualism.’”
11 Canney and Bielefeldt, “Gender Differences in the Social Responsibility Attitudes of Engineering Students and How They Change Over Time”; Faulkner, “`Nuts and Bolts and People’”; Smith and Gayles, “‘Girl Power’: Gendered Academic and Workplace Experiences of College Women in Engineering”; Seron et al., “‘I Am Not a Feminist, But … ’”
12 Rhoton, “Distancing as a Gendered Barrier.”
13 Ronen, “The Postfeminist Ideology at Work.”
14 Lockhart and Miller, “Destined to Design?”; Lockhart, Cathy and Miller, Evonne, “Studying Industrial Design.”
15 Reimer, “‘It’s Just a Very Male Industry.’”
16 McMahon and Kiernan, “Sisters Are Doing It for Themselves?”
17 Yang, “Gender Differences in Industrial Design Students’ Vocation Maturity and Career Choices in Taiwanese Universities.”
18 Bruce, “A Missing Link.”
19 Ronen, “The Postfeminist Ideology at Work.”
20 Reimer, “‘It’s Just a Very Male Industry.’”
21 McMahon and Kiernan, “Sisters Are Doing It for Themselves.”
22 Lerman, Oldenziel, and Mohun, eds., Gender & Technology: A Reader, 436.
23 Johnson, “Sorting out the Question of Feminist Technology.”
24 Ibid.
25 Connell, Gender in World Perspective.
26 Trescott, Dynamos and Virgins Revisisted: Women and Technological Change in History.
27 Ibid., 15.
28 Trescott, Dynamos and Virgins Revisisted: Women and Technological Change in History.
29 Cowan, More Work for Mother; Cowan, “The Industrial Revolution in the Home”.
30 Pursell, Carroll W., “Toys, Technology, and Sex Roles in America”.
31 Baker, personal communication, February 19, 2021
32 Silva, personal communication, February 27, 2021.
33 Edison Research and Triton Digital, “The Infinite Dial 2021.”
34 Ibid
35 Taylor, “Podcasts are dominated by male voices, these women want to change that.”
36 Ibid.
37 Perks and Turner, “Podcasts and Productivity.”
38 Craig, Brooks, and Bichard, “Podcasting on purpose.”
39 Perks and Turner, “Podcasts and Productivity.”
40 van Dijk, “Critical Discourse Analysis”.
41 Lazar, “Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis: Articulating a Feminist Discourse Praxis.”
42 Ibid.
43 Apirakvanalee and Zhai, “An Ideological Square Analysis of the Podcast Discourse in ‘Chinese Dreams’ of the BBC World Service;” Apirakvanalee and Zhai, “Telling Stories from the New Silk Road.”
44 Mannix et al., “Gender Distribution of Emergency Medicine Podcast Speakers.”
45 Hill Collins, “Intersectionality’s definitional dilemmas.”
46 Apirakvanalee and Zhai, “Telling Stories from the New Silk Road.”
47 Greenbaum, “Andrew Greenbaum.”
48 Quotes in this paper were edited for clarity by removing some pause words.
49 Lappe, “Lucas Lappe.”
50 Lee, “Stuart Harvey Lee of Prime Studio.”
51 Ibid.
52 Zarki, “Tim Zarki.”
53 Troy, “Julia Troy.”
54 Abbate, Recoding Gender, 72.
55 Buckley, “Made in Patriarchy.”
56 Fink, “Hannah Fink.”
57 Lappe, “Lucas Lappe.”
58 Lee, “Stuart Harvey Lee of Prime Studio.”
59 Zarki, “Tim Zarki.”
60 Bruce, “A Missing Link”; Bruce and Lewis, “Women Designers – Is There a Gender Trap?”
61 Buckley, “Made in Patriarchy.”
62 Oldenziel, Making Technology Masculine, 32
63 Lee, “Stuart Harvey Lee of Prime Studio.”
64 Lappe, “Lucas Lappe.”
65 Lee, “Stuart Harvey Lee of Prime Studio.”
66 Abbate, Recoding Gender, 20.
67 Ibid., 110.
68 Oldenziel, Making Technology Masculine, 166.
69 Ibid., 166.
70 Koudelka, “Amy Koudelka.”
71 Ibid.
72 Ibid.
73 Faulkner, “Dualisms, Hierarchies and Gender in Engineering”
74 Design Council, “The Design Economy 2018.”
75 Lim, “Katie Lim.”
76 Zarki, “Tim Zarki.”
77 Nugent, “Design Discourse;” Seward, “Growing Through Design.”
78 Seward, “Growing Through Design.”
79 Custer, “Kelly Custer, Founder of Knack Design Studio.”
80 Zarki, “Tim Zarki.”
81 Faulkner, “The Technology Question in Feminism.”
82 Barnhart and Walters, “The Hot Industrial Design Sketch: Perpetuating the Dominance of the Male Industrial Designer.”
83 Ibid.
84 Ronen, “The Postfeminist Ideology at Work.”
85 Oldenziel, Making Technology Masculine, 146.
86 Zarki, “Tim Zarki.”
87 Bruce and Lewis, “Women Designers – Is There a Gender Trap?”
88 Zarki, “Tim Zarki.”
89 Reimer, “‘It’s Just a Very Male Industry.’”
90 Abbot, The System of Professions, 122.
91 Acle, “Navigating Rough Sea”; Seward, “Growing Through Design”; Brunner, “Design Legacy.”
92 Seward, “Growing Through Design.”
93 Acle, “Navigating Rough Sea.”
94 Reimer, “‘It’s Just a Very Male Industry.’”
95 Nugent, “Design Discourse.”
96 Acle, “Navigating Rough Sea.”
97 Reimer, “It’s just a very Male Industry”.
98 Fink, “Hannah Fink.”
99 Lim, “Katie Lim”; Koudelka, “Amy Koudelka”; Hirotsu, “Designing Toys!”
100 Custer, “Kelly Custer, Founder of Knack Design Studio”; Troy, “Julia Troy”; Pierone, “Brittany Pierone.”
101 Lappe, “Lucas Lappe.”
102 Faulkner, “Dualisms, Hierarchies and Gender in Engineering”
103 Cowan, More Work for Mother.
104 Ronen, “The Postfeminist Ideology at Work.”
105 Ensmenger, “Beards, Sandals, and Other Signs of Rugged Individualism.”
106 Lappe, “Lucas Lappe.”
107 Faulkner, “The Technology Question in Feminism.”
108 Faulkner, “Nuts and Bolts and People.”