Arabic Toy Typography Research

These toy ads demonstrate the reinforcing of gender stigmas through subtle typographic hints . The first 1988 ad presents a girl Barbie doll in a pink dress. The ad includes other smaller images, one showing a girl playing with her dolls, revealing the toy's main female demographic. In using more soft, flowing style of Arabic typography in more calm, desaturated colors, the ad reinforces the idea of women being fragile, gentle, or delicate. The next image is of a Superman comic book page from 1983. This page shows two male superheroes in action at the center, taking up the majority of the page. These kinds of superhero comic books were sold in high majority to boys, which likely has correlation with the fact that high majority of superheroes, especially at this time, were male. The designers of this comic page and many others utilized a type that is slanted, bold-colored, and sharp. This subtle difference to the girl-dominated toy reinforces a stereotype that associates men with authority, swiftness/action, and strength.

Oftentimes, consumers will take note of the imagery associated with gender and the ways that those images can be problematic, but these kinds of subtle typographic differences in Arabic children's toys demonstrates the small ways that typography alone can accomplish the same thing in a way that is less noticeable. This just comes to show that not all gender stigma reinforcers are obvious; there are so many design choices that slip through the cracks and remain unnoticed, despite having overall large impacts through their repetition.