Task 6

As a designer have you ever used a stereotype to initiate communication? For instance an idea of youth as opposed to age or what it is to be female as opposed to male? Have you tried to communicate to an audience based on class stereotypes? Have you seen other designers doing this?

Sterotypes are reinforced by design because they work. The asthetics of something makes us associate a response, this is the semiotics of a piece. With stereotypes, a range of semiotic symbols have been gathered to form one.

This is stunting the growth of our understanding of others, most prominently in relation to other cultures. As we see the same images used to portray a culture, such as Chinese, we take it on board and it reinforces our stereotype, as nothing is being done to confront it.

Chinese restaurant in China

Chinese restaurant in England

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From the two comparative pictures. I cannot see where this design stereotype has evolved form. As designers and throughout advertising especially, stereotypes are used because they work. They easily denote a thought and association. We can communicate really easily with the use of these, to a large audience, but we are communicating the wrong this on a large scale. This way of communicating is using redundant techniques such as high predicatability to communicate to a large audience.

Previously, I have used stereotypes in my design to communicate Vogue. I aimed it specifically at women and so used pink, a symbol of a woman and hand-drawn, girly writing. Looking back I am very dissapointed in this piece and is one of my worst bit of work.

Vogue