Hall 1Briana Hall Dr. KurlinkusAuthoring in the New Information Age5 March 2015

An Explanation of Briana Halls Audio Project Gendered Mass Marketing of Toys

Initially, it was difficult to incorporate the idea of technology into the idea of gender as being socially constructed. However, after deciding that I would use a clip from the ever-articulate Judith Butler (a gender theorist who was guaranteed to provide insight on the subject), I ended up finding very good samples of little kids discussing what differentiates girls from boys. Drawing on comical sketches from Jimmy Kimmel and more intellectual audio clips, both from small children, I was able to focus my project on a critique of how capitalist corporations use the technology of gendered marketing to appeal to a distinct boy versus girl binary.

While the first few seconds of the podcast replicate the Radiolab introduction, as we were assigned, the track smoothly fades into the sample of Jimmy Kimmel interviewing little kids about gender and what makes a person either a girl or a boy. This source provided a nice compilation of funny dialogue, along with music tracks and added audience laughter, which immediately presented the podcast as rather professional.

As this source faded out, I was able to cut portions of my own recorded voice to introduce the podcasts topic, discuss it, and further introduce the later clips from Judith Butler and Riley (the little girl who innocently and accurately explains the techniques of these corporations). Although the original recording of my own voice was very long, I was able to cut out extraneous parts and extra pauses, meshing the sounds together well enough to make the track sound seamless. I also used special voice compression and noise reduction effects to make my narration sound cleaner and more professional.

Additionally, light moments of children laughing in the background as soundscape were also inserted whenever I directly discussed how children were to be affected by this particular technology of marketing. Likewise, transitions of soft and thoughtful-feeling music in between my intermittent talking were placed in the background in order to avoid awkward pauses between clips. The same track of music that was sampled for these transitions was also faded out at the end of the podcast, creating both a thought-provoking and subtle ending.

The latter two sources that were clipped provided distinct juxtapositions to the earlier sample from Jimmy Kimmel, but continued to support the podcasts main thesis against gendered mass marketing of toys. Whereas Judith Butler was used to provide a very intellectual and authoritative understanding on the subject, the last clip from the young Riley was used to finally combine the intellectuality of Butler with the light-heartedness of Kimmel. Also, as noted in the peer review session, both the introductory track and the final track of the podcast used audio from childrens discussion, thereby creating a meaningful reflection throughout the podcast, from beginning to end.

All things considered, a culmination of dynamic audio samples from diverse sources, sound effects, music, and my own, recorded discussion were all used to successfully present an argument about modern, capitalist toy corporations use of gendered marketing via audio podcast.