Gender and visual culture

Gender and visual culture due: Why did girls prefer the purple color? From the theoryof visual culture, it is evident that the girl child prefers the color purple in their drawings. This paper will seek to answer the questions “ why is the color purple a girl color? And, how purple has become a girl color? And, where would girls get the idea that purple is a girl and not a boy color?
A study conducted by Zentner (2001) reveals that there is a deep link between children’s drawings and their use of the colors; depicting their emotions. Moreover, as evidenced from a study by Boyatzis & Varghese (1994), color and emotions in children is linked, this implies that some colors depict happiness, excitement, and anger. Additionally from the study, girls showed a preference for brighter colors as opposed to boys (77-85). This proves that gender is linked to the color. Purple has certainly seen some significant gender-specific changes in the past few years. The color purple is considered to be feminine because it is too dependent on personal experiences to be universally translated to specific feelings. It is imperative to note that one’s surroundings and especially cultural perceptions (gender appropriate behaviors) play a part in dictating the color appropriateness for gender which in return will influence a person’s decision (Ross, 2010). For instance, the girl child has always played with the brightly color toys it is learned that the girl child is to brightly colored colors while as a boy child is to dull ones. Purple was a common color in the middle ages. It did appear in the fashion and religious art. As written by Ross (2010) the purple color was associated with the girl child from year’s back (p. 392).
In conclusion, the reason as to why girls prefer the color purple and use them in their drawings is because of the behavioral culture instilled in them. In addition, it is noted that most girls like or rather prefer the soft color as it is appealing to their eyes.
References
Boyatzis, C. J., & Varghese, R. (1994). Childrens emotional associations with colors. The
Journal of genetic psychology, 155(1), 77-85. DOI: 10. 1080/00221325. 1994. 9914760
Ross, K. (2012). The handbook of gender, sex, and media. Malden, MA [etc.: Wiley
Blackwell.
Zentner, M. R. (2001), Preferences for colours and colour–emotion combinations in early
childhood. Developmental Science, 4: 389–398. DOI: 10. 1111/1467-7687. 00180