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The Concept of Gender

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The Concept of Gender
The concept of gender was bought in to academic usage to stand for the cultural manifestation of biological sexual differences. However what it means to be a women or a man is a cultural accomplishment that has its roots both in the way gender is presented in our society and in the way we talk, walk and the interact with others. Consumption activities are fundamentally gendered. Women enjoy shopping and being style manager of their homes even talking it upon themselves to dress their husbands. Men on the other hand are portrayed as avoiders of shopping but can be seen as the addicted consumers of alcohol, expensive sports cars and sex. The relationship of the gender and consumer behavior is pointed out the breadth of four applicable interest areas. The way we have come to live in a world where the consumer has historically become constructed as female is discussed firstly. The rise of the early department store in the middle of the 18th and 19th centuries instructive for illustrating feminized consumer became a more consolidated social and cultural persona. Department stores became more established feature in the inner cities of industrializing countries. These stores were containing with fashionable articles that could improve the female look or the male appearance. Customer where overwhelmingly well off ladies of leisure for whom these new stores offered a welcome new public spaces in which they could spent time away from their homes without risking their reputations. These stores were typically owned by male entrepreneurs and staffed by women from the lower middle and working classes. In this way Mrs. Consumer is coming forward with the stylistic knowledge. The development of retailing culture also brought forth a number of new professional occupations in which middle class women found jobs. The gender pervades the very organization of these new retailing spaces and the assumed priority of the female customer. When making purchases male good departments were

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