Gender Construction
Object Autopsy
Autopsy of a Gendered Object: The Women’s Razor
Object Under Analysis
The object I analyze is a women's disposable razor, a neutral everyday item at first, designed for hair removal. It is deeply embedded in daily routines but rarely being questioned. Its familiarity makes it an ideal object to examine how gender norms are naturalised through ordinary objects
Razors are not only functional tools; they are also cultural artifacts that communicate ideas about bodies, femininity, hygiene, and social acceptability.
Opening the object: how gender is built into it.
At first glance, the women's razor is identified as "feminine". Normally it's designed with pastel colors, like pink, purple, or light blue, with curved shape, and soft materials. This contrast with man's razors, which tend to be darker, angular, and marketed around strength, speed, and efficiency.
This aesthetic distinction already performs gender. The razor assumes a female body that must be smooth, soft, and hairless, reinforcing the idea that femininity requires constant maintenance and self-surveillance.
Gender as something we “become”.
Simone de Beauvoir’s famous statement, “One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman”, is particularly useful to understand this object. The women’s razor participates in this process of becoming by training bodies into gendered routines. Shaving is not a biological necessity, it is a learned practice that becomes naturalized through repetition.
Through the razor, femininity is constructed as something that must be performed daily, through discipline, care, and bodily regulation.
Gender as a system, not a trait
Following feminist theorists such as Ann Oakley and Gayle Rubin, gender can be understood as a social system rather than a personal attribute The razor does not simply reflect gender difference; it actively produces it by linking femininity to hairlessness and masculinity to visible body hair.
This reinforces a gender hierarchy where women’s bodies are expected to conform to stricter norms of appearance, while men’s bodies are allowed greater variation.
Power, institutions, and normalization
As Joan W. Scott argues, gender is a primary way of signifying power relations in society. The normalization of hair removal is not imposed by law, but by institutions who has the power such as advertising, beauty industries, media, and peer culture.
These institutions make gender norms appear universal and natural, while masking their historical and cultural specificity.
Intersectional limits of the object
The women’s razor is aimed to a very specific subject: a cisgender woman, with an able body, access to markets, and living in a cultural context where hair removal is expected for her.
This emphasized how gender norms intersect with class, race, ability, and nationality. For example, beauty standards around hair are racialised, and access to “proper” femininity often depends on economic resources. This challenges any idea of gender as a universal experience shared equally by all women.
Contesting universality
This object reveals that gender is not universal, but contextually produced. Postcolonial and decolonial feminist critiques remind us that Western gender norms, such as mandatory hair removal, have been displaced globally through colonialism and capitalism, often replacing other practices and meanings about bodies.
Thus, the women’s razor exposes gender as a contested concept rather than a natural or inevitable one.
What the autopsy reveals?
By “opening” this everyday object, the autopsy shows how gender is constructed through mundane practices that feel personal but are deeply social. The women’s razor teaches bodies how to behave, how to appear, and how to be recognised as properly feminine.
Rather than being a neutral tool, it functions as a quiet but powerful technology of gender, reminding us that gender is something we continuously do, negotiate, and sometimes resist.