Proposal Equality

This research animation, titled “Proposal Equality”, was commissioned by Dr Daniela Pirani of the University of Liverpool and Dr Vera Beckley-Hoelscher of Royal Holloway, University of London, as part of their research into gender equality in marriage proposals, explored through the lens of “MANgagement Rings” (rings offered by women to men during proposals).

The research asks what happens to the traditions around heterosexual marriage when women do the proposing. Drawing on interviews with women who proposed to their partners, it looks at how reversing the script both pushes against gendered expectations and, sometimes, accidentally reinforces them, as well as the creativity and courage required to step outside such an established ritual.

The vibes were high with this project and its cheeky questioning of retro relationship roles. I worked in a bright, cheerful mid-century illustration style that winked conspiratorially at the 1950s ideals the researchers were interrogating, keeping things light vs. lecturing. Finding the right visual register for a subject and letting the style itself carry part of the argument, is something I care a lot about in my animation work with academics and researchers.

The wider research has since been published as an open-access article, “Changing informal institutions via mimesis: gender equality in marriage proposals”, in the journal Gender, Work & Organization (2023), and the project was featured on the University of Liverpool’s research blog. It’s rewarding to see collaborative work like this become part of how a research team shares its findings with the wider public.

If you’re a researcher or organisation working on gender, sociology or social change and you’d like to turn your research into animation, I’d love to hear from you. Get in touch.