Geosemiotics (Scollon & Scollon, 2003) provides a way to read artifacts and places for their material messages. For example, a geosemiotic analysis of toys recognizes that these artifacts have been designed according to particular visions of who children should be and how they should play. Artifacts can be read as layered assemblages of designs and uses that reveal intended meanings, histories of ways they are used, and discourses. My notion of toys as texts draws upon Pahl and Rowsell’s (2010) theorization of artifactual literacies in which objects concretize their prior meanings, identities, and uses. For example, a child dancing a princess doll along the floor while voicing a line from a movie script materializes a popular film and its fairy tale narrative, the color decisions made by animators, an intended audience forecasted by marketing teams, and so on. . . .
In this exploration, choose a children’s popular media franchise and select a toy, such as the promotional toys often included in children’s fast food meals.
1. The first challenge is to assemble it, if necessary, and try to figure out what it does.
2. Examine the toy for its modal meanings: color, shape, texture, size, weight. How does it feel? What sensory qualities in the materials would make children want to play with it?
3. If you don’t recognize the character or the popular media franchise it represents, what can you learn on Google or Wikipedia about the artifact’s media narrative, histories of production, its marketing, and children’s consumption?
4. What is the toy’s expected use? (the authorized use that its producer intends)
5. What else could you do with it? (unauthorized uses that consumers imagine)
6. What kind of space do children need to be able to play with it?
7. What do children need to know in order to play with it?
8. Are there other toys or media that children would need to have?
9. What would children (or parents) need to buy to complete the collection?
10. What media would children (or parents) need to buy, and how many times would they need to view, play, or listen to the media to know the “official” storylines?
11. Who is represented by the toy?
12. Who is not represented in the toy’s design or expected as a player?
13. These questions provide a start toward analyzing how identity expectations are materialized through the toy’s materials and how action text expectations impact toy popularity, drive consumption, and shape children’s play.