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The Why Shop? shopping bags have been created by Women's Studies students to serve as billboards promoting awareness of ethical consumption during the holiday season. The bags are an effort to counter the biased magazine and television advertisements that bombard customers with distorted images and misleading slogans. In fact, the bags confront such manipulation with their own images and slogans, challenging shopper's consumption habits.



The Why Shop? bags provide a creative outlet for students to share their work with an interested public, as well as portray a new understanding of difficult issues presented in class through art. The bags are displayed on large frames during the annual rally as an eye-catching device for the curious passer-by. They have also appeared in shopping malls, student centers, classrooms, and community rooms. The bags not only contain striking images, but act as informational, factual billboards for the ethical consumer in all of us!!

We invite people to utilize any portion of this work-- we want to spread the awareness, not contain it!!