In this paper it is maintained that the awareness of being poststructural critical, or rather of using (borrowing) a poststructural lens would be of benefit to phenomenographic research in general as it could promote gender awareness, while providing a means by which to avoid the pitfalls of the cliches concerning normality, rationality and universality. The poststructural approach makes the consequences of the dualistic view visible by advocating (in a methodologically active way) the avoidance of the dividing and controlling force of binaries, such as male/female, heterosexual/homosexual, adult/child, normal/pathological, body/soul and thought/emotion, etc. The benefit for phenomenographic research of using a poststructural lens as a critical "helping tool" would be, above else in contextual, decontextual and recontextual terms, to make the relationally based gender experience visible, where it occurs. The aim of this paper was to outline some of the main differences between two approaches, i.e., the humanist discourse and the poststructural discourse. More specifically, the aim is to make the poststructural discourse visible, drawing from Merleau-Ponty, Foucault and, Derrida, (among others), to offer an ontologically grounded alternative model to the liberal humanist view of describing the subject and subjectivity. The view held in this paper is in favor of the poststructural view in relation to ways of thinking and (in) constituting meaning as proposed by Weedon (1987), Davies (1999), Jones (1997), Butler (1993, 1997) and others. This paper draws on the main questions that Hazel et al., (1997) raise: In connection with phenomenographic studies the authors ask "does the exclusion of women- and of values and ways of knowing associated with women - make the outcome space not so much elegantly parsimonious as restricted or impoverished?/.../Are women missing?/.../Are there ways in which women's experience might enrich the practice of phenomenographic research" (ibid. p. 215). In addition, an attempt is made to discuss the possibilities in phenomenographic oriented research (in a broad sense) of, holding a critical position, by making use of a poststructural approach in general as well as by making use of ways of constituting meaning, in order to make the gender aspect more distinct in phenomenographic research. The relation between informal learning and cultural and gender-inclusiveness is important to stress. How can it be made a valid part of research in general and in phenomenographic research in particular? How can the connection be made between, on the one hand, conceptions of formal learning in phenomenographic studies and, on the other hand, the assumption that such learning always involves gender and cultural inclusiveness? The paper concludes that further efforts are required to make the above relations explicit.