Vogue Flashcards

1
Q

intro

A
  • Created and published by Conde Nast
  • In the post-war period Vogue continued to do well, as many women were enjoying the consumerism and emphasis on “treating yourself” (40s, 50s).
  • still able to mainatain circulation throught the years despite the in general decline in print sales
  • INTERNATIONAL EXPANSION - launched a spanish vogue, italian vogue and the rest of eastern europe = REFLECTIVE OF HESMONDAULGH that powerful companies often replicate successful formats to maximise profit
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
2
Q

vogue

production context

A
  • Front cover design centers on Sophia Loren, (an Oscar-winning Italian actress) ,avoiding conventional cover lines for a minimalist approach emphasising her image.
  • Language choices evoke themes of freedom and exoticism, while the central image of Loren in a Turkish dancer attire exudes aspirational femininity, reflecting the glamour and luxury of the 1960s cultural context.
  • She wears aturquoise colour palette, shimmering scarf, feathers, pearls, and jewels= which connotes luxury, and wealth.
  • This aesthetic was a reflection of fashion associated with the ‘mad midsummer’of the 1960s.
  • The masthead, overshadowed by Loren’s image,showcased the iconic Vogue brand, synonymous with high fashion and sophistication. = Z-LINE
  • Vogue evolved into a symbol of sophistication and style, remaining relevant today as a global brand promoting diversity
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
3
Q

vogue

ECONOMIC CONTEXT

A
  • Major publishers like Hearst, IPC still dominate the magazine industry, but there’s increased competition due to a wider range of titles available.
  • Print circulation decline necessitates strong online presence; magazines must cultivate unique brand identities to compete, leading to closures of some mainstream titles while niche magazines thrive with distinct selling points and loyal audiences.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
4
Q

historical/social context

A
  • Vogue’s July 1965 cover featuring Sophia Loren captures the transformative era, blending Old Hollywood glamour with emerging liberation.
  • Th cover emphasises Loren’s image, reflecting societal shifts towards individualism and self-expression.
  • The cover mirrors the era’s political and social movements, expressing a desire for freedom and rebellion against traditional norms.
  • Sophia Loren as an embodiment of a ‘mythicencapsulates evolving perceptions of femininity and beauty, *challenging traditional expectations.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
5
Q

Industry

Vogue was very sucessful, in the 20th centutry, why, what makes him stand out?

A
  • one of the first magazines to start using colour photography for their magazines, which was very expensive back in the 1930s but their target audience could afford it.
  • Conde Nast encouraged more modernity and risk-taking.
  • one of the first fashion magazines to use a black woman on the cover = it created the idea of Vogue being pushing boundaries.
  • Vogue has a huge range of international editions to target various global audiences. = this reflects Hesmondhalgh’s idea that powerful companies often replicate sucessful formats to maximise profits.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
6
Q

Industry

Minimising risk/ maximising sales : featuring celebrity

Hesmondhalgh’s

how they stood out:

A
  • how they stood out: one of 1st to use colour, very expensive to produced but the audience was able to afford it
  • risk taking business plan: use a black african american model - paved the way for models to appear in magainzes
  • audience like that cutting -edges - pushing boundaries
  • MAXIMISING DALES Guess aditing collaboration: ANDY WORHAL
  • Featured people that weren’t exactly famous before hand,
  • also featured Nelson Mandela &. exclusive photos about people apart of the Royal Family like Princess Diana
  • brings inclusivity/collectibe
  • draw in global audience
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
7
Q

Industry

Anna Wintour

A
  • (editor in cheif)
  • made huge changes in the magazine
  • began a trend of using more celebrities on the covers, rather than just models.
  • She also introduced “Teen’s Vogue” and “Men’s Vogue” in order to expand the brand and attract a much larger audience
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
8
Q

Industry

Diversifcation of Vogue

A
  • moving from producing one type of product to creating different another
  • Vogue has now moved into a lot of digital media- there’s a digital version of the magazine.
  • have a strong social media presence, recognising many people are online now
  • Vogue “Fashion Fund” which started in the mid-2000s and was all about helping new fashion designers financially.
  • [adds to the reputation of Vogue being the forefront of fashion]
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
9
Q

industry

Advertising

A
  • Have their own exhibition in national portrait gallery to celerabte 100 years
  • charged£36,000 = earn profit from advertising
  • Manyfrom afluent backgrund, embraces their culture likely to buy
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
10
Q

Representation

Sophia Loren

A
  • A very famous actress in the 60s.
  • The front cover is a close-up of her that makes her seem important, powerful, exotic, and like a role model.
  • (looks like a turkish dancer).
  • The exotic nature of her image may reflect Stuart Hall’s ideas about the use of Middle Eastern stereotypes, representing ethnic minorities as “other”.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
11
Q

features in the magazine

Sheila Black

£

A
  • Featuring a working female expert on finance would’ve been quite unusual in the 1960s.
  • Sheila Black works for the Financial Times. (She talks about women being financially independent and wanting to invest money) = Countertypical for women.
  • at the time women didn’t have that much power over finance.
  • This started after an influx of second-wave feminism.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
12
Q

Cutex advert

Representation of Women

A
  • conventional representations = often showing them as domestic or sexualised. links to Van zoonen
  • For example, one of the magazine (Cutex advert) denotes a woman with bare shoulders suggesting nudity,bare essentials”, “barely decent”.
  • The shade names have connotations of nudity, suggesting that showing flesh and being sexualised is important for women.
  • “Are you woman enough to wear them?” the rhetorical question suggests that femininity is linked to nakedness and sexual appeal.
  • Very reflective of the way women were and often still are, represented.
  • Appearacne is importance
  • However, The passivity of the women in many articles, fails to reflect the growing power of some women in the 60’s e.g. feminist, the sexual revolution, the crotraceptive pill,
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
13
Q

Historical Representation of vogue

young women

A
  • The use of images of young women as mothers reflects the historical context as women in the 60s were typically expected to marry young and start families.
  • Modern women’s magazines aimed at those age 20-35 often choose not to feature content about children, as many women now are able to have careers first, and have children in their 30s or later
  • Vogue was aimed at a mainstream market. this may also reflect the fact that richer women were under less financial pressure to go out and work, so many of them did lead lives more centred around leisure and family life.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
14
Q

Class Representations

A
  • There’s quite complex language going on because the magazine is targeted toward middle-to-upper classes with an assumed advanced lexis.
  • they talk about lords and ladies, famous artworks, etc, representing upper-class “cultured” women
  • This may reflect the fact that readers of Vogue tend to be from the middle/upper classes, or aspire to this.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
15
Q

PICNIC ADVERT

Ethnicity Representations

A
  • White ethnic appearance is normalised, with darker ethnicities being underrepresented in the range of ‘nude toned’ Cutex products
  • White models are often pictured in jewels and expensive clothes, representing them as high status.
  • The lack of minority models, and makeup aimed at darker skinned readers, reflects the less inclusive nature of Britain in the 60s.
  • in other vogue magazines: the black Egyptian men in the fashion pages positions show as being marginalised
  • they’re in the background of the shots, out of focus, and are seen as working,whereas the white woman is dancing and enjoying leisure time
  • This marginalisation of ethnic minorities creates a post colonialist view of ethnicity, with them being seen less important than the white models. - GILROY
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
16
Q

more on representation of women in all magazines

SUBVERTED

A

Stereotypical representations of gender and magazines:
- Domestic role of women. Housewife/Housekeeper.
- Beauty – Women were expected to look attractive.
- dependant – Women relied on the men.
- Nurturing – Women had to raise the child and care for the child whilst the men went to work.
- Subductive – Women were expected to obey the men.

However.. this is subverted:
* The Vogue magazine shows women to be independent and shows that women don’t need to rely on men to financially support them.
* Women are no longer housewives and aren’t nurturing the children.
* The Vogue 1965 magazine doesn’t reinforce traditional stereotypes/ offers a sense of female liberation or independence

17
Q

Guantlett on Vogue

imperial leather

A
  • Gauntlett identifies historical magazines as significant for stereotypical perfect housewife.
  • This stereotype has allows women’s magazines to put particular emphasis on the domestic sphere.
  • By Constructing ‘Domesticity’ as a feminine ideal, these magazines and print adverts were reasserting the importance traditional gender roles.
  • Given that men occupied the majority of jobs and controlled corporations this can be seen as reinforcing the dominant ideology of patriarchy.
18
Q

Does the magazine support Gauntlett’s claim that the media offered a message about ideal types of male and female identities?

A
  • Yes, this Vogue magazine supports the Gauntlett’s
  • Women in the 1960s were expected to look attractive and please the men.
  • This Vogue front cover shows a stereotypically attractive women who is slender and has make-up on.
  • The singular representation of the front cover is that the women is Beautiful and Subjective however is Independent
19
Q

VOGUE

Feminist theory - Van Zoonen

A
  • Vogue is mostly made by women, containing women but most representations tend to reinforce strict gender binaries through articles, features and adverts.
  • women are still encouraged to passively act and look in a way (attractive, domestic and motherly) which empowers men
20
Q

VOGUE

semiotics - Barthes

A
  • FRONT PAGE: Sophia Loren and her elegant (yet, exotically ‘other’) dress codes reinforcing the connotations of difference combined with the ‘beauty ideal’ readers should find ‘aspirstional’
  • MAKE-UP ADVERTS: Emphaising the use of lipstick and eyeshadoow to connote that a woman must be sexually appealing to members of the opposite sex = feminine beauty as norm
  • exotic photoshoots of ‘pinic’ article: contain connotations of freedom and travel being ‘good for the soul’, encouraging women to break away from more traditional role of the ‘happy housewife’
21
Q

vogue

structuralism - claude levi-strauss

A
  • freedom vs motherhood
  • beauty vs unattractive
  • rich vs poor
  • successful vs failure
  • cultured vs uncultured
22
Q

vogue

Power and the media - Curran & Seaton

A
  • Conde Nast published other women’s magazines such as Vanity Fair (Horizontal Integration) during the 1960s.
  • Vogue was a mainstream publication and, could be seen to have upheld many historical traditional ideologies surrounding gender (in relation to domesticity, motherhood, fashion and beauty, for example) and perpetuate many narrow and stereotypical ideals of feminine beauty.
  • These ideologies were shared through all Conde Nast’s women’s magazines. Theres more emphasis on single independent women / less reliance on men.
23
Q

vogue

Reception Theory - Stuart Hall

A
  • A Preferred Reading would clearly align themselves with the desired 1960s response of the writers / editors - these fashions/lifestyles are amazing and must be purchased ASAP. Engrossed by celebrity interviews and advice.
  • A Negotiated Reading could be created by contemporary audiences reading the 1960s set text for historical research purposes yet fully recognise that the content is at best ‘out of date’ and in some case even funny.
  • An Oppositional Reading could be expressed by feminists (especially radical feminists) who see no logical purpose of Vogue other than to subjugate women, empowering men and ‘normalising’ the objectification of women.
24
Q

specifc examples

‘MONEY’ & REPRESENTATION

A
  • The financial management advice article challenges traditional gender roles by portraying women as capable financial managers within families, recognizing the prevalence of single women and their need for financial guidance.
  • Despite a light tone and use of sub-headings for clarity, the absence of images and a serious, personal approach contribute to its weightiness, although there’s a potential for the content to be perceived as inadvertently patronising due to its indirect mode of address.
25
Q

specifc examples

HOLIDAY HEATWAVE’ & REPRESENTATION

A
  • Images of women in Summer attire in fashion magazines often reinforce objectification
  • The way photos are shot often aligns with the concept of the “Male Gaze”
  • Direct mode of address in accompanying copy and personal captions suggests ambivalence towards male company
  • Contrasts with expectations of teen marriage prevalent in the 1950s
  • Reflects the more independent expectations of women in 1965
  • Acknowledges the necessity of including photoshoots and attractive models in a fashion magazine
26
Q

Alvarado - otherness

A
  • Theory related to ethnicity based on the idea that people from different cultures tend to be defined by how different they are, by their ‘otherness’.
  • These representations can focus on racial characteristics and on preconceived audience perceptions.
  • Certain ethnic groups represented as:
  • exotic: links closely to Stuart Hall’s ‘the secret fascination of ‘otherness’’.
  • The ‘exotic’ stereotype presents the individual in terms of how they look, what they wear,
  • dangerous: some texts represent ethnic minorities as a threat to society and are often blamed for social problem.