How magazines talk about women

1. How magazines talk about women

2. Millions of “women’s magazines” are sold every year. You’ll see them on shelves in shops, in doctors’ and dentists’ waiting rooms, discarded on buses or trains – or maybe someone in your family buys them. These magazines can be brightly-coloured and attractive, but they hide some darker messages. All the headlines on the following slides were taken from the front covers of four magazines: Closer, Now, Simply You, and Woman, in one week in September 2018…

3. The two pictures that accompanied this headline showed an overweight lady in her wedding dress, and the same woman having lost a lot of weight. The headline is saying, in a few words, that this woman was called names for being overweight at her own wedding, and that she has since lost lots of weight and wants people to know about it. Consider the following questions: What do you think about the behaviour of the wedding guests? How do you think this woman felt on her wedding day? How should she have felt? Should your level of happiness depend on how much you weigh? Finally, what do you think is the hidden message behind this headline for readers of this magazine?

4. Now look at these headlines. What do they have in common? What are they inviting the reader to do? How do they want the reader to feel when they read these words?

5. Often, magazines focus on people’s romantic relationships. What is the purpose of these headlines? Which of the following do you agree with? Being single is just as good as being in a couple You’re not worth anything if you’re not in a relationship Your level of happiness depends on your relationship status People will feel sorry for you if you’re not in a relationship You can achieve things on your own You need to have your heart broken in order to work out what you really want out of life

6. These headlines are all about appearance. Two of them claim to be about health. But what is the effect of all of these headlines together? What are the magazines suggesting their readers should be concentrating on?

7. How many of the following hidden negative messages did you come up with while looking at the headlines? • Losing weight will make you happier • If you don’t diet and exercise, you are lazy and unattractive • Wearing makeup and new clothes will make you feel more confident and also more attractive • You should want to be attractive • Having a romantic relationship is very important • If you’re a celebrity, you shouldn’t complain if strangers want to know about your personal struggles • Gossiping and being judgemental about other women is perfectly normal and an OK thing to do • Reading about celebrities with problems will make you feel better about yourself

8. Remember, all those headlines were on only FOUR magazines in ONE week. What do you think is the cumulative effect* on women who read these magazines every week? Of course, there are magazines for men too. Men’s Health focuses almost exclusively on encouraging its readers to lose body fat and build enormous muscles, which is problematic in itself. But men’s magazines do not gossip about male celebrities’ personal lives on the whole. Next time you’re faced with a shelf of magazines, have a good look at the way they are using language to send hidden messages, day after day. And then consider if they’re the sort of messages you want for yourself… *an effect produced by regular exposure to something over a long period of time

9. I’ll leave you with this. This is the ‘strapline’ or ‘sub-heading’ for the magazine title Now. If you were creating a magazine for yourself, what kinds of topics would you want to include? Resource created by Jo Cotterill 2018