Assignments: Batch Two: Assignment 12

Identify which visual signifiers distinguish an upmarket magazine from a downmarket one, focusing either on magazines for males or on those for females.

Guidance

For general guidance about what is expected in your essays for this module, see the general criteria.

What Key Features Do I Look For?

  • Familiarity with relevant texts
  • Evidence - the stronger the better
  • Argument - coherent and balanced
  • Theoretical discussion - relation to relevant theories
  • Understanding of relevant concepts
  • Reflexivity - reflections on methodology
  • Examples - insightfully analysed
  • Style - readability and effective presentation

Please remember to avoid footnotes and to include an alphabetical list of 'References' which have been cited in the text (not a Bibliography of anything you have read for the essay). This list should include author's names, date, book titles (in italics), place of publication and publisher. Within the text always cite author's surname, date and page number. Double-space your text and number your pages. For more detailed notes on writing essays in this department, click here.

Advice for this particular assignment: Remember that you are looking either at men's magazines or at women's magazines - not both. Compare/contrast several issues of two different magazines for which you can obtain demographic readership data from the National Readership Survey ('Latest Topline Readership', under 'General Magazines' or 'Women's Magazines'). If a magazine you had intended to study is not listed in the NRS, don't use it. The age-groups need to be as similar as possible. Look for a significant difference between the magazines in the percentage of readers from ABC1 compared to those from C2DE. For each group you will need to calculate the percentage of the total readership using the raw figures from the NRS (note that these are in thousands).

Do not limit yourself to the front covers, though these are important. What differences do you notice between the topics covered (and how they are covered), and the products advertised (and how they are advertised)? Are there any noticeable differences in the layout and use of space, or in the typography or use of colour? Are there any differences in the styles of photography? Are there differences in the ways in which men and women are depicted? If you (or friends) happen to have a collection of relevant magazines, you may include some reference to patterns over time. Does this reveal a 'formula' for the form and content of a particular magazine? What embedded assumptions do there seem to be about the 'ideal readers' of each of the magazines? What kinds of cultural tastes are they expected to have? Feel free to discuss your observations with friends who read the same magazines.

In your analysis of examples you are expected to demonstrate your understanding of relevant semiotic concepts. These are likely to include codes, markedness and the commutation test. For instance, you may comment on what effect it might have if a particular element of one magazine's cover were to appear on the other one (this is a commutation test): where such substitutions feel most strange you have touched on a key signifier. Do not waste space explaining concepts with which the reader can be expected to be familiar. What do the contrasts you have noted reveal about the construction of social class?

Where possible, include reproductions of at least the covers as appendices to your text. You may also find it helpful to make some of your points by including within the main text cropped close-ups of different aspects. Remember that contrasting specific pairs of images can help you to notice features. Remember to include a list labelled either Figures or Image sources after your list of References.

Some suggested reading

Note: Treat with extreme caution sources labelled with this symbol!


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