Question Two

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

The female representation of my magazine

• My magazine “New Republic” both challenge and reinforce stereotypical representations of female teenagers and young adults as their particular stereotype is currently; thugs, chavs, underage drinkers and drug users; I felt the need to challenge these representations because a majority of the teenagers and young adults these days are nothing like that; they are automatically placed into this category and I would like to see this differently. In my magazine I will show them to be talented and stylish people who care about their health and future as well as keeping the feistiness of some females these days I will use this to create a rebellious feel to the magazine as well as female power.

Ideological representations of women

• Women’s residual ideological representation of women suggested that they were powerless, gentle, non-important to the worlds economy and only good for cleaning and reproduction. Recently there has been emergent ideology for women which has now become dominant; women now have their own power and are seen as independent; they are beginning to have equal rights for almost everything they didn’t have before, and are not just seen as eye candy, for cleaning nor reproduction but also at a working class and rather feisty.

• I wanted to use a mixture of these representations in order to create an ideal representation for women; gentle, independent, of working class, powerful as well as slightly sexualised, by using this as a brief outline of my audience I am challenging and reinforcing the female ideological representation.

Residual ideological representation for women

These particular images connote; powerless, reproduction, stereotypical, housewife, un-independent, good girl, non-violent, gentle, friendly.

Current stereotypical female

These images connote; chavs, underage drinking, alcohol abuse, drug abuse, violence, independent, feisty, underage pregnancy.

Here are the type of women that my magazine represents; these images connote; independence, feisty, powerful, urban, strong, successful, sexual.

My magazine connotes women to be independent, feisty, stylish due to the way that the model is posing. As well as there

being challenging aspects to the cover there are also aspects that contradicts this; a man wouldn’t necessarily pose in the way

that the model does, also the props; necklaces, bow in hair and bangles suggest that women are still over empowered by

men as they have to try and look attractive throughout their lives whereas men don’t

need to try as hard. The colours of the magazine; white and purple suggest that

the magazine audience are gentle and soft; but the colours that the model is wearing

and also the masthead colour; mostly being black suggest that she is feisty and dark as

well as gentle. The decorated masthead font also suggests that my audience is

female as it seem slightly floral and due to the grainy effect of the masthead as well as

the colour suggest that it is darker and slightly rebellious.

Again the poses and colouring of the models and layout of the magazine

shows women to be independent, feisty and powerful. Though the image on the top-right of the magazine suggest that women are still slightly sexualised butt in a more subtle way; at first I did not

notice the contradictory element of the poses. The difference to the way males and females are posing in the images

used again contradict the empowerment of women; they look

sexualized and innocent where as the male used looks slightly closed and

sinful due to the facial expression that he has. The use of script writing shows elegance and class which emphasises

the independent aspect of the magazine. Both the script font and the masthead font gives off a girly feminine

image as it seems slightly floral.

On the left side of the double paged spread women are shown to be empowering, slightly aggressive as well as feisty; we see this from the connotations on the two

images; her straight facial expression shows seriousness and her pose is as if she is flaunting and showing off, again the script font adds a feminine and girly element to

this. On the right side of the spread the images connote fun and shows a softer side to the model this would show a variety of different ways empowering and independent

women could be.

The male representation of my magazine

• Whilst I have challenged the female stereotypes for teenagers and young adults; I have reinforced the dominant black male stereotype that is currently shown; gangsters, tattoos, white vest, muscular, and slightly aggressive; I wanted to

maintain the stereotype in order to make the magazine focus mainly on the way women have adapted throughout time; I also wanted to keep the stereotype on

black males as this is what many male music artists are like nowadays so this would keep the magazine slightly realistic. there is also a sense of sexualisation as many

women are attracted someone similar to the way I have represented males; strong, protective, and confident.

Ideological representations of men

• Men’s residual ideological representation suggested that they were powerful, strong, working class, important to economy and put first in many things. Recently there has been emergent ideology for men which has now become dominant; men are now equal to women, whereas before they superior to them, many of them have now become more feminine and gentle as well as emotional to many things.

• I wanted to use again a mixture of these as well as mixing them with ethnical stereotypes, I wanted to show them to be strong, powerful, working class as well as equal to women.

Residual and emergent ideological representations of men

These images connote; success, power, wealth, common, this is partly how I would like my male model to be connoted as.

Dominant representations of black men

These images show black men to be violent, aggressive, intimidating, involved with crime, youths, and gangsters; this is not the type of black man that I will use in my

magazine.

These images of black men connote; success, empowerment, independence, strength, wealth, seriousness, and gentleness. These images challenge the black make stereotype just as much as is reinforces it; they still look slightly over empowering but also look

quite gentle and equal to women and these are the type of men that will feature in my magazine. It could be argued that the image on the left reinforces the stereotype for black males more than it does challenge. Though these days black men and the

black race are labelled as being cooler than the white race; many people aspire to be like this and I think this is a realistic portrayal of some black men.

My contents page connotes black men to be slightly aggressive, materialistic as well as powerful we can see this by

the way he is shown; muscles on show, though in many R&B magazines

black male models are shown with intimidating facial expressions, I

wanted to show my black male model to be slightly gentle by showing him

with a straight face. The colour purple shown throughout the magazine also

connotes him to be gentle, but I decided to mix this with the colour

black to emphasize the seriousness of the stereotypical black male.