Discourse Analysis of Cosmetic Maybelline Advertising

The writing of words in print media advertisements is certainly influenced by the elements and structures of its own discourse. This study analyzes the elements and structures of cosmetic advertising discourse used by cosmetic manufacturers in promoting their products. The research approach used in this research is qualitative research by taking samples from Maybelline cosmetic advertisements contained in Seventeen Magazine 2012. Based on the analysis of elements and structures contained in Maybelline cosmetic advertisements, the elements used in the discourse of cosmetic advertisements are verbal elements and visual elements. while the structure of the discourse that appears is the opening, the content and the closing.

Sex and Spectacle in Seventeen Magazine: A Feminist Myth Analysis

This paper interrogates the semiotic processes by which semiological codes operate to construct female sexuality in a top-circulating fashion and beauty magazine targeted to adolescents. While a number of studies have found the representations of femininity and sexuality in teen media to be restrictive, unrealistic and conservative, this paper fills a gap in the literature by presenting a close analysis of the strategies by which sexuality is constructed. Given that there is a documented difference between the real-world exigencies of girls’ sexual lives and the representation of sexuality in teen media, this paper uses Barthes’ concept of myth and Debord’s understanding of spectacle to frame media rhetorics of sexuality. For Barthes, a myth is a rhetorical figure that supports ideological social beliefs; for Debord, the spectacle is a system of capitalism that manifests itself via mediated images. On the basis of these ideas, the paper claims the semiological method of myth analysis as a feminist practice. Using myth analysis, patterns of representation of adolescent female sexuality in the 2006 issues of Seventeen magazine were analyzed. The analysis uncovered four overarching myths of girls’ sexuality in the magazine: the myth of sexuality as a function of body hierarchies, the myth of sexuality as spectacle, the myth of sexuality as a heterosexual male domain, and the myth of girls as sexual victims. The paper calls for myth analysis as a media literacy strategy that offers feminist emancipatory potential.

From private to public? Changing perceptions of young women in Seventeen magazine, 1955–1965

As a form of popular culture, magazines provide a lens through which historians can examine the dominant attitudes and values of a society. This article examines the portrayal of young American women in the popular teen magazine, Seventeen magazine, during the period 1955–1965. The study documents and analyses the messages conveyed within the magazine regarding ideals concerning feminine behaviour and appearance. Seventeen provides an opportunity to investigate both the production and reception of the cultural ideals for young American women as the decade of the 1950s ends and that of the 1960s begins. I argue that the letters-to-the-editor represented a public platform in which readers could voice opinions, express identities, engage in debates and communicate with each other. In this way, it is possible to see a change in the framing of women’s roles over time; a change that occurred not via a purely ‘top-down’ processes, but via and exchange relationship between Editors, writers and readers, and indeed between the readers themselves.