Media Language
The magazine front cover and specified content should be analysed in terms of the composition of
the images, positioning, layout, typography, language
Key Notes:
dominant signifier – Vin diesel on the front cover of the magazine
dominant ideology – Body image
reactionary representation – A heterosexual man and what society expects on him.
negative stereotype – this creates a negative stereotype to men having to be seen as strong and loose weight
The blue background is associated with male stereotypes, a traditional boy colour
Laswell’s module:
Sender – Men’s health’s is one of the largest men’s magazine and is aimed mainly at “manly” men
Says What – The brand of the magazine called ‘Men’s Health’ aimed for active men who want a better control on their physique / appearance to impress society.
What Channel – Men’s health is a print lifestyle magazine and can also be accessed on their website and social media.
To Whom – Aimed at men who are ‘sporty’ or active. If a man wants motivation to get into shape then the magazine provides information on loosing weight to get that ‘perfect body’
What Effect – Selling the magazine to their target audience through shops, website or social media.
CS Peirce:
Iconic sign – The bold text tells you what you can find inside of this magazine issue. It all relates to loosing weight fast
Indexical signs – The only image is the dominant signifier placed right in the middle. The muscles relates to the text and the magazine.
Symbolic sign – The magazines colour theme is mostly blue which is seen as a stereotypical colour for men, influences them to buy the magazine. Big bold texts all about loosing weight “demolish junk food cravings” and “Blast body fat”. The dominant signifier, vin diesel, is positioned in the middle showing off his muscles.
Stuart hall – Hall provides a framework for decoding messages:
accept the dominant message
negotiate the dominant message
reject the dominant message
Laura Mulvey – The Male Gaze
PAGE 148 is an example of the male gaze as a strategy to appeal to the male audience. Shows women in the background of the dominant signifier, the man who’s wearing the Givenchy aftershave.
Steve Neale
What is the theory? Neale believes that films of a type (genre, like romance or horror) should include features that are similar, so the audience know it is a horror film or romance, but also include features that are different, to keep an audience interested. This is his theory of repetition and difference.
Narrative and Genre
Consider the way the front cover creates a narrative about character and lifestyle in order to
attract an audience
Lévi-Strauss – Binary Oppositions
Todorov – Stock Characters
Hero
Helper
Princess
Villain
Victim
Dispatcher
Father
False
Facts:
Men’s health magazine had an average monthly reach of around 1.8 million individuals in the UK between 2019 to 2020
The ages of people who buy this magazine between 2019 to 2020 were 15 years and above and could potentially be harmful for young teenagers because they feel this is how they should look like and that the magazine would help them with their goal to looking muscular.
The media chooses how people should look like. By adding a celebrity to the front page of their magazine it influences young people to buy and read it.
Mens health is owned by hearst who own 40 different companies founded in 1887.
Questions:
Essay:
In this essay I am going to discuss how print magazines have little appeal to the digital world, the CSP I will be talking about is men’s health. Men’s health is a magazine who is owned by Hearst who owns 40 different companies founded in 1887, making them a conglomerate. Men’s health, the print magazine rules out most of the potential audience due to the magazine being aimed mostly at Men who are trying to or are “professional men”. Some ways of identifying this is the dominant signifier, being Vin Diesel who is a famous celebrity and a reason for using him, is two things to make the appeal of magazines more significant, the first being is as he is a celebrity that will already increase the sales and minimize the risky business of owning a media company, another being that is can be seen as a sizeable man and creating a female gaze at the same time by being the cool man, he does this through showing no emotion with a cool stance and bulging muscles. Men’s health also tries to appeal to more audiences by it being a reactionary representation with society expecting a men’s health magazine to have a big strong man on it. However it can also have a negative stereotype and make people stray away from it by him suggesting the message that if you want to be a man you have to lose weight and been seen as strong.
I believe that Men’s Health does not challenge the social and cultural contexts in which they are created.
Postcolonialism is seen in Men’s health, this is seen with the dominant signifier on the first page being a white Caucasian male