dominant signifier – fully clothed, focus on face

The central image is of a woman who is shown in an androgynous way meaning she is not seen with more masculine or feminine fashion traits. In other words a blur between male traits and female traits.
Unlike other magazines aimed at females, she is not overly sexualised (male gaze).

he headline which is written in bold gives a clear indication that the articles to follow with talk about empowerment of women.

Speaking out feature – A FGM campaigner is featured in one of the speaking out sections. She is a young Muslim woman who talks about FGM and the issues around it. This is an example of representation of culture and diversification in the magazine.

The capitalised “Sister” creates a group identity towards the target audience, a group- a sisterhood where readers come together and create.

Gerbners can also be used to show representation throughout the magazine, he argues that nothing has a representation until the media represents it to try and create a fixed meaning to which the audience can argue against; for example people being perceived as trouble makers from repeated stereotypes of them represented in the media- we can see how Oh Comely tries to oppose the reactionary representations that have been displayed in the media and recreate them as strong. An example is page 15 where someone from Somalia wearing a headscarf (which is represented in western media as “terrorists”) is surrounded by a syntagm of signs such as the iconic signs of colour that have high connotations to positivity and a semantic field of strength through words such as “unstoppable force” and personal pronouns to extenuate her achievements to redesign the stereotype into a counterstereotype- a person of power and positivity.

Industry-

Launched in 2010

published by the “proudly independent” Iceberg Press.

Iceberg Press is completely different to Hearst UK – the publisher of Men’s Health and subsidiary of global conglomerate Hearst.

It publishes just two magazines: Oh Comely and The Simple Things

Social Media Reach: 100,000 Readers Per Issue: 25,000 Average Age of reader: 27 Sold through independents, WHSmith and international outlets

‘a mindful magazine with a fresh perspective.’

Each issue was available to purchase for £5 in a few newsagents, independent retailers, cafes and museums. – £14 for six months (3 issues).

The publishers wanted to “celebrate the humble, the frugal and the plentiful; the magic in the mundane, and the unsung beauty of the unnoticed”. This is obviously in contrast to the quick and easy reads found in glossy lifestyle magazines

the magazine was impacted by the pandemic (possible excuse from iceberg in order to save/gain money) and the final issue was published in September 2021.

representation-

Oh Comely is part of a development in lifestyle and environmental movements of the early twenty first century which rebrand consumerism as an ethical movement. Its representation of femininity reflects an aspect of the feminist movement which celebrates authenticity and empowerment

comely-pleasant to look at; attractive (typically used of a woman).- a polite non sexualised way of saying something is nice, pretty….

The photos aren’t photoshopped in order to present certain meanings of beauty but is natural and shows the real side of people.- gives a sense of truth as well as empowerment and positive representation of women.

I believe that Oh Comely fits into the fourth wave of feminism since it clearly shows feminist ideologies and attempts to empower women.

Compared to the cover page of Men’s Health, we can see a clear different in gender representations between the two. In Oh Comely, the cover star is shown in an androgynous way in order to not reinforce any gender stereotypes. Men’s Health on the other hand shows a very built Vin Diesel as the cover page which already shouts out traditional men’s stereotypes.

The magazine includes a diverse range of religion, race and age:

Gerbners theory on mainstreaming suggests the excessive consumption of media products the more you will conform to the medias ideologies, therefore by promoting a range of diversity throughout Oh Comely’s magazine’s they’re recreating the dominant reading (via theory of preferred reading by Stewart hall) that has been mass presented throughout media as reactionary stereotypes to create a common enemy in the media (common enemy via Habermas’s five filters of mass media).

audience-

Niche product-

“celebrate the humble, the frugal and the plentiful; the magic in the mundane, and the unsung beauty of the unnoticed”. – the audience is humble as well as the magazine

Frugal- simple and plain and costing little.

In terms of the uses and gratifications theory, the magazine might appeal to the reader’s personal identity because the content reinforces their values and beliefs. Of course, the articles about fashion and music can help the audience to construct their identity as suggested by David Gauntlett.

Language-

The masthead is written in a sans serif font which seems to be handwritten which suggests that Oh Comely has already started to create personal relationships with the audience. 

Oh Comely values the power of women and minority groups.

Oh comely does support Gauntlett and shows this through their choices of images and choices of content to include within the magazine.

THEME	NEWSBEAT	WAR OF THE WORLDS
Curran	James Curran writes about the ideas that underpin The Liberal Free Press, but much can apply to transformation of Public Sphere (Habermas) which in turn connects to ethos of PSB	James Curran writes about the ideas that underpin The Liberal Free Press, but much can apply to transformation of Public Sphere (Habermas) which in turn connects to ethos of PSB
OWNERSHIP	BBC, (PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING) GOVERNMENT, BBC BOARD (TRUSTEES) DIRECT GENERAL , FIRST BEING (LORD RITHE),MULTIMEDIA, CROSS MEDIA, TRANSNATIONAL TRANSGLOBAL, NOT A MONOPOLY, THERE IS A CONCENTRATION OF OWNERSHIP SMALL NUMBER OF FANS WHO OWN TV AND RADIO EVEN THOUGH THEIR ARE A LOT OF DIFFERENT STATIONS. I THINK THE BBC COMES FROM A LEFT WING LIBERTARIAN IDEOLOGY.	PRIVATE COMPANY, TRANSNATIONAL, IT IS AN EXAMPLE OF CONCENTRATION OF OWNERSHIP E.G. A COUPLE OF COMPANYS THAN OWN A COUPLE OF CARTERS. VERTICAL AND HORIZONTAL INTERGRATION
HABERMAS	TRANFORMATION OF THE PUBLIC SPHERE, MEDIA IS CONSTANTLY CHANGING WITH THE BBC KEEPING UP. BBC INTENTIONS TO ENSHRINED IN THEIR ETHOS TO INFORM, ENTERTAIN AND EDUCATE. DOESN’T MAKE A PROFIT. THEY PUT SOME MONEY BACK INTO THE PROGRAMME AS HABERMAS EXPLAINS THE NOTION OF TRANSFORMING THE PUBLIC. IT IS PATERNALISTIC.	PRIVATE BUSINESS’S ARE AIMED AT MAKING A PROFIT. THEY TEND TO CARE MORE ABOUT PROFIT RATHER THAN THE PUBLIC SO THEY ARE MORE CONCERNED WITH ENTERTAINMENT THAN EDUCATION. COMMERCIAL ETHOS IS NOT IN THE SPIRIT OF HABERMAS.
CHOMSKY	CHOMSKY TEACHES THE CAPACITY TO LEARN AND USE LANGAUGES AS THEIR ARE STRENGTHS AS HUMANS GROW AND DEVELEOP WHICH LINKS WITH NEWSBEAT AS THEY ARE TRYING TO ENTERTAIN BUT INFORMING THE AUDIENCE FOR THEIR OWN BENEFIT.	FOR THE WAR OF THE WORLDS THEY ARE INFORMING THE AUDIENCE TO MUCH WITH KNOWLEDGE OF WHAT IS HAPPENING RATHER THAN ENTERTAINING THEM. THIS IS BECAUSE DIFFERENT PEOPLE HAVE DIFFERENT LANGUAGE UPON OTHERS AND FIND IT EASIER TO REACT CALMLY AND DISTUINGISH WHAT IS TRUE OR NOT. THIS IS KNOWN AS UNIVERSAL GRAMMER.
REGULATION	OFCOM, BBC CHARTER GOVERNED BY PARLIAMENT , LICENSE FEE REGULATES BBC AS WELL. BBC/PSB ETHOS TO ENTERTAIN, TO INFORM AND TO EDUCATE (REITH), NEW TECHNOLOGY MEANS BBC FACES MORE COMPETETION.	FEDREAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION AS REGULATOR FOR PRIAVTE BUSINESS WHICH IS NOT REALLY IN THE PUBLIC INTERESTS.
AUDIENCE (ACTIVE/PASSIVE)	Lasswell hyperdermic model, how messages are encoded. People getting increasingly passive and lack of reading amounts to newsbeat using specific methods to cater towards a younger audience/lesser intelligence; ie star guests and games- no complicated words Newsbeat encouraging active ‘uses and gratification’ model personal needs escapism, entertainment, self esteem and social needs. information, knowledge about the world, connecting with family, friends and community	Newspaper and Radio in direct competition for the decade, panic is suggested to have been caused by the newspapers rather than the actual radio broadcast showing the passiveness on media consumption ie; 98% were on different station while other 2% knew it wasn’t real- source from RadioLab war of the world broadcast. No accurate answer to weather panic was caused or not- diminishment of habermasses public sphere. The hypodermic needle theory suggests a media text can have a powerful and immediate effect on the passive audience. It would seem “The War of the Worlds” production supports this argument because so many terrified listeners, for example, “rushed out of their houses” to escape the “gas raid”.4
AUDIENCE (LAZARSFELD)	2 step flow / opinion leaders how we gravitate to people who share the same ideas as ourselves. So the BBC is an unbiased, informed opinion leader (ie BBC Charter focus on impartiality, accurate, true)	opiniion leaders- auson wells, brought on the show to compete with the newspapers, but unlike the bbc who used will and kate to share mental heath issues for the good of the people and society, CBS used this strategy to generate income rather than benifit the public but themselves.
AUDIENCE (GUERBNER)		Gerbners cultivation theory more specifically in the sub section called mean world index describes the more consumption of negative media we consume the more negative we see the world- therefore through cultural setting we can use this as an argument to suggest their was panic as the negative in the world such as war and discrimination could’ve manifested and reinforced their belief of something catastrophic actually occurring during the time.
NEW TECHNOLOGY	New technology poses a threat for the bbc as through time and newer technology us as a society is becoming increasingly passive, emergence of short videos have lowered our attention span and therefore the younger emerging audience is too uninterested to listen to a longer news production or story- therefore bbc newsbeat produces cross media available at any time catering towards a younger mind to draw in viewers at any time.	New technology at the tame was the emergence of radio, newspapers and radio were in direct competition for the decade during the gloden age of radio- therefore suggesting as to why newspaper could’ve created panic to almost try and sabotage radio by creating a negative reaction. Radio transformed space as provided news and live audios from all around the world, which also started diminishing habermases public sphere theory as people started writing less and having more trust in a broadcast service- overtrusting for reliability in media products could’ve lead to the increasingly passive audience we have become today, however during the time since it was so new we can associate with Lasswell and Shannon and weaver, how noise and disruption from still a relatively active audience can create a difference encoding from the desired one.
CROSS MEDIA CONVERGENCE

Press

acting- good

storyline- strong, good, surprises, suspense

sound- good

educational, highlights social issues

diversity within the show- representation.

broad/narrow casting

narrowcasting – targets a niche audience

broadcasting- larger target audience.

BBC

1922- radio

director general – lord john wreath

ethos- educate, inform, entertain

BBC charter- set of rules which makes sure the BBC does what its meant to do.

paternalism- giving people what some people think they need

popularise- giving people what they want

BBC- Paternal approach

grace wyndham Goldie- the most significant thing about broadcasting is that it changes time and space. 100 years ago lives in the present.

fear people had- doubting its gonna be important

BBC became social cement. brought people together, British culture centred around the BBC.

THEME	NEWSBEAT	WOTW
OWNERSHIP	BBC, Public Service Broadcasting, Government, BBC Board of Trustees (??), DG (Lord Reith), Multimedia, transnational, not a monopoly, concentration of ownership	CBS, Private Company, Multimedia conglomerate, transnational(??), monopoly(??), example of concentration of ownership i.e. a few companies own everything – oligopoly / cartel (??), vertical & horizontal integration (??)
HABERMAS	Transformation of the public sphere, media is constantly changing – BBC is adapting, BBC intention enshrined in their ethos, profit is not a priority – they put money back into programmes so Quality is important. Fits notion of transforming the public. Therefore more paternalistic, give you what you need instead of what you want.	Private business, likely to prioritise making profit. Quality is not as important as long as a profit is made. This profit will not go back into programmes. Does not fit the notion of transforming the public. Less paternalistic, gives you what you want if it makes them money.
CHOMSKY	Second filter (advertising) The BBC does not run ads in the UK	Second filter (advertising) CBS runs ads which helps them accrue profit
REGULATION	OFCOM, BBC Charter governed by parliament, license fee regulates BBC, BBC Ethos – educate, inform and entertain (Reith) BBC has a left wing, libertarian ideology (??)	Federal Communications Commission regulates private businesses i.e. not necessarily in public interest
AUDIENCE (ACTIVE/PASSIVE)	Audiences are more active, they are not just given programmes that they want but are given what they need (Paternalism)	Audiences are more passive, they are only shown the programmes that they want to allow CBS to make a profit. Hypodermic needle suggests that media can have a powerful and immediate effect on passive audiences. WOTW supports this because so many listeners became terrified of an alien invasion.
AUDIENCE (LAZARSFELD)	Two-step flow, people get their ideologies from opinion leaders. Newsbeat brings opinion leaders onto the show as guests.
AUDIENCE (HALL)
NEW TECHNOLOGY	New Technologies mean that the BBC is faced with more competition
GERBNER		Cultivation theory suggests that the more people take in media the more susceptible they become to it’s messages. This could explain why some people believed that the broadcast was real.
CURRAN		Concerns about the interests of big companies – profit over social concerns
SEATON

THEME	NEWSBEAT	WAR OF THE WORLDS
OWNERSHIP	BBC which is a public service broadcast owned by government and BBC board of trust feeds, DG (lord Reith) Transnational Not a monopoly Concentration of ownership ie small number of firms to own tv and radio Seems as if it is under a left wing authoritarian viewpoint	CBS which is private company conglomerate, multi or cross media conglomerate. Transnational/ Transglobal ?? It is an example of concentration of ownership, ie: just a few companies own everything Integration horizontal or vertical??
HABERMAS	Transformation of the public sphere- media is constantly changing, In bbc to fulfil its ethos.	The new technology of radio was in direct competition to newspapers and as radio discovered how influence its broadcasts can be over an audience- radio became more exciting and used and signifying the public sphere ending.
CHOMSKY	Jean seaton explains how through time public service broadcasts have learnt to hate the government for regulating their freedom of media production however must rely on them for legitimacy and to stay running; Chomsky’s 5 filters of mass media can explains the flack- therefore fear of the government flacking and labelling sources as unreliable if they don’t stick to the regulators political compass,
REGULATION	Ofcom, BBC charter governed by Parliament. License fee regulates BBC ethos- educate, entertain and inform (made by Reith) New technology faces complications as bbc faces higher amount of compition	Federal communication commissions FCC, regulates for private business ie not in the public interest
AUDIENCE (ACTIVE / PASSIVE)	Lasswell hyperdermic model, how messages are encoded. People getting increasingly passive and lack of reading amounts to newsbeat using specific methods to cater towards a younger audience/lesser intelligence; ie star guests and games- no complicated words	Newspaper and Radio in direct competition for the decade, panic is suggested to have been caused by the newspapers rather than the actual radio broadcast showing the passiveness on media consumption ie; 98% were on different station while other 2% knew it wasn’t real- source from RadioLab war of the world broadcast. No accurate answer to weather panic was caused or not- diminishment of habermasses public sphere.
AUDIENCE (LAZARSFELD)	Lazarsfeld two-step flow analysis builds on Lasswell passive consumption idea, he explains that through sending the message that is wanted to be encoded through an opinion leader like a celeb, the passive audience are more likely to agree to it. In terms of the Newsbeat, they want to show support when dealing with obstacles and mental health, and therefore had prince William and Kate send the message to the audience instead, as they’re influential and very well known.	When this theory comes to War of the World, Lazarsfeld and Cantril researches the PRP (Princeton radio research project) which explains how radio affects social opinions and how changes in content, patterns of reception will alter as well. This research links the reception of war of the worlds reaction presented by it and how propaganda and politics on radio can also be presented in an affective way via radio. Research such as “4 out of 30 listeners only understood the story line, the others thought maybe rabid animal attacks” and that panic was through different codes such as the abrupt start of the program interrupting a dance break and naming government officials.
Audience theory (hall)	Dominant reading negotiated reading Opposition reading
AUDIENCE (Gerbner)		Gerbners cultivation theory more specifically in the sub section called mean world index describes the more consumption of negative media we consume the more negative we see the world- therefore through cultural setting we can use this as an argument to suggest their was panic as the negative in the world such as war and discrimination could’ve manifested and reinforced their belief of something catastrophic actually occurring during the time.
NEW TECHNOLOGY	New technology poses a threat for the bbc as through time and newer technology us as a society is becoming increasingly passive, emergence of short videos have lowered our attention span and therefore the younger emerging audience is too uninterested to listen to a longer news production or story- therefore bbc newsbeat produces cross media available at any time catering towards a younger mind to draw in viewers at any time.	New technology at the tame was the emergence of radio, newspapers and radio were in direct competition for the decade during the gloden age of radio- therefore suggesting as to why newspaper could’ve created panic to almost try and sabotage radio by creating a negative reaction. Radio transformed space as provided news and live audios from all around the world, which also started diminishing habermases public sphere theory as people started writing less and having more trust in a broadcast service- overtrusting for reliability in media products could’ve lead to the increasingly passive audience we have become today, however during the time since it was so new we can associate with Lasswell and Shannon and weaver, how noise and disruption from still a relatively active audience can create a difference encoding from the desired one.
CROSS MEDIA CONVERGENCE	Multi-media/cross-media platform	During the time it was only available on a private radio and therefore was not able to hear for everyone
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THEME	NEWSBEAT	WAR OF THE WORLDS
OWNERSHIP	BBC, PSB, Government, BBC board of trustees, DG (Lord Reith) BBC/PSB ethos- to inform educate and entertain, BBC multimedia / Cross media, transnational / trans global, not a monopoly, concentration of media (ie small, even though there are many channels its all by the BBC overall) I think the BBC is left wing libertarian ideology.	CBS, private limited company, Mutli or cross media conglomerate, transnationtal?? trans global?? monopoly?? it is an example of concentration of ownership ie just a few companies own everything oligopoly / cartel. vertical / horizontal integration? I thank that war of the worlds is right wing due to not caring about audience but money.
HABERMAS	Transformation of the public sphere, media is constantly changing the BBC need to keep up, intention to inform educate and entertain their viewers, BBC is a non profitable company. Put money back into programs so quality is important, Habermas notion of transforming the public. Therefore the BBC are more paternalistic what you need not what you want.	Most private businesses are aimed at making a profit. private businesses don’t care about their viewers they care about money therefore they’ll prioritize money over entertaining their audience, just for profit is a commercial ethos not in the understanding of Habermas.
CHOMSKY
REGULATION	Ofcom, BBC charter, governed by parliament. License free regulates BBC as well. BBC/PSB ethos to inform entertain and educate (Reith) New technologies suggest that the BBC has more competition.	Federal communication commission as regulator for private business i.e. not necessarily in the publics interest.
AUDIENCE (ACTIVE / PASSIVE)	Passive audience As the audience listen to Newsbeat and accept what is going on the audience is suggested to be passive. An audience that is exposed to media/marketing material but doesn’t actively engage with the content or messaging. Therefore the audience is suggested to be passive as they don’t have much engagement within the broadcasts.	Active audience The audience for War of the worlds took the broadcast in a different way than intended suggesting them to be active. As they actively thought for themselves and what they were going to-do about the situation For example people committed suicide and threatened to shoot Orson Wells. when an audience is engaging, interpreting, and responding to media messages and are able to question the message.
AUDIENCE (LAZARSFELD)	two step media theory. The flow of communication comes from a news presenter to the audience in regards to News beat.	two step media theory the flow of communication came from Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre Company to a wild scale audience who consumed the idea that aliens had invaded earth. As it came from a well known and respected radio broadcaster (CBS) in 1938 it was more believable.
AUDIENCE (HALL)	encoding/decoding Encoding information about what’s going on across the world in a short amount of time to keep the attention of the audience who also decode the information.	encoding/decoding encoded the idea of an alien invasion which the audience decoded to be true. Dominant ideology of Martians coming to attack earth.
NEW TECHNOLOGY	In regards to listening to broadcasts, you can listen on catch-up by logging in the BBC can collect that data of who’s listening when and what to then produce more shows similar as they can gather an understanding of what their audience like. Radio is more competitive now so broadcasters want to play the newest well known songs for their audience to listen to which is also used to entice more listeners.	Radio was fairly new in 1938, More than 40% of American households now had a radio so there were more listeners especially when War of the Worlds was broadcasted that’s why is is suggested to have caused mass panic.
CROSS MEDIA CONVERGENCE	Many different platforms for example, Tik tok, Twitter, YouTube, Live radio, Catch up and Facebook etc therefore reaching a wider audience and gaining more of a media presence within the digital world.	The novel of war of the worlds was broadcasted across the radio there is a physical book of it and also a online book available to be listened to of the actual broadcast of war of the worlds in 1938.
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