Teen Vogue: Audience and Representation blog tasks

Teen Vogue: Audience and Representation blog tasks

Create a new blogpost called 'Teen Vogue Audience and Representation' and work through the following tasks to complete the audience and representation aspects of your Teen Vogue case study:

Audience

1) Analyse the Conde Nast media pack for Teen Vogue. What is the Teen Vogue mission statement and what does this tell us about the target audience and audience pleasures?

We aim to educate, enlighten, and empower our audience to create a more inclusive environment; this shows that their target audience seem to be quite ambitious people. 

2) What is the target audience for Teen Vogue? Use the media pack to pick out key aspects of the audience demographics. Also, consider the psychographic groups that would be attracted to Teen Vogue: make specific reference to the website design or certain articles to support your points regarding this.

63% of their audience are millennial's and majority of them tend to use digital media to access teen vogue. 

3) What audience pleasures or gratifications can be found in Teen Vogue? Do these differ from the gratifications of traditional print-based magazines?

Personal relationships; they talk about topics that other publishers or other parts of the media don't tend to focus on meaning people may be able to relate more to what they read in teen vogue and they also right articles about people around the same age as their target audience sometimes.

4) How is the audience positioned to respond to political news stories?

The political news that teen vogue deliver would be less biased in the way that their thoughts are not influenced by the government. The articles are also structured in a form where  the target audience would be able to relate and agree with the political things being said. 

5) How does Teen Vogue encourage audiences to interact with the brand – and each other – on social media? The ‘tentpoles and editorial pillars’ section of the media pack may help with this question.

The Teen Vogue Summit : June 1-3, New York City / Nov. 30 - Dec. 1, Los Angeles
Young Hollywood: Q1
Acne Awards: Q2
Back to School Awards: Q3

Representations

1) Look again at the Conde Nast media pack for Teen Vogue. What do the ‘tentpoles and editorial pillars’ (key events and features throughout the year) suggest about the representation of women and teenage girls on teenvogue.com?

They have topics that girls would traditionally enjoy such acne awards or young hollywood alongside political topics which women should also be able to read and enjoy in the new teen vogue. 

2) How are issues of gender identity and sexuality represented in Teen Vogue?

They tend to focus on this quite a bit in Teen Vogue trying to show the acceptance of gender binaries and almost 'fighting' for that equality feeling. 

3) Do representations of appearance or beauty in Teen Vogue reinforce or challenge traditional stereotypes?

It challenges stereotypes as their images don't use the idea of 'male gaze' or objectify women, they now use models of different colour from various ethnic backgrounds.

4) What is the patriarchy and how does Teen Vogue challenge it? Does it succeed? 

Patriarchy; a society is dominated by men who hold all the power over women, belittling women. Teen Vogue challenges this by giving women a larger platform and a bigger voice to spread awareness and make people recognise they are just as equal as men. 

5) Does Teen Vogue reinforce or challenge typical representations of celebrity?

Teen vogue portrays celebrities in a positive way as it is more of a magazine that talks about their victories and praises them rather than gossiping about them.

Feature: how Teen Vogue represents the changing nature of media aimed at women

Read this Quartz feature - The true story of how Teen Vogue got mad, got woke, and began terrifying men like Donald Trump - and answer the following questions:

1) How was the Teen Vogue op-ed on Donald Trump received on social media?

The readers had a very similar view point to Teen Vogue as they said Donald Trump was "Gaslighting America" meaning it reached out to the audience well. 

2) How have newspapers and magazines generally categorised and targeted news by gender?

Magazines and newspapers have really reinforced gender stereotypes by presenting topics such as fashion,cooking and beauty to women and things like politics, business arts and literature to men.

3) How is this gender bias still present in the modern media landscape?

Gender bias mainly exists in magazines or media platforms that are made for and targeted specifically at one gender.

4) What impact did the alternative women’s website Jezebel have on the women’s magazine market?

Jezebel’s success pushed establishment magazines to change the way they operated. Also proving that women enjoyed being spoken to an intellectual manner. 

5) Do you agree with the writer that female audiences can enjoy celebrity news and beauty tips alongside hard-hitting political coverage? Does this explain the recent success of Teen Vogue?

6) How does the writer suggest feminists used to be represented in the media?

Feminists used to be represented as being stupid. They 'struggled to overcome the perception that they were sexless, grim bra-burners, uninterested in pleasure or aesthetics.'

7) What is the more modern representation of feminism? Do you agree that this makes feminism ‘stereotyped as fluffy’?

I disagree that feminism is stereotypes as fluffy as this has clearly been changing over the years and the traditional stereotypes of a women/for a women has been changing.

8) What contrasting audience pleasures for Teen Vogue are suggested by the writer in the article as a whole?

Teen vogue readers are able to enjoy both fashion and politics, reading intellectual articles and widening their knowledge whilst also enjoying themselves. 

9) The writer suggests that this change in representation and audience pleasures for media products aimed at women has emerged from the feminist-blog movement. How can this be linked to Clay Shirky’s ‘end of audience’ theory?

This links to Clay Shirky's theory as he suggests that there is an end of audience as who used to be the audience now also have the chance to voice their ideas and have people listening to them due to the growth of social media.

10) Is Teen Vogue simply a product of the Trump presidency or will websites and magazines aimed at women continue to become more hard-hitting and serious in their offering to audiences?

I believe more women's magazines will become hard-hitting and successful as teen vogue became more successful once they focused on serious topics which represents what females are more into these days. On top of that, teen vogue has given a voice for females to voice things that haven't otherwise been done by other media platforms or institutions. 

Teen Vogue: background reading and textual analysis blog tasks

Teen Vogue: background reading and textual analysis blog tasks

Work through the following tasks to complete your first case study on Teen Vogue.

Teen Vogue: background reading

Read this Guardian feature from 2017 on Teen Vogue and answer the following questions.

1) What was the article that announced Teen Vogue as a more serious, political website – with 1.3m hits and counting?

Donald Trump gaslighting America.

2) When was the original Teen Vogue magazine launched and what was its original content?

Teen Vogue was launced in January 2003 and it started off as a fashion, 'glossy' magazine. 

3) How did editor Elaine Welteroth change Teen Vogue’s approach in 2015?

Elaine Welteroth diverted teen vogue from the typical teenage girls beauty magazine and took a risk and dived into politics. 

4) How many stories are published on Teen Vogue a day? What topics do they cover?

Approximately 50-70 stories are published every day. These cover a range of topics from fashion to entertainment and even current affairs and politics.

5) What influence did digital director Phillip Picardi have over the editorial direction?

Phillip Picaardi;the digital director helped teen vogue grow online as they started seeing declines of sales with their print editions. 

6) What is Teen Vogue’s audience demographic and what does ‘woke’ refer to?

They are aimed at a teenage audience as there name suggests and to be more precise, they are mainly aimed at female audience. The term 'woke' refers to being aware of what's happening. 

7) What issues are most important to Teen Vogue readers?

More than the fashion and beauty side, their political, identity and in a way raising awareness side is more important. 

8) What does Tavi Gevinson suggest regarding the internet and ‘accountability culture’ with regards to modern audiences? Can you link this to our work on Clay Shirky?

She suggests that the relationship between teen vogue and their audience is becoming stronger and more 'transparent' which also supports Clay Shirky's theory of end of audience.

9) What social and political issues have been covered successfully by Teen Vogue?

• The rise of transgender models in fashion
• Gun control in the states
• Articles relating to homecoming, graduation and careers
• Racially-charged attacks and action from the police

10) What do Teen Vogue readers think of the magazine and website?

The new and digital media is a lot more efficient for teen vogue audience as they're now able to access it online whenever and wherever they like especially as many teenagers prefer to do things digitally and it also saves paper; being more environmentally friendly. 

Teen Vogue textual analysis and example articles

Work through the following tasks to complete your textual analysis of the Teen Vogue website and read notable Teen Vogue articles to refer to in exam answers. 

Homepage analysis

Go to the Teen Vogue homepage and answer the following:

1) What website key conventions can you find on the Teen Vogue homepage?

- The top has a menu bar and a search engine

- Consistent basic, yet eye-catching colour scheme

- Use of images and bold texts; making it easy on the eyes

2) How does the page design encourage audience engagement?

Offers a sign up page within a couple of seconds of entering the page. 

Has different genres for audience to choose e.g. fitness, identity 

3) Where does advertising appear on the homepage?

Right at the top; one of the first things you see before going onto reading articles. 

4) What are the items in the top menu bar and what does this tell you about the content of Teen Vogue?

The different types of topics they have to offer and how they're giving audiences the choice of what to read; attracting a broader audience. 

5) How far does the homepage scroll down? How many stories appear on the homepage in total?

They have 5 articles at the front of the page and then several more to choose from as you keep scrolling down as they offer a lot for their readers to choose from. 

Lifestyle section

Now analyse the Lifestyle section of Teen Vogue (in the Identity section) and answer the following:

1) What are the items in the top menu bar for the Lifestyle section?

• Tech
• Campus Life
• Careers
• Decorating ideas
• Food

2) How is the Lifestyle section designed to encouragement audience engagement? Think about page design, images, text and more.

- The visual design; it's very simple yet visually appealing making the visual experience better and more attractive for audience. 

- Use of images; before opening the articles there are more images than text which makes it more attractive for audience. 

3) What do you notice about the way headlines are written in Teen Vogue?

Headlines are more of a summary what the article is about rather than a snappy subheading like most magazines and newspapers tend to use. 

4) What does the focus on education, university and ‘campus life’ tell you about the Teen Vogue audience demographics and psychographics?

There demographics are teenagers/young adults and more specifically teenage girls; in their late teens. 

5) Choose three stories featured in the Lifestyle section – why do they fit the Teen Vogue brand?

Five key articles

Read the following five notable Teen Vogue features then answer the questions below for EACH feature.

Donald Trump Is Gaslighting America

The new face of teen activism 

Black Teens Have Been Fighting for Gun Reform for Years

Netflix and strong female leads 

How to Break Away From the Gender Binary

Donald Trump is Gaslighting America:

1) Who is the writer and what is the article about?

LAUREN DUCA

The article is about how Donald Trump being president has weakened America as a whole. The term gaslighting means manipulating someone. 

2) How does the article use narrative to engage the reader? Try and apply narrative theory here if possible.

The article focuses on how Donald Trump uses his power to manipulate people and reinforces the whole idea of Trump being a terrible president. 

3) Why is this article significant?

Discusess the concept of politics; the first article to be published under this genre for Teen Vogue which then ended up being a massive success. 

4) How does this article reflect the values and ideologies of the modern Teen Vogue?

This shows the new political side that doesn't just focus on glamour and celebs, it also shows 'acceptance' of other colours because it used to mainly be based on whites and Caucasians.

The new face of teen activism:

1) Who is the writer and what is the article about?

 ALEXIS MANRODT

The article focuses on how the internet and digital media has played a role in social activism and the idea of using social media to raise awareness on unspoken topics. 

2) How does the article use narrative to engage the reader? Try and apply narrative theory here if possible.

Todorov's equilibrium; the issue they're addressing is the disequilibrium and making society aware of this and attempting to come to a conclusion eventually would be the new equilibrium. 

3) Why is this article significant?

It addresses the impact social media has and speaks about the pros of having social media as a lot of people have a bad idea of social media and think it's only used for things like communicating with one another. 

4) How does this article reflect the values and ideologies of the modern Teen Vogue?

As it speaks about a topic that teen vogue traditionally wouldn't address and also reinforces the importance of technology and digital media which is ironic as they now also publish their magazine articles digitally.

Black Teens Have Been Fighting for Gun Reform for Years:

1) Who is the writer and what is the article about?

LINCOLN ANTHONY BLADES

The ongoing struggle for teenagers to get the gun control that is becoming increasingly necessary in America.

2) How does the article use narrative to engage the reader? Try and apply narrative theory here if possible.

It's based on teenagers protesting against something which reaches their target market well as they're aiming it at teenagers and they're more likely to be interested in something they can potentially relate to. 

3) Why is this article significant?

The article is significant because it challenges stereotypes of teenagers and more specifically black teenagers as it is about how they're fighting for something positive that people in America would benefit from rather than causing chaos how they're stereo typically thought of. 

4) How does this article reflect the values and ideologies of the modern Teen Vogue?

How they're focusing on other ethnicity's and working on challenging stereotypes in society.  

Netflix and strong female leads:

1) Who is the writer and what is the article about?

DE ELIZABETH

It is about how Netflix are working on challenging stereotypes of women we have in society. 

2) How does the article use narrative to engage the reader? Try and apply narrative theory here if possible.

The article discusses the impact of stereotypes e.g. how stereotyping makes the scenes more 'familiar' to audience making it easier for them to understand. It also discusses the female stereotypes we see on television and the media that feminists from around the world have been talking about. 

3) Why is this article significant?

It is significant to discuss the way women are portrayed in the media and how feminists have been fighting against these negative stereotypes over the years from all around the world and there's finally beginning to be change in these things. 

4) How does this article reflect the values and ideologies of the modern Teen Vogue?

It reflects modern teen vogue as teen vogue is a magazine mainly aimed at females and their traditional genres were on fashion and celebrities and potentially even reinforced these stereotypes in the past, to now seeing the shift of them supporting feminist beliefs and issues in society which women can also have an interest in.

How to Break Away From the Gender Binary

1) Who is the writer and what is the article about?

SAMANTHA RIEDEL

The article is based on Trump and his thoughts towards gender binaries; he sees gender binaries as a spectrum rather than fixed binaries. 

2) How does the article use narrative to engage the reader? Try and apply narrative theory here if possible.

This article helps understand and show acceptance that there are more to gender differentiation than just transgenders and the idea that anything on sex and gnder needs to be standardised. 

3) Why is this article significant?

It is significant as it shows the acceptance in society over the years about the topic of LGBTQ+ and how it is now the people that aren't supportive that are looked down on rather than those who are part of the community as it would've been a couple of years ago. 

4) How does this article reflect the values and ideologies of the modern Teen Vogue?

 It shows how teen vogue is more than just fashion and beauty and how they're aimed at all types of females/teenagers and not just the typical 'elegant' girl and how they are accepting of these changes in society. 

Baseline assessment learner response

Baseline assessment learner response

Create a new blog post called 'Y13 baseline assessment learner response' and complete the following tasks:

1) Type up your feedback in full (you don't need to write the mark and grade if you want to keep this confidential)

WWW - This is a useful benchmark at the start of yr13 on what we need to work on, You clearly have some knowledge of CSPs and theory but need to work on some key areas.

EBI - Question focus: work on topic sentences that use the key words from the question (Q2 - 'how useful' etc.)
Revise effects theories and evaluate them. 
Q3 is about planning and developing an argument. Also need more specific reference to stats and CSPs.  

2) Focusing on the BBC Life Hacks question, write three ways it helps to fulfil the BBC's mission statement that you didn't include in your original assessment answer. Use the mark scheme for ideas.

- informs listeners about topics and issues they may be facing themselves.
- they offer educational content by addressing issues that listeners may potentially not know much about. 
- they also play music and talk about topics their listeners are interested in for entertainment. 

3) Question two asked you how useful media effects theories are in understanding the audience response to War of the Worlds. Complete the following:

• Gerbner's Cultivation theory: useful or not useful? Why? very useful in understanding how American radio’s recent convention in the 1930s of ‘breaking news’ (‘We interrupt this broadcast to bring you…’) may have made audiences more likely to believe the fictional radio play was real.
• Frankfurt School's Hypodermic Needle model: useful or not useful? Why? The Frankfurt School’s hypodermic needle theory is arguably supported by the reported audience panic following the War of the Worlds broadcast in 1938. However it is not useful; considering media audience as 'empty vessels'
• Stuart Hall's Reception theory: useful or not useful? Why?  Stuart Hall’s reception theory is arguably more useful than traditional effects theories in analysing audience reaction – some would have believed it (preferred reading?), other sections of the audiences would have challenged or rejected it entirely.

4) Write a full essay plan for the 25-mark Magazines question. The mark scheme contains plenty of ideas you can use here. Your plan should include notes/bullet points addressing the following:

• Introduction: one sentence answering the original question and laying out your argument clearly.
• Paragraph 1 content: men's health; media audience such as audience pleasures, hyper-masculinity, the structure to attract audience and so on...
• Paragraph 2 content: men's health; media industries such as rise in new/digital media, difference in what digital platforms have to offer... 
• Paragraph 3 content: oh comely; media audience - trying to attract a different type of audience; ones that wouldn't usually by a typical women's magazine. 
• Paragraph 4 content: oh comely; media industries how they reflect changing media marketplace, how they have a unique target audience. 
• Paragraph 5 content: compare both magazines, see any similarities or differences and what it shows about each magazine and their target audience. 
• Conclusion: sum up your argument a final time in one sentence

5) Finally, identify three key skills/topics you want to work on in A Level Media this year before the final exams in June.

- Memorising theories 

- Structuring exams questions 

- Linking different theories with case studies