GLAMOUR AND COSMOPOLITAN - THE POST FEMINIST FEMALE
Post-feminism means the age after feminism. The idea being that the feminist battle has been won and that we have entered into a new age of equality where women have equal roles in the home and workplace and the same opportunities as men ; meaning also that women have no longer to try and emulate traditional and restrictive models of acceptable feminine behaviour and can behave exactly as they like without social stigma; but also meaning that women no longer have to feel they are betraying their sex or ‘letting the side down’ by adhering to beauty regimes and taking a strong interest in their appearance. The post-feminist female would be one happy to take a leading role in the workplace, would not passively wait for a man to pursue and marry her, might not even want to get married, but equally would happily buy the latest fashion and accessories or any other activity frowned upon by second wave feminists.
The coining of this term does not mean that we no longer live in a sexist society and indeed the statistics on pay in the workplace and gender in management suggest that we don’t . It does suggest that there are a generation of women who have benefitted from the greater social liberty fought for by the feminist movement but that many of this generation do not wish to feel that they have to fulfil the feminist ideal any more than they would wish to fulfil the ideal of the happy housewife.
The post-feminist can easily be seen in magazines such as Cosmopolitan and in film such as Bridget Jones Diary and in television in such shows as Sex and the City.
The coining of this term does not mean that we no longer live in a sexist society and indeed the statistics on pay in the workplace and gender in management suggest that we don’t . It does suggest that there are a generation of women who have benefitted from the greater social liberty fought for by the feminist movement but that many of this generation do not wish to feel that they have to fulfil the feminist ideal any more than they would wish to fulfil the ideal of the happy housewife.
The post-feminist can easily be seen in magazines such as Cosmopolitan and in film such as Bridget Jones Diary and in television in such shows as Sex and the City.
The Post-feminist magazine
It is best to begin by considering how these magazines are similar to those of the 40s/50s with traditional and frequently limiting representations of women, and how they differ to the second wave’s feminist magazines which had a more radical style and politicised content. Magazines such as Glamour and Cosmopolitan have mass appeal. Their representations certainly appear to have approval from the modern generation. Representationally, they could be either attacked or defended for the post feminist ideology. They rarely feature Friedan's 'happy housewife heroine' and frequently subvert Mulvey's 'male gaze' but messages are mixed.
In many respects they are traditional. These are not magazines for second wave feminists who object to women being associated with trivial fascination with the decorative; with clothing, fashion and cosmetics. The names are associated with fashion and appearance (Glamour/Vogue) .The content heavily features articles on fashion and is heavily materialistic suggesting that a central aspiration of the modern woman is to look good. Coverlines of recent copies of Glamour (March 2015) include ,’516 Spring Looks’ and Cosmopolitan has '38 Fashion Solutions'. In doing so, they encourage advertisement from the wealthy fashion and cosmetics industry which helps them avoid the fate of magazines like Nova but could also be attacked for cynically reinforcing female appearance anxiety in order to please big brands who invest heavily in marketing campaigns. However, the messages are mixed. There are also empowering coverlines such as 'How Men Really Cope with being dumped' and 'The World's 100 Sexiset Men.' The covers suggest that McRobbie was right in stressing the ambiguity found in the messages of these magazines both sexually empowering while still maintaining some restrictive female aspirations.
The content of these magazines is important. Although the biggest sections of Cosmopolitan are beauty and fashion there are separate sections for careers (suggesting economic independence) and sex which contradict earlier critiques of these type of magazines seeking to suggest that in order to find happiness a woman needs to find and subsequently please a man, 'I love having sex with my favourite person -me' and 'Sex and the Single Girl.' Teen Vogue has a similarly high proportion of fashion and beauty features but still finds space to discuss feminism in an article of Emma Watson and her role as a U.N representative.
Each of the editorial letters seeks to establish their interest in serious women's issues. Glamour focus on International Women's Day and 'women who built me,' stressing the need for women to support each other in their careers. Cosmopolitan calls for women to vote in the approaching elections while Teen Vogue attacks trolls on social media attacking women about their appearance.
If we look through the magazines there are a number of articles which also seem to make a stand about empowering a new woman. The language used is no longer the 'dainty', 'pretty' vocabulary of My Home and Home Chat. Teen vogue's cover model is described as 'fierce and fearless', in Cosmo men are described as 'smoking hot' and Glamour is happy to declare that 'Leo is 40 and FIT.' Alongside the new and more aggressive vocabulary the articles seek to redress concerns about how women's roles are mediated. The first article in Cosmo, 'Fat is The New Black' concerns a plus size catwalk model and is followed by the Be That Girl section featuring successful business women. A later interview with Jameela is headlined 'I don't think I'll ever be ready for a baby, ' followed by the Manthropology section featuring nude males for the enjoyment of the female gaze.
So, are we saying that these magazines offer entirely positive representations of a new stronger and more independent woman? Yes and no. Alongside the empowering messages there are hundreds of pages of idealised size zero women, airbrushed to remove any imperfections which contradict articles such as 'Fat is the new black.' Likewise, the focus is primarily on women and their appearance which is in line with previous Home Chat/ My Home ideologies suggesting that women's primary role is decorative. Perhaps the 'false consciousness' Adorno discussed and Gramsci's 'cultural hegemony' is still present in these images
It could also be defended from this criticism. It may represent a form of diversion (Uses and Gratification) for women, in featuring flawless lifestyles, glamorous clothing and near perfect images of women, within a context of what our society considers attractive. This argument gains force if we consider the readers as active and fully media literate, both aware of airbrushing techniques and the artificiality of the medium. The often repeated tagline ‘For the Fun Fearless Female’ is promising and suggests in the ‘fearless’ some of the demands of the feminist agenda. While it carries an abundance of messages stressing the importance of weight loss that could be accused of encouraging anxiety it also features a good deal of content encouraging women towards self-acceptance and considering the dangers of poor self image
Furthermore, Friedan's 'neurotic careerists' are replaced by positive images of women fulfilled by their work in the Be That Girl section and women are no longer represented as trophies to be hunted by predatory males. In these magazines women are frequently the hunters.
The editorials do reinforce the importance in women’s lives of how they look but it also addresses women in the workplace and represents women as career minded and assertive, which would also, no doubt please Friedan. The content is also unashamed to present women as sexually liberated not merely passively waiting male attention but actively seeking to gratify their own desires.
McRobbie puts distance between herself and those feminist writers who denounce women's magazines outright. Whilst some of their content may be disappointing to feminist readers, McRobbie notes, many of the messages are positive and empowering to young women. (She has interesting things to say about how the old-school feminists seem unable to accept the fact that younger women might want to do things a bit differently). For example, in defence of magazines like Cosmopolitan, McRobbie points out that:
"The idea that sexual pleasure is learnt, not automatically discovered with the right partner, the importance of being able to identify and articulate what you want sexually and what you do not want, the importance of learning about the body and being able to make the right decisions about abortion and contraception, the different ways of getting pleasure and so on, each one of these figured high in the early feminist agenda. This was the sort of material found in books like Our Bodies, Our Selves (Boston Women's Health Collective 1973), the volume which started as a feminist handbook and went on to sell millions of copies across the world.’
Janice Winship has also commented on the contradictory nature of these magazines, which on the one hand seem to make women complicit in the male gaze with women objectified and encouraged to take a decorative role, while on the other, carrying more liberated messages involving women’s sexual independence.
There is no one simple response to the question of whether these magazines offer positive or negative representations of gender. The messages are ambiguous and will be decoded in different ways by different audiences. What is certain is that they embody change in a society in which gender roles are increasingly questioned and changeable.
2016 Magazines
Cosmopolitan suggests a modern urban sophistication while Glamour has more stereotypically feminine connotations. Both magazines feature simple and often capitalised fonts and models who, although heavily made up, tend to pose alone and not within a narrative of male domination, often with strong confident body language.
Cosmopolitan’s cover lines follow the template that McRobbie deemed to have some empowering and liberating messages such as ‘The Millenial Power List – a list of powerful women under 35’ and an article on ‘Porn face’ criticising the ‘boorish male heterosexual fantasy’ image of women that is prevalent in social media. In Glamour there is a feature on the sexually charged 50 Shades film, a form of erotica targeted directly at a female audience as well as an aggressive and assertive coverline, ‘GO GET His Salary’ alongside an article commemorating International Women’s Day about ‘14 Awesome Women’ involved in politics, business and the arts. These liberating messages are counterbalanced by the more traditional focus on appearance with 528 Spring Upgrades and Articles on fashion. A feature article on an American news anchor in America, ‘TV Star, Mother , Alcoholic’ in Cosmo is interesting in not attempting to create the ideal image of femininity offered by earlier magazines but this isn’t Friedan’s unhappy careerist it is a strong woman taking control of her future.
The editorials also offer positive and liberating messages. The Glamour editor makes clear that Valentines Day ‘leaves me cold’ thereby subverting stereotypically romantic expectations while the pre 2nd wave aspiration to find a male provider is undermined as she goes on to suggest that the real loves of her life are her female friends. In Cosmopolitan the editor also makes clear she is not attemting to follow a conventional domestic or maternal role making clear she has been trolled for suggesting she has no desire to have children.
The problem for many who read these magazines would be that they could fall victim to accusations of ambiguity to the points of hypocrisy when one consider that the majority of the features still relate to appearance and that the majority of pages feature size zero models in adverts designed to create limited consumerist aspirations rather than those fought for by the second wave feminists.
Cosmopolitan suggests a modern urban sophistication while Glamour has more stereotypically feminine connotations. Both magazines feature simple and often capitalised fonts and models who, although heavily made up, tend to pose alone and not within a narrative of male domination, often with strong confident body language.
Cosmopolitan’s cover lines follow the template that McRobbie deemed to have some empowering and liberating messages such as ‘The Millenial Power List – a list of powerful women under 35’ and an article on ‘Porn face’ criticising the ‘boorish male heterosexual fantasy’ image of women that is prevalent in social media. In Glamour there is a feature on the sexually charged 50 Shades film, a form of erotica targeted directly at a female audience as well as an aggressive and assertive coverline, ‘GO GET His Salary’ alongside an article commemorating International Women’s Day about ‘14 Awesome Women’ involved in politics, business and the arts. These liberating messages are counterbalanced by the more traditional focus on appearance with 528 Spring Upgrades and Articles on fashion. A feature article on an American news anchor in America, ‘TV Star, Mother , Alcoholic’ in Cosmo is interesting in not attempting to create the ideal image of femininity offered by earlier magazines but this isn’t Friedan’s unhappy careerist it is a strong woman taking control of her future.
The editorials also offer positive and liberating messages. The Glamour editor makes clear that Valentines Day ‘leaves me cold’ thereby subverting stereotypically romantic expectations while the pre 2nd wave aspiration to find a male provider is undermined as she goes on to suggest that the real loves of her life are her female friends. In Cosmopolitan the editor also makes clear she is not attemting to follow a conventional domestic or maternal role making clear she has been trolled for suggesting she has no desire to have children.
The problem for many who read these magazines would be that they could fall victim to accusations of ambiguity to the points of hypocrisy when one consider that the majority of the features still relate to appearance and that the majority of pages feature size zero models in adverts designed to create limited consumerist aspirations rather than those fought for by the second wave feminists.