three paragraphs on comparing the two magazines

The most obvious point to make is the fact that Angelina Jolie is wearing revealing cloths. The costume she is wearing shows a lot of cleavage which implies that Angelina Jolie is promiscuous. This could also link with the audience as it would appeal to the male target audience. This is because of Laura Mulvey’s theory of the male gaze as the half naked women in the front page will attract the males to read more of the magazine as it promises more sexy women. This is seen in the tagline ‘100 most beautiful’. This front cover will also appeal to female audiences as they would take a preferred reading and aspire to be just like Angelina Jolie. However, an oppositional reading could be taken by radical feminists arguing that in this front cover, women are being negatively presented to be ‘bimbos’. The white top Angelina Jolie is wearing can also identify her purity.

We can also see that social issues such as alcohol and drugs will be mentioned in this magazine as we can see in the front cover Carnies’ revealing her problems with alcohol. Another social issue is the ‘new man’ and how it is increasing in today’s society, we can see this from Brad Pitt’s photo with his son. This shows how the media has changed in today’s postmodern society as in the 20st century, the ‘new man’ would have been frowned upon.

We can see the sophistication of this magazine from the title which could connote the fact that the target audience for this magazine are older people. It is very obvious that this is a women’ magazine not only from the fact that it is the ‘#1 women’s magazine’, it also has a women in the front cover and the contentious topics on men. Furthermore, just like Angelina Jolie in the other cover, the costume that the woman is wearing in this cover shows a lot of cleavage which represents her as promiscuous and sexually active. This also appeals to the male gaze.