final dissertation by Antonella Festa

Fashioning Invisibility Antonella Flavia Festa

BA (Hons) in Fashion Media London College of Fashion University of the Arts London 2013 .

Abstract Despite the growth of an ageing population in Western society and the universality of the subject, ageing remains an area pervaded by anxiety, denial and avoidance from a cultural and commercial perspective. The fashion media industry and society at large seem to remain youth obsessed and focused on a very narrow concept of beauty while anxiety over appearance is becoming endemic along with the stigma surrounding ageing (Blaikie, 1999; Grogan, 1999; Woodward, 2002; Bordo, 2003; Dolan and Tincknell, 2012). This dissertation aims to explore with a theoretical approach what sorts of narratives and stereotypes are being articulated about ageing femininities through the fashion media, as well as their wider consequences. A critical discourse analysis of how ageing is represented and negotiated in four British women’s magazines offers a mean of investigating these discourses. Representations have a profound effect on the creation of social identity, body image and self-esteem but only recently studies have started to assess the cultural implications on ageing identities (Blaikie, 1999, Ylanne, 2012). This study explores the significance of these narratives with consideration of the wider implications these may have with regards to identity, beauty and sexuality. It aims therefore to contribute to the theoretical positions advanced within cultural, media and feminist studies on the subject of ageing femininity. Despite the polysemous nature of magazines and the changing ideals of ageing identities, these narratives remain problematic. Representations of ageing femininity are still failing to exceed what Woodward (2006) calls ‘“the youthful structure of the look”, one that exhorts women to pass for younger once they are a “certain age” (Woodward, 2006:162). This research will be of interest to students and researchers in cultural and media studies, as well as those working in consumer studies.

Contents Abstract

List of Figures

List of Tables

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Background and rationale.

Theoretical Framework

Overview of the dissertation structure

Literature Review

Ageing, media and identity

Essentialism: The mind-body problem and the relation of gender and age to dualism

The body politics. Age as a feminist issue

Media theory. The production of consumption

Foucault. Normativity and panocticism

Methodology

Analysis

Data gathering

Magazines as ‘women’s mass culture’

Textual Sampling

Secondary and tertiary sources

Discussion

Cosmopolitan

The youthful gaze

Vogue

The concealed aged body

Dilution

Good Housekeeping

The evolution of the spectacle: the age appropriate graceful ageing

Sex as taboo

Saga New structures of looking: the non-youthful gaze

48 48

Conclusions

Bibliography

Appendices

Appendix 1. Pilot

Appendix 2. Sample Survey Transcript

Appendix 3. Survey Questions

Appendix 4. Magazineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Statistics

List of Figures Figure 4-1 Molly King (2013) Cosmopolitan, March Issue: Cover

Figure 4-2 Feel Naturally Beautiful Cosmo Promotion (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 146 30 Figure 4-3 Riggot, B. (2013) Live Big and go for it! Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 58

Figure 4-4 Transform Advert (2013) Cosmopolitan, March Issue, p.184

Figure 4-5 Weight Watchers Advert (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 17

Figure 4-6 Cosmopolitan Body (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 14

Figure 4-7 Leutwiler, H. (2013) Paul Rudd. Inside Men's Mind. Cosmopolitan, March Issue, p. 85.

Figure 4-8 Getty, PA (2013) Halle Berry. Cosmopolitan, March Issue, p. 185

Figure 4-9 L’Oreal Advert (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 83

Figure 5-1 Sims, D. (2013) New Look. Vogue, April Issue: Cover

Figure 5-2 Testino, M.; Images; Camera Press; Getty Images (2013) ‘House work’. Vogue, April Issue, p. 244

Figure 5-3 Julia Robert in Lancôme advertisement. (2013) Vogue, March Issue: Back Cover

Figure 5-4 Dolce, D. & Gabbana S. (2013) Dolce & Gabbana Spring Summer Advert. Vogue, March Issue, pp. 12-13

Figure 6-1 Swannell, J. (2013) Jane Seymour. Good Housekeeping, March Issue: Cover

Figure 6-2 Ambipur Advert (2013) Good Housekeeping, March Issue, p. 109

Figure 6-3 Olay Advert (2013) Good Housekeeping, March issue, p. 37

Figure 6-4 Clarins Advert (2013) Good Housekeeping, March Issue, p. 382

Figure 7-1 Waters, J. (2013) Helen Mirren. Saga, February issue: Cover

Figure 7-2 Bannecker, A. (2013) ‘Click here’ [Illustration] Saga, February Issue, pp. 50-51

Figure 7-3 Saga Advert (2013) Saga, February Issue, p. 102

Figure 7-4 Appendix 4

List of Tables Table 1 NRS (2012) Women's Magazines Readership [Online]

Acknowledgements I would like to express my gratitude to those who helped me over the years and in diverse ways, to complete this degree. I wish to thank my tutor Caroline Stevenson for guiding me through the completion of this dissertation and encouraging me in taking this project to the end and Laura Avery for helping me in the choice of the magazines. I would also take the opportunity to thank Claire who proof read the entire draft of my dissertation in its final phase and Eugene who kindly read the work in progress. Finally, I wish to thank my aunt Liuccia, who has always been my muse and inspiration in life, my dad Clemente for supporting me in my lifetime education and the rest of my family for their love and encouragement

Introduction Background and rationale. In an image-saturated environment, where the dominant ideal seems to be a young, thin, sexy model of beauty, women seem to be becoming socially invisible and to be losing their cultural value when they start losing their fertility. This process of cultural dilution is not limited to visual culture but applies to a variety of social contexts, such as the media, society and even the humanities (Blaikie, 1999; Gibbs, 2010; Woodward, 2006, Dolan and Tincknell, 2012). Images circulating within the fashion media support ideologies that have become reified and ingrained in our culture through repetition. The territory explored here is one that might challenge the traditional concept of youth, worshipped by the fashion and media industry in favour of more inclusive and diverse representations that may challenge the cultural perception of age as negative. This dissertation aims to question the image of women’s sexuality beyond the scope of their fertility or perceived ‘usefulness’ (Blaikie, 1999; ChurchGibson, 2000; Woodward, 2002; Bordo, 2003). Being a media studies practitioner, the primary concern and focus of this study is to critically examine how ageing femininity is represented in the media and explore how culture and society construct this category focusing on images and discourses found in women’s magazines and topics such as the anti-ageing culture and positive ageing. The research objective was to look at how ageing is currently represented and discussed in magazines through textual and critical discourse analysis and develop a more complex understanding of representations of ageing as an important aspect of identity. Images and representations are an important part of the process, in which individuals in late modernity, come to construct and understand their identities. The absence of more diverse bodies in our culture implies that ageing is something to resist or fear, and forces individuals to see their bodies as imperfect, creating a distorted and limited vision of what being old means (Featherstone and Hepworth, 1991; Grogan, 1999; Woodward, 2002; Bordo, 2003; Faircloth, 2003;). The line of enquiry that motivates this dissertation is to examine the role of cultural discourses in shaping, empowering or limiting female identity through the production and consumption of images and the social structures they support (Bordo, 2003; Bartky, 2010; McRobbie, 1998; Woodward; 2002; Ylanne, 2012). It will discuss how ‘these discourses have

implications for the way images and representations are an important part of the process in which people operate since discourses are not merely textual but put into practice at the micro-level of the body’ (Entwistle, 2000:16). Ageing, while remaining palpably biological in nature, is also largely a product of discourses that become normalised through the media. Therefore, the consequences of invisibility or stereotyping can have significant negative effects, individually and culturally, on intergenerational relationships and on how individuals perceive the ageing process (Lewis, Medvedev and Seponski, 2011). As Cristofovici emphasises, ‘To deny aging results in psychic and cultural dysfunction, a kind of anaesthesia of both the personal body and the cultural body’ (Cristofovici, 1999:19). It is important to note that the term ‘invisibility’ is used in this dissertation to refer to a process by which women start to gradually disappear from view as they age. Women’s social and cultural worth, which seems to fade as they age, remains closely linked to appearance, and, for this reason, they tend to be much more damaged by the process of ageing. (Bartky, 1988; Blaikie, 1999; Bordo, 2003; Woodward, 2006; Dolan and Tincknell, 2012). The importance of the present study derives primarily from three points. Firstly, ageing femininity remains an under researched area within the Humanities and cultural and media studies. Dolan and Tincknell observe: Theories of race, sexuality, class, disability and childhood, as well as gender, have radically shifted our understanding of the body away from essentialist formulations predicated on biology, and have established identity as a product of discourse and culture. But the intersection with age remains underdeveloped and under-theorised (Dolan and Tincknell, 2012: IIX). Theorists have discussed in depth the role of images and the fashion media in the construction of social identities and how the gazing process and practices of looking determine not only the relationship that women have with themselves, but also the relationships they have with others (Berger, 1972; Gill, 2007). However, it is generally assumed that the young gaze is the only subject of the theoretical gaze (Woodward, 2006). Secondly, visual culture and fashion media remain strongly ageist and invisibility, along with the characteristics of unwatchability and asexuality, remains strongly associated with female ageing (Sontag, 1079; Gullette, 2004). Representations of ageing women in the media are sparse and where they are present, these have been traditionally stereotyped or associated

with those negative connotations (Blaikie, 1999, Twigg, 2012). The media use a logic that emphasises the young body visibility and then later renders the female ageing body invisible. As Woodward (2006) notably contends ‘this hyper visible body will disappear into the invisibility of middle age. First you see it, then you don’t’ (Woodward, 2006:183). Cultural or social ageing as opposed to biological age, in postmodern Western societies seems to correspond to the fading of youth. A fading that in our society might be perceived by women as starting in their thirties or, alarmingly, even their twenties. With the loss of the precious commodity of sexual appeal and biological reproductive capacity, women seem to change inevitably into the unwatchable and undesirable (Blaikie, 1999; Church-Gibson, 2000; Gullette, 2004; Woodward, 2006). This research will focus particularly on a Western female demographic over the age of forty-five as this seems to be the age when the onset of invisibility begins, as a result of the restrictive normalised ideas that women’s purpose is to give birth and nurture (Church-Gibson, 2000; Woodward, 2006). Lastly, another impetus for this study comes from the UN Madrid international plan of action on ageing which identified the need to challenge stereotypes of ageing as one of its objectives to ‘facilitate contributions of older women and men to the presentation by the media’ (United Nations, 2002:45) and challenge existing stereotypes( Zhang et al. 2006; Williams, Ylänne and Wadleigh, 2007 and 2010).

Theoretical Framework The theoretical reading of magazines draws on cultural studies utilising and repurposing elements of media theory, sociology and semiotics. This dissertation is strongly influenced by postmodernist feminist approaches and performativity studies and uses theoretically grounded critical perspectives drawing on Foucaldian discourses of power, body and sexuality. Normativity and performativity (Butler, 1990) are recurrent themes in this review and have underpinned the data analysis to describe the role of cultural and social norms and their ‘grip’ on the body (Bordo, 2003:25). Theoretical positions on reproducing social systems are also important elements of the interpretive analysis of how age is constructed as a social and cultural category. An inter-disciplinary research framework enables the dissertation to look at the problem in both a theoretical and empirical manner by analysing text and visuals and investigating how the meaning of age is produced (Bartky, 1990; Blaikie, 1999; Bordo 2003; Woodward, 2006; Tyner, K. and Ogle J. 2010; Dolan and Tincknell, 2012).

Overview of the dissertation structure The theoretical framework provides an overview of the various theoretical models, critical

tools and interpretive perspectives used in the dissertation. The literature review presents the theoretical positions advanced within cultural and social studies on the female body and considers the various ways in which these theoretical positions may provide a path to conceptualisations of ageing femininity. The same section discusses the legacy of Cartesian dualism and how Western narratives position womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s bodies within our culture, how this is reflected in visual representations and how the modalities of representations and practices of looking find their roots in essentialist understandings of gender differences. The methodology section explains the approach to data gathering and analysis, the selection process and a rationale for the methods used. The discussion section of this dissertation is an interpretive and analytical review of the data, the magazines and the case studies. It examines the narratives found in the print media and analyses how ageing is represented through the lens of a broader semiotic and postmodern cultural studies theoretical framework. The chapter discusses the findings and analyses the role of the media and visual culture in the construction of identities and the stereotypes currently circulating in our society. Specific images and themes are critically interpreted within the context of existing contemporary feminist and media theories. The conclusion section includes a summary of the work presented and suggestions of possible avenues for future research.

1. Literature Review Ageing, media and identity Major inputs to this dissertation come from recent academic and ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council) sponsored programmes and networks such as the WAM (Women Ageing in the Media) and the NDA (New Dynamic of Ageing). The work of researchers who are broadly connected to these programmes such as Dolan and Tincknell, Twigg and Ylanne who have recently published and edited a vast amount of material on the subject of images and representations of ageing has been essential to this dissertation. These studies are significant due to their inter-disciplinary approach to aged identities and the body of research constitutes an original source of information on women, ageing, and the media. The work of these academics is pivotal to this dissertation as is their discursive approach to researching aged identity, the strong constructionist epistemology and the assumption that discourse is produced through social processes. The notion of age as a social category that is culturally constructed underpins much of this dissertation (Ylanne, 2012). Twigg (2010; 2012) offers an interesting sociological evaluation of ageing, fashion and the print media. Her study of magazines and how age is negotiated in relation to fashion, in particular, is closely related to the analysis carried out in this dissertation and offers meaningful information on the various strategies employed by magazines such as Vogue in negotiating age. However, the key difference between her work and this research is that her focus is mostly on dress and her research method draws on content analysis. Her study is confined exclusively to editorial pages, leaving advertisements and, therefore, most of the visuals unexplored. While the issues of the concealed aging body in women’s magazines are central to the themes discussed in this dissertation, Twigg’s (2010) study leaves a gap in the discussion of the ideologies behind the discursive strategies adopted in cosmetic and fashion advertisements in addressing older readers. This dissertation, like Twigg’s study (ibid.) also makes references to Bordo (2003) and Wolf (1990) when positioning the body in relation to disciplining beauty regimes, the anti-ageing culture and the significance of magazines in normalizing certain images of femininity. Similarly, the themes of the politics of the body and appearance are key in the conceptualization of aged identity in this dissertation; however, Twigg, from her sociological stance, does not fully explore the ideological nature of the disciplining of the body in its relation to power. The consideration of the different ways in which Wolf (1990) and Bordo (2003) conceptualise the body and women’s preoccupations

with beauty demands will be discussed further in the sections dedicated to feminism and the body politics (Twigg, ibid.).

Essentialism: The mind-body problem and the relation of gender and age to dualism In order to provide a context to the present analysis, it is important to explain how Western culture would appear historically link women’s social status to their physical attractiveness and youthful and sexualised ideals of beauty. Western epistemologies are underpinned by Cartesian ideologies that tend to conceive the world in terms of binaries such as mind-body; male-female; positivity-negativity; universal-particular, culture-nature, young-old; activepassive. These ideological binaries tend to identify the man with the superior rational part while associating the woman with the materiality of the body. Bordo (2003) argues that, because the ‘thinking self’ is associated with the mind (masculinity), ‘the body becomes constituted as “alien”, as the not self, the not-me’ (Bordo, 2003: 144). Whatever the ‘historical and cultural context of this duality, the body is the negative term’ (Bordo, ibid: 5) and the woman is always identified with the latter, the body, and associated with that negativity. Understanding this dualism is fundamental to theoretical readings of the Western female body. This understanding has been incorporated into this dissertation to interpret how the female body has come to be so strongly associated with physical attractiveness and how femininity is negatively affected by the process of ageing. Within this argument, the relation of female ageing to this duality can also be seen in the projection of its limitations onto the female body, ‘weighted down’ in Beauvoir’s words ‘by everything peculiar to it’ (Beauvoir’s in Bordo: 2003: 5). Western dualisms are again at work when considering the ageing body and the associated loss of cultural and sexual power. Cultural reconstructions of this dualism appear in visual culture and from a textual and visual analysis of all magazines. The absence and the old–young binaries of the anti-ageing culture, the loss of sexual power in Good Housekeeping, the rhetoric of dilution in Vogue or the ‘heroes of ageing–bodily decline’ binary (Featherstone and Hepworth, 2000) in Saga are all broad manifestations of the agonistic mind-body duality. This becomes even more evident from a textual analysis of Vogue, Good Housekeeping and Saga where the meaning of youth and the new typology of positive ageing are coded as a new moral duty. Here the anti-ageing battle is a symbolic victory over the betrayals of bodily decline (Bartky, 1990; Bordo, 1993; Featherstone and Hepworth, 2000; Richards, Warren, and Gott, 2011).

The body politics. Age as a feminist issue This dissertation incorporates various strands of contemporary feminist thought in interpreting the themes that emerged during the data gathering process such as the anti– ageing culture. While original modern feminist theories have been valuable in problematising the contemporary obsession with appearance within capitalistic cultures, a postmodern feminist approach has been more useful in explaining the role of cultural norms in relation to agency and subjectivity. Post-rational feminism moves beyond dualistic categorizations and aims to deconstruct cultural hierarchies that tend to limit and oppress women. From this feminist stance, it is here argued that ageing, quite as much as sex, is socially constructed, strongly gendered and is the product of limiting discursive strategies that support patriarchal structures. Through feminist and particularly post-rationalist and postmodernist readings of the female body it is possible to understand media texts as the result of capitalistic and ideological constructions that tend to push individuals back into the mind–body and young–old binaries. This dissertation offers a critique of the narratives of decline and draws on the work of Sontag (1972), Bartky (1988; 1990), Butler (1990), Bordo (1999; 2003) and more recent work by Woodward (1999; 2002; 2006) using their approaches to read the contemporary obsession with youth and practices aimed at digitally or cosmetically removing the ageing female body from sight. These writers provide a deeper understanding of the many contemporary debates on the female body, representations and identity. Their driving concern is to expose this underlying oppression and reclaim the ageing female body from ideologies that promote a culture wide anxiety (Blaikie, 1999; Tyner, K. and Ogle J. 2010, Dolan and Tincknell, 2012). Wolf’s (1991) seminal work on femininity is still hugely significant in theorising the female body as the locus of the power struggle and exposing beauty regimes as a new form of oppression and the direct consequence of capitalistic patriarchal structures. Faludi (1991) similarly called the Western preoccupation with appearance and beauty as the ‘backlash’ against female advancement in society. Many of the original feminist readings of the body have been strongly criticised for their inadequacy in interpreting the realities of identities, agency and the modern multiplicity of the gaze. It is important to note that where Faludi (1991) and Wolf (1991) conceptualise power as owned by masculinity, Bordo (2003) and Bartky (1990) see power as an anonymous structure. In this sense, Bordo criticises the feminist approach as an over appropriation of Foucaldian theories of power. For Bordo (2003), power is a dynamic force not owned by the masculine but by privileged groups and ideologies.

Media theory. The production of consumption One of the driving assumptions behind this dissertation is the significance of images and media texts in forming and constructing female identity. In this respect, media studies have endlessly explored how contemporary media tend to repurpose the duality structures and relegate women to the restrictiveness of Western binaries. Traditional media theories support the reading of the magazines images and the symbols and connotations they convey (Berger, 1972; Barthes, 1973; Mulvey, 1975; Bordo, 2003; Butler, 1990). Berger (1972) proposed that the activity of looking and the passivity of being looked at, where the woman – a young woman – is always the object of desire defines practices of looking and visual culture. For the last thirty years, analyses of media texts have stressed how visual cultures tend to replicate power structures representing women as passive objects of man’s desire and the ‘male gaze’ (Mulvey, 1975). This theme is developed further when discussing the ‘young gaze’ and how femininity is coded in Cosmopolitan. However, the limitation of traditional media studies is that the gazing process is always only theorised in relation to young bodies. The gaze becomes problematised in Vogue in its attempt to negotiate age within a fashion context or in Good Housekeeping when addressing and representing older women. Representations featuring or targeting young women and those that target older women are very different but they all seem to replicate similar signifying practices of representation (Woodward, 2006; Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh, 2007; Dolan and Tincknell, 2012). Readings of the anti-ageing advertisements or the discussion of the dilution strategies utilised in magazines will address these themes further by explaining ‘youth’ and attractiveness in terms of cultural demands and consumer culture. An image remains a ‘record of how contemporary consumer society has chosen to see women in order to sell more goods’ (McCracken, 1999: 33). Gauntlett(2008) has criticised original feminist media positions for focusing only on the negative aspects of popular culture and their tendency to regard the media as a ‘backwards looking force that was trying to relocate individuals within the boundaries of the traditional categories’ (Gauntlett, 2008: 85). In Saga for example it is possible to see how media texts are serving, even though for commercial reasons, a subversive purpose. The destabilisation of the traditional stereotype of the elderly as passive and indecisive has been replaced in media texts aimed at older people with a healthier, more active ideal. At the heart of Gauntlett’s critique of the ‘media effect’ models (ibid: 3) is the idea that media play a major role in challenging as much as in perpetuating stereotypes and have, arguably, contributed to the circulation of contemporary feminist ideals. It is interesting to note that, even though

Gauntlett suggests that there is scientific evidence linking unrealistic depictions of beauty to negative effects on women, he argues that these finding are unclear. While not dismissing the epidemic of body dissatisfaction and mental disorders associated with ideals perpetuated in magazines, his position is not conclusive and does not identify magazines as the culprits of these negative effects (Gauntlet, 2008).

Foucault. Normativity and panocticism The purpose of this dissertation is to analyse narratives about ageing femininity in magazines through contemporary feminist readings focusing on how Western body image culture has often become an instrument to oppress the female self. Although the achievement of equality in many areas of society has provided women with a leisured, emancipated status, it is suggested here that a new kind of dominance is exerted through a culture of ‘normative’ and stereotyped femininity (Bordo, 1993). Normative images are those ideals of beauty, perfection, flawless, sexualized femininity that women measure themselves against and that have become reified in the hegemony of contemporary media. Normative standards are those values that women measure themselves against and that are produced by culture and circulated through the media. Foucault’s (1977) concepts of self-surveillance, discourse and power underpin the discourse analysis of the case studies. Notions of ‘panocticism’ and disciplinary power have contributed enormously to an understanding of ‘normalisation’ and feminist’ readings of ‘the body as the focal point for struggles over the shape of power’ (Bordo, 1999: 248). In this sense, feminists have identified women’s magazines as key sites of discourses of power and resistance because reinforcing oppressive versions of femininity but also in offering opportunities to resist them. The concepts of ‘self-surveillance’ and the ‘inspecting gaze’ explain the modern self-disciplining practices that women engage with to obtain the ‘docile body’ in a culture of anti-ageing and plastic surgery (Foucault, 1977; Bartky, 1990; Blaikie, 1999; Bordo, 2003). Foucault (1977) employed the panopticon as a metaphor for control in modern societies where power is conceptualized as a non-authoritarian, pervasive force, not exercised through coercion and force. What is critical to the appropriation of Foucault by some contemporary feminists is the shift from the notion of power as retained by a single entity. Power is no longer a possession held by a singular individual, but is exercised by social and cultural stereotyping through self-disciplining behaviours. The central point of this argument is that, even in the absence of surveyor, women constantly monitor themselves for deviations from these imposed and oppressive cultural standards. In a culture increasingly obsessed with appearance, our bodies, exactly like in the panopticon, are constantly on display. Visibility becomes a ‘trap’. Women have, consequently, internalised the surveyor and resorted to 18

producing the ‘docile body’ to monitor themselves for deviations from normative standards (Bordo, 2003; Bartky, 1990). Foucaldian notions of power and ‘self surveillance’ are of particular relevance in reading contemporary magazine texts. The emphasis on disciplining methods to achieve the effacement of age and the control of deviations from normative cultural standards of femininity of youthful sexualised, thin bodies can be conceptualised through the internalization of the surveyor and ‘clinical gaze’ (Foucault, 1977; Bordo and Jaggar, 1989). Entwistle (2000) expresses a criticism of postmodern ideologies for being highly theoretical and dismissing issues of subjectivity, embodiment and agency. The limitation of feminist arguments, from these perspectives, would be the lack of acknowledgement of women’s agency particularly in how these disciplines are experienced and lived by the individual. Conversely, Bordo (1989) warns that the feeling of empowerment generated by control over the body is temporary and illusory. The notion of control over the body in the fight against the signs of ageing is also detrimental to the psychological health of women as it promotes anxiety and fear about the process of ageing and precludes coming to terms with the finitude of looks.(Blaikie, 1999; Lewis, Medvedev and Seponski, 2011)

2. Methodology The primary purpose of this chapter is to examine the research methodology and design adopted in the dissertation, the sources of the data, the selection of the magazines and the specific case studies. Further considerations on the purposes and procedures will also be discussed in the context of the research question and its aims and objectives. The choice of data gathering, analysis and the case studies selection process were made in consultation with my tutors.

Analysis As a fashion media practitioner, the purpose of this study is to contribute, from a theoretically grounded critical perspective, to an area that is largely under researched within cultural studies. The present enquiry is directed not so much towards the description of, but to an overall interpretation and evaluation of the texts, the truths they convey, the power relations involved and the discursive formations they are structured around. In the tradition of qualitative media studies this research is interested in ‘images within the cycle of production, circulation and consumption through which their meanings are accumulated and transformed’ (Lister and Well, 2001 in Kress and Jewitt, 2001:64). A broadly semiotic approach was the theoretically grounded tool used to review the texts and deconstruct the meaning beyond the signs to understand the images and their intrinsic ‘social life’ along with the cultural structure they support (Barret, 2000; Gill, 2007). The chosen methodology lies within the tradition of ideological and qualitative analysis often adopted in cultural theory. Cultural studies are a compound field that repurposes and borrows elements from semiotics and discourse analysis (Gill, 2007; Lister and Wells, 2001: 63 in Van Leeuwen and Jewitt, 2001). The aim of this study was to critically explore how ageing is depicted in fashion media and what messages about ageing femininity images and texts communicate. This study follows broadly the discursive methods employed by Twigg (2010), Bordo (2003) and Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh (2007) but on a smaller scale and in different contexts. These interpretive methods aim to identify the kinds of discourses around ageing femininity that are articulated in magazines through visuals and texts. The concern of this analysis is to read images and text at a meta-level, deconstruct (Barret, 2000) the social, political and cultural nature of these texts and critique them from a feminist theoretical perspective. It

might be argued that an appropriate reading of these case studies should take both normalising and resistance into account. However, while it is acknowledged that the nature of these texts is unstable and relative to the audience, the theoretical readings applied here follow the discourse analysis employed by Bordo (2003) that strongly emphasises the normalising elements of texts. For this reason, the primary task is to ascertain the normalising ideological content of the case studies and how ageing is discursively constructed through images. The use of observation and analysis of secondary sources, supported by visual and textual analysis of magazines, seemed to offer the possibility of a more in depth investigation of the topics addressed by this dissertation. Researchers such as Twigg (2012) and Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh (2007; 2010) in their analyses of ageing in media and advertising suggest that a deeper understanding of narratives might be gained by adopting a methodology that goes beyond the simple image categorization often used in content analysis. Moreover, alternative research methods, such as quantitative research, would not adequately address the complexity of the research questions from a theoretical perspective. Certain empirical content analyses focus on the classification of negative versus positive images, but these approaches would not help to contextualise the meaning behind the images or provide a deeper understanding of the more complex dynamics of media construction and consumption. In the context of the analysis of magazines, for example, this method would have proved inadequate in interpreting the emerging positive stereotypes of ageing that are starting to be seen in advertising and print media. While the overall frequency and recurrence of certain images might be relevant in demonstrating women’s invisibility in visual culture, this research focuses on a qualitative interpretation of these representations (Twigg, 2012; Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh, 2007). The limitation of the chosen methods lies in their relativism and in the fact that there is never such a thing as ‘neutral looking’. It is recognised that ‘looking is always embodied and undertaken by someone with an identity. (Lister and Well, 2001 in Kress and Jewitt, 2001:65). While it is acknowledged that this dissertation has no statistical or scientific significance, the study adopts discursive and semiotic methods that work as a form of textual reading but also of social analysis. The main point of this argument is that ‘the relationships between signifiers and their signifieds may be ontologically arbitrary but they are not socially arbitrary’ (Chandler, 1994). The subjectivity of textual reading is made objective through methodological reflexivity as the data gathering and analysis process are supported by substantial formal and critical analysis.

Data gathering The research process went through a number of trial and error stages. The initial investigation process involved engaging with different media such as television, advertisement and magazines, but also adopted other pragmatic primary research methods such as drawing and photography. Even though they are not the specific foci of this dissertation, the observation and investigation of a variety of visuals were also key in defining and developing the initial research question and approach (Collins, 2012). Other data gathering methods were used to investigate the subject and strengthen the secondary research approach. A pilot study involving respondents from different age groups was conducted through online surveys and an online poll to assess the validity of the methodology and collect and analyse primary data. The surveys aimed at measuring participants’ beliefs about fashion and media representations in relation to age. These methods helped to explore the notion of femininity and ageing based upon the contradictions displayed in popular culture and helped to define the research approach. Even though the surveys were not used in the subsequent data gathering phases, an analysis of the responses seemed to confirm the main literature reviews findings and the primary data supported the more in depth textual and visual analyses.

Magazines as ‘women’s mass culture’ The rationale behind the choice of the print media and the selection of specific publications was driven by factors such as their relevance to audiences of women and the research subject, circulation and consumption. The four magazines selected for textual analysis were Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, Saga and Vogue. The primary reason for choosing the print medium over other media was the consideration that magazines are not just a key site for the production and circulation of images of and for women but they also put themselves forward as a source of development. They are a source of amusement, self-improvement and fantasy attempting to establish a dialogue and offering advice, help and entertainment. Magazines have been defined as ‘women’s mass culture’ (Wolf, 1991:74) because of the roles that media, appearance and fashion have assumed in contemporary culture and their relevance as cultural texts, lived culture or cultural practice (Wolf, 1991). Wilson (2003) explains the centrality of fashion and print media and their role in the creation of discourses, arguing that ‘journalism, advertising and photography have acted as the mass-communication hinges joining fashion to the popular consciousness’ (Wilson, 2003: 157). In this sense, women’s magazines embody popular culture and ideologies but also have a very direct connection with female audiences while being closely linked to 22

advertising, fashion and visual culture. Magazines are, thus, central to the construction of female identity and can be a considerable source of self-esteem for women. While readers might be capable of distancing themselves from the subject, it has been suggested that women might be involved with the magazines in a much more intimate and active way than other media (Hermes, 1995). The monthly, or â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;glossyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;, magazines have been chosen over other forms of printed periodicals such as weekly or quarterly publications, because these tend to position themselves as womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s best friend. They pay closer attention to a wider range of interests and experiences that engage women at a much deeper level. The variety of themes and discourses adopted in these magazines address women in a more direct and personal way. Furthermore, these magazines incorporate topics related to women and image in a much more integral fashion than other forms of print publications; fashion, beauty and visual representations of femininities are key themes of these publications providing a significant source of information for this research. Other factors contributing to the specific choice of these publications are the circulation and high readership of monthly glossies targeted at women from different demographics. Profiling authorities for British magazines such as BRAD, NRS and ABC were consulted in arriving at the overall sample. High circulation figures and large readership are likely to provide a more accurate account of how narratives of ageing are situated in mainstream print media and the typology of images used to appeal to a certain demographic.

Textual Sampling Magazines were collected over four months and the content of each of the magazines (between January and April 2013) was scrutinised and reviewed. A large number of images and editorials were collected for follow up. The images were then sorted and analysed to ascertain the presence of patterns within the publication. The final sample was the result of an overall analysis of the publications carried out over two months. Finally, from the chosen case studies, specific editorials, images and advertisements were selected. The final texts were chosen based on their relevance to the primary aims and objectives of the dissertation and as being the most representative of a certain view of femininity, ideology or discourse within the magazine itself. Specific themes and narratives emerged from the magazines themselves and these informed the final choice. For example, images of anti-ageing adverts were selected from Good Housekeeping because of their high recurrence within the magazine itself and for their relevance to the debates around the anti-ageing culture. The final images presented in this dissertation were sampled from the most recent issues and purchased online for practical reasons. 23

Secondary and tertiary sources The dissertation draws on secondary sources, which were accessed via the University and British library. These are discussed and analysed primarily in the literature review section and listed in the bibliography. Tertiary sources such as information consultancies and market size and economic databases such as Mintel and Verdict, were used to support the selection of the specific magazines, and gain an understanding of the UK magazine market and the over fifties audience. Tertiary data such quantitative and qualitative academic journal research were consulted to complement previous studies that might have become out-dated as the last decade has produced social, cultural and technological changes of an unprecedented nature at every level of society.

3. Discussion This section contains an interpretive and analytical discussion of the findings followed by sections presenting each magazine and a selected number of texts images that have been analysed with a discursive and broadly semiotic approach. The data analysis findings seem to be consistent with Twigg’s (2010; 2012) conclusions suggesting that representations of ageing femininity in magazines remain problematic. While modern female identities are fluid and arguably more dislocated from class and biological lifecycles, they seem to still remain strongly entangled in the normative cultural and social structures of the young – old binary. The narratives that emerge from this analysis, present ageing femininity as something that is not seamlessly integrated in women’s and fashion magazines but that is largely based on ‘effacement of age’ (Twigg, 2010:486). Most narratives can be framed within the context of the cultural dichotomy young-old. The ageing body and its signs are generally disguised in magazines and, when they are present, are more often associated with advertising and tend to replicate the conventions and the problematics of thin, young, white femininity used in mainstream media. The tension between celebrated bodily perfection and ageless style is achieved through a series of discursive strategies widely used within the magazine industry that include ‘localization, generation and personalization’ (Twigg, 2010: 479). By ‘localization’ Twigg (ibid.) means that older women’s presence in Vogue is either localized or restricted to certain sections or featured only sporadically. In the Vogue issues examined, women of a certain age are for example talked about rather than pictured and only addressed in specific sections of the magazine. Where they are present they rarely show any typical signs of ageing; this can be seen in the Lancôme Vogue advert. (Figure 5-3) Their presence is also either ‘diluted’ from sight or embodied by a celebrity with what Twigg calls a technique of ‘personification’ (Figure 5-3). Other practices emerging from the magazines are the ‘dilution’ through the ‘decades’ approach where fashion is addressed across multiple ‘decades’ or demographics or the 'generations’ approach, as featured in the Dolce and Gabbana advert selected from Vogue (Figure 5-4)(Twigg, 2010). Another salient aspect of the narratives that emerge from magazines is the construction of femininity through consumer culture. Identities across the various magazines are clearly marked as consumer groups. Magazines, whose existence relies on advertising, provide

instructions or solutions via brands on how to achieve a particular aspirational lifestyle; whether this be the perfect sexy body, outfit, house or roast. They balance their contradictory role of ‘treat’ and friend to women by playing on people’s insecurities and the audience’s capacity to participate in this fantasy word that they create. (McCracken, 1993) Femininity is coded through a structured system of verbal and non-verbal signs to build an aspirational model of femininity where the concept of ageing is often only present in terms of products aimed at combatting the effects of time. Research suggests that the ageing process is problematised through advertisements that prescribe youth at all costs. ‘Texts aimed at a female market project skin care as a serious issue, pathologise the look of ageing’ (Coupland, 2007: 37). On the other hand, fashion, unlike skincare advertisements, rarely addresses older women and tends to make it clear that fashion is a youth centred arena. (Twigg, 2010) A large part of magazines is dedicated to appearance and body modifications; between thirty to fifty per cent. Each edition of a magazine is commonly taken up by skincare and cosmetics advertising and large part of the editorials are dedicated to grooming, fitness, beauty and fashion (Moeran, 2010). The texts analysed symbolise how femininity is portrayed and marked as a consumer differently across the four different target groups and, more importantly, define how ageing femininity is ‘performed’ when intersecting with other categories such as gender and class (Butler, 1990). The texts draw on the different kind of femininities that they invite their female readers to embody across different life stages. Magazines from their beginnings, as manuals written by men for women on how to perform femininity, to contemporary publications, maintain their position of ‘adviser’ playing a significant role in the construction of female identity. In contemporary culture ’we are no longer told what a ‘lady’ is or of what femininity should consist. Rather we learn the rules directly through bodily discourses: through images which tell us what clothes, body shape, facial expression, movements and behaviour is required’ (Bordo, 1989:17). Magazines provide models of femininity and remain key sites of production and circulation of images. Their significance in creating discourses and meaning is achieved through repetition. (Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh, 2010) The sexualised thin young bodies represented in Cosmopolitan embody a notion of femininity in very different terms from the domesticated Good Housekeeping woman. The texts from Vogue portray ageing in terms of its effacement and concealment, while in Saga, a new healthy and active model of ageing is being represented to address the wealthy grey market, but this model is not without its problems (Featherstone and Hepworth, 2000). A common

factor across all texts is the normalization of the body through ‘self surveillance’ and ‘disciplining regimes’ (Foucault, 1977; Entwistle, 2000; Twigg, 2012). Cosmopolitan and Vogue, while aimed at younger women, offer an overview of the typical standards of femininity portrayed in the fashion media. These while mostly defined by the absence of age, are used to discuss the nature of this invisibility. When considering the ideologies behind the circulation and production of images in these magazines, discourses of Foucaldian power and feminist readings of the body rationalise the significance of images and magazines in producing and normalising certain looks. It is important to note that Good Housekeeping and Saga are not specifically fashion magazines. Good Housekeeping is a publication aimed at women over forty-five while the latter, is not exclusively aimed at a female demographic. Saga does not exactly belong to the category of the fashion glossies, but it was deemed significant for its popularity amongst middle/early old aged women as it has one of the highest circulation rates of monthly publications (BRAD, 2012). A magazine targeting older people was considered significant for the analysis of texts and images produced for the specific consumption of a more mature audience. It is also important to acknowledge that, with the exception of Vogue, there are no women’s magazines explicitly aimed at women over forty-four in the UK market that fall strictly within the category of fashion.

4. Cosmopolitan

Figure 4-1 Molly King (2013) Cosmopolitan, March Issue: Cover

The youthful gaze Cosmopolitan is a magazine targeting eighteen to thirty-four-year-old women, the female readers that are likely to later grow into other magazines publications such as Good Housekeeping and Saga. Launched in UK in 1972, it remains an iconic brand amongst the

publications aimed at younger women and one of the most popular monthly women’s publications in the UK (BRAD, 2012). This was selected from the magazines aimed at younger readers to offer an overview of femininity as typically represented in the fashion media. Femininity in Cosmopolitan is defined in terms of perfection through the standards of flawless, slender, young, women depicted in glamorous clothing and sexy poses typical of the fashion media. A semiotic analysis of the image on the cover (Figure 4-1) shows how femininity is coded here through a symbolic system of signs where the skin dominates the image in an explosion of seductive beauty. The non-coded iconic meaning of the red lipstick, the pouting facial expression, the provocative tilting pose are all sexualised signifiers typical of Cosmopolitan’s front cover. This is the embodiment of the ‘male gaze’ and ‘her expression is the expression of a woman responding with calculated charm to the man whom she imagines looking at her…she is offering up here femininity as the surveyed’ (Berger, 1972: 49). The image anchors into the text, inviting an act of self-love in an attempt to lift the readers’ self-esteem with positive messages. Images and text conform to the typical ingredients of a fashion advert. Inside the magazine, a strong emphasis on beauty, fashion, self-improvement, sex and how to pursue, attract and seduce men complete the list of the magazine’s main features. Unsurprisingly, in Cosmopolitan, ageing is only defined in terms of its absence and narratives aimed at producing the ‘docile body’ or the modern ideal femininity are framed by the visual and linguistic messages.

Figure 4-2 Feel Naturally Beautiful Cosmo Promotion (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 146

Figure 4-3 Riggot, B. (2013) Live Big and go for it! Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 58

Editorials generally seem to address the reader with positive messages incorporating strands of popular feminism. The editorial where the headline reads ‘Live big and go for it’ (Figure 43) or, on subsequent pages, the headline ‘Feel Naturally Beautiful’ (Figure 4-2) at uplifting and boosting self-esteem. However, messages promoting self-confidence are often undermined by the incidence of overly airbrushed pictures portraying unattainable ideals of beauty. Readers seem to be presented with very narrow representations of beauty that ascribe social value only to specific values of femininity. The adverts and editorials showing overly airbrushed faces promote and naturalise looks through repetition while the editorials and images of plastic surgery promote a false ideology of instant gratification. This lack of diversity tends to exclude most women and certainly older women from the fantasy world of fashion and presents confusing and contradictory messages. The further women move away from these normative standards, the more they morph into the invisible, the ‘other’ (McRobbie, 2005).

Figure 4-4 Transform Advert (2013) Cosmopolitan, March Issue, p.184

Clearly, the pleasures afforded by modern culture should not be dismissed out of hand as they can also be experienced as socially empowering. Cosmopolitan tends to value notions of independence, self-improvement and empowerment through the pursuit of fashion and body improvement (Gauntlett 2008). There are, however, several problems with this view. Firstly, both Bordo (2003) and Bartky (2010) agree that what appears to be marketed as freedom and empowerment is, instead, a new set of demands that society has imposed upon women. Secondly, in these texts happiness is consistently associated with specific narratives and ideals of beauty and alterations achieved through body modifications (Figure 4-4; Figure 4-9) is important to note that in magazines, and in Western culture generally, only certain values â&#x20AC;&#x201C; which are the normalising values embodied by the fashion media culture, are praised, given visibility and accorded value and, consequently, experienced as socially empowering (McCracken, 1993; McDonald, 1995; Gill, 2007).

Figure 4-5 Weight Watchers Advert (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 17

Figure 4-6 Cosmopolitan Body (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 14

In the Transform advert, for instance, (Figure 4-4), the image is built around the centrality of the body, which is reinforced by the caption where ‘text...and image stand in a complementary relationship’ (Barthes, 1973: 41) so that the linguistic message of the text proposing the ‘biggest change’ anchors into the visual message coded through a smiling young woman inviting the reader to participate in a larger anecdote of happiness. While this advert is not unexpected, it is important to note is that Transform reinforces a false ideology of instant gratification and most importantly creates the illusion that this body is a matter of choice, the result of agency and ‘disciplining practices’. According to this argument, the pursuit of happiness and the normalised body become almost moral imperatives (Bordo, 2003). In the images from the Weightwatchers adv ‘I’ve got my sparkle back!’ (Figure 4-5) or the apparently innocuous diet book advert asking the reader “Want to be 100% body confident”’ (Figure 4-6) the normalising role of diet and exercise are encoded in discourses that associate self-confidence and success with body perfection and slenderness. These texts contain normalizing elements that promote and naturalise looks through repetition and

Figure 4-7 Leutwiler, H. (2013) Paul Rudd. Inside Men's Mind. Cosmopolitan, March Issue, p. 85.

Figure 4-8 Getty, PA (2013) Halle Berry. Cosmopolitan, March Issue, p. 185

the myth of the postmodern, plastic body, as a continuous project that ‘disciplines’ and ‘corrects’ itself towards these normative models. Indeed, these messages, in Foucaldian terms, function as powerful normalizing texts that ensure the production of ‘docile bodies’. McRobbie (2005) powerfully argues that magazines, from this perspective, are a major source of normative discontent and trap their readers ‘into cycles of anxiety, self loathing and misery that have become the standard mark of modern womanhood’ (McRobbie, 2005 in Gauntlett, 2002). There are virtually no images of older women in the magazines. The March issue features the presence of two celebrities (Figure 4-7 and Figure 4-8) .The actors are Paul Rudd (age forty-three) and Halle Barry (age forty-six). In both images, any sign of age has been digitally or cosmetically removed. This absence speaks very powerfully about the role of magazines in constructing the meaning of age and the process of ‘figuring’ age to younger readers. With these ideologically and emotionally crippled values about what constitutes being successful or normal for a woman, the fear of the unidentified, being the ‘other’ or departing from those models is a natural response to what we see depicted as normal. Visual culture tends, very early in life, to set beauty standards that are unattainable and which, therefore, are often

regarded by feminists as partly responsible for perpetuating an ideology of constant dissatisfaction. While there is very little space or mention of ageing, the young reader is promptly reminded to engage in an early battle against time though the anti-ageing adverts and beauty editorials (Figure 4-9). The seeds of negative association with the signs of ageing are introduced very early in the process and readers are warned about taking appropriate measures against the ravages of time. What remains to be examined are the social values associated with failing to embody the dominant ideals of slenderness and youthfulness in Cosmopolitan terms. More â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;diverseâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; characteristics or alternative models for identification remain visually unidentified and underrepresented and unacknowledged.

Figure 4-9 Lâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Oreal Advert (2013) Cosmopolitan, February Issue, p. 83

5. Vogue

Figure 5-1 Sims, D. (2013) New Look. Vogue, April Issue: Cover

The concealed aged body Vogue is an iconic fashion magazine targeting twenty-four to forty-four-year-old women. The average age of a reader of Vogue is thirty-four (NRS, 2012). Vogue, under the direction of 35

Alexandra Shuman has become more aware of the changing demographic (Twigg, 2010), dedicating entire issues to the theme of ‘Ageless Style’ (July, 2007; 2008; 2009; 2011; 2012). Despite targeting an older readership, of the plethora of fashion adverts and editorials actually very few portray individuals that are over forty. The magazine remains strongly aspirational and the texts analysed seem to result in narratives where ‘the ageing body is being remodelled, in an attempt to eliminate it’ (Woodward, 2006: 163). Looking younger is generally valued as ideal and ageing is presented as something that can be overcome.

Dilution Representations of ageing femininity are scarce and, where present, they are mostly ‘localized’ (Twigg, 2010) and set apart from the rest of the issue’s content or appropriately framed through discursive strategies of dilution. These representations, in Foucaldian terms, homogenize looks and tend to ‘smooth’ out all signs of difference that disturb the ideal of the, slender, young white body (Bordo, 2003). Older women are featured in texts, rather than in images or in fashion spreads. They are not permitted to truly subvert the normative standard of beauty featured in the fashion media and are framed within specific sections of the magazine. Vogue’s endorsement of the idea of an ageless style is not ‘seamlessly embodied’ within the magazine and the narratives offered do not offer enough situations where ageing can be imagined or experienced. Rather, aging is integrated into the magazines without ‘disturbing’ the overall balance of the fashion media text (Twigg; 2010). Another dilution technique that emerges from the analysis is ‘personalization‘. The April issue (Ibid. 2013: 144-149) offers an article on women in politics where a number of older women are featured. However, these are real women, ‘named individuals’ rather than models, and the pictures of these women (Figure 5-2) are rather small and presented amongst other, younger, women. These women are always real women, either celebrities or personalities rather than models and usually have very aspirational lives.

Figure 5-2 Figure 5 2 Testino, M.; Images; Camera Press; Getty Images (2013) ‘House work’. Vogue, April Issue, p. 244 Clockwise from left: Harriet Harman; Claire Perry; Margaret Thatcher Clockwise from above: Penny Mordaunt; Theresa May; Nancy Astor.

Another article on a not-so young woman features Joseph’s creative director Louise Trotter. However, her age remains visually unidentifiable, with the photography almost completely disguising her features. In the text, moreover, she is identified as ‘the petite designer, pretty and with impish features belying her fortysomething (my italics) years’ (Vogue, March, 2013: 175). These are all examples of women over forty in positions of power, very good looking, in successful careers and strongly involved with their love for fashion. This is an effort to negotiate the notion of style at any age and it offers opportunities or scenarios where age can be featured, experienced and imagined by readers, even though the lives of those women are far removed from ordinary lives (Twigg, 2010).

Figure 5-3 Julia Robert in Lancôme advertisement. (2013) Vogue, March Issue: Back Cover

The Lancôme advert represents a typical example of the concealment of age where a very airbrushed Julia Roberts (age forty-five) (Figure 5-3) is portrayed as perfume ambassador. In this image, signs of age are completely absent because they have been either digitally or cosmetically removed. This strategy of dilution to remove ageing from sight is of course widely utilised in the magazine sector and comes as no surprise even to the least fashion conscious reader. Incidentally, in 2009 a similar advertising campaign picturing the celebrity was withdrawn from public for being so overly retouched to be considered false advertising by the advertising standard authority (Advertising Standards Authority, 2009). The postmodern fantasy of an infinitely malleable body is here materialised in images and texts that support narratives of femininity in terms of ‘concealed aged body’. Given enough financial and cultural capital the denial of age can be achieved with regimes of aesthetic surgery.

Figure 5-4 Dolce, D. & Gabbana S. (2013) Dolce & Gabbana Spring Summer Advert. Vogue, March Issue, pp. 12-13

One notable image selected from Vogue (March, 2013) is a Dolce and Gabbana advert representing a variation on the typical fashion spreads found within Vogue. This Dolce and Gabbana image from the latest S/S collection (Figure 5-4) is a good example of one of the modalities often used in magazines to depict older people. Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh (2007) argue that the presence of the elderly in advertising is very rarely age neutral or ‘age incidental’. Representing older people with their grandchildren is a common dilution technique borrowed from non-fashion advertising and to some extent pioneered by Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein (Twigg, 2010). The most typical way of diluting age is often to depict older adults as performing family roles with their grandchildren or, as in this advert, within the presence of several generations. Hummert et al. (2004) argue that this particular portrayal of the elderly fits within the ‘perfect grandparent’ role, one of the well-defined positive stereotypes they have identified in their analyses of advertising (Hummert in Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh, 2007; Twigg, 2010). Older people, in this context, are ascribed to what Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh (2007; 2010) have identified as positive stereotypes associated with older people. ‘Mentors’ and ‘Perfect grandparents’ are some of the fairly new positive typologies emerging in mainstream media. This is an attempt to reinterpret negative older images of frailty and ineptitude previously used in media and popular culture to depict old age. (Blaikie, 1999; Zhang et al., 2006; Ylanne, 2009)

The picture composition seems to follow the rules of traditional portraiture associated with family memories, ageing and heritage. The two older people clearly show signs of ageing: grey hair, wrinkles and softer, plumper shape. Again the dilution of older age is here achieved via ‘generation’ technique by presenting a number of people from different age groups in the context of an outdoor summery background. Even the relationship between these older people in this context are purely conjectural, they are naturally ascribed the signifiers of intergenerational ties. What seems to be encoded here is not so much the inclusion of diversity in advertising, as the connotations of tradition, durability and heritage that the brand wants to infuse the advert with. For the purpose of contextualization, it is important to note that the overall tone of the photo-shoot is very tame in comparison to previous sexualised Dolce and Gabbana campaigns and, in this sense, the presence of older people is not incidental. The inclusion of older people in the picture is a set up to facilitate the mis en scene of a particular narrative. The older woman is portrayed here in a regal matriarchal pose embodying the Mediterranean myth of longevity, tradition and family nostalgia. The non-direct gaze, the reflective pose, the soft, composed posture add to the soft, nostalgic tone of the family portraiture evoking the coded iconic meanings of ‘Italianity’ and timeless style and tradition. The qualities of longevity, style and heritage are then transferred onto the brand. Although this advert emphasises the positive traits of the elderly, here captured as ‘lovely grandparents’ (Hummert in Williams, Ylanne and Wadleigh, 2007) and brings some diversity into the fashion media landscape, it still fails to escape the dilution of old age and the duality of the nostalgia/melancholia categorization underpinning certain stereotypes (Blaikie, 1999; Richards, 2011).

6. Good Housekeeping

Figure 6-1 Swannell, J. (2013) Jane Seymour. Good Housekeeping, March Issue: Cover

The evolution of the spectacle: the age appropriate graceful ageing Good Housekeeping is a lifestyle magazine aimed at the thirty-five plus age group. The average age of a reader is fifty-two and i has a very high circulation rate amongst women 41

over forty-five (BRAD, 2012). The overall tone of the magazine is glamorous and upbeat. An analysis of the images shows that women, unlike those in Vogue, are addressed directly and in all sections of the magazines rather than just in the skincare adverts. The Good Housekeeping woman is much more accessible than the sophisticated and aspirational woman portrayed in Vogue. Using semiotic it is possible to see how representations of women in Good Housekeeping tend to use naturalised myths of middleaged women, which are nothing more than ‘idealized mirror images or windows to the future self’ (Berger in McCracken, 1993: 14). These images represent a ‘judgment about what constitutes ideal femininity (…) and this ‘way of seeing’ is often that of an implied male spectator’ (Ibid: 14). Although media educated women may have learnt to discern the purely fictional from reality, these idealised images are still problematic because they have a strong normalising power. The overall image that the magazine creates is one that supports the ‘Myth’ of the postmodern body of consumption where youth is still presented as a precious commodity and women are exhorted to pursue what Woodward (2006) calls ‘the youthful structure of the look’ (ibid. 2006:162). Images presented in Good Housekeeping represent a semiotic system of signs where aged femininity is encoded employing very well preserved celebrities, usually considerably younger than the average reader of Good Housekeeping and whose picture has been noticeably retouched post-production. When non-celebrities are featured in the magazine, these have even more powerful effect as ‘ the real analogue makes the symbolic messages more effective. “These women are so glamorous”, we are encouraged to think’ (McCracken, 1993: 24). Other images and text tend to create discourses that locate women as mothers and grandmothers emphasising the link between womanhood and their biological role of nurturers. The cover (Figure 6-1) has a similar format to that of the magazines aimed at younger readers; the image appears simply denotational at a first glance as its meaning has been almost ‘naturalized’. The cover appears to simply reproduce reality, but, in fact, it recreates an idealised image of the magazine’s middle-aged target reader. Jane Seymour (March, 2013) is staring back at the camera with an exaggeratedly confident smile, a tilting pose on very bright pastel colorama. This mulveysque relationship between surveyed and surveyor usually implies a male presence communicated by the facial expressions and the poses displayed by the woman staring at the camera (McCracken, 1993). While the Cosmopolitan women appear glamorous and sexy, the Good Housekeeping models are graceful and ‘appropriate’ to their age group, the housewife and the working mother they are trying to appeal to. The overall tone of the pose is much more subtle than the sexy cover of Cosmopolitan( Figure 4-1)or the disengaged and sensual spreads from Vogue (Figure 5-1).

There is definitely a shift from the overly sexual poses of the younger publications to a much more ‘domesticated’ look. Any reference to sex in the cover headlines has also disappeared.

Sex as taboo It is interesting to note that, throughout the magazine, there are very few references to sex or men in either visuals or text. The normative priorities of finding a man and being sexually attractive proposed to the Cosmopolitan reader have changed, shifting the dialogue with the reader into domesticity and family themes. MacDonald (1995) notes, with irony that ‘Vogue will tell you how to have an orgasm with style, but Woman’s Weekly (aimed at older women) will tell you how to knit one’ (MacDonald, 1995:194). Female bodies might be ‘intrinsically linked to sexual desirability’ (ibid. 194) but female sexuality seems to end in media discourses around the age of forty. While this break in the media patter of explicit images could be theorised as freedom from the commodification of the female body as a sexualised object, the absence of discourses about sexuality is linked to cultural rejection of older women as sexual beings. Sex and female sexuality are generally taboo in visual representations of later life. Sontag (1972) famously points out, ‘that older women are repulsive is one of the most profound aesthetic and erotic feelings in our culture’ (Sontag 1972:37 in Gibson). Women are not only prematurely aged by culture and deprived of their cultural entitlement to sexuality, but are also constrained by a concept of age appropriate behaviour. A contradictory set of rules seems to exhort women to appear younger yet undermines, restricts, and ridicules the pursuit of youth at all costs (Woodward, 2006). Celebrities, like Madonna, attempting to disrupt these taboos have often been subjected to harsh criticism and social disapproval for her unconventional ways of performing age (Railton and Watson, 2012).

Figure 6-2 Ambipur Advert (2013) Good Housekeeping, March Issue, p. 109

The body is no longer the site of sexual attention as in Cosmopolitan or Vogue and the long sections dedicated to men and sex have disappeared to leave space to editorials and adverts dedicated to house products and food recipes, which are elevated to enjoyable homely duties (Figure 6-2). Femininity is, in these cases, coded via adverts picturing women with the presence of iconic signs rich in secondary connotations. For instance, women are often depicted indoors, standing in the living room, kitchen, or with items strongly associated with signifiers of domesticity such as cleaning products or domestic appliances. The non â&#x20AC;&#x201C; coded iconic meaning for such homely representations are inherent to more traditional values of womanhood as a source of nurture and caregiving. This focus on homely duties is ratified in the long sections dedicated to food, cooking and other domestic chores along with long editorials on ratings for house products. The message reinforced across the editorials

Figure 6-3 Olay Advert (2013) Good Housekeeping, March issue, p. 37

and visual representations is that being sexual is no longer an option; it is more appropriate to engage in caregiving activities and â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;disciplinesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; of self-improvement. The symbols of womanhood in its intersection with age have been replaced by the pursuit of perfection of household duties, which are represented as pleasurable and uplifting. The final product seems to be an idealised middle-aged woman, who is emancipated, in charge of her house and engaged in caregiver activities. (McCracken, 1993). However, while references to sex or men have almost disappeared, the emphasis on beauty and selfâ&#x20AC;&#x201C;improvement is almost overwhelming in the number of pages dedicated to adverts for beauty and anti-ageing products and to long editorials on how to look young, stay young and dress appropriately. Texts and advertisements dedicated to beauty and skincare focus mainly on the topic of ageing and occupy a large amount of editorial and non-editorial space.

Figure 6-4 Clarins Advert (2013) Good Housekeeping, March Issue, p. 382

This obsession with the body, discipline and cosmetic surgery and anti-ageing culture is the logical response to the fear of disappearing, of loss and exclusion. Ageing is rendered more acceptable but still defined as the negative. Bordo suggests that, ‘We may be obsessed with our bodies but hardly accepting of them’ (Bordo, 2003:15). Frequently associated with celebrities, the body led battle against ageing and weight continues to cast women down and prematurely age them through the loss of social power. Femininity is still strongly defined by ideologies of lack: loss of power, loss of desirability and exclusion from mainstream fashion in the lack of offer of clothing (Mintel, 2010a, b, c, d; Church-Gibson, 2000,; Swinnen and Stotesbury, 2012). Often, texts have connotations of a medical nature suggesting the medicalisation of ageing which is treated as a form of pathology. Beauty care adverts often talk about age in terms of battle or a sort of pathology to overcome. Terms such as ‘laser focus’, ‘repairwear’, ‘cellular biology’, ‘cell defence technology’ are the recurrent lexicon used in relation to age. Products (Figure 6-3) help you ‘Roll away the years’ with an ‘age defying’

eye cream or promise to give ‘The beauty of a second chance’ (Clinique advert, Good Housekeeping, 2013, March : 6-7). The Clarins advert (Figure 6-4) states “One. With the power of two. Complete age control” and employs words such as ‘control’ and ‘power’ juxtaposed to the category of age, echoing ‘panocticism’ and the notion of discipline required to produce the ‘docile body’. The body remains a major source of preoccupation and focus attention; age can be prevented, rolled away, controlled, delayed, defied, fought against if enough measures are taken and enough spending power, time and care are spent in the process.

7. Saga

Figure 7-1 Waters, J. (2013) Helen Mirren. Saga, February issue: Cover

New structures of looking: the non-youthful gaze Saga is one of the most successful monthly lifestyle magazines in the UK with a very high circulation and is extremely popular amongst the over fiftyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s (BRAD, 2012). The magazine is

Figure 7-2 Bannecker, A. (2013) ‘Click here’ [Illustration] Saga, February Issue, pp. 50-51

a general lifestyle magazine aimed at relatively affluent male and female readers that has actively declared its intention to challenge negative stereotypes of ageing (Twigg, 2012). The texts analysed in the magazines place great emphasis on positive ageing achieved through the introduction of normalizing elements adopted from consumer culture and a persistent focus on a richer, healthier and more socially active prototype of femininity. Here, the media texts are serving, albeit for commercial purposes, subversive purposes by replacing the old stereotypes of the elderly as passive and indecisive with healthier and more active models of ageing. The Saga (February, 2013) magazine cover (Figure 7-1) featuring Helen Mirren represents a postmodern model of ageing that simultaneously disrupts and conforms to traditional codes of representations. The image seems to borrow some characteristics of the younger gaze: the eyes staring and the camera, the clinging pose and a poised sexiness. Representing older women, as sexual beings is, in this sense, a violation of the codes of acceptable appearance for older women. Accepted assumptions about being old are being questioned and sexual and romantic potential in later life is subversively and explicitly addressed in some of the images and in articles on online dating discussing ‘the dating phenomenon among older age’ (Saga, February, 2013: 51(Figure 7-2).

Figure 7-3 Saga Advert (2013) Saga, February Issue, p. 102

Saga routinely features a repertoire of celebrities who embody ‘successful agers’ (Featherstone and Hepworth, 2000), and portray a richer, healthier and more socially active prototype of ageing femininity. The rhetoric of the anti-ageing ‘fear appeal’ seems to have vanished in favour of articles on health and leisure activities. Images and text are often associated with adverts for holidays, insurance, cars, and equipment to aid older age. These images are usually signified by warm relationships, family and overall good times. These narratives seem to frame old age in terms of longevity, good health and happiness (Figure 7-3). However, the lifestyle of the successful agers routinely featured in Saga magazines requires a significant investment of cultural and financial capital that not everybody is able or willing to make (Featherstone and Hepworth, 1995; Blaikie, 1999). This discursive tautology of the ‘positive agers’ seems to result in equally oppressive schemes. Consumer culture, in the attempt to create anti-ageist narratives and appeal to older consumers, has produced new 50

forms of stereotyping. ‘The struggle to promote alternative images of ageing works directly against the youthful stereotyping of later life in consumer culture’ (2000: 359). What seems to be achieved in Saga is not the representation of diversity through the inclusion of the elderly in advertising, but the equal objectification of ageing through advertising where growing old is ‘symbolically annihilated’ and subjected to the sphere of consumption (Bordo, 2003; Edwards, 1997). The commodification of older people, through a consumerist lifestyle, might exclude those who do not fit this healthy, active, glamorous prototype because of lack of health or economic power. Given the lack of alternative images, this can be felt as equally oppressive when proposing this as the only ‘socially approved’ identity (Featherstone and Hepworth, 1991; William, Wadleigh and Ylanne, 2007; Dolan and Tincknell, 2012; Ylanne, 2012).

Conclusions The analysis across the four magazines aims to understand what messages about ageing femininity were communicated through text and visuals. The publications try to maintain the escapism element that is intrinsically linked to women’s magazines, the ‘window to the future self’ (Berger, 1972 in McCracken, 1993). Women are mostly exhorted to be competent, independent and autonomous, if, perhaps, slightly unadventurous. However, Cosmopolitan, Vogue and Good Housekeeping present narratives framing ageing femininity in negative terms such as absence, fear or loss. The ageing female body remains symbolically linked to its reproductive capacity. Ageing is presented as something that should be resisted. The antiageing battle based on ‘fear appeals’, the retreat into domesticity and the loss of sexual power emerge as recurrent themes. The focus on the normalising aspects of the texts in this study highlights the contradictions within a culture that often presents ‘normal’ bodies as defective and projects age as pathology. The emphasis on producing the ‘docile body’ through disciplining, concealing and remodelling age is very strong and the text and imagery in the magazines reflect this pattern. The current study shows how ageing femininity is discursively constructed across publications aimed at different demographics and how the female body, in the context of consumer culture, is coded as on-going project. The most salient aspects are linked to advertising fear appeals, where ageing is presented as something to be resisted, pathologised needing to be cured and controlled. This is emphasised by the normalizing aspects of the visuals that tend to render visible and praise only those bodies that fulfil certain criteria and retain, even in later life, the dominant ideals of femininity as in the case of celebrities like Helen Mirren. It has been argued here that narratives about ageing femininity are encoded in different ways across the various publications but these are, on the whole, homogenising and homogenised and offer only narrow resources for identification (Woodward, 2006; Dolan and Tincknell, 2012; Ylanne, 2012). The fluidity of identity and the many possibilities to change and modify appearances along with the rise of consumer culture and the silver pound have replaced the concept of natural ageing with the normality of reinventing oneself. (Blaikie, 1999) However, the emphasis on cosmetic surgery and other ‘technologies of the self’ to preserve appearance is somehow oppressive. Imperfect and ageing bodies remain generally concealed from sight and youth is still represented as the strongest cultural capital. Contemporary representations do not seem

to have become more inclusive but simply offer more modalities to counteract and resist the non-normative characteristics portrayed in the media. They offer options, through consumption, to achieve a certain model of femininity and tend to challenge any deviations from the dominant cultural standards of appearance. The conclusions of the present dissertation concur with Bordo’s (2003) ideological position on representations. She claims that representations in our culture tend to normalise, visually removing or, in the case of plastic surgery, remodelling non normative models of femininity which are not associated with hetheronormative, young, Caucasian, slender bodies (Bordo, 2003). Consumptions and homogenization offer of course the advantages of integration for both older and younger women but imply the exclusion of those who cannot conform. Magazines have to negotiate their identities as ‘pseudo’ friends and their intrinsic nature as brand ambassador for female products. While magazines have partially and arguably endorsed a number of feminist ideals, these are also often annihilated by their intrinsic nature as advertisers. They remain sales platforms with an enormous role to play in circulating and creating more diverse cultural ideals of ageing femininity. (McCracken, 1993; Hermes, 1995; Gauntlett, 2002; Twigg, 2010 and 2012)Images such as the ones analysed in this study, or the absence of them, have become reified within the common visual conscience and they seem completely normal and to some degree unquestionable. The narratives that emerge in magazines remain linked to the conceptualization of woman as a spectacle for male ‘consumption’ but the ageing femininity remains marked by progressive cultural and sexual disqualification. Attempts to move beyond these conventions are strongly resisted and associated with the abject and grotesque and sexuality in Good Housekeeping, for instance, remains ‘unwatchable’ (Woodward, 1991). Saga representations, while moving beyond the pattern of negative stereotypes, are still highly aspirational. Even in Saga it is only the bodies of the ‘heroes of ageing’ routinely embodied by celebrities such as Helen Mirren and Joanna Lumley that are on display. The body remains a lifelong project, and magazines offer mixed advice on how to produce a socially acceptable body, a concept that remains narrowly defined. (Blaikie, 1999; Featherstone and Hepworth, 1991; 1995; Ylanne, 2012) Photography and the arts have a more mature approach to representations of ageing femininity (McDonald, 1995). Photographers such as Rosy Martin and Jo Spence (2005) in their work have visually reclaimed women’s experience of the ageing body in its full spectrum forcing the spectator to come to terms with representations of the ageing body often hidden from visual representations. The autobiographical element and the ‘outrageous’ expression of ageing femininity in their work is in the embodiment of gendered age. The aged body is shown ‘naturally and without embarrassment, actively protesting and disobeying the

conventions that stem from this society’s double standard of aging’ (Sontag, 1979: 44; MacDonald, 1995). Of course the pleasure and empowerment deriving from the possibilities of reinventing oneself and preserving a youthful look are undeniable; ‘Today, the surrender to aging no longer has a fixed date’ (Sontag, 1979: 46) and the fluidity of identities and the multitude of possibilities are extending the chronological boundaries of ageing in ways inaccessible to women in the past. The positive evolution of older stereotypes such as the development of romantic potential in representations of older age in Saga remains an important development in the deconstruction of gender categories (Ylanne, 2012). More research is needed to broaden the understanding and design of media strategies that can meet commercial requirements without playing on insecurities and provide more fair and inclusive representations of ageing. Possible avenue for future research could involve participatory visual methods and include ordinary people in the process of creating alternative images of ageing as in the ‘Look at Me! Project ‘led by the University of Sheffield (2011). The challenge of creating positive images of ageing is multifaceted and open to debates but the fashion media can play a major role in influencing what types of information and bodies are valued (Bordo, 2003; Ylanne 2012).

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Appendices

Appendix 1. Pilot A pilot involving respondents from different age groups was conducted online to assess the validity of the the data gathering methodology . This data was not used in the final phase of the analysis but supported the development of the main research hypothesis and validated the findings from secondary sources.

Recording Agreement By completing this questionnaire, you license Antonella Flavia Festa, a student at the London College of Fashion, University of the Arts of London, to copy and use your contribution for the following purposes: 1)

Private Study

Educational use

Publishing

Public Performance

Displays and Exhibitions

To be archived and stored at the London College of Fashion and made available to

future researchers

The online questionnaire is completely anonymous and the purpose of this agreement is to ensure that your answers are used in strict accordance with your wishes.

Appendix 2. Sample Survey Transcript Online survey with anonymous Name of the Interviewee: Anonymous (2012). Date: 26 October 2012 Age: 51-60 Gender: Female Q: Question R: Respondent Q: Do you think old can be beautiful? R:

Agree

Q: There is a lack of inspiring images of aging in media, fashion, and advertising. R:

Agree

Q: What age do you reach your optimal level of style and glamour? R:

There is not an age for being Stylish

Q: What do you associate with Ageing? R:

Wisdom

Q: What do you think is missing in the market that you would like to buy? R: Good quality clothes that fit and don't look like the clothes they expect older people to wear!!!! Q: Senior people are respected and considered as role models R:

Disagree

Q: Are you afraid of getting older? R:

Neither Agree nor Disagree

Q: How do you feel about the clothes shopping experience? R:

A way to spend a pleasant afternoon

Q: Getting older should automatically translate into losing touch with fashion? R:

Strongly Disagree

Q: Images of fashion R:

I feel they are targeted mainly at young people

Q: What kind of representations of women would you prefer to see when looking at adverts? R:

Realistic but aesthetically pleasant

Q: Does looking good also mean feeling good? R:

Strongly Disagree

Q: Do we get happier as we get older?

Agree

Q: Which quality you would prefer in an advert picturing women and why? R:

Honesty - I would like to see more real people in the Media

Q: Who are your favourite style icons and why? R: Joan Collins, Joan Bakewell, Joanna Lumley, - women who just carry on with what they do best, yes they are growing older but they don't allow it to dominate their lives. And also lots of my tennis playing friends - all 60 plus and some nearer eighty but still playing tennis and still looking good. Why stop? What age do you reach your optimal level of style and glamour R: There is not an age for being Stylish. What do you associate with Ageing? R: Wisdom. Q: Do you feel ageing is associated with being â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;invisibleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;? If yes at what age this is likely to happen and what way? R: I think that once women reach 50 it's difficult to feel that anyone looks at them twice. However, occasionally one can be proved wrong - at a concert a few months back a man I had never met told me that I was 'Divine' absolutely divine!!! So there is hope for us all!!!!!! I'm certainly not invisible to my grandchildren or to all my friends or my husband and the others don't really matter. How do you feel about the clothes shopping experience? R: Frustrated, even if you have the money in your hot little hand, the difficulty of buying anything nice is overwhelming. For instance, most dresses for the summer have no sleeves; well most ladies I know over a certain age just don't want to show their upper arms! What do you think about Images of fashion? R: I feel they are targeted mainly at young people Q: Would an advertising campaign using people resembling your age and size make you more likely to purchase that product? If yes why * R: I certainly think it would be nice to see more ads for clothes with people over forty. Come on John Lewis - you sell to lots of older women so use us to advertise your wares. How does aging affect the notion of femininity? R: I think that ageing causes younger people to see us as neither male nor female â&#x20AC;&#x201C; we become non-people.

Q: Which quality you would prefer in an advert picturing women and why? R: Just some normality, attractive normal people modelling smart, wearable clothes that we can all aspire to own. Q: What do you think of women depicted in fashion adverts? R: My daughter modeled on the catwalks for a while and gave up when asked to lose a stone to go to Japan. So I am very anti the androgynous look required by some advertisers. Not only is it dangerous for the young girls but how many people out there are ever going to look like that. I don't want ultra thin models and I don't want equally dangerously, ultra fat models. Just middle of the road - normal models. Q: What do you think about fashion and appearance and ageing in our media dominated society? R: Dreadful, good-looking older women are held up as the exception and there is no value placed on any other quality except looks, age and thinness. Nothing about brains, achievement, kindness, compassion - appalling. I suspect that a lot of people just judge a person 'by their cover' in our society today and fail to realise that it's whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s between the pages that counts. Q: How can the media provide more fair representations of age? R: I think they should work out who it is that has the spending power today and it probably isn't the ultra young, ultra thin. I turn sixty this year and probably have more spending power now than I ever did, so come on advertisers, talk to us â&#x20AC;&#x201C; ask us what we want. Q: How can advertising make age more attractive and appealing? R: Stop calling everyone over sixty a pensioner. These days we probably aren't and we certainly don't feel we are. In fact we probably feel like our grandparents did at forty. Move with the times, treat us like the modern adults we are. We use computers, IPads, mobile phones, drive smart cars, go on lots of lovely holidays so for goodness sake, use your huge advertising power to make us feel that fashion etc., is for the over fifty's as well. You are the ones missing out!!!

Appendix 3. Survey Questions Gender â&#x2014;Ś Female â&#x2014;Ś Male Age 21-30 31-40 41-50 51-60 61-70 71-80 80+ Is ageing a taboo subject? * Strongly Agree; Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree; Disagree; Strongly Disagree Other: Do you think old can be beautiful? Strongly Agree; Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree; Disagree; Strongly Disagree Other: There is a lack of inspiring images of aging in media, fashion, and advertising. Strongly Agree; Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree; Disagree; Strongly Disagree Other: What age do you reach your optimal level of style and glamour? 20-30 30-40 40-50 50+ There is not an age for being Stylish What do you associate with Ageing? Time passing by Gratification Wrinkles Loss Wisdom What do you think is missing in the market that you would like to buy? Senior people are respected and considered as role models Agree; Disagree How do you feel about the clothes shopping experience? Overwhelmed

Excited A necessity A way to spend a pleasant afternoon Other: Getting older should automatically translate into losing touch with fashion? Strongly Agree; Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree; Disagree; Strongly Disagree Other: Images of fashion Make me feel inadequate Make me dream Are informative I feel they are targeted mainly at young people Other: What kind of representations of women would you prefer to see when looking at adverts? Aspirational Young and Beautiful Realistic but aesthetically pleasant People of my age and size Other: Does looking good also mean feeling good? Strongly Agree; Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree; Disagree; Strongly Disagree Other: Do we get happier as we get older? Strongly Agree; Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree; Disagree; Strongly Disagree Other: Do you feel there are many stereotypes about ageing and older people? Strongly Agree; Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree; Disagree; Strongly Disagree Other: Which quality you would prefer in an advert picturing women and why? Honesty - I would like to see more real people in the Media Glamour - I want to be entertained Beauty - I do not want to see wrinkles Other: Who are your favourite style icons and why? Do you feel ageing is associated with being â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;invisibleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;? If yes at what age this is likely to happen and what way? Would an advertising campaign using people resembling your age and size make you more likely to purchase that product? If yes why? 66

How does aging affect the notion of femininity? What do you think of women depicted in fashion adverts? What do you think about fashion and appearance and ageing in our media dominated society? How can the media provide more fair representations of age? How can advertising make age more attractive and appealing?

Appendix 4. Magazineâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Statistics Women's Magazines Monthly Circulation and popularity were some of the parameters used to determine the magazines sampling. Brad monthly guide to advertising media (March, 2012) and the national readership survey (NRS, 2012) are the top two profiling authorities regarding periodicals in the UK. These were consulted in order to select the most appropriate magazines to utilise for the data gathering and analysis phase of this dissertation.

ABC versus NRS In publishing, the main terms used are either circulation (provided by ABC figures) or audience (NRS readership figures). The relationship between readership and circulation is known as readers-per-copy.

NRS Readership (Estimates - Latest 12 Months: January - December 2012) Estimates of average issue readership for the 260 or so titles for which NRS publishes data. These readership figures are for:

All adults (age 15+)

Adults aged 15-34 (15-44 prior to Q3 2012)

Men

Adults aged 35+ (45+ prior to Q3 2012)

Women

Adults in social grades ABC1 Adults in social grades C2DE

UNWEIGHTED SAMPLE

Total

ABC1

C2DE

35974

21558

14416

50620

EST.POPULATION 15+ (000s)

27246

23374

(000s)

Asda Magazine

5821

11.5

2715

10.0

3106

13.3

Sainsbury's Magazine

3319

6.6

2140

7.9

1179

5.0

Waitrose Kitchen

1486

2.9

1182

4.3

305

1.3

Cosmopolitan

1438

2.8

924

3.4

514

2.2

Good Housekeeping

1379

2.7

1006

3.7

373

1.6

Saga Magazine

1375

2.7

1060

3.9

315

1.3

Vogue

1234

2.4

843

3.1

392

1.7

BBC Good Food

1216

2.4

923

3.4

293

1.3

Glamour

1106

2.2

741

2.7

365

1.6

Ideal Home

885

1.7

588

2.2

297

1.3

Weight Watchers Mag

880

1.7

470

1.7

410

1.8

Marie Claire

815

1.6

550

2.0

264

1.1

Elle

794

1.6

515

1.9

279

1.2

Country Living

752

1.5

519

1.9

232

1.0

House & Garden

700

1.4

447

1.6

253

1.1

Woman & Home

694

1.4

467

1.7

227

1.0

Homes & Gardens

685

1.4

483

1.8

202

0.9

Red

539

1.1

393

1.4

146

0.6

Prima

536

1.1

349

1.3

187

0.8

Mother And Baby

512

1.0

229

0.8

283

1.2

Company

504

1.0

348

1.3

157

0.7

House Beautiful

434

0.9

297

1.1

137

0.6

InStyle

372

0.7

255

0.9

117

0.5

25 Beautiful Homes

368

0.7

244

0.9

124

0.5

Candis

367

0.7

216

0.8

151

0.6

Country Homes/Inters

327

0.6

210

0.8

116

0.5

Easy Living

317

0.6

224

0.8

0.4

Delicious

243

0.5

187

0.7

0.2

BBC Homes & Antiques

227

0.4

151

0.6

0.3

Vanity Fair

224

0.4

153

0.6

0.3

Real Homes

221

0.4

137

0.5

0.4

Elle Decoration

199

0.4

129

0.5

0.3

Top Sante

196

0.4

112

0.4

BBC Olive

181

0.4

141

0.5

0.2

R Conley Diet/Fit Mg

178

0.4

122

0.4

0.2

Essentials

168

0.3

113

0.4

0.2

Living etc

163

0.3

130

0.5

0.1

Harper's Bazaar

160

0.3

120

0.4

0.2

Tatler

160

0.3

122

0.4

0.2

Zest

152

0.3

112

0.4

0.2

Period Living

147

0.3

0.4

0.2

Table 1 NRS (2012) Women's Magazines Readership [Online] Available at: http://www.nrs.co.uk/toplinereadership.html (Accessed 10 February 2013).

Women's Magazines UK Circulation and Readership

700,000

Circulation Jun -‐ Dec 2012

600,000 500,000 400,000 300,000 200,000 100,000 0

Figure 7-4 Appendix 4 Circulation Women’s Monthly Magazines UK Jun –Dec 2012 Source: ABC

COSMOPOLITAN Established: 01/3/1972 Price: Single Copy: £3.60, Subscription: £42.00 Editorial Profile: The authority on young women in the UK and around the world. Celebrates fun, glamour and a passion for life and inspires young women to be the best they can be Target Audience: Young, upmarket females and independent readership. Median age: 27 Frequency: Monthly Source: ABC Dates: 01 Jul 2012 - 31 Dec 2012 Total Average Net Circulation: 308,482 Readership Source: NRS Dates: 01 Apr 2011 - 01 Mar 2013 Total Readership ('000):

1,430

Readership/Copy: 4.50 Quarter: Q4 (BRAD, 2013)

GOOD HOUSEKEEPING Established: 01/03/1922 Price: Single Copy: ÂŁ3.80 Editorial Profile: Complete lifestyle magazine focused on home and family. Combines fashion, beauty, homes, gardening, family and health issues with cookery and consumer features, researched and tested in the Good Housekeeping Institute The Good Housekeeping Institute â&#x20AC;&#x201C; a research facility, that allows Good Housekeeping to carry out independent testing on a wide range of consumer goods. Target Audience: ABC 1 Females, aged 25 - 54 Median Age: 52 Source: ABC Dates: 01 Jul 2012 - 31 Dec 2012 Total Average Net Circulation: 409,326 Readership Source: NRS Dates: 01 Apr 2011 - 01 Mar 2013 Total Readership ('000): 1,349 Readership/Copy: 3.00 Quarter: Q4 (BRAD, 2013)

SAGA MAGAZINE Is part of: Saga Publishing Ltd Category: News & Current Affairs Current Affairs, Society & Culture Women Style & Fashion Lifestyle Retirement URL: http://www.saga.co.uk Established: 1984 Price: Subscription: £19.95, Single Copy: £2.50 Editorial Profile: Wide-ranging editorial stance including campaigning for its readers’ rights, specialist consumer columns, general interest and topical editorial content, issues of historical importance, technology and internet, holiday and leisure Target Audience: ABC1 50+ Readership. People in and approaching retirement Frequency: Monthly Source: ABC Dates: 01 Jul 2012 - 31 Dec 2012 Total Average Net Circulation: 591,223 Readership Source: NRS Dates: 01 Apr 2011 - 01 Mar 2013 Total Readership ('000): 1,335 Readership/Copy: 2.20 Quarter: Q4 (BRAD, 2013)

VOGUE Established: 1916 Price: Subscription: ÂŁ27.00, Single Copy: ÂŁ3.99 Editorial Profile: Leading-edge fashion magazine playing a vital part in helping women decide what is the right style, the right colour, and above all the right look Target Audience: Concentrated in the ABC1 20-44 demographic group. A high proportion are in some kind of job or profession and are in the higher income groups Frequency: Monthly Circulation Source: ABC Dates: 01 Jul 2012 - 31 Dec 2012 Total Average Net Circulation: 203,356 Readership Source: NRS Dates: 01 Apr 2011 - 01 Mar 2013 Total Readership ('000): 1,348 Readership/Copy: 7.50 Quarter: Q4 (BRAD, 2013)

Definitions Socio-economic group Socio-economic groups are based on the head of household or chief income earner and are defined as follows: Socio-economic group

Occupation of chief income earner

Higher managerial, administrative or professional

Intermediate managerial, administrative or professional

Supervisory or clerical, and junior managerial, administrative or professional

Skilled manual workers

Semi and unskilled manual workers

All those entirely dependent on the state long term, through sickness, unemployment, old age or other reasons

Retired persons who have a company pension or private pension, or who have private means are graded on their previous occupation. Students in higher education living at home are graded on the occupation of the head of the household. Students living away from home are graded C1 (no account is taken of casual or vacation jobs). (BRAD, 212)