Evaluation - Question Two

"How does your media product represent particular social groups?"

There are many social groups within society such as ethnicity and class, with my product addressing certain social groups and representing them in several ways.

I have not represented any ethnicity other than white-British, which shows that my genre of magazine is dominated by this ethnicity. However, I have only used images of two bands; this therefore could represent that other bands are of another ethinicity but it is not clearly stated. The white-British ethinicity is shown to be powerful as they model on the front is from this ethnic group, along with being successful, as I have shown all the bands to be very successful.

There is a large difference in the gender gap between men and women; all the images I use are of males. This represents the fact that the genre I am writing about is male dominated. I have mentioned women on my front cover and contents page; however, as there are no images of these women, I have shown how they are not as powerful as the men, it could also be interpreted that they are almost "invisible" within the genre. I have used positive language when I am referring to the male bands/artists e.g."sensation" and "legendary", this represents the fact that males are successful and happy in their life. In contrast, when referring to the women I use less positive words, such as "hell" and "wild child", this shows the women to be rebellious, and seem less like role models as the males seem.

I have shown there to be a variety of age within the artists featured in my magazine, however the main age group I focus on is the teenage age range. My double page spread is on a group of teenagers who have just become famous within the music scene; I have shown them in a positive light. I have shown them to be dedicated to studies, "We said we'd finish this year off, something to fall back on...." along with have a  "feet on the ground" attitude, "We know who we are, we're not going to just lose ourselves..." This shows how mature they are for there age. The following are some of the photos that accompony the article:

These show the different attitudes of teenages; we are shown a typical "moody" shot of the model, he represents the stereotype of teenagers, and shows how society deems all teenagers to be, this image represents the whole teenage population, however by having the text accompying it, we are shown how teenagers are not only moody, they can be positive and not always the "bad" people they are usually represented as.

The other image shows the model looking coy, this could show how teenagers are awkward and embarrased at a young age, and are dealing with identity and other issues, looking away from the camera shows how they are not also full frontal.

I have spoken about young adults within my magazine, but not in great detail, with statements showing how they are much more rebellious, and "off the rails". This is showing this age range to be quite irresponsible, and not as mature as stereotypically they could be seen. I have also used words such as "legendary" when talking about a band who have had a decade apart (this shows they are of an older age), which shows that being of a slightly older age is not a negative thing.

As the above images show, along with the image on the contents page show that class is not dealt with in my magazine, as the clothes are quite casual, and the surroundings are neutral, showing no particular economic group divisions within the magazine.