[Michael]

Why what is this you ask? My media presentation meant to go alongside with the rest of my reliable group, unfortunately due to their incompetence and my teachers vendetta against my work it appeared as though my only break at my new job (each day ) was wasted on this pathetic piece of an assignment. You might as well read it, since i only got through three paragraphs before i decided to stop before i bored the brainless failures that shallowly pretend as though they actually care about their education.

Incase you didnt get the drift, i did three pages of high quality work, the rest of my group did one paragraph each, meaning i was apparantly supposed to stand their and read out my essay, giving the group as a whole acclaim. I thought these days of dependancy and complete lazyness where evaporated once you left school and entered the "mature" world that is known at College.

Target Audience: As of the past 10 years there has been a drastic change in the views of men and their role in society. They are now no longer the dominant gender with equality running rife throughout the media as a whole, this has lead not only to more power being diverged towards women but this has actually also allowed men to explore and express more feminine and once considered stereotypically image conscious routes then ever before. A target audience within their mid twenties will have lived through this revolution as a teenager, at which point they are probably most susceptible to media advertising and newly tested out subliminal techniques. By using a combination of figurative techniques in the way that the words are organised and the syntax actually used we can quite clearly delve into how exactly Men’s Health successfully appeals to this more materialistic and status symbol desiring generation. For example the use of exclamatory and imperative sentences creates a successful combined effect of using commanding, and authorial sentences to subliminally entice the reader to purchase this magazine and buy into their ideologies and set of beliefs. Using simplistic, short sentences will little clauses helps the language appeal to an audience who are not necessary well educated but still have dreams of tapping into the magazines ideas. Powerful emotive verbs and personal pronouns are used to make the magazine appear much more inclusive and personal. Again this could possibly attract those who where originally not intending to the purchase the magazine; but were subliminally over thrown by the magazines promotional tactics. By using monosyllabic and colloquial terms this helps appeal to a reader on a more local and personal level, this is the sort of terminology which has often been used in similarly marketed female magazines such as Cosmopolitan which has proved successful in infiltrating mass audiences. Capitalisation is used throughout in the subheadings to create the idea that the magazine has an epic stance of importance and urgency. By making the magazine appear epic in quality and stature this entices the reader to supports its beliefs as they will assume that they are well founded and appropriate to them. The use of a bold, simple, organised font face appeals to a masculine audience who would also find this text easy and appropriate to read again this would appeal to a less educated audience yet still has an element of organisation and predictable which would stereotypically be associated with a higher audience class of ABs. The Effects: By presenting images of what the magazine considers masculine perfection alongside images of powerful status symbols and higher class goods such as watches and perfume helps the user juxtapose between the ideology that upon buying into this ideology of looking good and dominating your time to achieving this god-like status you will also, in turn, achieve a high quality lifestyle where you would be able to purchase these excessive items of materialistic value. A major effect of Men’s Health has been to create a whole new market targeted at young males with interests of a sexual, physical and materialistic nature. Magazines such as “Loaded”, “Nuts” and “FHM” could have in many ways accredited their existence to the success and the ground-breaking ideologies that Men’s Health distributed. That without attaining this physical state that is so often repeated throughout the magazine you will be unhappy, unsuccessful and will be unable to enjoy life like those featured in the magazine and its excessive advertisements appear to do. By repeating these images of unattainable bodies and masculine attributes over a long extended period of time, the target audience for Men’s Health will slowly begin to assume that this is the normal excepted convention of how people are to look, behave and have interests in. Although there may be a very definite effect on the target audience as a whole the magazines ideologies will most likely not have an effect on the media audience as a whole. For example in the essentially every single page there is an advertisement featuring essentially the same diversification of an attractive male adorning cultural status symbols; this is indoctrinating the audience into change their views of what is socially accepted within society. In this Dolce and Gabbana advertisement for example there is the showcasing of gender equality alongside the powerful status symbols of watches which are persistently showcased throughout this magazine are creating a link that without the watch you are not getting the full experience, that it is no longer necessary to have a good physical appearance; and by repeating and juxtaposing these two elements together successfully informs the reader of the pilgrim which awaits them. In the front cover of the Men’s Health magazine features a model who successfully embodies and encompasses what Men’s Health ideologies are; because he, himself is considering a perfect representation of what a Men’s Health reader should appear like. He is showcased as an item of desire not only to the female population but also the male population because he showcases all the attributes that the readers of this magazine would not doubt endlessly strive to attain. By altering the lightness, and the saturation to reflect the colour scheme of the front page layout this helps the reader make the assumption that this model is connected to Men’s Health and supports its ideology that all men should look this way. This also makes the model appear somewhat distant from you, since he isn’t in full colour makes it appear as though without this magazine you will be unable to live your life optimally and in full colour; this entices the target audience to partake within the values which the model and the front page layout so clearly exude. Strellson: This advertisement successfully juxtaposes the themes of success and a good fashionable image together via a series of subtle subliminal representations used to appeal specifically towards the magazines target audience. By presenting a confident, powerful and dominant male in theme position in the advertisement, this helps to increase the effect of the ideology being relayed to the viewer that becoming a pilgrim in this seemingly endless task of attaining the unattainable in a self-idealized, stereotyped view of what all males should look like. With the model adorning clothing stereotypically unified to that which a businessman would way this adds a sense of power and authority not only to the product but the magazine itself too. The setting of the advertisement appears very suburban as though this is filmed in a back street or alley way, the use of this allows the reader to denote that using this product will ensure you yield success and generate a powerful image without sacrificing street credibility, or your social class status which may be highly valued by the readership of Men’s Health. Chanel: By presenting the model in black and white in this advertisement this successfully stimulates the reader into creating the assumption that this product is in someway affiliated and generally associated with the ideologies and values in which Men’s Health portray. This is because in the front page of the magazine a similar monochrome colour setting has clearly been adopted to showcase how the two are interlinked with one another. Although the product being advertised is a fragrance the use of the watch which is placed in horizontal alignment with the fragrance for added effect creates the generalized assumption of power; this generates an authorial tone and style to the advertisement and its overall image, since this values are symbolic of watches. By Chanel creating the assumption of power and success this is clearly reflecting upon how Men’s Health promotes the ideology that by purchasing into their dream and design of masculine perfection you will become powerful and successful. These are all attributes generally associated with the model in this advertisement.

Sorry that there isnt a scanned image of this magazine for you to view.
But we arent all rich multi-media moguls with that sort money to through around.

[Hector]

Lolz, Mike got used.

[+ Ryan]

Originally Posted By: Michael Why what is this you ask? My media presentation meant to go alongside with the rest of my reliable group, unfortunately due to their incompetence and my teachers vendetta against my work it appeared as though my only break at my new job (each day ) was wasted on this pathetic piece of an assignment. You might as well read it, since i only got through three paragraphs before i decided to stop before i bored the brainless failures that shallowly pretend as though they actually care about their education. Incase you didnt get the drift, i did three pages of high quality work, the rest of my group did one paragraph each, meaning i was apparantly supposed to stand their and read out my essay, giving the group as a whole acclaim. I thought these days of dependancy and complete lazyness where evaporated once you left school and entered the "mature" world that is known at College. Sorry that there isnt a scanned image of this magazine for you to view. But we arent all rich multi-media moguls with that sort money to through around.

Been down that road too many times, Mike. Sorry to hear it.