Teen Vogue: background reading
1) What was the article that announced Teen Vogue as a more serious, political website – with 1.3m hits and counting?
Lauren Duca, a Teen Vogue contributing editor and award-winning writer for the likes of Vice and the New Yorker. “To gaslight is to psychologically manipulate a person to the point where they question their own sanity, and that’s precisely what Trump is doing to this country,” Duca wrote, summing up with the rallying cry to: “Refuse to accept information simply because it is fed to you, and don’t be afraid to ask questions.” This is solid advice for any teen at any point in history; but in the era of “alternative facts”, it is also, she noted, “the base level of what is required of all Americans”.
2) When was the original Teen Vogue magazine launched and what was its original content?
Launched in 2004 as a little sister to US Vogue, Teen Vogue used to focus on the standard cocktail of fashion must-haves and celebrity worship. (A classic coverline from a 2005 edition was How To Get Perfect Party Hair.)
3) How did editor Elaine Welteroth change Teen Vogue’s approach in 2015?
With the new August 2015 issue, the team, including then beauty editor Welteroth, engineered a shift. That issue featured three unknown black models on the cover, seemingly breaking all the rules (that you should have a famous person; and that having no Caucasian faces on the cover is a commercial risk).
4) How many stories are published on Teen Vogue a day? What topics do they cover?
This morning’s stories (the team publishes between 50 and 70 a day) present a typically mixed bag of fashion, entertainment and current affairs. Today’s hits are already at over 700k, with What Donald Trump Lied About This Week performing particularly well; there’s also a personal essay on the chemicals in hair relaxant, a roundup of Models Turning 19 Today, a story about Isis recruiting potential terrorists through social media, and an analysis of why Melania Trump chose to wear red for her first post-inauguration appearance.
5) What influence did digital director Phillip Picardi have over the editorial direction?
The editorial meeting is led by 25-year-old digital director Phillip Picardi. Picardi is dressed in slim-fit jeans and a navy shirt by Dries van Noten, his boyband looks dominated by luminous, aquamarine eyes. .Changing the editorial direction meant diversifying the backgrounds of the people in our newsroom.
6) What is Teen Vogue’s audience demographic and what does ‘woke’ refer to?
the team is a reflection of the title’s demographic, which “ages up”, in the words of Welteroth; in other words, they’re not all teens. “Our sweet spot is 18-24,” she tells me. Also describing her readership as “genderless”, she explains that “it’s more about a sensibility. This is somebody who is sophisticated, conscious. We say ‘woke’ here. We’re a woke brand, and our readers are woke, too.”
7) What issues are most important to Teen Vogue readers?
“Identity is big. We want to help make them feel better about themselves, whether that’s giving beauty tips, or empowering them with political information to have smarter conversations and feel they can stand up for themselves.” Career advice “is an evergreen topic”; above all, “young people are craving something real, craving authenticity”.
8) What does Tavi Gevinson suggest regarding the internet and ‘accountability culture’ with regards to modern audiences? Can you link this to our work on Clay Shirky?
She believes the internet has created an “accountability culture”, where the relationship with readers is closer and more transparent, and says brands have had to respond to that. “It is in their best interest to subvert expectations of teen girl magazines,”. It can link to Clay Shirky, as it Teen Vogue was a platform to communicate and create idea and arguments.
9) What social and political issues have been covered successfully by Teen Vogue?
In the wake of a summer of social and political unrest, Trump’s election created something of a perfect storm for Picardi’s new political agenda; the Teen Vogue news desk had already caused a stir with strong coverage of the Dakota Access pipeline protests and the Black Lives Matter movement. Instead of merely reporting them, Picardi says, they try to figure out what their readers will care about the most, and this often means finding the personal interest angle. One of the first stories Picardi went big on was the case of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died of spinal injuries following a brief (unwarranted) stint in police custody. “Black male teens are 21 times as likely to be killed by police than their white counterparts – 21 times. Can you imagine that?” ran the opening paragraph. “Think about your brothers, cousins, fathers
10) What do Teen Vogue readers think of the magazine and website?
16-year-old Paige Wagner, who says truthfulness and trust are the main reasons she reads it, since “most of what I read on social media is unreliable”. For her, “The recent presidential election brought to the surface a lot of important issues that weren’t getting as much attention as they should have: women’s rights, LGBTQ+ community rights, immigration.” Like many young people, Wagner is galvanised by the election, in which she saw “a complete misrepresentation of the younger generation. It’s important now to educate young minds so they can form a political identity.
Teen Vogue: Factsheet Part 1
1) The Factsheet suggests Teen Vogue has successfully made the transition to an online, social and participatory product. Why? What platforms is it now available on?
It has made a successful transition due to Teen Vogue design and new ideology following on online platforms and articles. They have adapted to the new generation of rebellious teens facing social and political issues in this decade. And with articles which cause stirs and makes the audience question and get educated about social and political issues. It attracts more viewers and sets them up for the future. Teen Vogue can be found on every major online platform. Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter.
2) Look at the screenshots and details on pages 3-4 of the Factsheet. What does Teen Vogue offer its audience?
Teen Vogue online media and presence offers education throught their articles and a ideology to be promoted to their targeted audience. In their online platforms they focus on the latest trends and issues, which links to their articles. It gives a mix of fashion, entertainment and current affairs. insight, the contemporary approach is diverse, political and critically engaged. Where as a previous fashion story would focus on the visual aspirational values (Style Secrets from Music’s Coolest Girls) now readers are offered a more diverse representation.
3) Who is the typical Teen Vogue reader?
The reader of TeenVogue in traditional terms is the 18-24 demographic, millennials with an interest in popular culture, current affairs and issues of identity and lifestyle.
4) Read the content analysis of the Teen Vogue website on page 5 of the Factsheet. Pick out three key examples of how meanings are created in Teen Vogue and what is communicated to the audience.
The background is white, with a black and red colour palette. It’s not ‘horror movie’ black, red, white, but more akin to inews.co.uk or The Spectator in its use of colour. This use of news website convention adds validity to the shift in focus of TeenVogue’s reporting. Here the conventions of news sites are encoded to position the audience to take that preferred reading (Hall).
The site has continued to evolve, with the menu tabs moving from ‘fashion, entertainment, beauty, my life, wellness, prom’ (2016) to ‘style, politics, culture, identity’. This change reflects the brand’s shift, and acts as a signifier of the ideological stance of TeenVogue.
The website is the where the most political content is published within the TeenVogue ‘universe’. The site combines both news and lifestyle webpage conventions. We could argue that TeenVogue is a postmodern text, using a bricolage of existing media products
5) Finally, look at pages 6-7 focusing on representations. What range of representations can be found in Teen Vogue and what does this suggest regarding Teen Vogue's values and ideologies?
We can see that TeenVogue are offering a range of representations. We see cultural stereotype portrayed in a positive way in the way images are mediated for various stories. For example, the report on 7 Young Activists uses indexical signs to encode the ‘activist’ narrative, the denim jacket and pin badges, megaphone, Capitol Hill building in the background. This image of the teen girl alone could be open to interpretation, however the syntagm of the three images positions the audience to decode a position representation. TeenVogue does offer a selective representation to both appeal to their intended audience, but also to challenge the dominant ideology – the establishment. There a number of articles that criticise or highlight problems with President Donald Trump’s behaviour, policies, finances, associates, social media. A search on TeenVogue using term ‘Donald Trump’ throws up a wide range of articles that construct representation of Trump that seeks to undermine his position. In this way, TeenVogue seek to destabilise the dominant ideology and challenge the hegemonic media coverage that Trump commands through his unconventional approach to politics.
Teen Vogue textual analysis and example articles
Homepage analysis
1) What website key conventions can you find on the Teen Vogue homepage?
Teen Vogue uses different key conventions to entice users to click on different articles. They split up articles into different categories to what they article is related to. Different categories like identity, culture, politics and style. They use big pictures and "clickbait" titles to make viewers click on different articles.
2) How does the page design encourage audience engagement?
The home page is designed to reveal first big pictures and titles to reveal their main stories. And other articles that aren't that of importance are smaller with less quality on the title. The more you scroll down, the more you can see different articles to different topics and advertisement and newsletter signups.
3) Where does advertising appear on the homepage?
Once you enter the website, A banner of ads appears on the top of the screen below the search bar and categories. Once you start to scroll down, advertisements can follow you scrolling down or pop-up in the middle and on the bottom of the page.
4) What are the items in the top menu bar and what does this tell you about the content of Teen Vogue?
Style, Politics, Culture, Identity and Summit. Teen Vogue tries to change its content to fit into the new generation. These contents shows that Teen Vogues supports the 'woke' ideology. They shift their content to fit more then fashion, but to add different radical topics to fit in with the rebellious leading young females of today.
5) How far does the homepage scroll down? How many stories appear on the homepage in total?
The more you scroll down, the more diverse the articles and stories get. You get a range of different topics that fits in the Teen Vogue new identity. There is a total of 28 stories.
Lifestyle section
1) What are the items in the top menu bar for the Lifestyle section?
Health, Sex and Relationship, Wellness, Horoscope, Lifestyle, Voices
2) How is the Lifestyle section designed to encouragement audience engagement? Think about page design, images, text and more.
There are 2 main headers that are spread out through the page. It uses big images and enticing 'clickbait' titles to attract the viewers. Then the other articles on the web page are mainly about tips and tricks you could use on your daily life, which could attract viewers because they can relate to the article they desire.
3) What do you notice about the way headlines are written in Teen Vogue?
Headlines are in bold text to catch the eyes of readers. As well as using 'clickbait' titles.
4) What does the focus on education, university and ‘campus life’ tell you about the Teen Vogue audience demographics and psychographics?
It shows that Teen Vogue is willing to appeal to the older audience, instead of young aspiring female teenagers..
5) Choose one story featured in the Lifestyle section and explain how reflects the Teen Vogue brand.
The Only Dorm Room Checklist You Need - by Kate Dwyer. This again relates to question 4 as it reflects Teen Vogue motive to change the brand identity and focus on the future of the brand. Trying to relate with the audience to gain more readers.
Teen Vogue: Five key articles
1) What do you notice about the content and style of these articles? What do they have in common?
This article all have in common of including controversial topics. For example two of the articles speaks about Trump. Since Teen Vogue takes more of a liberal position this is not surprising. However, it is surprising coming from Teen Vogue, which nobody expects since Teen Vogue has an identity of representing fashion for adolescent teens, instead of these radical arguments.
2) How do the articles use narrative to engage the reader? Try and apply narrative theory here if possible - what makes the reader want to click or read more?
We can use Barth & Katz narrative theory. Different factors like personal identity, security and relationships make the narrative an engaging experience with the reader and educate the growing young female population.
3) Pick a quote from each article that illustrates the political, 'woke' ideology of Teen Vogue and paste it here.
Donald Trump is gaslighting America - "so presumably that's another red-herring lie to distract from Trump treating the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States like it is some rogue blogger to be cast to the trolls. A foreign government's interference in our election is a threat to our freedom"
the New Face of teen activism - "With an estimated two in five young adults engaging with social issues online, we've entered into the age of digital activism"
Black teens have been fighting for gun reform for years - "Students from Stoneman Douglas responded powerfully to the loss of life in displays of courage that exemplified what kids are capable of."
Netflix and strong female leads - "Most of the time women are put in a category," Logan Browning of Dear White People explained at a recent Netflix press panel. "If you're prim and proper, you're 'good.' If you have a little sass about you, then you... 'have daddy issues,’” she adds as an example. "People like to label women and put them in two categories."
how to break away from the gender binary - "Stop labeling gender at birth"
4) What effect on the audience are these articles hoping to achieve?
To educate the new generation. This was stated in the media kit for Teen Vogue. Their mission to educate the new leaders of the world. So I believe that they want to bring these controversial topics to their readers so in the future, topics like these can be discussed openly and be shared amongst us.
5) How do these article reflect the values and ideologies of the modern Teen Vogue?
These articles reflect that Teen Vogue is shifting to fit with the new generation. Hiring new creative directors and staff to make it work. It trends towards the 'woke' ideology and hoping that it could make things comfortable in the future.
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