Q2) How does your media product represent particular social groups?

My target audience are teenage girls over the age of 14. As such, the magazine follows typical teenage girl conventions in a pop magazine. This includes an advertisement of clothes, a quiz of some description, usually either testing their knowledge of something or to help them discover what kind of guy would suit them. The colour scheme of pink, baby blue, white and black are quite feminine colours, and the backgrounds are usually block colours, so that the text is easy to read. The models used are within the target audience age, and are dressed fashionably in order to encourage readers to dress similarly. In addition, the 'celebrity' being interviewed is also offering fashion advice. Abigail also never looks at the camera directly, giving some hints of modestly that readers should try to replicate. The simple colour scheme also reflects how their own wardrobe should be simple and fit a single style, instead of being varied. The colour scheme is very feminist, with baby blue and pink, showing that readers are very 'girly' and are completely stereotypical of the age I'm targeting. There are also ways for the audience to influence the magazine, such as the Ensemble of the Month competition and the Fan Mail section. This will keep readers occupied, with something different every month. It will also advertise the appropriate style that the readers should be following, because they are reading this magazine. In the general media, teenage girls are often portrayed to be one of two extremes. There are the intelligent girls who care about there education, and are normally not socially accepted. The other group are the girls that only care about their appearance and getting social acceptance, using through boyfriends and being anti-school. There are an increasing number of teenage girls taking their own life through events that take place on social media sites, the most recent case being 15 year old Tallulah Wilson, who killed herself towards the end of January 2014. When I searched 'teenage girls' on the Daily Mail website, the most relevant articles were mainly related to the many health problems that teenage girls face, making them appear very vulnerable to the mass audience. On the BBC News website, when I typed the same thing in, the main stories were about sex offenders, health and eating disorders that affect young teenage girls. On the Guardian website, the main articles were about how teenage girls are groomed by society, and their opinion on certain pop stars such as Miley Cyrus. The main theme, and therefore representation is one of vulnerability and the easiness of convincing young teenagers to do something that they wouldn't normally do. They are seen as weak and unable to take care of themselves.

In this image (From the Guardian article Sex, Lies and Teenage Girls), all of the pictured girls are seen to have the same style of clothing (short shorts, t-shirts and flip-flops), the same hairstyle and all of them on their mobile phones. This shows them to be detached from the real world. To counter this sexual stereotype in my magazine, the photography shows Abigail to be modestly dressed in comparison. This shows the responsibility I feel towards my target audience of teenage girls that they do not have to wear revealing clothes in order to be accepted into society. My photography therefore shows a more positive side to a teenage girls wardrobe.