Same Topic, Different Treatment

An Analysis of The Sun Newspaper, Total Film Magazine and Woman Magazine

For this essay I shall be comparing and contrasting magazine and newspaper articles from three genres. I have used a gossip piece from The Sun newspaper, a real-life story from Woman magazine and an interview from Total Film magazine. I shall be identifying various parts of the construction of a newspaper and magazine to identify how the producers of the publications try to entice their target audience into purchasing their newspaper and magazines and to read specific articles and stories.

All newspapers and magazines aim their publications at a specific target audience. This however, does not mean that the readership is only from the target audience and, can and usually is, across the entire social demographic spectrum. Target audiences are used so that the publishers of the magazine or newspaper can successfully market their product. Target audiences are also very important for the advertisers to know who they are directing their products and services to.

The target audience for my three examples are as follows:

Publication	Social Group	Sex	Age
The Sun	C2DE	Male	25-34
Woman	C2DE	Female	25-34 / 34-35
Total Film	C1C2	Male	25-34

The target audience can be identified by numerous factors contained in the articles including language and writing style, page furniture, page layout and conventions as well as technical and symbolic codes.

For example the language and writing style in The Sun is written in short concise sentences which are easy to read and the terminology used is simple and concise. This is because the target audience are made up from the C2DE social group, as shown in the table above, of men aged 25-34. The majority of readers from this newspaper are working class and therefore may not have had the education to read articles of a more intellectual standard. The Sun have also used numerous primary sources such as the quotation of Valeria Lukyanova saying: “This pleases me because a doll is an image of an ideal woman. Nobody would mind being compared to a doll.” Using quotes is a good way for The Sun to communicate to its readers as many people that they interview will also be of a similar social background.

The article written for Total Film magazine has used numerous secondary sources which is information gathered from other sources that may or may not be verified. The language used is fairly sophisticated and this is evident by the use of the words such as “obliterated”, “daubed” and the way the sentences are structured. This quote is a good example; “Shooting in Cambodia set her on a philanthropic path that ultimately saw her appointed a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)…” The target audience of this publication are from the C1C2 demographic, in which people from this demographic, may have attended educational institutions than those of state education stature.

Woman magazine has used an article written in the First Person tense. The narrator tells her story impartially allowing the reader of this article to make their own choices and decisions on the content. The story has been written as if the narrator is telling a story to a friend.  For example, a quote from the article reads: “I’ve known Grace since I first met my husband Rick, when my sister married his brother in 1976.” Like The Sun the target audience, due to the social demographic, may have not had the education to read more intellectual articles.

The images used in this article by The Sun are predominantly to attract the ‘male gaze’ of its readership by using numerous images of the “pretty” woman. The slim, blonde with big boobs is an iconography of what society would deem as a “beautiful woman”. Many photos carry a caption to briefly describe what is going on in the scene. The producers of this article have simply introduced the people as their “characters”. By using the phrase “Almost lifelike…” it adds a witty connotation to amuse it’s readership by suggesting they’re not real people. The Sun often uses images and the use of captions to tell the reader the story. Many readers of The Sun would prefer visuals rather than large amounts of text to read.

Although not featured on my annotation sheet Total Film has used a whole page to feature an image of Angelina Jolie. This gives a visual attachment to the article so that Angelina Jolie fans are engaged into reading the article and also to stop those who maybe flicking through the magazine quickly, for example in a dentist waiting room, as like The Sun, using the ‘male gaze’.

For the article in Woman magazine the producers have decided to go with just two images that feature the woman that this article is about. This gives the audience a “connection” with the person which this story is about. The caption for these photographs tells you who the people are whilst giving basic information about them to the reader. For example; Liz Pugh, 56, lives in Cockfosters, north London, with her husband Rick, 62, and his mother Grace, 82. This information doesn’t feature in the article and it is used to give some background information so the reader can relate to the people the story is about.

Page 25 of The Sun, where the article I am referencing was taken from, is littered with numerous amounts of page furniture. These include; headlines, strap-lines, photographs, captions, by-line and the exclusive banner. The page furniture also includes a box-out, a stand-first, a sidebar and some credits. By using this amount of page furniture serves two purposes. One method is used to direct the reader to specific stories on any particular page and the other purpose is to direct readers to certain areas of the page. Because of the amount of page furniture and they layout of the page furniture the articles are smaller. Therefore the reader can go directly to the small articles and read them in short bite-sized segments as it may be deemed that readers of The Sun may not have the attention span or the interest in longer articles.

The page furniture on page 116 of Total Film, again which I am referencing to, is limited to just a few elements. They have included the credits of the author of the article and the photographer of the portrait of Angelina Jolie that accompanies the story. The producers of this print media text have also used a green bar next to the start of the aritcle, which acts as a hook. By limiting the amount of page furniture it gives more room on the page to dedicate the article to. In this instance it is a question and answer piece and as the article is a spread covering six pages it connotes the importance, fame or notoriety of the person being interviewed. The limited amount of page furniture used helps to endorse the article as a written piece.

Woman magazine has a moderate amount of page furniture as shown on page 17 of the publication. Surprisingly they have managed to include a headline, a strap-line, a box-out, photographs, captions, a hook, a lure, and credits whilst also devoting much of the page to written text to tell the story to the reader. They have been able to do this by the use of carefully constructing the page layout to utilise this page furniture in an effective manner without making the page looking too busy. Two of the page furniture the producers of this publication have used includes a lure and a box-out. The lure, which in this case is a quote from the narrator of the story which says: “We’ve got our own set of house rules!”. This is used as a “taster” to tempt the reader to read more of the article to find out what the house rules are. The box-out is used on the right hand side of the article, shaded in blue, gives information the magazines want to draw the reader’s attention to that is in relation to the story.

The news agenda of newspapers and magazine are determined by two factors. One is that if a story is repeated enough as follow-on stories it becomes important in the agenda of the public. The other is dependant on the positioning of the story within the publication. If a story appears on the front page of a newspaper it would be deemed that story as the most important for that day. It could then be deemed that the further a story appears in the paper the less important that story is regardless of the content of the story or what they story maybe about. Often The Sun will feature a story of a celebrity on their front page and more pressing matters for example social issues may feature further in the newspaper. Of course, other newspapers will have different agendas and this will be reflected by the same stories featuring in different positions within the paper or publications.

The article in The Sun about the ‘human dolls’ features on page twenty-five of a 56-page publication. This connotes that the story is not particularly important on this occasion in relation to the publisher’s news agenda. However, the remainder of the newspaper in this particular edition does contain numerous stories of celebrities or storyline of famous TV shows which is why the story may have appeared on this particular day.

It could be argued however that on occasions an article may feature later in a publication as part of its agenda. If we take the article featuring the interview of Angelina Jolie in Total Film magazine as an example, this article is the last major article before advertisements, movie reviews and smaller written pieces. It could be argued that, despite the article being on page 116 of a 150-page magazine, the article which is a spread over six pages, is would remain at the forefront of the readers mind for longer. This is because, and it is mentioned at the end of the article, the release of the film Angelina Jolie is directing, try to ensure that the movie buffs that read this article either go and see the movie or talk about it to their peers to spread the awareness of the film.

Woman magazine features their article on page 17 of the magazine, after two celebrity articles, one about a celebrity divorce and one leaving a TV show where the actor describes that she is leaving “lifelong friends”. This more positive article is placed before another feel-good article. Both of which are placed within the magazine before numerous pages of advertisements. Possibly this may be an attempt to make their readership feel more positive when looking at the advertisements as the advertisers pay lots of money to feature in magazines.

Publications such as newspapers and magazines follow technical and symbolic codes. This is done in the form of the page layout and the use of the semiotics within the page. The page layout of The Sun is fairly basic. They have used a large image to cover the vast majority of the page and within that they have added the other page furniture in relation to the story. A slither on the left hand side of the page is taken up by the use of a side bar containing one short article, an article shorter still and a smaller article that contains only 22-words. This sidebar also contains and advertisement of a competition which is run by the newspaper where readers can enter to win a Goody Bag worth £100. What The Sun has made excellent use of however is the semiotics of this page. By using red font to print the headline “Human Dolls go to War” connotes that there has been a huge argument or something more sinister to engage the reader. They have also used a photographic image of the “warring” couple in front of a red curtain. This makes the reader indentify with who article is about.

Pink has also been used and this is denoted by the colour of the bikini on the model Valeria Lukyanova who features in this article. The producers of this text have ensured that in the two images that feature a Barbie doll are also adorned in pink outfits. In addition the producers of this article have used other images of the model dressed in lighter clothing which brings the reader full circle and back to the article.

The Sun has also made use of the colour blue within their semiotics. In the main image we can see the blue skies and blue sea of the beach scene image. The colour of the gentlemen ‘Ken’ is wearing a blue shirt and his blazer jacket is a darker shade of blue. This links Ken to the article also but what is interesting is the advertisement about the £100 Goody Bag is on a blue background. This entices the reader to the side bar on the page possibly, not only to take an interest in the £100 Goody Bag, but also to read the articles above and below it.

As the article in Total Film magazine is predominantly a written text nearly all of page 116 in this publication is written text. The first half of the page is written in a larger font to use as one of the three hooks to capture the reader’s eye. Hooks are used to engage the reader to specific part of the article or gives a brief annotate from it. The first is the used of bold lettering of Angelina Jolie giving her importance and also showing her empowerment. The second is the green text quoting the words of the celebrity. By quoting her and using a different font colour connotes that what she is saying is important. By using the green bar next to the start of the article seemingly takes the reader effortlessly into the article. The second half of the page which is the beginning of the article is written in three columns such as that in newspapers as it makes it much easier for the reader to read the article. It is also gives editors much more control in preventing stray images or texts that may confuse the reader. The layouts of newspaper and magazines are produced around grids as if they are in an imaginary square or rectangle.

This explains how Woman magazine has been able to produce their article with the page furniture that they have used. Within the rectangular shape of the page across the top there is another rectangular shape containing the headline and next to it the main image that accompanies the story, which includes the caption, in a slightly squarer shape with a smaller square with another image slightly below. Another rectangular shape contains the written text of the article and within that the text surrounds an un-bordered square. This square contains the lure which is in blue, the same colour as the background and, as previously explained in the analysis of The Sun’s semiotics, links the story from the reader back to the narrator as she is dressed in blue attire. Also a box-out to the right of the story is also in blue.

In analysing the numerous ways that producers try to entice their target audience to purchase their publications I conclude that different strategies are used to enable this to happen. Writing in particular styles and the language and terminology used not only identifies the type of readership of that publication but also helps the consumer identify what they wish to read in relation to their ideologies. Different publications will have variant amounts of written text to cater for their target readership based on their social demographic and the educational status. More photographs are used in publications aimed at the C2DE social demographic to help tell the story more than publications aimed at social groups higher in the social system. But all publications use semiotics to ensure that the reader not only reads that article but to maintain enough interest so that they keep turning the page to read the rest of the publication.