Greek men’s and women’s magazines as codes of gender conduct
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Ourania Hatzidaki
Abstract
This chapter reports on a data-driven contrastive study of Greek men’s and women’s lifestyle magazines. Integrating methodologies of corpus linguistics and critical discourse analysis, it explores the hypothesis that, despite their apparently dichotomic gender-oriented differentiation, these two types of publication bear fundamental discoursal and ideological similarities. The initial quantitative (n-gram-based) analysis of the two corpora reveals an equally striking prominence of the power-expressing feature of deontic modality in both men’s and women’s magazines. The in-depth qualitative (concordance-based) analysis of the instances of deonticity demonstrates that magazine texts systematically simulate and creatively rearticulate a multitude of recognizable voices of authority of the public and private spheres (e.g. official institutions, professional experts, educators, parents and older relatives, lovers, friends), seamlessly incorporating the relevant styles and registers (e.g. information leaflet, instructions manual, self-help book, teacher scolding, parent counseling, lover’s reprimand, friend’s mock-impolite criticism, etc.) in the magazines’ proposed life scripts. The relentlessly regulative tone is invariably mitigated by the implication that the rules posed are for the benefit of the reader. It appears that the extensive appropriation of canonistic discourses and their skillful and imaginative hybridisation with other replicated non-regulative genres and registers renders deontic modality a powerful rhetorical instrument for effectively conveying gender-differential and other crucial (e.g. consumerist/commercial, political) messages in both types of lifestyle magazines.
Abstract
This chapter reports on a data-driven contrastive study of Greek men’s and women’s lifestyle magazines. Integrating methodologies of corpus linguistics and critical discourse analysis, it explores the hypothesis that, despite their apparently dichotomic gender-oriented differentiation, these two types of publication bear fundamental discoursal and ideological similarities. The initial quantitative (n-gram-based) analysis of the two corpora reveals an equally striking prominence of the power-expressing feature of deontic modality in both men’s and women’s magazines. The in-depth qualitative (concordance-based) analysis of the instances of deonticity demonstrates that magazine texts systematically simulate and creatively rearticulate a multitude of recognizable voices of authority of the public and private spheres (e.g. official institutions, professional experts, educators, parents and older relatives, lovers, friends), seamlessly incorporating the relevant styles and registers (e.g. information leaflet, instructions manual, self-help book, teacher scolding, parent counseling, lover’s reprimand, friend’s mock-impolite criticism, etc.) in the magazines’ proposed life scripts. The relentlessly regulative tone is invariably mitigated by the implication that the rules posed are for the benefit of the reader. It appears that the extensive appropriation of canonistic discourses and their skillful and imaginative hybridisation with other replicated non-regulative genres and registers renders deontic modality a powerful rhetorical instrument for effectively conveying gender-differential and other crucial (e.g. consumerist/commercial, political) messages in both types of lifestyle magazines.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Gender imbalances revisited 1
-
Part I. Patriarchy and emancipation in private spaces
- “He beat her so hard she fell head over heels” 17
- The discursive construction of gender among Dholuo speakers in Kenya 49
- Snippa – a new word for girls’ genitals in Swedish 69
- What it means to be a Bosnian woman 81
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Part II. Mediating gender in public spaces
- Greek men’s and women’s magazines as codes of gender conduct 113
- Representation of desire and femininity 145
- Gendered discourse(s) 169
- Gender ideologies in the Vietnamese printed media 195
-
Part III. Trajectories of patriarchy and emancipation across professions
- Constructing masculine work identity through narrative 219
- Stereotyping gender 249
- Living in therapeutic culture 273
- Index 303
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Gender imbalances revisited 1
-
Part I. Patriarchy and emancipation in private spaces
- “He beat her so hard she fell head over heels” 17
- The discursive construction of gender among Dholuo speakers in Kenya 49
- Snippa – a new word for girls’ genitals in Swedish 69
- What it means to be a Bosnian woman 81
-
Part II. Mediating gender in public spaces
- Greek men’s and women’s magazines as codes of gender conduct 113
- Representation of desire and femininity 145
- Gendered discourse(s) 169
- Gender ideologies in the Vietnamese printed media 195
-
Part III. Trajectories of patriarchy and emancipation across professions
- Constructing masculine work identity through narrative 219
- Stereotyping gender 249
- Living in therapeutic culture 273
- Index 303
