Question 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

To represent a particular social group, a product needs to contain the codes and conventions necessary to connect with the audience. In my case, my music magazine follows the codes and conventions of R&B magazines. The demographic to whom I was aiming my music magazine at is very similar to that of the R&B/ Hip Hop music genre. Therefore I attempted to convey the conventions of the genre through my magazine in order to gain a sense of comfort for the audience – and present a product which they find identifiable to them.

One convention of the genre that I try to keep in my music magazine was the image of my artist. The women of the R&B / Hip Hop genre present a contrast to the males of the genre. The women are seen to be more elegant, seen in high fashion clothing. In comparison to the baggy jeans and heavy chains. One example of how I tried to repeat the idea is by dressing my artist in an all black outfit – leather jacket and jeans. This sense of high class and high art was also conveyed through the pose – the hands forming a box around the face. I made a direct decision to not over sensualise my artist, as historically the genre has. I felt that this idea was outdated and would not give any merit to the music magazine. Therefore allowing me to follow a more high class approach with the music magazine matched the evolution that the demographic has undergone. When the genre started out in the late 70’s and 80’s, many of the demographic would have been in the C2/D/E category and therefore felt that the genre was a reflection of the social and political issues at the time. However, now many of the demographic would be classed in the A/B/C1 category and now have dispensable income on products such as music magazines, justifying the evolution of the genre. Therefore it could be said that my media product is representative of the social group because I have attempted to capture the evolution of the genre.

One code and convention of the genre that I attempted to convey through my music magazine was the content that I put in my magazine. Many indie / rock magazines would have a list of artists within the genre and have some content related to that artist. I did not think that this fit the codes and conventions of the genre. Many contents pages to R&B magazines are very spread out with limited information on the contents page. The main prominence of the page would be the artist that the issue is focused on. That is what I attempted to do with the second contents page – with the image of Keisha in black and white. Therefore it could be said that my media product is representative of my social group because I tried to structure the magazine in a format that the audience would find some familiarity with the magazine and not find it too intimidating.

The main article itself has identifiable codes and conventions of the R&B / Hip Hop genre. One code and convention of the genre is the associated iconography that each artist has. This trend could be said to have picked up with the Edition font that was used on Beyonce’s “I am Sasha Fierce” album cover. This is the font that I used on the masthead – to reinforce the image and genre of my music magazine. The iconography that I used for my artist was a calligraphy-type bold font. This iconography was effective as the contrast between the thin edition font and the boldness of the name “IMAN” emphasised the feminine theme of the magazine. Another code and convention of music magazines is that they try to summarise the journey of the artist, from often humble beginnings. This helps the audience identify with the artist (echoing the ideas of the Uses and Gratifications theory). Therefore it could be said that my media product is representative of my social group because they feel that they can relate to my artist and that they have more knowledge on the artist that they did prior to reading the article

It could be said that my media product is very representative of my social group because of the type of artist that I have in my magazine, content that relates to them and interests them. Content that is relevant to the scene of that genre. It could also be said to be representative of them in terms of the way that the magazine looks – a structure that they would not deem to be too intimidating.