is a common theme throughout the magazine, with another article in
the magazine titled “Pretty Genius”. The authors attempt to combine
elements, both visually and textually, in order to refute the dichotomy
between beauty and intelligence; this works to deflate the myths that
have been created and maintained by traditional media.
The ‘Brain Feed’ section, which is placed in the lower-third of the right-
hand page signifies another attempt to educate the reader. The play on
words suggests that the Instagram accounts they advertise are good
for the reader’s brain. The author presupposes that the reader uses
Instagram through the imperative sentence: “Smarten up your daily
scroll”, demonstrating the strong links between the reader, the magazine
and social media. Furthermore, the magazine’s endorsement of other
content creators illuminates the magazine’s concept of an imagined
community, which Fung (2002, p.238) argues is key for identification and
interaction. This imagined community is supported by the advertisement
on the following page: the placement of the Peace Corps ad asking
readers to help ‘Educate Girls, [and] Change the World’ highlights the
stark contrast between the education of ‘Western’ women, who are now
scientists and engineers, and the 62 million girls who are not in education
across less-developed countries. McCracken (1993, p.4) argues that
women’s magazines “foster a reifying image of woman as shopper”;
however, including this ad alongside the plethora of high-fashion ads in
the magazine again constructs women as being interested in fashion,
charity and more. McCracken (1993, p.3) goes on to state that the
“multiple mini-narratives that begin on the front cover and extend to the
ads and features inside combine to foreground a pleasurable, appealing
consensus about the feminine”. The analysis of these two articles
highlights how Teen Vogue organises its mini-narratives to interrogate
traditional definitions of the feminine, whilst depicting how the feminine
can be present in many different forms.
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