Diferencias entre vertederos de desecho y desembarques

This research uses three titles from the contemporary Russian women’s magazine market. All of the titles were originally Western titles which have been ‘imported’ since 1991, but which are – aside from a small minority of articles, such as interviews with international celebrities – produced in the Russian Federation by Russian-speaking staff. Cosmopolitan was first published in Russia in 1994, Liza in 1995, and Elle in 1996. Although Soviet-era

women’s magazines such as Rabotnitsa and Krest’ianka still exist,28

with the latter recently having undergone a makeover, a focus on foreign-origin titles in comparison with Russian interviews was planned to provide a further perspective on aspects of gender that may have been subject to cultural globalisation after the fall of state socialism. The magazines chosen are aimed at younger women aged from 18 to 35 years old, and although readership information reflects this, it also shows that they may be read by women of all ages (albeit at lower rates) (Cosmopolitan Media Kit, 2013). Most women interviewed for this study, for example, read their mother or sister’s women’s magazines from early adolescence. However, there were other considerations in choosing the magazines.

Market share was one factor, in that it gives a good indication of the popularity of each magazine in the Russian context. By readership share Liza was the most popular print magazine in Russia as of 2007; Cosmopolitan holds third place with a readership share of 2.7% (Pietiläinen, 2008: 376). That these magazines should retain such prominence in the magazine market as a whole suggests that women’s magazines are a significant sector of the contemporary Russian print media. Amongst glossy magazines (which excludes Liza),

Cosmopolitan is in first place and Elle in fifth. (Cosmopolitan Media Kit, 2013).

The second factor was to use a fairly diverse range of sources within this genre. In this sense, the choice of Elle29 (rather than, for example, the more popular Glamour magazine) resulted from a desire to represent a different sector of the market aimed at women. Although its readership share was only 0.1% as of 2007 (Pietiläinen, 2008: 376), representing more of a niche area of the market, based on informal discussions with

28_{As of 2007, their market share was 0.3% and 0.8%, respectively (Pietiläinen, 2008).}

29_{As an aside, Elle was originally started in 1945 by Hélène Gordon-Lazareff, a Russian who had emigrated}

different Russian women prior to beginning the research it seemed to be ‘up and coming’ in Russia,30 and I thought it would add a valuable insight given its greater focus on high fashion than either Cosmopolitan or Liza.31 Elle features longer articles and what may be termed a slightly more ‘high-brow’ register than the other two magazines, which perhaps reflects its more luxury or upmarket style in the brands it features, as well as its generally more serious approach to the world of fashion. Bartlett (2010) discusses the efforts of women’s magazines to find resonance with more ‘serious’ sectors of the literary intelligentsia in Russia, who would have traditionally regarded glossy magazines as somewhat culturally corrupt. Elle magazine’s use of a more complex vocabulary and register than Cosmopolitan or Liza indeed made it more difficult to translate, but also may hint at an attempt to position itself within a more legitimated (Bourdieu, 1984/2010) cultural sphere.

The choice of Liza magazine was also motivated by diversity: although it is popular, unlike the other two magazines it is not considered a ‘glossy’ or glianets, and it is published on a weekly basis.32 Although focusing on glossy magazines would also have provided an interesting range of texts, Liza’s different style of layout and content – articles tend to be relatively short, and language more straightforward – and its market popularity suggested that it would provide an interesting contrast to mainstream glossies. Its greater focus on

30_{During the writing of this thesis its circulation increased from 200,000 to 1.109m copies (Elle Media Kit,}

2013), suggesting that the past five years have been a time of significant growth for this brand and confirming my initial expectations.

31_{Gough-Yates (2003: 101) notes that Elle is aimed at a more wealthy sector of the market in France and the}

UK.

32_{Some work (e.g. Ratilainen, 2013) refers to Liza as part of wider glamour/glossy culture; this research also}

essentially relates it to similar discourses in relation to gender. However, my own informal discussions with Russian women, in addition to comments by Russian researchers at conferences suggested that it is not generally viewed as a ‘glossy’ magazine in Russia. This seemed to be as much because of its content as it was related to the magazine being printed on non-glossy paper. However, as this thesis dwells on gender rather than categorising women’s magazines as glamour/glossy culture, I merely note the existence of ambiguous attitudes towards this particular magazine.

family life and child-rearing as well as fashion, beauty and career advice, and the more straightforward, less ironic register that it used to speak to its readers were also motivating factors for this choice.

The final consideration in choosing magazines was initial, informal research carried out on previous trips to Russia. These three magazines seemed to represent the interests of a fairly wide group of women in terms of income and interests, and yet could also be grouped together as popular women’s lifestyle magazines. The magazines were procured from an online subscription service in two rounds, the first running from November 2009 to April 2010, and the second from November 2010 to April 2011. The reason for this was to allow time for analysis and to allow for the budgetary constraints of my research funding. Although all issues of Elle and Cosmopolitan from these discrete periods were selected for analysis, given that there were four times as many copies of Liza, one per month was selected for analysis. In the interests of diversity of material, I chose the first of each month from 2009-2010, and the last of each month from 2010-2011. This gave a total of 12 of each magazine (36 magazines overall) for analysis (see Bibliography for a list of magazine issues used in this research).

To give further relevant information about each magazine, Elle targets readers aged 25-35. Looking at issues relevant to this research, according to its 2013 media kit,33 51% “can afford to buy expensive clothes and all they want”, and “self-fulfilment” is important to 88% of readers. These are clearly rather vague statements, but they do demonstrate the centrality of one theme of this thesis – consumption – in producing this kind of magazine.

33_{Media kits or packs are generally compiled for marketing purposes, and are especially aimed at selling}

advertising space. They contain a letter from the editor and information about content, issues, market and advertisement pricing.

They offer “special advertising projects”, including product placements within the beauty and fashion pages (Elle Media Kit 2013). Cosmopolitan gives a readership age structure rather than a specific target consumer, but the majority (57.9%) of its readers are aged 20- 34. Its media kit argues that it “is the closest of all to what an ideal magazine should be – it has the largest audience that has the highest income level possible” (Cosmopolitan Media Kit, 2013). This arguably positions it between the intended readerships of Elle and Liza:

Elle has a relatively small circulation with relatively high spending power, and Liza has the

opposite, but Cosmopolitan encompasses (it implies) a wide readership which includes higher income levels. Again, this is also a rather vague statement, but it does highlight the significance of selling products to the magazine’s production ethos.

Liza magazine claims to be aimed at women aged 25-35 (Liza Media Pack, 2013).

However, in their information they also cite the main age of their readers at 25-44, further stressing the fact that readership can be wider than their intended audience. Appropriately for a non-glossy magazine, it likes to differentiate itself from other popular women’s titles: the reader of Liza, according to their own material, likes to “make her own life in her own way”. The editor writes that “a woman is not just a shopaholic, but a mother, a colleague, a daughter and a friend” (Liza Media Kit, 2013). Clearly, less of a stress is given to conspicuous consumption in the magazine’s brand identity, although selling advertisement space is still a priority. In terms of reader social class, they prefer to cite what percentage of their readership can “afford expensive purchases” – 33%. This is contrasted with the

Elle and Cosmopolitan media kits, the latter of which states that the magazine contains