134 ESTADO DE LA NACION EQUIDAD E INTEGRACIÓN SOCIAL CAPÍTULO

Although we depend on imagery for evidence of a reality, images, due to the subjective nature of their production, can be presented in a certain light or be used to emphasize a stronger or weaker version of a particular reality. Therefore, all images absorb and portray societal tensions, and are constructed through a conversation between their immediate and broader contexts (Faigley 2003, 100). The immediate context includes the creator's conscious selection of materials and decisions about what to focus on, as well as through what methods the image is being produced and for what purpose. The broader context involves the circumstances in which the image is produced. According to Picturing Texts, a guide to visual communication, there are four broader contexts at play: historical, cultural, social, and

economic (Faigley 2003, 15). This thesis replaces consideration of the cultural and historical contexts with political and religious contexts, as they are more specifically related to changes occurring in Turkey between 1980 and 2016. I will examine the immediate contexts — the women’s magazines — through the lens of specific themes in order to better understand how these broader contexts (economic, political, religious, and social) may be changing.

Magazine imagery specifically is a product of what a producer desires to share according to their mission, what they believe their audience wants to consume, and what current social, political, and economic tensions allow them to produce. This thesis focuses more on what types of images are being generated through the platform of the magazine, as opposed to how specific audiences are interpreting the images. Although the opinions of the viewers are important, a great deal more interviews and a more in depth, encompassing research project would have to be undertaken to understand how the audiences of women’s magazines are responding. Therefore, this thesis focuses on how women’s magazines represent a social space, and how current and newly created magazines absorb and portray particular trends according to the mission of the magazine and the demands of their target audience. In order to explore how images in women’s magazines are indicators of these broader influences, I will detail the physical attributes of several images in multiple magazines according to the following three themes.

Themes

I developed three key themes to analyze magazine images based upon what elements I have determined are important elements in understanding social, political, religious, and economic changes. My development of these themes was mainly informed by Dyer’s checklist for exploring how certain qualities or signs in human photography produce meaning (Faigley 2003, 80-82). Dyer’s checklist points are indicated in parenthesis next to the method that correlates closest to my methods. Her specific checklist is important because her research focuses on certain signs, or qualities, of images that produce meaning. This list is key to exploring what signals in human imagery may symbolize.

1) Arrangement & Environment (Props & Settings) focuses on what elements of the image are included and what may be excluded, as well as what is present in the foreground and the background. There is not only a focus on where a person or object is placed, but what sort of meaning it may hold based on its social significance. We want to know whether the person is at school, work, home, etc. and what this may say about their position in society.

2) Attributes & Expressions (Representations of Body and Representations of Manner) focuses on bodily attributes and expressions, such as the feelings that may be expressed on a person’s face, where they are looking, how they are standing, what they are wearing etc., as well as basic descriptive characteristics such as age, gender, build, etc.

3) Activities (Representations of Activity) focuses on what a person is doing and where they are doing it. Is the person in working or having fun? Are they active or passive? Is there a certain spatial arrangement of people who are active and what are their levels of engagement and their roles?

The main goal in using these themes as a guide to analyzing magazine images is to understand an image in light of the pieces that compose it, and then layer these elements together so as to gain an idea about the ‘bigger picture’. The following chapter begins my analysis using Elele, Aysha, and Glamour.

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Now that each magazine has been introduced and the methodology for examination has been laid out, this chapter focuses on image analysis. I begin with an analysis of several front covers of each of the magazines considered in this research — Kadınca, Kim, Elele, Marie Claire, Glamour, and Aysha. I am discussing the front covers first for two reasons: 1) The front cover is an audience’s initial interaction with a magazine, meaning that there must be an important element on the cover that pulls in the reader to open the magazine, and 2) the front cover sets a precedent for what will be found inside the magazine. After surveying several front covers of all of the magazines concerned in this research, I then move forward to analyzing the images inside the May 2016 issues of Elele, Glamour, and Aysha. I will conclude this chapter by discussing the prevalent trends I found inside those three magazines individually and compare them with the collective trends found on the front covers of the rest of the collection of magazines used in this research. The goal in exploring patterns of change in Turkish women’s magazines over time is to utilize the conclusions as indicators of broader change in Turkish society. This method of analysis seeks to answer questions about what forces may be causing change in Turkey and what these changes may look like.