Construction of femininity

: contemporary gender discourse of international women's magazines in Hong Kong (1997-2002)

Abstract

This thesis investigates how the international women’s magazines in Hong Kong construct a sense of femininity for Hong Kong women, how this femininity is consumed by local readers and how it becomes meaningful in their everyday lives. Adopting a gender-sensitive approach, this study enriches the local gender research database, in which most studies have concentrated on social problems faced by clients of various social groups, by studying the pleasures and uses of popular and easily accessible cultural texts in society like women’s magazines. The present thesis also represents a first attempt in local women’s magazine research to go beyond the quantitative analysis of the content and visuals by including also a qualitative account of interviews with both editors and readers of the magazines. Incorporating a reflective feminist perspective, I also critically examine my dealings and relationships with the informants and the research phenomenon. While the dominant femininity constructed by the international women’s magazines may be illustrated by the global formula which incorporates fashion and beauty sense, slimness and whiteness, the unspoken heterosexual orientation and the unmarked middle income lifestyle, such femininity is also contested by alternative articles and contradictory messages, mixed with a touch of local attitude and identity and fused by a complex web of advertising and consumerism cultures. Appropriating the content in the international women’s magazines in Hong Kong, local readers, using various tactics and strategies, (re)construct their femininities in a contemporary, highly westernized and yet pre-dominantly Chinese society their very own versions of glamorous, cosmopolitan and successful women.

Date of Award	3 Oct 2006
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	City University of Hong Kong
Supervisor	Mei Yi Angel LIN (Supervisor)