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National Geographic Magazine

National Geographic magazine is the official magazine for the National Geographic society. It has published continuously since its first issue that was released in 1888. The issue in 188 was released to 200 charter members. In 1898 the now very well-known Alexander Graham Bell assumed National Geographic society’s president. The magazines copy from 1905 had having several pages on Tibet. The 11 pages produced by the governor including some shocking scenes of Lhasa in Tibet were seen to get him fired however the magazine sold copies and he was there for congratulated.

Magazine changed from a text oriented publication to a scientific journal to eventually an extensive look on pictorial content. Now it has become well known for its style.

During the Cold war the magazine became known for presenting balanced views on physical and human geography of nations beyond Iron Curtain. It was formally focused on scientific achievement however now looks at several aspects such as Deforestation, Chemical pollution, Global warming, endangered species and the environment.

The magazine recognised for its book like quality and high quality photojournalism. The magazine is well known globally and has the magazine in many languages such as English, Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, German, Greek, Finnish, Japanese and Hungarian to name a few.

In October 1952 the magazine published the first of what was to be many articles by Jacques-Yves Cousteau. These images of the sea were the deepest photographs ever taken.25, 000 feet down in mid-Atlantic Romanche Trench. This only shows how far the magazine is willing to go to get important information.

In December 2011 National Geographic launched its Global Exploration Fund, an initiative to fund research, conservation and exploration projects through regional centres around the globe.

Examples on how to layout work.

Genre Characteristics – National Geographic

Content- More images then text focuses on high quality photojournalism

Style- House style used the yellow border and the Times new roman used for name on each copy.

Symbolic- Often bright colours but only 2-3 on each title page. The title itself is used to relate to image.

Cultural- The images taken on covers are from exotic locations and the words go hand in hand with what the magazine is trying to get across. Here for example ‘The other Humans’ goes with the image of a Neanderthal.

Technical- the ration of text to image would most probably be 80% Photograph and 20% text. This is as it focuses on the photojournalism side.

Changes over time- Old versions compared with new.

Here you can see that the changes from 1888 to 2013 are enormous. Not only does the front cover look different the text inside does as well. The magazine did not used to have many images in and was more text orientated.

Different magazines

When looking at Genres the National Geographic is a good example. This is made for those with interest in the environment and all that goes with it.

Negative impression: This is because females aspire to look like the women on the magazines. Genre characteristic s, Style can be seen through the way the front cover is laid out. The appearance is always similar with a celebrity covering the full page with little captions supporting the image.

Positive impression: Provides information for the age group about the person on the cover. Genre Characteristics, Contentincludes interviews and images of footballers, also between articles adverts are included. The images are again of well-known people to keep the customers.Style includes that of the house style for the title FourFourTwo. It is in Bold Red so it is easily recognisable. The visual appearance always has a lot going on such as the title and the variety of fonts in the same colour as the title.

National Geographic magazine is the official magazine for the National Geographic society. It has published continuously since its first issue that was released in 1888. The issue in 1888 was first released to 200 charter members. In 1898 the now very well-known Alexander Graham Bell assumed National Geographic society’s presidency.

Representation

When looking at National Geographic Magazine you can look into representation and how the topic on the magazine is portrayed. For example there are two main types, negative and positive. Negative impression is showing a group or person in a bad light.

Representation is the way people are shown. Here the magazine is shown in a positive way as it is trying to make a good impression of the topic which is about the Neanderthals.

The magazines chosen for analysis: FourFourTwo, Hello and National Geographic.

To be analysed by looking at Genre characteristics (Content, Style, Symbolic, Cultural, Technical and changes over time. Also analysing representation (Social grades, Social issues and presence and absence) including stereotypes.

Social issues: These are not seen in the National Geographic magazines as it tends to focus on Deforestation, Chemical pollution, Global warming, endangered species and the environment. The topics are related to the target audience, as they are the types of things that the age group will be concerned about. As the age group is that of an older one, they are likely to have young children or grandchildren, meaning that they will want to know how life will be like for them. Presence and Absence: There is a group of people missing from the magazine. That is the young people. The magazine leans towards older people.

Start!

Content: The articles contain content about Rock music. Here you can see from the website how the inside of a magazine will look. It will contain fewer words than expected and more so, Images and bright colours used to relate to the theme.

Content- includes

gossip about other celebrities and what they are doing. Images used are of well-known people. Words are in different fonts to keep that target audience of young females interested.