Women S Periodicals In The United States

Throughout American history, women have worked in reform organizations, informal community groups, and consciousness-raising societies to change their neighborhoods, their states, and their nation. To accomplish social change, women have needed to communicate effectively among themselves and with society as a whole. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, women created numerous periodicals to address social, political, and economic issues. Many of these were short-lived newsletters, while others continue to be published today. Through entries on more than 70 individual periodicals published in the 19th and 20th centuries, this reference traces the history of women's involvement in many of the social, political, and economic issues in the United States. From abolitionism to temperance, from moral reform to birth control, from suffragism to anti-suffragism, from pacifism to feminism, this reference surveys a wide range of social movements. Entries are arranged alphabetically and each is written by an expert contributor. Each entry overviews the history of the periodical and provides circulation and related information. The entries close with selected bibliographies, and the volume concludes with a chronology and a general bibliography.

Profiles discuss the history of seventy-five women's consumer magazines published in the United States.

Profiles discuss the history of seventy-five women's consumer magazines published in the United States.

Throughout American history, women have worked in reform organizations, informal community groups, and consciousness-raising societies to change their neighborhoods, their states, and their nation. To accomplish social change, women have needed to communicate effectively among themselves and with society as a whole. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, women created numerous periodicals to address social, political, and economic issues. Many of these were short-lived newsletters, while others continue to be published today. Through entries on more than 70 individual periodicals published in the 19th and 20th centuries, this reference traces the history of women's involvement in many of the social, political, and economic issues in the United States. From abolitionism to temperance, from moral reform to birth control, from suffragism to anti-suffragism, from pacifism to feminism, this reference surveys a wide range of social movements. Entries are arranged alphabetically and each is written by an expert contributor. Each entry overviews the history of the periodical and provides circulation and related information. The entries close with selected bibliographies, and the volume concludes with a chronology and a general bibliography.

Throughout their history, women's mass circulation journals have played a major role in the lives of millions of American women. Yet the women's magazines of the early 20th century were quite different from those perused by women today. This book looks at changes that occurred in these journals and offers insight into these changes. Business forces formed a key shaping mechanism, tempered by individual editors, readers, advertisers, technology, and cultural and social forces. Founded in the second half of the 19th century, six titles became the largest circulators—Ladies Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, McCall's, Pictorial Review, Woman's Home Companion, and Delineator. Capturing the interest of readers and advertisers, these journals published reliable service departments, fiction, and investigative reporting; however, competition eventually bred editorial caution. This, coupled with the depression of the 1930s, led to a narrowing of content and the beginning of Betty Friedan's feminine mystique. After World War II, the journals faced competition from television. The women's liberation movement and women's entry into the work force also brought changes.

Consumer magazines aimed at women are as diverse as the market they serve. Some are targeted to particular age groups, while others are marketed to different socioeconomic groups. These magazines are a reflection of the needs and interests of women and the place of women in American society. Changes in these magazines mirror the changing interests of women, the increased purchasing power of women, and the willingness of advertisers and publishers to reach a female audience. This reference book is a guide to women's consumer magazines published in the United States. Included are profiles of 75 magazines read chiefly by women. Each profile discusses the publication history and social context of the magazine and includes bibliographical references and a summary of publication statistics. Some of the magazines included started in the 19th century and are no longer published. Others have been available for more than a century, while some originated in the last decade. An introductory chapter discusses the history of U.S. consumer women's magazines, and a chronology charts their growth from 1784 to the present.

Women have been important contributors to and readers of magazines since the development of the periodical press in the nineteenth century. By the mid-twentieth century, millions of women read the weeklies and monthlies that focused on supposedly "feminine concerns" of the home, family and appearance. In the decades that followed, feminist scholars criticized such publications as at best conservative and at worst regressive in their treatment of gender norms and ideals. However, this perspective obscures the heterogeneity of the magazine industry itself and women’s experiences of it, both as readers and as journalists. This collection explores such diversity, highlighting the differing and at times contradictory images and understandings of women in a range of magazines and women’s contributions to magazines in a number of contexts from late nineteenth century publications to twenty-first century titles in Britain, North America, continental Europe and Australia.

Ledbetter explores themes and patterns of poetry publication in a variety of women's periodicals published throughout the Victorian era using taste, style and the significance of poetry to advance our understanding of women's lives in the nineteenth century.