Abstracts - Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa

INÊS CONDE, UTAD, IPL, ILTEC, PORTUGAL“ALICE IN WONDERLAND”: MULTIMODAL GENDERED WORLDS IN TEEN FASHIONEDITORIALSThis paper aims at presenting a systematic description, analysis and interpretationof gender representations in teen fashion editorials. These multimodal texts,regarded as social practices, carry a significant ideological potential: the visual anddiscursive representations of fashion trends re(produce) networks of knowledgeregarding social roles, values and activities, which are to be regarded as acceptableand desirable for contemporary young women (Macdonald 1995, McRobbie 2009).Bearing in mind the recognition of the fashion photograph as a site where powerrelations and social representations are negotiated and naturalised, the selectedanalytical approach is supported by the contributions of Critical Discourse Analysis(Fairclough 2003, 2006; Lazar 2005) and by theoretical and methodologicalframeworks for analysing multimodal representations of social actors (Kress & vanLeeuwen 2006, Machin 2007, van Leeuwen 2008). Results indicate that teen fashioneditorials offer the possibility to open up a distance between different modes ofsignification. On the one hand, the visual mode is saturated with static, conceptualdepictions of the feminine, in fetishised geographies drawn away from thehistorical, social world, thus enhancing models’ frailty, passiveness and childishdisposition. Language, on the other hand, instantiates discourses of power,rebellion and personal revolution, mainly through the co-option of post-feministdiscourses. Such hybrid configurations of the feminine, managed by the articulatorypotential of discourse in late modernity, reinforce the promise of transformationand individual choice. Resistance to more traditional representations, however, isnot politicized. What it does is to contribute towards the legitimation of a culture ofconsumption that constructs feminine worlds as commodities, confined to thegame of esthetical and symbolical reinvention provided by the fashion industry.Keywords: Gender, Teen Fashion Editorials, Multimodality, Critical Discourse Analysis.ReferencesFairclough, Norman (2006): Language and Globalization. London: Routledge.Fairclough, Norman (2003): Analyzing discourse: textual analysis for social research. New York:Routledge.Kress, Gunther and Theo Van Leeuwen (2006): Reading Images: the Grammar of VisualDesign. New York: Routledge.Lazar, Michelle (Ed.) (2005). Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis: Gender, Power and Ideologyin Discourse. London: Macmillan.Macdonald, Myra (1995): Representing Women: Myths of femininity in the Popular Media.London: Arnold.ISFC38 Book of Abstracts Page 85 Lisbon, July 2011