Inside Gigi's World

What Did I Just Read?

By: Angela Tindell-Gula

My Pop Culture Review and how these journals made my stomach turn.

            September 2022 started a new semester with new classes. I was eager to start my Women’s Studies Theory class and even more eager when I learned our first assignment would be to do a pop culture review. I thought about, at length, what my pop culture topic would be. I knew I wanted to do something from the past as an ode to the women who came before me but was having a hard time picking out subject material that I felt would have enough meat on the bones to give it my honest review. 

            First, I thought I would find some advertisement materials from the 40s and 50s, but I couldn’t decide what I wanted to use. My second thought was the old sitcom, “I Love Lucy.” I started to write my review and I was somewhat happy with how it was turning out. I took a break from my schoolwork to venture out into the big scary world and went antiquing in some flea markets in the area. I was amused and happily distracted by all the broken trinkets, brightly colored glass, an astronomical amount of PEZ dispensers, vintage women’s evening wear adorned with millions of shiny sequins and an over abundant amount of Corelle dishes. As I rummaged through all the treasures, as if by cosmic design, tucked in a random wooden crate, set back out of sight, were a handful of Ladies’ Home Journals from the 1950s. BINGO!

            As I shifted through the crate, pulling back one copy after another of cellophaned wrapped magazines, I couldn’t help but notice some of the stories on the covers like, ““No Men in my Life”…How to Become Marriageable,” and “I Knew I Was Being Disloyal to my Husband, Can This Marriage be Saved?” I was instantly intrigued and started riffling through the musty smelling periodicals to find my newest reading material. After almost a half hour, covered in dust, I found four magazines to take home and devour. 

            Ladies’ Home Journal was first published in 1883. It was a monthly running magazine and considered a trend setter for women’s magazines; the headline under the title reads, “The Magazine Women Believe In.” There were many first impressions I had as I read through the contents between the pages, none of which could prepare me for the disgustingly insulting and sexist material that laid amongst the pages.

 An issue from 1953 boosts an article called, “16 and Slim at Last,” describing a sixteen-year old’s journey to slimming down to better her chances at finding a husband and being more attractive for him. Let me repeat that just in case you missed it, 16. Also included in the article were “Tips & Tricks for Teenager Dieters,” because the pressure of being a suitable wife for a man at 16 years old isn’t enough…make sure you’re thin while doing it.

The June 1955 issue-The Wedding Issue- was filled with articles of how to be a good wife. Images after images of young women in wedding gowns, so excited to give themselves to their husbands. There was an article for teenage girls teaching them how to attract and get the kind of boys they want in their lives which included the “Shy Guy,” the “Spot Light Happy Clown,” and my personal favorite, the “Sweet Talking Sophisticate.” The article also included what kinds of likes and dislikes these types have, so a girl knows how to behave in front of them. My favorite, however, was an ad that had a beautiful, young blushing bride in a white gown and veil, smiling from ear to ear holding her bouquet. The advertisement was for the perfect gift for a bride. The tagline read, “A beautiful way to toast the bride!” The gift the ad was referring to, a scale! A scale you ask? Yes, a scale; with a wonderful catch hook, “Keep your bathroom stylish while keeping your waist trim.” A scale. I would have thrown that damn scale right out of the window. 

The September issue was just as disturbing. An article called “The Late-Dater,” geared for fourteen-year-old girls, explains how to make themselves more “dateable” so she can find a potential husband and stop being a “Late Bloomer” also known as “The Late-Dater”, grooming at its finest. Another ad asking, “Are you lovely enough to love?” What are the advertisers trying to sell you ask? Deodorant. If you stink you won’t be able to find yourself a good man…

Each issue contains the regular contributions of course material such as, “Can This Marriage Be Saved?” where the lists are long and plenty of how a woman can find all the problems in her marriage from within herself. Topics about how over education and working outside of the home makes the husband and children unhappy which causes problems within the marriage; had she not been educated to being with she would have never known what she was missing to begin with. If she stayed home instead of working, her husband would be happier making her feel more fulfilled. BARF. When addressing the issue of infidelity, the author credits a man’s disloyalty and infidelity to being unhappy, if his wife was more attentive, the indiscretions would have never happened; she needs to take her share of the responsibility and blame for making him feel this way. It is also her duty, as his wife, to forgive him; then the burden of the responsibility of restoring “old-fashioned morality” is hers to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Are you neighborly enough? Are you available enough? Does your husband know you love him? If you answered “no” to any of these questions, then it is no wonder that your husband is so unhappy because making my sick neighbor tea shows my husband that I am a good caretaker. Not all the laundry and meals and caring for the children. Recipes! So many recipes, page after page of recipes. An overabundance of recipes, a good woman of the 1950s knows it is important to keep her children and husband full and happy and of course all these recipes help do that. It seems like a bit of an overkill. I do however plan on making some myself. What can I say, I like food. 

In the article, “Social Constructionism,” by Miliann Kang, she explains how social constructionism highlights the ways culture categories such as “men,” “women,” black,” and “white,” are created, changed and reproduced throughout history (Kang p.1) and how they are used to obtain and maintain power. I think Ladies’ Home Journal solidifies this idea, highlighting all the things it took for a woman – in the 1950s – to be a good woman. Beautiful. Thin. Submissive. God-fearing. Motherly. Provocative while being modest and mysterious. The ideas in this magazine – that featured female writers – only propelled these ideas even further. By today’s standards, I think this magazine reads like a disgusting horror monthly subscription that most “women” would laugh at and put aside but for many generations of women, this was a handbook of how to be a “woman.” 

Ladies’ Home Journal stopped printing in 2014; the magazine had a 130-year run. At that point it was described as a “by-gone era of women’s service magazines.” I imagine that the contributors felt as though they were creating something spectacular, maybe for the times they were. As I read the articles now, I feel sick to my stomach. These articles prove that women repressed other women. They solidified the gender roles between men and women, while giving permission, encouraging women to make themselves “less than” for their husbands. There were no women of color, there were no different body sizes, just the magazine’s idea of what the perfect “woman” was, white, thin, submissive and a good cook. In Carole Vance’s article she explains, “It is commonplace for anthropologists to say that human behavior is socially or culturally constructed, by which we mean that human behavior is learned and not intrinsic or essentially determined.” (pg 162) Ladies’ Home Journal is a prime example of just that. It is propaganda used to make women – for many years – conform to what men wanted us to be. I wish it went out of print before causing irreversible damage against the people reading it for as long as it did. I would have never made it as a “woman” of that time era and I am thankful for that.