The Cultural Politics of Health Magazine Reader Letters
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Looking after yourself: The cultural politics of health magazine reader letters Christy Elizabeth Newman A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy National Centre in HIV Social Research / School of Media and Communications University of New South Wales January 2004 Certificate of originality I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and to the best of my knowledge it contains no materials previously published or written by another person, nor material which to a substantial extent has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma at UNSW or any other educational institution, except where due acknowledgement is made in the thesis. Any contribution made to the research by others, with whom I have worked at UNSW or elsewhere, is explicitly acknowledged in the thesis. I also declare that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work, except to the extent that assistance from others in the project’s design and conception or in style, presentation and linguistic expression is acknowledged. __________________________________ i Abstract Health is an organising principle of contemporary neoliberal citizenship, particularly evident in the political rhetoric of individual responsibility articulated around the privatisation of public health and welfare systems. The popular culture of these political technologies is expressed via the discourses of self-help and self-care, exemplified by the commercial success of consumer health magazines, and the responsibilising strategies of public health interventions. This thesis investigates the contemporary function of health magazines by examining both the content and the context of reader letters published between 1997 and 2000 in six Sydney-based ‘commercial’ and ‘community’ publications, and incorporating interviews with magazine editors. The three commercial magazines address the health media ‘publics’ of women (Good Medicine), men (Men’s Health) and alternative health consumers (Nature & Health), whereas the three community publications address the ‘counterpublics’ of people living with HIV/AIDS (Talkabout), sex workers (The Professional) and illicit drug users (User’s News). Despite their different social contexts, these six magazines are all exemplary of the advanced liberal health imperatives of Australian popular culture, although the community magazines also empower audiences to facilitate social change. Reader letters are approached via the interpretive lens of cultural studies, in which the specific local characteristics of each text is seen to have wider global implications. Each magazine’s letters are positioned within a complex cultural, political and economic context that includes the rise of consumer culture, the social function of narrative disclosures, the increased validation of exhibitionism and the gendered politics of health and medicine. This research advocates for interdisciplinary dialogue between media/cultural studies, health/medical sociology and political theory, suggesting that health magazine reader letters can help to identify the role of popular and alternative media in constructing ideals of ‘citizenships’ within advanced liberalism. ii Acknowledgements The writing of this thesis has been a collaborative project in which I have been blessed to take part. My humble thanks go to: My inspiring supervisors, Dr Catherine Waldby and Professor Philip Bell, who were consistently kind and rigorous with my endless drafts and made me believe that I was always capable of more each time I was certain I had reached my limit. Thanks also to Cathy and to Alec McHoul for vouching for me in my original application. All of my long-suffering PhD peers, who have kept me sane, particularly Suzanne Bermingham, Gary Smith, Cari Egan, Adeline Lee, Kane Race and Abi Groves. The National Centre in HIV Social Research, especially Maude Frances, Joseph Lopes, Jan Knapman, Sarah Behman, Paul Van de Ven and Susan Kippax, for providing workspaces to postgrads and making us feel like a valuable part of the team. Thanks also to Julie Miller of the School of Media and Communications. Those who gave me the opportunity to be involved in research work during my PhD candidature including Patrick Rawstorne, Juliet Richters, Carla Treloar, Sean Slavin, Henrike Korner, Jeanne Ellard, Asha Persson, Helen Keane, Suzanne Fraser, Erica Southgate, Joseph Jewitt, Heather Worth, Nicole Moore and Martin Holt. The organisations that agreed to take part in this research, specifically the NSW Users’ and AIDS Association, People Living with HIV/AIDS NSW, Sex Workers Outreach Project, Murdoch Magazines and AIDS Council of NSW. Our Commonwealth Government for granting me the Australian Postgraduate Award that funded my 3.5 years of research and the University of New South Wales for funding my interstate and overseas travel to take part in international conferences. Also the UNSW Library, Learning Centre and Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences for providing essential training programs for postgraduates. My wonderful family who are too plentiful to list but are represented by the key figures of Peter Newman, Jan Newman, Renee Newman-Storen, Samuel Newman, Beryl and Stuart Hogan, Betty Newman and all of my glorious aunts, uncles, cousins and once-twice-thrice removed relatives from the Newman, Hogan, Ingvarson, Mincham, McLaren, Curtin, Carolan and Bradley clans. My always supportive if a little bewildered friends, especially Pip Newling, Melissa Burgess, Kamala Thomas, Merryn Leo, Mel Norton, Richard Crappsley, Sarah Barns, Angie Fielder, Jane Tsai, Martin Holt, Lena Caruso and Alan Webster. And most important of all, the person who told me everyday that I could do it even if she didn’t understand exactly what it was that I did, my indefatigable and perpetually enchanting partner, Janna Richert. iii Table of contents Certificate of originality i Abstract ii Acknowledgements iii Table of contents iv List of tables and figures vii CHAPTER ONE 1 Introduction 1 Describing the magazines 4 Conclusion 14 CHAPTER TWO 16 Health, responsibility, and media publics 16 Introduction 16 Social research on health and the media 16 Notes on the cultural conditions of health magazines 19 1. The self-care obligations of advanced liberalism 19 2. The medicalisation of identity and sociality 23 3. The commodification of health and the marketisation of health care 25 4. The proliferation of alternative approaches to wellbeing 27 5. The women’s health movement and the responsibilising of gendered subjects 30 6. The HIV/AIDS epidemic and community health activism 33 7. The reification of pleasure and risk 37 8. The technological capacity to connect information and people 39 9. The public fascination with disclosure, confession and exhibitionism 41 10. The formation of (media) publics and counterpublics 43 Conclusion 46 CHAPTER THREE 48 Researching magazines and reader letters 48 Introduction 48 Collecting the material 48 Analysing the material 50 Content analysis 55 Context analysis 58 iv Evading the ‘problem’ of authenticity 61 Conclusion 62 CHAPTER FOUR 63 Entitled to write: A content analysis of letters, writers and genres 63 Introduction 63 Manifest content 63 Sample size and period 63 Letter word counts and editorial replies 65 Name and address formats 67 Latent content 69 Letter writers: Authorship entitlement claims 70 Claiming identity: The demographics of self-description 71 Claiming readership: Fans, browsers and critics 77 Claiming corporeality: In sickness, health and my professional opinion ... 78 Letter genres: The politics of form 82 Openers and rejoinders as ‘dialogist’ genres 83 Advocacy-endorsements as ‘activist’ genres 84 Commitments and confessions as ‘exhibitionist’ genres 86 Conclusion 89 CHAPTER FIVE 91 Boys doing bodywork: The reshaping of masculinity in Men’s Health 91 Introduction 91 The globalisation of the Men’s Health brand 91 Negotiating the discursive functions of Men’s Health 96 Not being doctors: Contesting the medical function 96 Don’t mess with the mix: Contesting the social function 100 Look better and feel better: Contesting the beauty function 105 Ideal target market: Contesting the consumer function 110 Case study: Men’s body hair removal 114 Conclusion 119 CHAPTER SIX 120 Natural alternatives? Wellbeing, femininity and consumption in Good Medicine and Nature & Health 120 Introduction 120 A ‘new age’ of women’s wellbeing? 121 Modelling the ideal women’s health magazine consumer 123 v The pragmatic consumer: ‘I would like to tell you how I cope’ 123 The public consumer: ‘I believe that society underestimates the effect’ 129 The dissenting consumer: ‘I must, however, take issue’ 133 The cosmetic consumer: ‘I am now happy with the image I see’ 139 Case study: Women’s pathographies 147 Conclusion 152 CHAPTER SEVEN 155 Discriminating audiences: The politics of community in Talkabout, User’s News and The Professional 155 Introduction 155 ‘It’s a balancing act’: Editorial community interventions 155 Integrating a dialogist audience 157 Empowering an activist politics 159 Revealing an exhibitionist reader 161 Discussion 163 ‘Many shapes and forms’: The market, identity and expert repertoires 163 Alternative media markets and the politics of community magazine advertising 164 Representing the diverse cultural identifications of media counterpublics 169 Negotiating ‘expert’ testimonials in media counterpublics 174 Discussion 179 Case study: Profound discrimination and bad poetry 179 Conclusion 188 CHAPTER