This essay adopts a Critical Stylistic approach to disclose the linguistic mechanisms of creation of (counter-)ideological meaning in a specific type of gendered text, that is the female-targeted periodical Vogue at the beginning of the twentieth century. In particular, it investigates the linguistic construction of femininity in the fashion content of the twenty-four issues of the magazine published in 1922. In a period characterised by the gradual emergence of new identities and roles for women, Vogue chiefly employed evocative depictions of the latest trends in clothing to convey transformative notions of womanhood and defy gender categories. A Critical Stylistic analysis of Vogue’s fashion features demonstrates that this periodical favoured alluring conceptions of female assertiveness and autonomy through the use of a sensuous language of desire and feeling, describing pleasurable, multisensory encounters with fashion and modernity. Vogue’s discursive strategies show that the magazine employed linguistic form, along with visual and verbal content, to encourage women to embrace both a confident longing for personal pleasure and self-fulfilment, and the progressive gender ideology deftly woven into a periodical where female agency, physicality and modernity were favoured rather than repressed. This essay, therefore, builds on foundational research in language and gender identity that highlights the discursive construction of gender ideologies, with a view to expanding the range of scholarly interest (generally focused on content rather than linguistic form) in women’s magazines as composite cultural products which played a fundamental role in mediating new conceptions of femininity in the interwar period.

中文翻译：

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感性的现代性：1920 年代早期《Vogue》时尚内容中女性气质的语言建构


本文采用批判文体方法，揭示了在特定类型的性别文本中创造（反）意识形态意义的语言机制，即 20 世纪初以女性为目标的期刊《Vogue》。特别是，它调查了 1922 年出版的 24 期杂志时尚内容中女性气质的语言建构。在一个以女性新身份和角色逐渐出现为特征的时期，《Vogue》主要采用对服装最新趋势的令人回味的描绘，以传达变革性的女性概念并挑战性别类别。对 Vogue 时尚特征的批判性风格分析表明，该期刊通过使用欲望和情感的感性语言，偏爱女性自信和自主的诱人概念，描述与时尚和现代的愉快、多感官的相遇。《Vogue》的话语策略表明，该杂志采用语言形式以及视觉和语言内容，鼓励女性拥抱对个人快乐和自我实现的自信渴望，以及巧妙地编织成一本期刊的进步性别意识形态，其中女性能动性、身体性和现代性受到青睐而不是压制。因此，本文建立在语言和性别认同的基础研究之上，突出了性别意识形态的话语建构，以扩大女性杂志作为复合文化产品的学术兴趣范围（通常集中在内容而不是语言形式上），在两次世界大战期间调解新的女性气质概念中发挥了根本性作用。