In this "inventing The Cosmo Girl" article, Laurie Ouellette explains Helen Brown's "Cosmopolitan" magazine and how it became widely successful in empowering women. Brown was one of the first mainstream figures that freed women from having sex guilt and advised them to disregard the double standard of male dominance. The Cosmo girl gives out self-management strategies to help form sexual identity.
Brown wrote the book, "Sex and the Single Girl," which was a response to the shortage of men and how to attract desirable men while remaining single. It was directed at unmarried working women. When she became editor for "Cosmopolitan," she transformed it into how to get emotional, social, and business crowds that confront a girl and to have a better life. The Cosmo Girl that was created was the symbol for sexuality of pink-collay femininity. "Sex and the Single Girl," was directed toward unmarried women in the work place, where "Cosmo," targeted single girls with jobs that had articles, advice, and ways to budget advertisements for feminine consumer items like make-up and fashion.
Brown's beliefs was to understand that identity could be re-worked and even dramatically changed. Her book gave women a chance to have an attractive aura by mimicking models and rich women. Thus, this gave women a new identity in terms of style and fashion. Cosmo encouraged female readers the right to make themselves over to meet demands and opportunities for long lasting love. Still to this day, women are always looking for ways to transform themselves and Cosmo is still a leading magazine that helps women achieve transformation. Phoniness in the magazine got to the core of Brown's advice that being made-up as "fake" was an OK thing. The white working-class was an example of femininity for make-over and improvement, showing that their identity could be easily changed through performance tactics, covered over strategies, and consumption. The re-working of this identity would put the Cosmo Girl on the path to individual identity.
Cosmo presented a guide to overcome the gender-class barriers that Brown had encountered. Women were the "cultural capital" which would legitimize class dominance in capital democracies. Pink-collar barriers were surface markers of class that could then be traded for money. The lower-class working girl was able to get ideas on how to live like an educated, wealthy, and sophisticated lady when she reads Cosmo.
One thing that Cosmo is known for its emphasis on women's sexuality. It features articles, quizzes, and advice on female orgasms, masturbation, birth control, casual sex and experimentation with men. Cosmo also encourages the female reader to seek out sexual partners(men) who are linked to high social and economic status. Furthermore, the magazine promoted sexual desire in the form of a working class prostitute, but in terms of the model being constructed as having a lot of cleavage, teased hair, dramatic clothing and accessories, and overdone make-up, BUT STILL having wealthy, classy taste.
Brown reframed the sexual code for women as an individual ethic and a commodity exchange, which was a way to give a man less power. The Cosmo Girl put out that she should never pass up dinner, gifts, or vacations from male dates, bosses, or co-workers, she encourages the exchange of sexual favors for comforts and luxuries. This reminds me of Emmaline's textual analysis of the "Be Stupid" ad, suggesting the woman getting away with sleeping with her boss to get ahead in her job in some way. The sexualization of an office relationship between a man and a woman was reworked to redefine the assumptions of women in the workplace. to As Brown says, "Sex is a powerful weapon for a single woman from getting what she wants from life." (p.124)
Brown's advice from Cosmo was a success because it gave the average girl tips on how to feel rich and beautiful which is important because she reworked the "American Dream" for women. It reconstructed identity as self-made femininity within the framework of consumerism and patriarchal privilege. Stuart Hall's articulation theory says there is no link to class and economics and Cosmo assesses the struggles to get that upper-calss style. As Brown puts it, "…be one of the girls, but also don't be like one of the girls…" which is what Cosmo puts out and I think it totally true.
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