Paper short abstract:

This presentation examines portrayals of ideal lifestyles in two contemporary housewives' magazines, VERY, and I LOVE mama and argues that gender norms that women should be 'good mothers and beautiful wives' are reinforced in these contemporary magazines.

Paper long abstract:

Housewives' magazines, of which publication began in the pre-war era, constitute a distinct genre of Japanese women's magazines and since then have offered various images of married women's lifestyles. A new trend began in 1995, when a new magazine titled VERY was published by Kobunsha. VERY was new in that it was a fashion magazine. This was followed by the publication of several other fashion magazines targeting housewives. Regarding readership, these magazines were segmented according to social stratification. While some magazines present luxurious products and lifestyles, others obviously target mothers in lower social strata, offering advice for inexpensive ways of cooking and fashion. In short, being stylish has become a new norm for younger generations of Japanese mothers. Caring not only own family but also own self used to be no choice for many housewives several decades ago. Here arises one question: Is this new trend a sign of liberation for women? A sign of diversification of women's lifestyle?

This paper attempts to answer this question by examining portrayals of ideal lifestyles in two Japanese housewives' magazines, VERY, and I LOVE mama. VERY targets college-educated, middle-class, full-time housewives, while the latter, published in 2009, targets young mothers or 'gal mama' in rather low social strata. The paper explores which lifestyles are constructed as an ideal way of life for housewives in these magazines published between 2010 and 2013. Identifying not only class differences but also commonalities between two magazines, we will argue that gender norms that women should be 'good mothers and beautiful wives' are reinforced through discourses and images constructed in both magazines published in Twenty-first-Century Japan.