Free Essays on Magazine

The origins of the twentieth-century magazine lie in the extensive economic and social changes of the latter portion of the preceding century. The result was the emergence of the newly commercialized form of national periodical which, for the ensuing fifty years, served as the dominant medium of popular culture. And while the centrality of magazines as shapers and reflectors of the nation's popular discourse began to diminish at mid-century, the form itself continued to prosper as new, more specialized types of magazines arose to serve the specific informational needs of more narrowly defined audiences. This progress of the American magazine through the twentieth century might, for the purposes of historical analysis, be divided into four major eras: The Magazine's Triumph as a Commercial Enterprise (19001920), The Golden Age of Mass Magazines (19201960), The Rise of the Specialized Magazine (19601990), Magazines as New Media (1990present). This essay will attempt to chart the changing character of magazines in America during the twentieth century, as well as the forces, individual and institutional, which shaped them. The first twenty years of the twentieth century saw the emergence of modern magazine publishing. Inherent in this triumph of the magazine as a large-scale commercial enterprise was the widespread validation of the advertising-based model of magazine publishing developed during the 1890s. The rise of magazines as a national media, however, was driven by a number of broader economic and societal factors which gathered increasing force throughout the last half of the nineteenth century. Three of the more important included the success of the Industrial Revolution and the attendant urbanization of the nation, the rise of public education and the subsequent spread of literacy, and the emergence of a national consumer market. More specific technological and comm... Free Essays on Magazine Free Essays on Magazine The origins of the twentieth-century magazine lie in the extensive economic and social changes of the latter portion of the preceding century. The result was the emergence of the newly commercialized form of national periodical which, for the ensuing fifty years, served as the dominant medium of popular culture. And while the centrality of magazines as shapers and reflectors of the nation's popular discourse began to diminish at mid-century, the form itself continued to prosper as new, more specialized types of magazines arose to serve the specific informational needs of more narrowly defined audiences. This progress of the American magazine through the twentieth century might, for the purposes of historical analysis, be divided into four major eras: The Magazine's Triumph as a Commercial Enterprise (19001920), The Golden Age of Mass Magazines (19201960), The Rise of the Specialized Magazine (19601990), Magazines as New Media (1990present). This essay will attempt to chart the changing character of magazines in America during the twentieth century, as well as the forces, individual and institutional, which shaped them. The first twenty years of the twentieth century saw the emergence of modern magazine publishing. Inherent in this triumph of the magazine as a large-scale commercial enterprise was the widespread validation of the advertising-based model of magazine publishing developed during the 1890s. The rise of magazines as a national media, however, was driven by a number of broader economic and societal factors which gathered increasing force throughout the last half of the nineteenth century. Three of the more important included the success of the Industrial Revolution and the attendant urbanization of the nation, the rise of public education and the subsequent spread of literacy, and the emergence of a national consumer market. More specific technological and comm...