Chueasuai article

Translation shifts in multimodal text: a case of the Thai version of Cosmopolitan

Pasakara Chueasuai, University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce, Bangkok

ABSTRACT

The American lifestyle women’s magazine Cosmopolitan is currently available in different versions worldwide. The magazine’s focus on the female ‘liberated’ lifestyle, in which women’s intimate relationships are the central theme, however, does not always sit comfortably with culture in Eastern societies. Adaptation of Western narratives and illustrations is sometimes necessary. This leads to shifts in meaning in both verbal and visual semiotic resources in the translated text. Since the magazine is a multimodal text, analyzing both verbal and visual elements can potentially be more productive than examining either one of these two constituents in isolation. This study applies the systemic functional linguistic model of text and context relationships, supplemented with social semiotics’ ‘visual meanings.’ An integrated tool of analysis is proposed as an appropriate instrument to examine and explain the overall translation shifts in the translated text.

KEYWORDS

Women’s magazine, systemic functional linguistics, visual meaning, Translation Studies, multimodal text.

1. Background of the study

A number of women’s magazines from the West have been and are being published in different local Thai editions, thanks to fast-developing Information Technology advances that provide the publication houses with unlimited access to audiences across national frontiers. Take, for example, the American monthly Cosmopolitan. The magazine is now available in 64 international editions and is published in 35 languages. This lifestyle magazine for young women can be found on newsstands in over 100 countries worldwide. Not only does this international franchise extensively benefit the US mother company financially, it is also of benefit ideologically. It allows its US publication house to have more channels to introduce discursive practices relating to the ‘Cosmo Girl’ to its readership across geographical and cultural borders.

This constructed female persona has been made to correspond with the magazine’s slogan “fun, fearless female” (Hermes 1995). The Cosmo Girl’s notion of liberated femininity has been conveyed to the Thai reading public whose socio-cultural background can be markedly different from that of their American counterparts, particularly the differences in social perception of female sexual relationships. Whilst sexuality can be discussed relatively more freely in public in the West, the topic is still limited to the private domain in Asia. It is still rare for the mass media to deal with female intimate relationships, although most Asian countries, including Thailand, have long been exposed to, and are now familiar with, modernisation, or Westernisation.

In order to be socially accepted and financially successful, an imported women’s magazine such as Cosmopolitan, whose verbal and visual resources reflect an ostensibly straightforward and open approach to female sexuality, has to adjust its content to fit into a different socio-cultural locale. In Thailand, where a conservative view of sex, and particularly of female sexuality, is still predominant, discussion of sex-related topics is generally reserved for the private domain of close friends or family members (Muecke 2004). Women are taught and expected to be, according to the country’s patriarchal societal structure, sexually passive in both verbal and non-verbal practices, including their sartorial choices and social behaviour. Sexually outspoken and provocatively dressed women are socially associated with sexual experience or even promiscuity (Esara 2009, Harrison 1997, Thaweesit 2004, Thianthai 2004).

This widely-held perception has resulted in textual adaptation and, consequently, shifts of meaning in the Thai edition of the magazine. This applies, in particular, to Cosmo’s well-known sex-related columns, in order for them to be publicly accepted and financially successful. The Thai edition has been published since 1997 and is the third highest-selling amongst local versions of international magazines (Nielsen (Thailand), 2011). Unlike other Cosmopolitan editions, e.g. in the UK, France and Australia, which produce their own material, the Thai edition relies on the US version for virtually one hundred per cent of its content (Chittasevi 2006, Srirattana 2008). Not only must the verbal semiotic resources be adapted, but the visual elements, which are undeniably an essential part of a glossy women’s magazine, must also be taken into account in translation. Elaborate and lavish illustrations of eye-catching models can attract potential readers and/or buyers of the magazine. Visual elements which include illustration, font, colour and page layout of this specific genre of print media are therefore extensively deployed throughout this particular genre of print media and will require adaptation.

Considerable critical attention has been paid to Cosmopolitan by feminist critics who analyse the magazine in terms of the construction of female subordination and dependency (see, e.g., Gough-Yates 2003, McCleneghan 2003, Inness 2004, Byerly and Ross 2006). The publication has also been analysed in terms of its attempts to constitute homogenous and globalised discursive practices (Machin and Thornborrow 2003, Machin and van Leeuwen 2003, Machin 2007). However, no previous research relating to Cosmopolitan has been conducted from the perspective of Translation Studies, particularly regarding the analysis of verbal and visual elements of the text. This paper attempts to examine the translation shifts that have taken place in this specific multimodal medium as a whole. In order to explain the phenomena, an integrated analytical approach that embraces both verbal and visual meaning-making resources is required and will be discussed next.

2. Analytical framework for examining a multimodal text from a women’s magazine

To analyse shifts of meaning in the translation of the Thai version of Cosmopolitan in this study, Eggins’ (1994/2004) model of text and contexts relationship is applied to examine and explain differences in the verbal resources (see Figure 1). This systemic functional linguistic model demonstrates how text (in the innermost circle of the figure) relates to the immediate circle of context of situation that further connects to the outermost circle of context of culture, under the invisible canopy of ideology. According to the systemic functional tradition, language is used to “make sense of our experience, and to carry out our interactions with other people” (Halliday 2004: 24). In other words, systemic functionalists explore how language, spoken or written, verbal or visual, is used to convey meaningful and purposeful messages in communicative events within specific social contexts.

The Hallidayan school of linguistics regards language as “a network of systems, or interrelated sets of options for making meaning” (Halliday 1994: 15). A specific lexical choice in a meaning making process is determined by the situational context (register) which is further shaped by the conventional practice in the cultural context level (genre). In this particular case, according to the editorial practice, the editor-in-chief of the Thai version of the magazine selects a particular verbal text over another, to conform with the genre of Thai women’s magazines and Thai culture as a whole. The interrelationship between text and contexts, therefore, demonstrates the systematic nature of language from the systemic functional linguists’ point of view.

According to systemicists, when language is used, it simultaneously generates three social functions, or metafunctions, i.e.

a) ideational metafunction: when language is used to explain or reflect the experiences and knowledge in and of the world of a language user;
b) interpersonal metafunction: when language is used to interact with or relate to the other communicative interactant; and
c) textual metafunction: when language is used to organise a meaningful text by complying with grammatical structure and relationship within and across the text – its context (Eggins 2004, Halliday 2004).

Applying the systemic functional grammar model thus allows the researcher to investigate how and why shifts of meaning occur at the textual level of the magazine, through its interrelationship with the situational and cultural contexts.

As mentioned earlier, the text of Cosmopolitan is multimodal, comprising substantial visual elements. It will be argued here that once a shift of visual semiotic resources has occurred in the translated text, it also affects the overall meaning of the text. In order to be able to explain these visual shifts, systemic functional originated and inspired social semiotics’ conceptualisation of visual meanings proposed by Kress and van Leeuwen (1996/2006), supplementing the model on the textual level. Basing their work on systemic functional grammar, the authors posit that being a semiotic resource that generates meaning potentials in its own right, the visual element is considered a semiotic system analogous with language. It is therefore capable of constructing three simultaneous meanings as verbal language does in the systemic functional linguistics tradition. The three visual meanings are:

a) representational meaning which is generated by represented participants (people, thing and place) displayed in an image in terms of what they are (conceptual pattern) or what they do (narrative pattern). This specific meaning can be loosely compared with the ideational meaning of the verbal element in terms of similarly constructed meaning potentials for the available elements within the text;
b) interactive meaning which is constructed through an imaginary relationship between the represented participants and the interactive participants — the image’s producer and viewer — in terms of: (i) contact — whether the represented participants look at the interactive participants (demand) or not(offer); (ii) social distance — how close to the interactive participant the represented participants presented in the image are - whether they can be seen from the chest up (close), from the waist up (social), or whether the whole body can be seen (impersonal); and (iii) attitude — the represented participants face the viewer directly (involvement) or not (detachment); power relation — when the represented participants are presented to look up at the viewer (viewer power); when the represented participants are presented equally at the viewer’s eye level (equality); and when the represented participants are shown from a high angle, looking down at the viewer (representation power); this interactive meaning can be, more or less, compared with the interpersonal meaning of the verbal resource. Both of them demonstrate the social role-relationships between text participants; and
c) compositional meaning which is how the represented participants are structured in the image to generate meaning potentials according to (i) information value — whether from the left to the right side of the image (given and new), or from the top to the bottom of the image (ideal and real), or from the centre of the image to its margin (centre and margin); (ii) salience — arrangement of the represented participants in terms of their importance as illustrated by relative size, sharpness, placement, colour contrast, etc.; and (iii) framing — the presence or absence of any actual or symbolic devices that divide the image into parts. This particular meaning functions in a similar manner to the textual meaning of the verbal text, since it involves how text is organised to generate meanings.

It is thus proposed here to integrate the formulations of visual meanings in the textual layer of the model with the systemic functional linguistic’s meta-functions, as it potentially provides an effective tool to analyse shifts of meaning in the multimodal text. This is because it can be used to examine and explain both verbal and visual alterations appearing in the translated text as a whole. As far as research in translation studies is concerned, and to the best of the author’s knowledge, this specific approach has not been applied to examine translation shifts in any previous study in the discipline. The analysis of the data set using the integrated tool is discussed in the next section.

3. Analysing the multimodal translation shifts

The current study focuses on investigating shifts of meaning taking place in the translation of the sex features in the Love and Lust section in the American version of Cosmopolitan into Thai. This specific section of the magazine is one of the sections published monthly ¹. In the American magazine, this section always starts with a regular one-page article before the main sex feature. This is followed by the main love feature, then by minor sex and love features and then by some more regular articles. There are approximately eight to ten articles in this specific section in each issue. This particular section explicitly deals with heterosexual female relationships consisting of psychological relations, ‘Love,’ and physical intimacy, ‘Lust.’ While the former involves romantic narratives, the latter revolves around female sexuality including sexual techniques, sexual encounters and sexual experimentation, using explicit, although informative, language. As a result, this section tends to create potential problems, requiring the translation to balance content against conservative sexual norms.

The analysed dataset consists of thirteen sex features from issues from December 2006 to December 2007 and their Thai translations. The specific data was selected due to the fact that at the time when the study was conducted, it was the tenth anniversary of this particular edition, signifying that this was a relatively established local version of an international women’s magazine in the Thai market. The study attempts to see how this specific, established local publication carries out its translational practices, so that it is accepted by the local readership.

According to interviews with two former editors-in-chief who were also responsible for translating most columns in this specific section, the Thai edition relies mostly on the US content, for financial reasons and because of the lack of a local author in the area of ‘how to’ of female intimate matters (Chittasevi 2006, Srirattana 2008). The latter can be linked to to the conservative view of female sexuality in the country in general. The issue also affects the editor-in-chief’s decision whether to select a specific sex feature for translating and publishing in the local version, or to omit it because of its strong sexual content. Following an unwritten agreement between the US and Thai companies, the local editorial team, at the editor-in-chief’s discretion, can adjust the verbal and visual content of the magazine where appropriate. Should any verbal and visual element be deemed too sexually explicit, the editor-in-chief has the authority to remove and/or adjust it (Chittasevi 2006, Srirattana 2008).

The situational context of the editorial practice thus determines the specific verbal and visual choices to be included and/or excluded in the translation, so the end result is in line with the wider conventionalised socio-cultural context. A range of mediation techniques are therefore applied when dealing with the sex-related lexis and images in the US version. The use of euphemising translations when dealing with sexually suggestive texts is normally applied, as stated by Chittasevi:

However, sex-related content is rather difficult to translate. This is because the English texts tend to use straightforward words such as testicle, vagina, etc. When these words need translation, I prefer to use a euphemism such as ‘younger brother’ or ‘little boy’ (2006).

The aim of this editorial approach is to produce a more implicit translation which tends to meet the expectations of the Thai readership towards the magazine. Certain columns considered to be sexually explicit, either on verbal or visual grounds, will be adjusted or may even be excluded because they are “too obscene for the Thai target audience. It will also downgrade the magazine” (Srirattana 2008). The adaptation of the translated text thus also includes the illustrated text. It is the editorial code of practice to monitor potentially problematic visual resources. According to Chittasevi (2006), this means that “highly suggestive images will be removed.” These adaptations of both verbal and visual resources, although they only occur very occasionally, have given rise to shifts of meaning in the local version.

Although the adaptations of the verbal and visual elements take place simultaneously, for ease of analysis this paper examines the verbal alterations first, before proceeding to the visual changes, as shown in the selected examples below. The American version (US) of the text is given first, followed by the Thai version (T) and the back translation (B/T), respectively.

Example 1 December 2006 Column Title
US: Beyond the Bedroom COSMO’S MOST CREATIVE SEX POSITIONS EVER
T: Beyond the Bedroom สุดยอดลีลารักของคอสโมฯ
B/T: Beyond the Bedroom Cosmo Supreme Love Acts

Example 2 February 2007 Column Title
US: The Sex He Dies For
T: โหมโรงสุดเร้าใจ
B/T: The Extreme Arousing Prelude

Example 3 February 2007 in ‘The Sex He Dies For’
US: Rotating your hand over the head of his penis stimulates this nerve-packed part of his package.
T: หมุนมือของคุณรอบๆ ส่วนหัว มันจะช่วยกระตุ้นส่วนที่เต็มไปด้วยปุ่มประสาท ในบริเวณจุดสวาทของเขา
B/T: Rotate your hand around the head, it’ll help to stimulate the part that is full of nerve endings in his passionate point.

Example 4 January 2007 in ‘Give Him Full-Body Bliss’
US: You can supersize your guy’s orgasm, making it so explosive, he’ll feel the shock waves from head to toe.
T: คุณสามารถทำให้จุดสุดยอดของเขาเข้มข้นถึงใจมากยิ่งขึ้น ทำมันให้ร้อนแรงจนระเบิด เขาจะรับรู้แรงสั่นสะเทือนตั้งแต่หัวจรดเท้าเลยทีเดียว
B/T: You [superior second-personal pronoun] can make his orgasm much more intense to his heart content, making it hot until it explodes. He’ll feel the shock wave from head to toe.

Example 5 February 2007 in ‘The Sex He Dies For’
US: You have the power to supersize, pleasure-size, and totally intensify your guy’s orgasm.
T: อำนาจในการเพิ่ม ขยายหรือทำให้จุดสุดยอดของเขาเข้มข้นขึ้น อยู่ในมือคุณนั่นเอง
B/T: The power of increasing, extending or intensifying his orgasm is in your [superior second-personal pronoun] hands.

Although the analysis has found shifts of meaning in all three metafunctions of the analysed data, the shifts in ideational meaning were found to be the most frequent. This can be reasonably explained in terms of the language being used to express experience and knowledge about the subject matter, i.e. female intimacy. Examples 1–3 demonstrate shifts in ideational meaning and Examples 4–5 show shifts in interpersonal meaning in the verbal text.

Example 1 showcases differences in meaning which occurred with the title of the main sex feature of December 2006 issue when ‘SEX POSITIONS’ in the American version is changed to ‘Love Acts’ in the Thai version. The sexual explicitness of the title has, in this case, been toned down. Although the feature contains sexual connotation, it is more indirect. In addition, ‘EVER,’ the lexical item emphasising that it is the first time is omitted. This has further decreased the high degree of explicitness in the translation.

Example 2 also refers to the title of the main sex feature in the February 2007 issue. It directly points to the reader’s male partner and his preference for particular types of sexual acts. ‘Sex’ in the original version straightforwardly shapes the ideational meaning that the article deals with sexual thematic content. The metaphorical linguistic choice of ‘dies for’ further brings the sense of intensity regarding the sexual experience sought by the reader’s partner into a sharper focus. However, the Thai title ‘The Extreme Arousing Prelude’ has reduced the explicitness, resulting in a more subtle text. The word ‘Prelude,’ generally used in musical and/or theatrical contexts, signifying the introductory stage of a performance preceding a more important stage, has been used here metaphorically as a synonym for the ‘foreplay’ that leads to sexual intercourse. The ideational meaning of the translated text therefore suggests the sexual thematic content in a more implicit fashion.

Example 3 is selected from the main sex feature of February. It further exemplifies a shift in ideational meaning in the translated text, as the original ‘the head of his penis’ is shortened to ‘the head’ in the translation, thus masking the direct sexual ideational meaning the source text readership is given. Similarly, the metaphorical term ‘his passionate point’ in the Thai version replaces the US slang expression ‘his package.’ The more covert and indirect term has therefore led to a relatively implicit ideational function in the Thai text.

Examples 4 and 5 are taken from the sex features of January and February, respectively. Both examples demonstrate a shift in the interpersonal meaning. The English text uses a conversational writing style and slang expressions as well as the direct term of address you. This approach tends to create a more personal and friendly text in contrast with the use of formal and written style lexicon found in the Thai text. The Thai text also uses a third person form of address indicating objectivity and formality. The use of the slang expression ‘supersize,’ normally used in a fast food dining context to designate extra portions of food and beverages, in the US version does not appear at all in the translated text. In addition, the use of second person forms of address in Thai is subject to different social role relationships between the interactants, shaped by the wider socio-cultural context (Cooke 1968, Palakornkul 1975). The Thai version opts for the formal second personal pronoun ‘khun’ which is normally used to address a more senior person, or unknown individuals, in a formal setting. This specific second personal pronoun choice, which is in line with the conventional practices in local print media, tends to retain the formal and respectful forms of addressing the readership. Together with the use of less informal lexical choice, it results in a more formal and distant tone between the author and the readership, in contrast to the original version.

The selected examples above showcase shifts of ideational and interpersonal meanings of the verbal text in the Thai version of the magazine. These micro shifts seem to tone down the open and observable sexual ideational meaning and the casual and friendly tone of interpersonal meaning of the American narratives. Analysing the verbal text has informed the study, to a certain degree, about the shifts of meaning in the translated version. However, as briefly discussed earlier, shifts also occurred with the other important element of the analysed data — the visual resources, i.e. image and font, which have generated significant shifts too. In this study, font can be realised as a hybrid semiotic resource, that is, it can be discussed both in terms of verbal (linguistic meaning potentials) and visual (size, colour, style) elements. In the next paragraphs, the author attempts to illustrate shifts in the visual constituents that are a part of the overall shifts of meaning ².

The visual meaning is primarily shifted due to the representation and reproduction of the section logo ‘Love and Lust’ in the American and Thai editions. The translated text retains the original English text, rather than translating or transliterating it into Thai. This particular practice has led to a twofold shift in ideational meaning. Firstly, the English lexicons help to bring down the sexual explicitness of its content. Although a literal translation into Thai (‘รักและราคะ’), that preserves the rhyme between the two key English words, could have been used (Love = รัก / and = และ / Lust = ราคะ), the Thai equivalent of ‘Lust’ might be considered too suggestive by the local audience due to its explicit sexual overtones. Non-English-speaking Thai readers who are not able to understand this specific term can therefore focus their attention on the more familiar term (Love) and its romantic meaning. Secondly, the English logo can potentially generate the meaning potential of an ‘imported Western notion’, rather than a locally constructed concept which corresponds with the policy laid down by the former editors-in-chief to distance the sexual explicitness from their local readers.

In terms of its visual dimension, although both versions use upper case, there are three visual distinctions, i.e. font size, font colour and position of the logo. Firstly, the font size of the logo in the source text is much larger than that in the translated version. This can possibly be interpreted in terms of the US magazine showing the significance of this specific section by emphasising the logo size, to draw the reader’s attention more than the Thai version does. Secondly, font colour also shows a difference between the two editions. The colour of the US logo slightly increases from a light shade of orange (LOVE) to a darker one (AND) and to the darkest shade (LUST) while the Thai colour stays the same shade of orange throughout. It therefore potentially represents a deliberate attempt on the part of the original design to add emphasis, from a light and romantic Love to a more sensual and suggestive Lust, through the use of different shades of orange colour. Lastly, in terms of the position of the logo, the US logo is placed on top of the right hand side of the odd page which directly faces the reader and marks the first page of this particular section. The Thai logo, by contrast, is on top of the left side of the even page which can potentially attract less attention from the readership (Boerman et al. 2011). These three simultaneous differences in the visual dimensions of the section logo have therefore given rise to micro representational meaning shifts in the translated version, i.e. toning down the striking appearance of the section logo in question.

Another difference in the representational meaning between the two editions of the magazine occurs due to the different font style. The title of the main sex feature in the American issue, ‘COSMO’S MOST CREATIVE SEX POSITIONS EVER’, is presented in the upper half of the page and it takes nearly the whole space of this specific part. The font appears in black bold capitals, signifying its importance, and tends, to a certain degree, to stress its significance as the main sex feature of the issue. In addition, the ‘EVER’ part is italicised and printed in grey, making it visually distinct from the preceding fonts. This design is probably aimed at highlighting this specific lexis as being narrated here for the first time. However, the Thai title, due to the characteristics of the Thai script that has no system of capitalisation, appears in a black, bold font, with a smaller size than its American counterpart. The omission of ‘Ever’ in the translation has resulted in the lack of grey highlighted font in this version, hence lack of emphasised lexis. In addition, the centre-aligned appearance of the translated title tends to visually formalise the text, thus reducing the informal layout style in comparison to the font design of the original version.

Next the visual meaning shift can also be discussed from the point of view of illustration. The main sex article illustrates a couple with a sensual act. The local version retains the original illustrated image, representing a nearly naked young Caucasian couple engaging in an intimate act. Both models are standing indoors and are scantily dressed in underwear, a fact which potentially signifies the beginning of a sexual act. This specific illustration appears in a full page size. According to the former editors-in-chief (Chittasevi 2006, Srirattana 2008), the local publication specifically intends to retain the original illustrations, where possible and where appropriate, for financial reasons. The most important reason, however, is to avoid provoking potential controversy caused by illustrating scantily dressed Thai models engaging in intimate acts. Both editors similarly voice their concerns over possible readership discomfort in seeing local models represented in this specific section. Chittasevi (2006) states that “it is impossible to use Thai male and female models. We would be in big trouble if we illustrated scantily dressed Thai models lying on a bed.” A similar opinion is given by Srirattana (2008), as she comments that “it is a no-no for Love and Lust. There is no way that we can use Thai models in the Love and Lust section.” Therefore, although the magazine has served as a useful resource regarding female intimate relationships for its readership, the magazine still needs to follow local social norms and to reserve its place as a sophisticated, chic women’s magazine on the shelf. Had the magazine illustrated scantily clad Thai models, it would have definitely caused controversy which would have eventually have affected sales. In addition, illustrating Western models in sensual acts also helps to emphasise a sense of ‘importedness’ to the local readership. In other words, this is the practice in the West (but it can also be done locally).

Lastly, the visual meaning shift occurs due to the reproduction of the illustrated figures in the Thai issue of December 2006. While the US feature is illustrated with representations of male and female participants in different sexual positions in different sub-columns, the Thai translation uniformly employs male and female figures standing next to each other at the beginning of each sub-column. Opting for the use of standing figures, rather than figures in sexual postures, in the local print has significantly attenuated the sexual strength of the text. It has plausibly further reduced the eye-catching effect on the readership since it has not suggested any sexual content in the text. The white figures in the pink circular background in the Thai copy can also generate romantic meaning potentials rather than the intense sexual phenomena as illustrated by the blue male and the orange female figures in the US version. Composition-wise, the illustrated figures of the Thai version that appear at the beginning of every sub-column have resulted in a more formally-styled text, compared with the randomly appearing figures in the original text that can imply creativity as indicated by the title.

Although this study separates the analysis into verbal and visual elements, this is merely for ease of discussion and clarity in the presentation of the results of the analysis. In reality, both semiotic resources simultaneously construct meaning potentials in the multimodal text. They are inextricably intertwined within the overall meaning-making process (see, for example, Mubenga 2009, O’Halloran 2008). The interplay and interrelationship between the verbal and visual resources therefore contribute to the meaning shifts in the translated texts. As was discussed above, shifts in the ideational meaning of the translated title and that of the illustrated images mutually and concertedly weaken the sexual strength of the translation as a whole. In order to explain shifts in both verbal and visual elements of the text, the paper thus applies systemic functional linguistics for the verbal analysis and visual meanings for the visual examination. The integrated tool of analysis has proved fruitful in investigating and explaining shifts of meaning of this specific multimodal text. It also suggests that to analyse a multimodal text, a multimodal approach is more adequate than a single analytic approach.

4. Conclusions

From the selected examples, the study attempts to demonstrate how shifts in meaning can occur from changes made with not only the verbal but also the visual semiotic resource of the multimodal text. Examining only one of these elements may not be sufficient to explain the shifts taking place, since the micro verbal and visual alterations that concurrently occur in the text have gradually shaped the shifts of meaning of the text as a whole.

Bibliography

Benjamin, Jennifer (2007). “Give Him Full-body Bliss.” Cosmopolitan, January, 102–104.
Boerman, Sophie, Edith Smit and Lex van Meurs (2011). “Attention Battle; the Abilities of Brand, Visual and Text Characteristics of the Ad to Draw Attention versus the Diverting Power of the Direct Magazine Context.” Shintaro Okazaki (ed.) (2011). Advances in Advertising Research (Vol. 2). Breaking New Ground in Theory and Practice. Wiesbaden: Gabler Verlag, 293–310.
Byerly, Carolyn and Karen Ross (2006). Women and Media: A Critical Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
Chittasevi, Chearanee (2006). Personal interview, 17th November 2006.
Cooke, Joseph (1968). Pronominal Reference in Thai, Burmese and Vietnamese. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Eggins, Suzanne (1994). An Introduction to Systemic Functional Linguistics. 1st edition. London: Pinter.
— (2004). An Introduction to Systemic Functional Linguistics. 2nd edition. London: Continuum.
Esara, Pilapa (2009). “Imagining the Western Husband: Thai Women’s Desires for Matrimony, Status and Beauty.” Ethnos 74(3), 403–426.
Gilbert, Laura (2006). “Beyond the Bedroom: Cosmo’s Most Creative Sex Positions Ever.” Cosmopolitan, December, 124–127.
Gough-Yates, Anna (2003). Understanding Women’s Magazines: Publishing, Markets and Readerships. London: Routledge.
Halliday, Michael Alexander Kirkwood (1994). An Introduction to Functional Grammar. 2nd edition. London: Arnold.
— (2004). An Introduction to Functional Grammar. 3rd edition. London: Arnold.
Harrison, Rachel (1997). “The ‘Good’, the ‘Bad’ and the ‘Pregnant’: Why the Thai Prostitute as Literary Heroine Can’t be Seen to Give Birth.” Virada Somswasdi and Sally Theobald (eds) (1997). Women, Gender Relations and Development in Thai Society (Vol. 2). Chiang Mai: Ming Muang Navarat, 310–323.
Hermes, Joke (1995). Reading Women’s Magazines: An Analysis of Everyday Media Use. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Inness, Sherrie (2004). “Pretty Tough: The Cult of Femininity in Women’s Magazines.” Cynthia Carter and Linda Steiner (eds.) (2004). Critical Readings: Media and Gender, Maidenhead: Open University Press, 123–142.
Kress, Gunther and Theo van Leeuwen (1996). Reading Images — The Grammar of Visual Design. 1st edition. London: Routledge.
— (2006). Reading Images — The Grammar of Visual Design. 2nd edition. London: Routledge.
Kwanyuen, Urisa (1999). Business Operation of the Licensed Women’s Magazines and the Characteristics of Their Readers. Master’s Thesis, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok.
Machin, David (2007). Global Media Discourse: A Critical Introduction. London: Routledge.
Machin, David and Joanna Thornborrow (2003). “Branding and Discourse: The Case of Cosmopolitan.” Discourse and Society 14(4), 453–471.
Machin, David and Theo van Leeuwen (2003). “Global Schema and Local Discourses in Cosmopolitan.” Journal of Sociolinguistics 7(4), 493–512.
McCleneghan, Sean (2003). “Selling Sex to College Females: Their Attitudes about Cosmopolitan and Glamour magazines.” The Social Science Journal 402, 317–325.
Mubenga, Kajingulu Somwe (2009). “Towards a Multimodal Pragmatic Analysis of Film Discourse in Audiovisual Translation.” Meta: Translators’ Journal 54(3), 466–484.
Muecke, Majorie (2004). “Female Sexuality in Thai Discourses about Maechii (lay nuns).” Culture, Health & Sexuality 6(3), 221–238.
Nielsen (Thailand) (2011). Women’s Magazines Leadership (2011). Unpublished Report. Bangkok: Nielsen (Thailand).
O’Halloran, Kay (2008). “System Functional-Multimodal Discourse Analysis (SF-MDA): Constructing Ideational meaning Using Language and Visual Imagery.” Visual Communication 7(4), 443–475.
Palakornkul, Angkarb (1975). “A Socio-Linguistic Study of Pronominal Usage in Spoken Bangkok Thai.” International Journal of the Sociology of Language 1975(5), 11–42.
Rotchford, Lesley (2007). “The Sex He’ll Die for.” Cosmopolitan, February, 128–131.
Srirattana, Kamalasopist (2008). Personal interview, 12th March 2008.
Thaweesit, Suchada (2004). “The Fluidity of Thai Women’s Gendered and Sexual Subjectivities.” Culture, Health & Sexuality 6(3), 205–219.
Thianthai, Chulanee (2004). “Gender and Class Differences in Young People’s Sexuality and HIV/AIDS Risk-Taking Behaviours in Thailand.” Culture, Health & Sexuality 6(3), 189–203.

Biography

Pasakara Chueasuai is a lecturer in the Department of English and Translation, University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce, Bangkok, Thailand. He holds a doctoral degree in Translation Studies from the University of Manchester, UK. His research interests are in translation studies, systemic functional linguistics, social semiotics and multimodality.
E-mail: pasakara_chu@utcc.ac.th, pasakara @gmail .com.

Notes

Note 1:
Due to the current restructuring of the magazine, the section no longer exists although the love and sex stories are still published.
Return to this point in the text

Note 2:
The author attempted to seek permission from US Cosmopolitan to use authentic illustrations from the magazine. Since this was not possible, no illustrations can be displayed here. However, illustrations of Cosmopolitan can be viewed online via www.cosmopolitan.com.
Return to this point in the text