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'50s housewives and the Cold War


Darryl

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How the Australian Women’s Weekly spoke to ‘50s housewives about the Cold War

 

Under editor Esmé Fenston, by the end of the 1950s, the Australian Women’s Weekly was selling over 805,000 copies a week. More than half of all Australian women read the magazine.


It focused on promoting a vision of the “everyday” Australian woman. Of course she did not represent all women — she was white, middle class, not working in paid employment and devoted to her home and family. Articles on fashion, cooking, homemaking, motherhood and romance supported this image.


But the Weekly also saw itself as a “women’s paper” with a responsibility to educate its readership by including current affairs and news stories in each issue.


While we might not think of the 1950s housewife as taking an active interest in Cold War politics, a close reading of the Weekly – the “popular face of femininity” – shows Australian women were not only interested in global politics, but encouraged to join in the discussion.

 

https://theconversation.com/how-the-australian-womens-weekly-spoke-to-50s-housewives-about-the-cold-war-145699

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Thanks for sharing, that was really interesting. 1950s AWW actually sounds more sophisticated (from memory) than the Dolly and Cleo magazines that I used to read, at least in terms of discussing contemporary politics.


H'mm, maybe I should have been reading AWW in my 20s instead of the above magazines. I would have appreciated an insight into cooking, homemaking and motherhood, instead of just a focus on men, sex, shopping, hair, make up, celebrities, shopping and being flogged by the advertising of products that were usually way out of my budget. (From memory there was an occasional article about inner happiness or workplace relations, but that wasn't the primary focus.)


Of course, cooking, homemaking and parenting shouldn't be just the domain of women's magazines. I wouldn't know if there have been any significant changes in the last 20 years, I stopped buying magazines years ago.

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That was a really interesting piece. I’d love to read her thesis.


I wonder if it was more to do with magazines as sources of news back then, rather than as entertainment as they are today.


I think the idea that women do diplomacy and deal with complex situations more effectively has been demonstrated with covid - I remember seeing a piece about how nations with female leadership had done better overall in dealing with the pandemic.

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My MIL has a subscription to AWW and gives me her copy when she's done. Women's Weekly is very different to new idea etc - it's still got royalty - but a lot less "scandal" and minimal celebrity gossip.


Current issue has profile on Kamala Harris, interview with Susan Sarandon, profiles of Australians of the year, etc, decent recipes and book reviews.

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