ABSTRACT

This book explores the emergence of "lifestyle" in the US, first as a term that has become an organizing principle for the self and for the structure of everyday life, and later as a pervasive form of media that encompasses a variety of domestic and self-improvement genres, from newspaper columns to design blogs. Drawing on the methodologies of cultural studies and feminist media studies, and built upon a series of case studies from newspapers, books, television programs, and blogs, it tracks the emergence of lifestyle’s discursive formation and shows its relevance in contemporary media culture. It is, in the broadest sense, about the role played by the explosion of lifestyle media texts in changing conceptualizations of selfhood and domestic life.

chapter |30 pages

Introduction

A Better Everyday Is Waiting for You

chapter 1|29 pages

Life-Style

The History of an Idea

chapter 2|31 pages

Empires of the Everyday

Gender, Entertaining, and the Emergence of Lifestyle Media

chapter 3|37 pages

Logics of Lifestyle

Cable, Class, and Domesticity on HGTV and the Food Network

chapter 4|37 pages

The Trading Spaces Train Wreck

Blandness and Lifestyle Anxiety on TLC

chapter 5|35 pages

Fantasies of Production

Digital Lifestyle Media and Women’s Work

chapter |13 pages

Conclusion

Lifestyle Unmoored