Sports Illustrated vs SLAM
The two magazines that I chose are Sports Illustrated and SLAM. In the Sports Illustrated issue for July 2022, it covers all the different sports including the NBA, MLB, golf, soccer, etc. While the SLAM magazine from December 1996 only covers college basketball and the NBA. Sports Illustrated covers stories on any type of sports, for example there is an article about Kelly Slater who is a professional surfer. SLAM is strictly basketball and the stories that they cover seem to be a lot shorter than the Sports Illustrated magazine and they don’t include as much detail. It is detectable that there is a decent amount of slant in the Sports Illustrated magazine while there isn’t as much in the SLAM magazine. Sports Illustrated seems to be slanted towards athletes being in favor of them in different stories by mostly being biased in their favor. There is a story about NBA players and them swearing on national television and the article seems to be having their backs by including evidence from people around the sport that says it has no negative impact on people. The SLAM magazine mostly just includes stories in the sport of basketball in both the NBA and college.
There are some noticeable racial differences between SLAM and the mainstream, Sports Illustrated. The most noticeable difference just by the articles itself is that basically every article in the SLAM magazine includes or is about a black person in the sport of basketball. Sports Illustrated contains articles about all different races and even the color and vibe of the magazine pertains to be white and more vibrant. The advertisements in the magazines are extremely different and that is instantly recognizable. The advertisements are different because they focus on the different racial groups and advertise completely different things. In the SLAM magazine, they have an advertisement of a hair product for black men and in the ad, you can even tell that the language that is used is very different from the mainstream magazine. Whereas in the mainstream magazine, there is an ad from the company, Yeti, that makes coolers and insulated cups. They have an advertisement with a white father and his blonde-haired white daughter, while they are both on the beach carrying surfboards on the beach. The two magazines just have a completely different demographic and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, and they make it very clear. There are even a few ads for rappers and each ad in the magazine has black people in them, while Sports Illustrated has very few people of color in their ads and most of the ads are focused on a white audience. Another example is how the mainstream has ads about Toyota trucks and expensive watches, while SLAM has lots of ads for basketball sneakers. The text font is different because in the mainstream magazine the font is very simple, but in SLAM the font is must more exquisite and old school, which isn’t surprising since the magazine was issued in 1996. They don’t really share any commonalities regarding advertisements, which is surprising to me.
The headings are also quite different and even the language used throughout both magazines is noticeably different. I noticed that as I was reading the SLAM magazine, I was much more interested in it than reading Sports Illustrated because of the terminology that is used throughout. In order to become a better overall person in society, you must learn how to adapt and understand diverse cultures. I continued to read the SLAM magazine and felt that I was learning more about black people in the NBA, college, and juco. Different people told different stories and I feel that more people in our society need to change and really get an understanding of what others deal with daily. The SLAM magazine uses several types of slang than Sports Illustrated does, and it makes it more interesting to read, because the stories contain more information and make me want to keep reading.
When you look at the media kits next to each other they are extremely different. The price for a full-page advertisement in Sports Illustrated will cost you around $100,000, but for a full page in the SLAM magazine it will only cost about $10,000. This is a significant difference, because that shows the popularity that Sports Illustrated gets over SLAM. The significant differences that really stick out between the two magazines is that the ads in the SLAM magazine pretty much only pertain to a black audience, while you can argue that in the Sports Illustrated issue most of the ads can go either way. There is an advertisement for a subscription service that gives people expert advice about investing, and different ways to manage your money. Aside from the ad differences, the content has similarities and differences. Sports Illustrated having all kinds of sports included in the magazine is very important cause that allows for a lot more content and keeps readers more interested. This also means that the mainstream magazine collects a much bigger audience because there is more information and stories for people to read. While SLAM only has information and stories about basketball. These differences exist for a reason, and that reason is that each magazine is for a certain audience. SLAM is focused on people who enjoy reading about basketball, and basketball only.
Personally, I enjoyed reading the magazine that was not targeted towards me, because it is always good to read and learn new things. Reading a magazine targeted towards people from a different race or culture helps me understand it more and ultimately makes me a more understanding person in our society.
https://www.zinio.com/reader/readsvg/538798/Cover
https://digital.emagazines.com/slam/19961201/index.html?t=70e4e147-4782-4807-b35b-5a918cc258aa&utm_content=preview&utm_campaign=tl_slam&utm_source=EG&utm_medium=EG#p1
