This thesis analyzes the representation of, and meanings ascribed to, the female body as portrayed in Cosmopolitan magazine from the 1940s through the 1960s. Reading the female body as a historical text in a popular culture medium, allows for a nuanced look at the lives of American women. In particular, examining advertisements as purveyors of popular requirements and ideals, reveals the hopes, dreams, and fears of the mid-twentieth century. Throughout this period, cultural anxieties influenced the ways that the magazine and the advertisers, pictured and presented the female body. Women's bodies mirrored, strengthened, and weakened decade-specific concerns, such as World War II, the Cold War, and the second sexual revolution. The female body worked as a blank slate upon which social fears could be expressed, controlled, and allayed. A decade-by-decade analysis of Cosmopolitan's images and advertisements allows a deconstruction of period-specific themes related to femininity, beauty, romance, and hygiene.