All journalistic media share a number of significant characteristics. Despite this verity, however, this paper puts forward an argument for a concept which might be labeled “magazine exceptionalism.” Underlying the concept is the proposition that the magazine form is a genuinely different one. As a result, periodicals can be usefully understood to lie on a continuum of function, ranging in both intent and effect from the reflective to the transformative. The paper claims that magazines not only reflect or are a product of the social reality of the times, but they also serve a larger and more pro-active function—that they can also be a catalyst, shaping the social reality of their sociocultural moment.