Change search
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf
Body Positive Content on TikTok: A Critical Study on How Body Positive Content on Social Media Can Reinforce Body Negative Discourses
Jönköping University, School of Education and Communication, HLK, Media and Communication Studies.
2022 (English)Independent thesis Advanced level (degree of Master (One Year)), 10 credits / 15 HE creditsStudent thesisAlternative title
Body Positive Content on TikTok : A Critical Study on How Body Positive Content on Social Media Can Reinforce Body Negative Discourses (English)
Abstract [en]

This critical study examines how TikTok content from body positive trends may influence power relations and reinforce female body negative discourses. The study takes its departure primarily in Michel Foucault. However, additional researchers were brought in to expand on Foucault’s ideas by e.g., introducing gender to Foucauldian theory. 30 TikTok videos belonging to two different body positive trends have been collected and undergone a Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis according to Foucauldian principals. Findings from the analysis illustrated how users acknowledged and heavily depended on societal body negative discourses to create body positive content. More specifically, this was illustrated when users self-categorised as plus size and pointed out body parts e.g., stomach rolls, that are seen as less desirable in society. Users furthermore directly engaged in behaviour, which was found to be body negative e.g., implying the existence of abnormal and imperfect bodies. Effectively, this behaviour was identified as performative and rooted in a fear of being seen as non-progressive and body negativeThe conclusive results of this thesis thus suggest that users inevitably produce and reproduce body negative discourses by relying heavily on the very same discourses in their TikTok communication. Essentially, the users are then contributing to the social and feminist problem of weight-based discrimination and marginalisation.  

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2022. , p. 54
Keywords [en]
Body positivity, body positive movement, body negativity, Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis, TikTok
National Category
Humanities and the Arts
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hj:diva-57456ISRN: JU-HLK-MKA-2-20220453OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hj-57456DiVA, id: diva2:1673584
Supervisors
Examiners
Available from: 2022-06-22 Created: 2022-06-21 Last updated: 2025-10-13Bibliographically approved

Open Access in DiVA

fulltext(583 kB)1448 downloads
File information
File name FULLTEXT01.pdfFile size 583 kBChecksum SHA-512
ce2077aa7974edba10c9eb8e6f89aea28963e6bc42969d510a2ca53b18ce8e5c02368b375c1e192ddc968bf50e129bc453f3eb7323b8c62e2647199d8def5a7b
Type fulltextMimetype application/pdf

By organisation
HLK, Media and Communication Studies
Humanities and the Arts

Search outside of DiVA

GoogleGoogle Scholar
Total: 1450 downloads
The number of downloads is the sum of all downloads of full texts. It may include eg previous versions that are now no longer available

urn-nbn

Altmetric score

urn-nbn
Total: 5359 hits
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf