Fitness ideal, how does it work? : A multimodal critical discourse analysis of how male fitness body ideal is communicated on Instagram.

Abstract: Fitness is considered as a diverse spectrum and the society surrounding it is considered to be in constant flux. There are few male fitness influencers on Instagram acting as mass mediums communicating their daily lives in front of a mass of followers. This study investigates how five Swedish male fitness influencers communicate male body ideal by gathering 15 similar Instagram posts while qualitatively analysing five of them. Methodology-wise, multimodal critical discourse analysis (MCDA) is used to analyse Instagram posts made by Swedish fitness influencers that are communicating something explicitly referred to fitness. Structure of the analysis relies on semiotic denotation and connotation while Critical Discourse Studies (CDS) theory is operationalised on linguistic and semiotic elements. The analytical results argue that they were following three sorts of discourses for communicating their daily lives. Additionally, the identified three discourses are argued to be constructed under certain ideologies.