A Critical Discourse Analysis of Old Spice Body Wash Campaigns

Abstract: The aim of this paper was to find out what role power relations play in the brand Old Spice’s advertisements for body wash products, and what language features the brand uses to attract desire and interest toward their products. In addition, I wanted to research if masculinity plays a big role in their advertisements, and in case the style they advertise their products had changed over the course of seven years. In order to analyze the chosen six advertisements (three advertisements from both 2010 and 2017), the following theories were applied to the study in the following order: Fairclough’s approach to Critical Discourse Analysis, AIDA model for advertising, and Connell’s theory of hegemonic masculinity. After a throughout analysis of each of these advertisements, I found out that the main characters in these advertisements used language to gain power and dominate others, the brand’s unique product slogans played a big role in attracting interest and desire toward their products, and that hegemonic masculinity was constantly present in their advertisements. It was clear that there was in fact a change in the way they advertised their products in 2010 compared to the advertisements from 2017, mainly because Old Spice’s advertising style had become more experimental over the course of seven years.