A Critical Discourse Analysis of Linguistic and Discursive Strategies Used in Kenya’s Citizen Television Advertisements to Display Gender Ideologies

Abstract

The present study sought to examine how linguistic devices and discursive strategies used in Kenya’s Citizen TV ads which pattern men and women differently according to gender well-being. This thereby results in unconscious rationalisations of social constructions. Using observation as the main tool of data collection, a corpus of fourteen adverts sourced from one mainstream media station, Citizen TV were purposively sampled, observed by the researcher, transcribed into data, coded, then thematically analysed using techniques of content analysis. Guided by Fairclough’s Critical Discourse Analysis theory which provided the framework for analysis, the study adopted a qualitative, case study research design. The research design provided in-depth information about the phenomenon in order to establish the discursive and linguistic strategies used in the TV ads and how they mirror society’s system of values, attitudes and beliefs about men and women. The findings of this study indicated that gender ideologies that affect how meaning is made out of Kenyan TV ads were embedded in linguistic structures, social processes and manoeuvres.