Barbie TM. Från Plastic Fantastic till Empowerment Chic: En Semiotisk Resa genom Barbies Reklamuniversum

Sammanfattning: Exectutive summary Barbie is more than just a toy, she is a phenomenon. Consumers love her as much as others hate her. It has been argued that the doll is damaging young childrens views of themselves and setting them up for a future of striving to achieve impossible beauty standards. However, Mattel, the founder and owner of the Barbie doll, claims that she was made for children to be able to play with a doll they can imagine themselves as, which they claim is more empowering than playing with baby dolls. They assert that the girl can only play as a mother to the doll, but with Barbie the options are endless. Barbie can be a dentist, a teacher or even an Astronaut. And so can the girl playing with her. The purpose of this study is to semiotically analyze the messages in Barbie commercials from the first ever commercial for Barbie from 1959 to one of the latest commercials in 2022. Women have been represented in different ways in commercials through out the years and different waves of feminism have swept the Western world during the last century. The study will discuss whether this will have any correlation with how Barbie commercials are designed. The method used for this thesis is a qualitative semiotic analysis with focus on denotations and connotations aimed at video commercials. An analysis chart with denotative and connotative questions was put in place to further guide the study in the intended direction. First, the videos were analyzed denotatively to illustrate what was happening in the commercial. Second, the denotative analysis was examined connotatively to provide depth to the message of the commercial. We analyzed six video commercials for Barbie from Mattel. The commercials were published in 1959, 1961/1962, 1984, 1985, 2010 and 2022. The only focus in the commercials from 1959 and 1961/1962 is on how Barbie looks and how beautiful she is. The message to young girls is how they should aspire to look like Barbie and be glamorous just like her. The message in the commercials from 1984 and 1985 convey the message that girls can do anything. The commercial encourages girls to focus both on their looks and career. The commercial from 2010 is similar to the commercials in the 80s, with focus on both career and looks. The last commercial from 2022 is focused more on inclusivity and doesn't encourage girls to look a specific way. The result of the study is that Mattel has changed their marketing approach for Barbie according to societal norms at the time. With feminist waves and movements the company has adjusted to the evolving views of the woman's purpose. The messages sent to girls in the commercials differ significantly from 1959 to 2022. The societal norms follow the same trend.