For a Healthier Nation: Revealing Hegemonic Messages in Public Health Nutrition Advertisements in The New Zealand Listener from 1948 - 1960

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate embedded beliefs and emergent discourses within historical public health nutrition advertisements, exploring their role in shaping hegemonic strategies, constructing social norms and conditions. Driven by the need to fill a significant scholarship gap, I explored the intersections of public health nutrition, ethics, and critical media studies, with a focus on a series of public health nutrition advertisements placed by The Department of Health in The New Zealand Listner, during the 1950s. These advertisements, selected for their historical availability as the first consistent set of public health nutrition messages, provide a unique lens for understanding how government-led nutrition promotion was used to reinforce social norms and state power during a formative period in Aotearoa New Zealand's public health history.

I chose Sociocognitive Discourse Analysis (SCDA) (Van Dijk, 2008a, 2014, 2016) as the methodological framework due to its ability to uncover ideological narratives and ambition to promote social change (Fairclough, 2013; Van Dijk, 2008b; Wodak, 2013). To apply this framework, I developed a four-phased method, the SCDA-method, which was effective at revealing the power and persuasion embedded in the nutrition advertisements.

My study revealed numerous culturally distinctive, hegemonic processes, tools and strategies. Findings included stereotyping, stigmatising, beauty idealisation and domestic gendering (Abrams et al., 2005; Fiske, 1993; Guttman & Salmon, 2004), racism through symbolical marginalisation (Edwards & Moore, 2009; Reid et al., 2019), nationalism through socioeconomic conditioning (Anderson, 2016; Billig, 1995; Van Dijk, 2008b), and individualism through the personal responsibility narrative.

Collectively, these findings illustrate how public health nutrition advertisements reinforced hegemonic social structures contributing to negatively impacting individual mental health in conflict with the bioethical principle of beneficence (Champine et al., 2022; Coleman et al., 2008; Duncan & Cribb, 1996; Van Dijk, 1993a). I also highlighted tensions between health promotion and individual autonomy raising ethical concerns regarding prevailing practices in the public health nutrition community (Brownell, 1991; Lupton, 1995; Verweij & Dawson, 2013).

In conclusion, these historical, culturally relevant hegemonic messages have not only shaped past social norms and dynamics but also provide critical insights for today's public health nutrition community in its endeavour to foster more ethical and effective public health nutrition promotion.