This bachelor thesis examines how terms of heterosexuality are negotiated within the Swedish reality show Gift vid första ögonkastet (Married at first sight), which is presented as a social experiment where strangers marry each other and go on to live together for four weeks. The couples are matched by four experts (two psychologists, one sexologist and one couple’s counsellor), and their roles as professionals and distributors of knowledge are the main focus of this study as it permeates how the terms are negotiated by the six participants. By applying queer theories such as the heterosexual matrix, performativity and temporality, the terms are identified as monogamy, height difference, desire, emotional labour, and equality. These are analysed using the three-dimensional model of critical discourse analysis, while also adopting its framework for ideological power to examine how the experts use their position to give way for their interpretations of relationships, love and gender.

The findings conclude that the programme works within a discourse of gender equality to support its own eligibility and does not challenge heterosexual ideals but rather furthers them by offering the heteronormative idea of monogamous love as a solution to a supposed increase of loneliness.