Communication ETDs

Publication Date

Fall 12-18-2017

Abstract

In this thesis, I focus on a Korean entertainment show Non-Summit as a media text through which to investigate racialized and gendered representations of transnational identities in Korean media. Specifically, I examine discursive strategies through which foreign male characters are racialized and gendered in order to interrogate the hegemonic masculinity of White, Western, and heterosexual identities. On the basis of a critical textual analysis of Non-Summit, I discuss Non-Summit reproduces and distributes representations of White, Western, and heterosexual masculinity as dominant foreign identities. Furthermore, I examine the ideological implications of such discourse on the hegemonic foreign identities given the current condition of multiculturalism in Korean society and context of transnational Whiteness. I found characterization of foreign panelists functions as a process of privileging White, Western, and heterosexual masculinity in Non-Summit. It reveals racialization in Non-Summit is insidiously and complicatedly formed through discourse of liberalism, egalitarianism, and homonationalism as a process of “othering.” Similarly, by connecting egalitarian, liberal, and tolerative identities to White, Western, and heterosexual panelists, who are from European countries, Canada, and the U.S., the hegemonic masculinity is dominantly possessed by Western masculine identities. In addition, the dominant representations of foreign characters reproduce postracial and postgender ideologies that emphasize we live in the raceless and genderless world. However, the ideological message should be critically evaluated and challenged in that Non-Summit is a media space with maintaining the dominant visibility of White, Western, educated, middle-class, and heterosexual masculinity.

Language

English

Keywords

Whiteness, Non-Summit, Transnational identity, Multiculturalism, Globalization, Critical Media Studies, Critical Cultural Studies

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Communication

Level of Degree

Masters

Department Name

Department of Communication and Journalism

First Committee Member (Chair)

Dr. Myra Washington

Second Committee Member

Dr. Shinsuke Eguchi

Third Committee Member

Dr. Jungmin Kwon

Project Sponsors

NA

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