M.A. - Asian Studies

Permanent URI for this collection

https://hdl.handle.net/10125/1916

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 58

Postcards, Place, and Progress: Colonial Korea as a Touristic Commodity
(2024) Crowley Duffy, Lucie; Park, Young-a; Asian Studies
Digital (Dis-)Embodiment: Virtual YouTubers, Queerness, and Neoliberalism
(2024) Yu, Anna Jj; Stirr, Anna; Asian Studies
GRIEVING TOGETHER: How Muharram poetry creates liminality, allowing women to grieve
(2024) Jeraj, Alia; Stirr, Anna; Asian Studies
Gender, Water, and Culture in Northern and Northeastern Thailand: Issues in Gender Mainstreaming in Water Resources Management
(2022) Sweeney, Sarah Sunthorn; Andaya, Barbara W.; Asian Studies
"Only Clear Water Flows East": Hero Narratives, Environmentalism, and Cultural Debt in Tibetan-Language Documentary Television of the People's Republic of China
(2022) Hayes, Caitlin Rose; Clayton, Cathryn H.; Asian Studies
Reimagining the Pre-Islamic Past: Narratives of Conversion in Two 1960 Malay Films
(University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2023) Lim Bin Adam Lim, Herman; Andaya, Barbara; Asian Studies
Described in newspapers as the first Malay-language films to deal with the coming of Islam to Southeast Asia, 'Noor Islam' and 'Isi Neraka' (1960) reinterpret the cultural memory of Malay conversion into Islam for the silver screen. This thesis explores how the pre-Islamic past was reimagined in these films, situating them within the continued negotiations over Islamic identity and ‘race’ in Malaya and Singapore at a time of intense decolonisation, where such identity categories remained in flux. I investigate what visual metonyms were used to connote Muslimness—as opposed to non-Muslimness—and where these visual vocabularies might be coming from. By using the concept of ‘inter-ocularity’, I show how these films were embedded within a web of visual vocabularies from across the Indian Ocean, drawing from circulating ephemeral art, theatrical traditions, and the films of India and Egypt. These various visual media drew from one another, simultaneously reinforcing the longevity of image tropes. Replicating Orientalist tropes of the ‘Problem Hindu’, the Malayan makers of 'Noor Islam' actively adapted such images to portray the pre-Islamic past as a time of demonic deities and virgin sacrifices, in contrast to Islam’s role as an illuminating force for good. The makers of 'Isi Neraka', on the other hand, appeared to build upon the genre of Sandiwara, a popular theatrical form focused on social issues at the time, to explore what happens to the relationships between people in a Malay society that recently converted to Islam. Hence, the consequences of transgressing Malay cultural norms such as durhaka or insubordination and disobeying one’s parents take centre stage. I therefore emphasise how images and discourses work together to perpetuate enduring essentialised ideas about identity, tightening and sharpening the limits for what constitutes Muslimness and Malayness.
From Wali Songo to Televangelists: Changes in Visuality and Orality in Javanese Islam
(University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2022) Antonio, Jordan Miller; Andaya, Barbara; Asian Studies
The intersection of media and religion is a relatively new phenomenon in contemporary society, but often embodies the most important aspects of successful proselytization: charisma, orality, and entertainment. In Indonesia, the largest Muslim country in the world, conveying a religious message in ways that will capture an audience’s attention is central in any explanation of the widespread popularity of televangelism over the past several decades. The preachers who have embraced these new techniques of proselytization, commonly referred to as da’i or ustadz(ah), while affirming their own Islamic commitment, and seeking to strengthen the faith of fellow believers, are celebrities in every sense of the word. Many own their own companies and invest in products that they believe will produce spiritual as well as material wealth, which becomes an extension of their religious outreach. The use of oral and visual expression to convey religious messages has a long history in Indonesia, but has found new pathways through technology and social media . In examing the teachings and presentation style of four popular preachers in Indonesia: Mamah Dedeh, Aa Gym, Tan Mei Hwa, and Muhammad Syafii Antonio, the thesis shows how this new style of technology-based preaching reflects the historical spread of Islam to the region and makes predictions for the future of digital dakwah.
Animating Sun Wukong: Shanghai Animation Film Studio's Havoc in Heaven and Symbolic Transformation on the Eve of the Cultural Revolution
(University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2022) Ayers, Jackson; Clayton, Cathryn H.; Asian Studies
This paper attempts to deconstruct the complex intersection of Maoist-era propaganda and Chinese folk-art traditions in the years before China’s Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) by interrogating the symbolic transformation of Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, into a hero who justified rebellious action. Specifically, this research analyzes director Wan Laiming’s 1964 film, Havoc in Heaven (Danao Tiangong 大闹天宫), China’s first domestic feature-length animated film. Employing Wan’s memoir and documents from other animators at the Shanghai Animation Film Studio (SAFS), this framework establishes artists as the unit of analysis to study symbolic change between Chinese Communist Party (CCP) propagandistic guidance and the Chinese people. This approach emphasizes the agency and mediating role artists possess when producing art as propaganda. Developing on approaches employed by Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney and Alexander Bukh in their research on nationalism, this research encompasses both the narrative content of Havoc in Heaven and the perspectives of SAFS animators towards their work. It argues that a lack of direct party intervention during production and the unexplored frontier of animated film created permissive and productive conditions in which Ohnuki-Tierney’s concept of meconnaissance flourished. Furthermore, Wan and his team reveal that the primary operating principle at SAFS was the development of a nationalized Chinese animation style, founded in traditional folk-arts, and directed towards children’s education, not the fulfillment of Party objectives.
Transreality: Finding the Real Trans Women Inside Hyperreal Trans Women in Korean Media
(University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2021) Kim, Young Seo; Park, Young-a; Asian Studies
Oftentimes, representation of marginalized groups in mass media comes short of actually representing the lived reality of the group that is on screen. The same is true for trans women in South Korea and elsewhere. Confronting the false and, at times, harmful representation by pointing out where the representation fails is important, but stopping there leaves out the nuance of the purpose of the mass media that gets the lived reality wrong. Rather than take the simple approach of describing the differences, this thesis describes and goes further to analyzes the reasons, cultural and sociopolitical, for trans women’s representation in South Korean cinema. The thesis focuses on the beginning of the 21st century and onward, and compares and contrasts the films with ethnographic data of lived experiences of trans women in South Korea. This comparison reveals the ways that the media attempts to present an understanding of trans women to the public that is radically different from the lived experiences of the trans women, while also critically examining what those similarities and differences mean for trans women.
Intersecting Hierarchies: Media Representation Of Marriage Migrants Under South Korea’s Empty Multiculturalism
(University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2021) Hong, Yeeun; Park, Young-a; Asian Studies
In 2006, the South Korean state enacted a multicultural policy, as an extension of immigration policy and a response to increased international marriages and marriage migrants. Marriage migrants wed ethnic Koreans and settle in South Korea for a variety of reasons. Despite the political rhetoric that the multicultural policy ensures life quality for marriage migrants, it remains an empty government promise which embodies a nationalist agenda. This study examines how the Korean media represents South Korea’s multicultural policies, and how the media help affirm or deny marriage migrants’ intersecting hierarchies of race, gender, and class. By exploring the political and cultural dimensions of Korea’s multicultural policies through media analysis, I argue the Korean media separates marriage migrants into four different ideal types: Inspiration, Integration, Assimilation, and Separation. Despite the media’s efforts to display racial harmony, the media perpetuates multicultural policies which maintain biased images of marriage migrants (e.g., the public surveillance and stigmatization of Southeast Asian migrant wives). To explore intersecting hierarchies of race, gender, and class, this study pays attention to racialized genders that have received little academic attention, such as non-white migrant husbands. This study rejects the prevalent dichotomous interpretation of marriage migrants’ experiences on an inclusivity versus exclusivity binary, and demonstrates how this dichotomous narrative fails to recognize their complex social positionality and agency.

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