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The impact of American film and television on Asian ESL students' perceptions of American culture
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Content
THE IMPACT OF AMERICAN FILM AND TELEVISION ON ASIAN ESL
STUDENTS' PERCEPTIONS OF AMERICAN CULTURE
By
Tracy Frances Levin
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE ROSSIER SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
August 2 005
Copyright 2 0 05 Tracy Levin
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ii
Dedication
This dissertation is dedicated with love to my
father, Dr. Donald L. Levin, D.D.S. He always taught
me to finish what I started, and would have been proud
to have another "doctor" in the family.
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Acknowledgements
Completing this dissertation was a long and
arduous, yet rewarding process which I could not have
accomplished without the invaluable support of numerous
friends, colleagues, students and professors.
I first wish to give special thanks to the late
Dr. David Eskey, my professor, mentor and Director of
the American Language Institute at the University of
Southern California, where I taught for four years.
Dr. Eskey was the first Chair of my committee, and
passed away after the completion of my first three
chapters. He would have been happy to see me complete
my work. I thank him for his encouragement and belief
in the value of my research.
I also thank Dr. David Yaden, my new Committee
Chair, in particular for the valuable comments he made
on the initial three chapters. Special thanks, as
well, go to Dr. William Rideout, for his careful
evaluation of my work. I also appreciate the
encouragement and contributions of my outside committee
member, Dr. Andre Simic, from U.S.C.'s Department of
Anthropology.
I will also be eternally grateful to my dear
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friend and colleague, Kris Olsen, who was available to
advise me, and who gave me invaluable feedback about my
work. Another friend and colleague who offered great
support and encouragement, and helped me begin the
writing process, was Dr. John Timothy Denny.
Thank you, as well, to my friends who put up with
me during this time. A special thanks to Irv Gershenz,
who encouraged me not to give up.
Finally, I greatly appreciate the enthusiasm and
willingness of the participants of this study who
volunteered their time and shared their feelings and
experiences openly with me. Without their
contributions, this dissertation could never have been
written.
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Table of Contents
Dedication .............................. ii
Acknowledgements ....................... iii
Chapter 1: Introduction ............... 1
Chapter II: Review of the Literature ... 31
Chapter III: Design and Methodology .... 77
Chapter IV: Participant Countries, Film
and Television Overview ................ 92
Chapter V: Findings ..................... 115
Chapter VI: Discussion, Analysis and
Conclusions ............................. 183
Bibliography ............................ 196
Appendices .............................. 205
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Abstract
The increasing pervasiveness of American film and
television programs has caused concern among
sociologists and educators in the United States as
these media have become powerful agents of
socialization, are primary sources of information, and
tend to create social stereotypes that can often be
misrepresentative. There has also been concern about
the impact of these media overseas, as the United
States is the leading exporter of television programs
and films to the rest of the world, and for many
foreign viewers, these media are still the sole or
principal source of information about American culture.
Although many studies have established that
American television has indeed had an impact on many
foreign viewers' impressions of Americans and American
culture, most have been quantitative and few have
focused on the impact on foreign students studying at
universities in the U.S. As cultural knowledge is
essential in language learning and socialization, and
television and films are pervasive and powerful
transmitters of cultural values, beliefs and
stereotypes, this issue is particularly important. It
is particularly so in light of the growing phenomenon
of globalization and world interdependence and the need
for cross-cultural competence for improved
international relations.
In a qualitative research study conducted at a
California Community College in Fall 2001, 23 students
from seven different Asian countries who were enrolled
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in an intensive, academic English as a Second Language
reading program, were interviewed to determine how they
perceived viewing American films and television
programs affected their perceptions of American
culture, their and their peers' behavior, and their
socialization into American culture and a college
environment. The data revealed that students had
acquired a wide range of perceptions and perceived the
media to be accurate at times and inaccurate at others
based on the extent of their socialization in American
culture.
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1
CHAPTER I
Introduction
Background of the Problem
Since the advent of motion pictures and, more
dramatically, since the creation and constant expansion
of television and other international mass media
technology, such as cable, satellite, home video and the
internet, world cultures have gone through significant
shifts in cultural values and the way those values have
been transmitted (Forsberg, 1993). Television, in
particular, has become a pervasive force that has shaped
Americans' lives and is constantly reshaping their views.
It has the power not only to reshape cultural values, but
to cultivate and reinforce attitudes and values that
already exist in a culture.
Riecken and Court (1992) assert that "Clearly, during the
past half century, television has become an agent of
socialization that is equal to or perhaps even greater in
its influence than the school, family, and religious
institution" (p. 154). Furthermore, according to Gerbner
(1998)
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Electronic media have re-shaped the way our
children are reared and socialized, the way we
manage our lives, and the way we conduct our
public affairs. A child is born into a home in
which television is on an average of almost
eight hours a day. For the first time in human
history, most of the stories are not told by
parents, schools, churches, or others in the
community who have something to tell, but by a
group of distant conglomerates that have
something to sell. (p. 3)
Gerbner, director and founder of the Cultural
Indicators project, which was established in 1968 and has
been conducting annual investigations of television
content and audience impact for over 30 years, and his
co-investigators, also assert that:
Television is a centralized system of
storytelling. Its drama, commercials, news,
and other programs bring a relatively coherent
system of images and messages into every home.
That system cultivates from infancy the
predispositions and preferences that used to be
acquired from other "primary" sources and that
are so important in research on other media.
. Transcending historic barriers of literacy
and mobility, television has become the primary
common source of socialization and everyday
information (mostly in the form of
entertainment) of otherwise heterogeneous
populations. Many of those who now live with
television have never before been part of a
shared national culture. Television provides,
perhaps for the first time since pre-industrial
religion, a daily ritual that elites share with
many other publics. The heart of the analogy
of television and religion, and the similarity
of their social functions, lies in the
continual repetition of patterns (myths,
ideologies, "facts," relationships, etc.) that
serve to define the world and legitimize the
social order." (Gerbner, G., Gross, L,
Morgan, M. and Signiorelli, N., 1993, p. 18)
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Films, although not as pervasive as television, also
have a strong impact on Americans' values and behaviors,
and movie theaters have been compared to "today's
cathedrals" (Simic, 1998.) One small example of films'
social influence, for example, can be shown by the impact
of Clint Eastwood's "Dirty Harry" movie persona. His
character's "Go ahead; make my day!" is "now listed in
Bartlett's Book of Familiar Quotations, right up there
with Shakespeare and Williams Jenning Bryant." (Fischoff,
1993, p.l)
On March 25, 2001, an estimated 72.2 million viewers
watched the Academy Awards telecast in the United States
(Armstrong, 2001), with an estimated worldwide audience
of 800 million (Welkos and King, 2001), a testament to
the powerful appeal of movie stars and the films they
star in. Moreover, the blockbuster hit of the 1998 Oscar
year, "Titanic," grossed $600,788,188 in box office
receipts in America alone (The Box Office Leaders, 2000)
and to date is not only the top grossing movie of all
time in the U.S., but is also still the worldwide box
office leader, with total earnings of $1,835,300,000
(IMDb, 2005).
This growing dependence on images as primary
transmitters of culture has created some concern,
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4
especially among educators and sociologists. Of
particular concern is that in many cases a fine line
exists between reality and what people might mistakenly
perceive as reality via these images, whether consciously
or subconsciously. It is not to say that critical
thinking, or the ability to discern reality from
distorted reality, and media consumption preclude one
another, but the nature of the media itself can create a
narrow perspective. This phenomenon is in part due to
the nature of the media themselves. Film and television
are high-speed, one-way media that provide no opportunity
for clarification of the meaning of the images they
present. (Riecken and Court, 1992 and Postman, 1984.)
Bandura (1977), for example, has asserted that:
Inaccuracies in thinking occur, even though
events are correctly perceived, when
information is derived from insufficient
evidence. The proverbial blind-folded persons
feeling different parts of the same elephant
developed diverse views corresponding to their
particular realities, but they were all misled
by their limited experiences. The same is true
of knowledge gained vicariously. Biased
conceptions are often developed observationally
by overgeneralizing from exposure to a
restricted range of the activities and
experiences of others. Learning from the
images conveyed by the mass media is a good
case in point. People partly form impressions
of the social realities with which they have
little or no contact from televised
representations of society. Because the world
of television is heavily populated with
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5
villainous and unscrupulous characters it can
distort knowledge about the real world, (p.
184)
Indeed, one of social theorists' main criticisms of
these media is that they are filled with stereotypes.
Moreover, heavy viewing of subject matter that viewers
have no firsthand knowledge of tends to create social
stereotypes that have little or no basis in reality. For
example, American television has consistently presented
stereotypical characters which are particularly extreme
for those who are not white Anglo-Saxon males. The
general consensus among many mass communication
researchers has been that "people of color, members of
ethnic groups, and women are under-represented and seldom
presented as well-rounded, competent, important and
independent. The result, television critics say, is that
viewers learn that white men are the only important
people in the world and that they control it" (Yarbro,
1994, p.l).
Arthur Bandura's "social learning theory" suggests
that people learn stereotypes, attitudes, values, beliefs
and expectations about people's roles and behaviors
through observation, and that television, films and other
visual media have a huge impact on social learning
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6
through symbolic modeling. (Bandura, 1977.) He also notes
that
A major significance of symbolic modeling lies
in its tremendous multiplicative power. Unlike
learning by doing, which requires shaping the
actions of each individual, by repeated
experience, in observational learning a single
model can transmit new behavior patterns
simultaneously to vast numbers of people in
widely dispersed locations. There is another
aspect of symbolic modeling that magnifies its
effects. During the course of their daily
lives, people have direct contact with only a
small sector of the environment. Consequently,
their perceptions of social reality are heavily
influenced by vicarious experiences — what they
see, hear, and read in the mass media. The
more peoples' images of reality derive from the
media's symbolic environment, the greater is
its social impact. (Bandura, 1977,pp 39-40.)
In addition, Gerbner et al. (1982) in his
"cultivation theory," suggests that the more people watch
television, the more likely they are to believe that the
characterization of life and society presented on
television and in films is realistic, even when it is
grossly exaggerated.
Gerbner and Bandura focused on the impact of the
media on people in general within their own cultures, not
outside of them. This study seeks answers to the
following questions, which are related to both Gerbner's
and Bandura's theories about the effects of the media on
viewers' images of reality, and vicarious learning:
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• If Americans themselves can receive and
internalize varied messages, including
stereotypes, from the images projected by their
own films and television programs while living in
their own country, what might foreign viewer's
perceptions of American culture be from watching
American films and television programs,
especially for those whose primary contact with
America or Americans has been through film or
television?
• Moreover, what impact might these perceptions or
misperceptions have, in particular, on foreign
students who are living in or are planning to
live and study in the United States, in terms of
socialization into American culture and a college
environment?
The preceding section has focused on the socializing
power of television and film, and delineated Gerbner's
and Bandura's theories about this phenomenon. To
continue the background of the problem in relation to
foreign audiences, the following two sections will focus
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on the "one-way information flow of American films and
television programs overseas," and "Cultural Imperialism
or Fear of Americanization."
The One Way Information Flow of American Films and
Television Overseas
Mass communication and social theorists are also
concerned with the impact of the "one-way" information
flow of American films and television overseas.
Significantly, the leading exporter of television
programs to the rest of the world is the United States.
(Ware and Dupagne,1994.) In 1983, in more than 70
countries, 33% of total programming was imported. The
United States provided approximately 75% of imported
programs in Latin America, 44% in Western Europe, and 33%
in Asia and the Pacific. With the expansion of cable and
satellite, the international market has continued to
expand. In 1996, for example, it was reported that in
India, the most-watched television show was "Baywatch."
Only three years before, "glimpses of undressed women
were unknown on TV but, with the advent of satellite
dishes, Indians now are transfixed by US shows replete
with bouncing blondes in bikinis and lady wrestlers in
leotards" (Earth Island Journal, 1996, p.14).
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According to McLean (2000), "U.S. television
programs fill hundreds of thousands of hours of
television around the world each year. . . Despite growth
in local production in some countries, U.S. product
continues to fill more and more time slots as cable and
new broadcast channels outpace local production growth."
(p. 2) The Writer's Guild of America's recent report on
international television program distribution revealed
that there has been "tremendous growth — 47% in just the
last five years— in the telecast of U.S. produced
programs" overseas (McLean, 2000).
Interestingly, even where local television
programming is dominant, as in China, the influence of
American television (and culture) is making inroads in
local television production. Sony Pictures'
Columbia/Tristar division, producer of such hit American
pop-culture situation comedies (sitcoms) as "Seinfeld,"
and "Mad about You," produced a television series about a
young, Chinese woman who manages a Chinese restaurant in
Los Angeles. Set in Los Angeles, but actually filmed in
Beijing in the Mandarin language, the show, "Chinese
Restaurant," focuses on the cultural clashes and comic
behavior of an immigrant restaurant manager and her
Chinese immigrant staff, including waiters and chef, who
are trying to survive in and adapt to the American
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culture. The show, which aired nightly on Beijing cable
in 1999, was very successful. However, although filmed
in China, it was financed by Columbia Tristar and
sponsored by FedEx and Coca Cola, American conglomerates.
The Beijing-born director, Ying Da, also has American
ties. He received a master's degree in drama at the
University of Missouri at Kansas City, worked as an
intern with director Alan Paula on the production of
"The Cosby Show," and based "Chinese Restaurant" on the
American sitcom "Cheers." (McCarthy and Florcruz, 1999;
Rose, 1999) In this case, he has taken the American
sitcom form and produced scripts that would appeal to
Chinese humor. According to McCarthy and Florcruz, "Ying
has picked up America's business ethos as well as its
culture. 'American TV is very commercial, very conscious
of advertising, he says. 'And that's the name of the
game. That's the bottom line.'" (p. 3)
American or "Hollywood" films also dominate the
world market. They control about 80% of the worldwide
market share." (Warner and Davis, 1996; Rose, 1999) In
fact, out of the 200 top grossing movies of all time at
the worldwide box office in 2002, 195 were produced by
Hollywood (IMDb, 2002). The five films that were
exceptions were Australian films "Crocodile Dundee"
(1986) and "Crocodile Dundee II" (1988), ranked 82 and
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11
151, respectively, British film "Four Weddings and a
Funeral" (1994), ranked 147, Italian film "La Vita e
Bella"/"Life is Beautiful" (1997), ranked 165, and
Taiwanese film "Woo hu cang long"/"Crouching Tiger:
Hidden Dragon", ranked 187. These box office rankings
are based on receipts collected from theatrical box
office sales, or movie ticket sales. They do not include
other significant sources of revenue and exposure to
these films such as video and DVD rentals, television and
internet broadcasts, and pirated (stolen) copies of
films.
Cultural Imperialism or Fear of Americanization
As demonstrated, there is a large audience for
American film and television overseas, and this "flow of
information" is mainly unidirectional, as the United
States does not receive an equivalent exchange of
foreign-produced films and television programs.
Moreover, for many foreign audiences, American media, and
film and television in particular, still seem to be the
sole or principal source of information about the
American culture and people (Tan et al, 1988; Ware and
Dupagne,1994; Talbot et al, 1999). A particular area of
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1 2
concern, therefore, has been "cultural imperialism" or
fear of "Americanization" of the rest of the world.
According to Zhan (1999), there is "a skewed image
of our (American) culture, which seems to consist largely
of police chases, hospitals, dysfunctional people in
comic situations, talking animals and surreal special
effects" (p.6). Tan et al (1988) have stated that "As
foreign television programs have become more pervasive in
developing countries, it becomes increasingly important
to understand the medium's influence on audiences in
these countries because "a major concern is possible
'enculturation' of foreign audiences by imported
television programs." (p. 65). Tan adds that:
With this influx of American programming into
non-Western countries, there are fears that
native cultures may be displaced and foreign
(e.g., American) values, lifestyles, behavioral
patterns and aspirations will be adopted. Such
displacement has sometimes been referred to as
'cultural imperialism' and is often considered
dysfunctional, in that it leads to conflict
between those who accept and those who reject
the new culture, thus disrupting the system.
(p. 650)
One such example was reported in a brief article on
culture in the New York Times Magazine. The author found
that a "1997 ruling from a Pakistani court, which found
that a woman was entitled to fall in love and get married
points to the influence of American TV in Pakistan"
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(Rashid,1997.) The author attributed this decision to
the popularity of American soap operas, which are
broadcast by Star TV, a satellite company, into Pakistan.
Rashid argues that the "subversive message that romantic
love is normal and acceptable," and that a woman has the
right to choose apparently goes against Pakistani customs
and is an indicator of "the extent to which such programs
are transforming attitudes." Indians are also concerned
about the impact of programs delivered to them by Star
TV, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation.
Mishra (cited in Barth, 1998), for example, wrote about
the "Murdochization of Indian culture." He stated that
"India's encounter with cultural and economic modernity
has come at a time when it is feeling particularly
vulnerable. . . The regular exposure, through the visual
and print media, to Western lifestyles, which are models
for millions of Indians, has induced deep feelings of
anxiety and inferiority among the modernizing class." (p.
3)
The Chinese government, as it opens up its markets,
is also worried about a "cultural invasion," which was
demonstrated in its reaction to the success of the
American film "Titanic" in China (Platt, 1998). For many
months, pirated versions of the film were sold on the
streets of Beijing at about one U.S. dollar per copy, but
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14
that did not stop young people from going to see the
movie in cinemas in China, for a ticket price of
U.S.$10.00, which is equivalent to about a week's pay.
According to Platt (1998),
"Titanic" is breaking box-office records across
Chinese cities, and reactions to the American
film seem to reflect a battle over China's
identity as it moves toward a post-Communist
society. The Chinese president has suggested
"Titanic" may be a "Trojan horse" aimed at
speeding up the American cultural invasion of
this long-isolated nation. But university
students say this winner of 11 Academy Awards
provides an American fantasy and imported
heroes for young Chinese who have lost their
dreams and ideals ... Yu Jie, a graduate
student at Beijing University (says). . .
"Nearly every aspect of Chinese society is
becoming commercialized to the point where
money is becoming god. . ." Ironically, he
adds, "Because love transcends social class in
the film, "Titanic provides an escape from that
world even for alienated youths, which accounts
for the film's massive popularity in Beijing.
(PP 1/ 2)
Most recently, the potentially dangerous impact
overseas of Arab stereotypes in American film and
television has been explored in relation to the terrorist
attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on
September 11, 2001. According to Jack Shaheen, award-
winning film expert and author of Reel Bad Arabs: How
Hollywood Vilifies a People, as shown in over 900 films
that he analyzed, "the stereotype of the Arab is one of
the most hateful bogeymen ever to surface in American
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1 5
culture," (cited in Davidson, 2002, p.l.) He suggests
that in American film and television, Arabs are
dehumanized and portrayed as caricatures with qualities
that range from sleazy, filthy and greedy, for males in
particular, to "bosomy bellydancers, beasts of burden,
and bundles of black" for women. Moreover, Shaheen
observed that there were "18 Hollywood movies between
'Black Sunday' in 1997 and 'The Siege' in 1998 that
showed Arab Muslims 'invading America and liquidating
innocents." (Tilove, 2001, p.F7)
Also, per Tilove (2001):
As Americans grapple with terrorist attacks
perpetrated by Arabs, their thinking cannot
help but be conditioned by a lifetime of
negative stereotypes of Arabs in the movies and
other popular culture, almost entirely
unleavened by alternative positive images.
And because of Hollywood's global reach, these
images profoundly inform not only how Americans
view the Arab world and Arab-Americans, but how
the peoples of the Middle East view America,
and even how they see themselves. In the days
since Sept.11, many Americans have been asking
themselves, "Why do they hate us?" It is the
mirror image of the question that millions of
Middle Easterners must have asked themselves
across decades of watching Hollywood movies in
which audiences are induced to cheer when the
Arab dies. (p. F7)
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1 6
The suggestion is that it is crucial that American
filmmakers and the American media, in particular, be
cognizant of their own stereotypes and the messages they
send out to the rest of the world.
In relation to these concerns, this one-way media
flow would also seem to go against the very nature of
internationalization, which has become increasingly
important in politics, economics and higher education.
Internationalization has been defined as an interactive,
"two-way" process allowing for "social and cultural
changes that occur on both sides in the process of
interaction between countries or nations." (Ebuchi, 1990,
p. 48) Given the enormous power of the media and the
influence wielded by the U.S., it is important not only
to be aware of the messages sent out about Americans to
the rest of the world, but also to be open to other
worldviews. One way of addressing this issue and
increasing the reciprocity is in the classroom, in the
area of international education exchange.
The following sections will detail the statement of
the problem in this study, the purpose of the study, the
research questions of the study, terms needed to be
defined, delimitations, limitations and the significance
of the study.
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Statement of the Problem
The United States is still and has traditionally
been the largest receiver country of foreign students in
the world. In 1996, the U.S. attracted approximately 32%
of the world's 1,300,000 foreign students studying abroad
(Desruisseaux, 1996). Moreover, according to the Open
Doors on the Web Report 2001, the number of international
students attending colleges and universities in the U.S.
increased greatly during the 2000/2001 academic year and
showed the biggest increase in 20 years. Open Doors is a
document compiled by the Institute of International
Education from the annual census of international
students enrolled on U.S. college and university campuses
for degree credit.
The information in this report also includes
information on students enrolled in Intensive English
programs and international scholars at US academic
institutions, and is compiled with the collaboration of
the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and the
U.S. Department of State.
The report notes that in the 1999/2000 academic
year, 514,723 foreign students were studying in the
United States, a 4.8% growth over the previous year's
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18
total, and that in the 2000/2001 academic year, the
number of students increased yet again by 6.4% to 547,867
students.
Over 50% of all international students in the United
States in the 2000/2001 Academic year were Asian. China
was the top-ranking home country for students pursuing
studies in the U.S. with 59,939 students. India was
next, with 54, 664. Following were Japan with 46,497,
Korea with 46,685, Taiwan with 28,566, Canada with
25,279, Indonesia with 11,625, Thailand with 11,187,
Turkey with 10,983 and Mexico with 10,670 (Open Doors On
the Web, 2001). California was the leading host state of
international students in the nation and also had the
biggest increase in international student enrollment.
Moreover, the majority of U.S. IEP (Intensive
English Programs) students came from three East Asian
places of origin. Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan were
the top three countries of origin in 1999/2000, and China
was ranked 13 (Open Doors on the Web, 2000).
In addition, according to Todd Davis, the Principal
Investigator for the Open Doors Project,
While major research institutions such as NYU
individually host the largest numbers of
international students ... as a sector it is
actually this country's community colleges that
have experienced the largest increases. Since
1993, enrollments at these two-year
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19
institutions have jumped almost 50% (49.7%)
compared with an overall growth in
international enrollments of 21% across all
institutional types since 93. This year,
Associate Degree institutions enrolled over
91,000 international students. (Davis, 2001,
ppl-2)
Purpose of the Study
As a professional in teaching English as a Second
Language (ESL) at the community college and university
levels in the United States for over twelve years, I have
been very interested in ascertaining what factors assist
foreign students in adapting or "transitioning" to the
educational and social environment. This adaptation,
which includes the acquisition of appropriate socio
cultural skills and knowledge, seems to be key to
assisting the students in achieving academic,
professional, and social success. (Tanaka, 1997, p. 14)
Therefore, as television and films seem to be the
prime transmitters of American culture, and Asian
students make up the majority of foreign students in the
United States, it is important to explore how these
students are affected by American films and television
programs.
This dissertation will thus explore the concepts of
mass media-generated perceptions, misperceptions and
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20
expectations of the USA by foreign audiences derived by
exposure to American television and films, with an
emphasis on Asian students studying in the United States,
specifically at the Community College Level in an
Intensive English Program (IEP).
In this study, I interviewed 23 students from seven
different Asian countries who were enrolled in an
Intensive English Program at a California Community
College and volunteered for the study. In this study,
the term "Asian" will refer to the students who come from
Southeast and East Asia and whose countries or regions of
origin (in the case of Hong Kong) are: China, Hong Kong,
Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Please note that although Hong Kong is not a country, but
an administrative region of Southeast China, in this
study it is included in the group of countries and
referred to separately from China, as the social
conditions and media accessibility vary from those of
China.
Research Questions
The main research questions in this study are as
follows:
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21
1. Has watching American films and television programs
shaped Asian students' perceptions of Americans and
American culture either prior to or after their
residence in the United States?
2. If so, how have American films and television
programs shaped Asian students’ perceptions of
Americans and American culture either prior to or
after their residence in the United States?
3. What perceptions of Americans or American culture
derived from American film and television viewing
did the students recognize as "accurate"
perceptions, according to their own definitions?
4. What "misperceptions" of American culture did the
students notice they had derived through American
film and television viewing once they had lived in
the U.S., according to their own definitions?
5. How did the students feel these perceptions or
misperceptions might have affected their behavior or
the behavior of their peers and their socialization
into American culture and a college environment?
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22
Significance of the Study
In the context of higher education, assessment of
how American films and television programs affect foreign
students' perceptions of the U.S. and how that, in turn,
affects their socialization process and academic
progress, would be useful for the following reasons:
First, it could provide important information on how
to use these media as tools of instruction inside and
outside of the ESL classroom either in the students' home
countries or in the United States or both.
It would also indicate to what extent teachers might
incorporate the teaching of media literacy (the ability
to understand how mass media work, how they produce
meaning, how they are organized, and how to use them)
into their curricula (Riecken and Court, 1992).
This is exceptionally important for international
students who will be competing in an increasingly global
marketplace where pragmatic competence is essential. As
Doyle (1990) so aptly states, "Higher education must
investigate strategies for more effective integration of
culture into the language and communicative components of
the curriculum for international business and economics"
as well as other fields. One way to achieve this is to
make use of the media's effects by assigning programs in
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23
and out of class, discussing students' perceptions, and
teaching critical thinking.
Delimitations/Scope of the Study
The ways in which this study was narrowed include:
• The participants were selected from among the Asian
students enrolled in an Academic Intensive English
Program at a community College in California.
• The study was confined to those 23 students who
volunteered for the study and whose English was
sufficiently advanced to understand and answer the
questions posed to them.
Design/Data Sources
The paradigm of research methodology was descriptive
survey research. Individual and group interviews were
the main form of data gathering. Participants were also
asked to keep and submit journals of their responses to
American television programs and films viewed while in
the United States.
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24
Limitations
Potential weaknesses in this study may include:
• In this type of research it is difficult to
completely differentiate between the influences
of American TV and movies on the students'
perceptions and the students' actual experience
with American society itself or other sources
which could bias their perceptions. However,
given the varied and qualitative mode of
gathering data, and the awareness of this
potential pitfall, hopefully, through a careful
interviewing process, a significant
differentiation can be made.
• The study is also limited in scope and depth
since it was conducted over a 15-week period,
and some of the participants have had varying
degrees of exposure to American culture.
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25
Definition of Terms
The following is a list of terms that will assist
the reader through their standardized definitions in this
study.
1. American Television Programs — Those American
television productions including news reports,
documentaries, dramas, situation comedies
(sitcoms), sports shows, educational programming,
game shows, and reality or lifestyle programs that
have been originally produced for television
broadcast primarily in the United States of
America. These may include feature-length movies
that originally showed in cinemas and later were
broadcast on television outlets such as terrestrial
television stations, cable or satellite.
2. American Films — Feature-length motion pictures or
movies produced by American producers and primarily
shot in English that are first exhibited in cinemas
or movie theaters. These films are also referred to
as "Hollywood" films. Later, these films may be
seen on videocassette, DVD, Compact Discs, the
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26
internet, and on television, including cable and
satellite channels.
3. Asian — The term "Asian" is very broadly used and
generally encompasses the overall geographic areas
of Central Asia, East Asia, South Asia, and
Southeast Asia. For purposes of this study,
unless otherwise specified, when referring to the
students who participated in the interviews,
"Asian" will refer to their countries of origin (or
administrative region of Southeast China in the
case of Hong Kong) which are located in East or
Southeast Asia, namely: China, Hong Kong, Japan,
South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam. The
term by no means intends to group all students
culturally, as Asia is large and heterogeneous, the
students are individuals and come from seven
different countries. This diversity implies that
they do not necessarily share universal values,
although they may have some in common. Moreover,
as individuals, they have had different experiences
and different exposure to American film and
television. The focus of this dissertation will
not be on individual cultures per say, but on how
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27
Americans and American culture are perceived by
individuals from these regions.
4. Asian values — There is a dearth of empirical
evidence that shows what personal and societal
values Asians have in common. However, per
Professor Tommy Koh, Executive Director of the
Asia-Europe Foundation, David Hitchcock of the
Centre for Strategic and International Studies in
Washington, D.C. conducted interviews in 1994 with
over 100 participants from Singapore, Kuala Lumpur,
Jakarta, Bangkok, Shanghai, Beijing, Seoul and
Tokyo that showed some areas of commonality.
Although the participants in Hitchcock's study came
from different backgrounds and countries in Asia,
the results revealed a "surprising degree of
congruence between (their) personal and societal
values." (Koh, 1999, p.2) On personal values,
Asians from these countries "gave equal emphasis to
the importance of hard work, respect for learning,
honesty, self-reliance, self-discipline and the
fulfillment of obligations. On societal values,
the respondents agreed on the importance of orderly
society, harmony, respect for authority, official
accountability, and consensus."
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28
5. American values — In the same study mentioned
above, Hitchcock defined American personal and
societal values in contrast to Asian values. In
regards to personal values, he found American's
priorities to be achieving success, personal
achievement and helping others. He found that in
regards to societal values, Americans placed more
importance on having personal freedom and
individual rights, while Asians focus more on the
importance of an orderly society and the group over
the individual.
6. Community College — For purposes of this study a
community college is an institution of higher
learning that offers general, professional or
technical undergraduate courses. It is a school
that is allowed to grant an Associate of Arts
degree, which is equivalent to the first two years
of university education. Students often transfer
from Community Colleges to four-year degree
universities to receive their Bachelor of Arts or
Sciences degrees.
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29
7. Culture — Three definitions by cultural
anthropologists apply here, as noted in Otsuka
(1996): "'The sum total of the knowledge,
attitudes and habitual behaviour patterns shared
and transmitted by the members of a particular
society' (Linton, 1940, cited in Keesing, 1971,
p.20), 'That complex whole which includes
knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and
any other capabilities and habits acquired by man
as a member of society' (Tylor, 1871, cited in
Keesing, 1971, p. 20, and 'The mass of learned and
transmitted motor reactions, habits, techniques,
ideas and values — and the behaviour they induce'
(Kroeber, 1948, cited in Keesing, 1971, p. 20)."
(P-4)
8. DVD — Digital Video Discs, a technically advanced
form of software that motion pictures/films/movies
are often distributed on.
9. Greater China — Includes Mainland China, Taiwan and
Hong Kong.
The remainder of this study will be divided into
five chapters.
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30
Chapter II will review the literature on theoretical
and empirical research relating to the influence of
American film and television's impact on both American
and foreign audience perceptions.
Chapter III will explore the rationale for choosing
a qualitative methodological approach for this study
versus a quantitative technique, will provide data on the
participants, and will delineate the actual
methodological procedures.
Chapter IV will provide an overview of the film and
television industries in the participants' countries to
provide a framework for later analysis.
Chapter V will present the findings derived from the
research.
Finally, Chapter VI will discuss the findings,
provide analyses and conclusions, and explore
implications and recommendations for future studies.
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CHAPTER II
31
Review of the Literature
Introduction
This chapter will be a review of the literature of
theoretical and empirical research pertinent to the
impact of American film and television's impact on
audience perceptions, first in the United States and then
on foreign audiences, both overseas and in the U.S.,
providing a framework within which to analyze the
findings of the study.
Theoretical Overview
First of all, what are the main theories related to
acquiring cultural knowledge from watching film and
television?
Bandura's Social Learning Theory
As explained in Chapter I, the major premise of
Arthur Bandura's "social learning theory" is that by
observing others we can acquire knowledge, attitudes,
values, beliefs and expectations about people's social
functions and conduct (Banduras, 1977.) Banduras also
asserts that the vicarious experience of watching
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32
television and films has a powerful effect on social
learning via "symbolic modeling."
According to Banduras (1977):
It has been shown that both children and adults
acquire attitudes, emotional responses, and new
styles of conduct through filmed and televised
modeling (Bandura, 1973; Liebert,Neale, &
Davidson, 1973). In view of the efficacy of,
and extensive public exposure to, televised
modeling, the mass media play an influential
role in shaping behavior and social attitudes .
. . With increasing use of symbolic modeling,
parents, teachers, and other traditional role
models may occupy less prominent roles in
social learning, (pp 39-40.)
Bandura believes that the one of the main reasons
that television and film are such powerful, symbolic,
observational learning tools is due to their huge
"multiplicative" capacity and their ability to reach a
plethora of viewers at the same time in "widely dispersed
locations" (1977, p.39). Moreover, he asserts that when
people's primary exposure to learning about particular
segments of society comes from a single model, such as
television, and their real life experience is limited to
observation of that model, it can strongly affect their
perceptions of social reality and can have as much impact
as direct experience. Such limited exposure can lead to
the development of stereotypes, or distorted views of
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33
reality, or what Banduras terms "inaccuracies in
thinking."
Gerbner's Cultivation Theory
George Gerbner's "cultivation theory," also focuses
on how the power of television affects viewers' social
reality (Gerbner et al, 1982). In his theory, Gerbner
asserts that the more often people watch television, the
more likely they are to believe that the television
representation of life and society the see is accurate
and realistic, even when it is greatly distorted.
George Gerbner, director and founder of the Cultural
Indicators project, and his colleagues, are the leading
researchers on television content and audience impact.
Gerbner is best known for his cultivation theory, also
called cultivation analysis or the cultivation
hypothesis. As suggested by Gerbner et al. (1982) in
Gerbner's cultivation theory, the mass media, including
film and television, act as a socializing agent. They
have the power not only to reshape cultural values, but
to cultivate and reinforce attitudes and values that
already exist in a culture and transmit them to the
members of the culture, thus binding the society
together. Gerbner' cultivation analysis is based on five
assumptions, which he calls "cultural indicators":
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34
• Television is fundamentally different from
other forms of media.
• Television is the central cultural arm of
the society.
• Television cultivates a general
consciousness on which people's
conclusions and judgments are based.
• Television's major cultural influence is
to stabilize social patterns.
• The measurable, indentifiable
contributions of television to the culture
at any one time are relatively small.
(Kwong, 1997, p. 1)
Cultivation theorists believe that television has
long-term effects that are "small, gradual, indirect but
cumulative and significant," (Chandler, 1995, p.l) and
that the emphasis is on the heavy viewer.
The terms "light," "medium," and "heavy" viewing
were coined by Gerbner but have been described diversely
in different studies on the impact of television
depending on the varying nature of each study's
respondents.
Gerbner, Gross, Morgan and Signiorelli (1982), for
instance, in their study "Charting the Mainstream:
Television's Contributions to Political Orientations,"
assigned the label "light viewers" to those who watched
an average of less than two hours per day. "Medium
viewers" were those who reported watching two to three
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35
hours per day, and "heavy viewers" were those who watched
four or more hours of television daily.
However, in Kang and Morgan's 1988 study on the
impact of U.S. television in Korea, the researchers
separated their respondents' amount of television viewing
at the median into "light" for those who viewed less than
an hour daily, and "heavy" for those who watched one hour
or more per day.
Beadle (1999) also presented a different definition
of "light and heavy" viewing while omitting the term
"medium viewers" in her study on the influence of U.S.
media on Argentine men and women. She divided her
respondents into "heavy viewers" for those who watched
more than 4 hours a day, and "light viewers" for those
who watched less than four hours a day. So the terms
"heavy" or "a lot" of television seem to be relative to
the respondents and contexts of each study.
According to Signiorelli (1993), the images
presented on television are consistent, regardless of the
programming source, outlet, or passage of time:
There is a degree of stability in program
content, regardless of the outlet (e.g.,
channel). The tight links in the industries
involved in the distribution and production of
media content, as well as the fact that these
industries are trying to attract overlapping
heterogeneous audiences, lead to the production
of programming that presents consistent and
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36
complementary images and messages, within and,
to a lesser degree, across genres. . . Study
after study has revealed that from year to year
television's aggregate system of messages has
been remarkably similar. Although individual
genres may have somewhat different
constellations of images, they are consistent
over time. Consequently, the heavy viewer, the
person who watches more of everything, tends to
be exposed to the same patterns and
constellations of images day after day, year
after year. (p. 316)
Signiorelli (1993), however, also pointed out the
complexity of the "cultivation" process. She stated
that, "Cultivation is not a unidirectional flow of
influence from television to audience, but part of a
continual, dynamic, ongoing process of interaction
between messages and contexts. In some cases, those who
watch more television (the heavy viewers) are more
likely—in all or most subgroups—to give the 'television
answers.' But, in many cases . . . the patterns are more
complex. Television viewing usually relates in different
ways to different groups' life situations and worldviews"
(p. 330).
To address this issue, Gerbner also established a
theory which he called "mainstreaming," which suggests
that heavy television viewing (4 or more hours a day)
reduces the disparities in perceptions of reality due to
demographic and social factors. Gerbner believed that
"heavy viewers of all groups tend to share a relatively
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37
homogeneous outlook" (Gerbner, 1980 as cited in Kwong,
1997, p.2). Therefore, heavy viewers, regardless of
their social and demographic makeup, can receive similar
messages.
The Influence of American Film and Television Programs on
Audience Perceptions in the United States
A great deal of research has been done on the impact
of American film and television programs on U.S.
audiences, with the majority focusing on the more
pervasive medium of television and on the prevalence of
stereotypes.
Studies on American Students'Stereotypes of Foreign
Cultures
Shatzer et al (1982) conducted a study of 676 high
school students in two small mid-western communities
which aimed to ascertain the social and psycho-
sociological traits of the students who were more likely
to watch "Shogun" on television, and to discover the
potential connection between exposure to the Japanese-
themed television mini-series and "knowledge about
Japanese history, language and customs; attitudes toward
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38
interaction with the Japanese (social distance); and
stereotypes of the Japanese" (p. 4).
According to the authors, "One underlying notion
behind conducting the study was that young people in the
Midwestern United States do not have many opportunities
to witness an extensive representation of a remote
culture such as the Japanese, and thus the TV program
could be an important input in their cultural
socialization" (p. 4). The results of the study supported
this notion. Based on the data retrieved from
questionnaires, the researchers found that at least for
the short term, the students acquired a lot of knowledge
that they considered accurate about the Japanese culture.
They also found that those students with positive
attitudes toward learning about other cultures held more
positive stereotypes of the Japanese and were open to
establishing a closer social distance. Moreover, those
respondents with greater ethnocentric values held more
negative stereotypes of the Japanese, and those
stereotypes were reinforced when the participants viewed
the series.
A significant observation made by the researchers
was: "The acquisition of knowledge about other cultures,
and the attitudes and stereotypes formed about other
cultures can be expected to be a function of experience
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39
and information acquisition. When few information
sources and experiences are available, then relatively
infrequent spurts of information or symbolic experience
may take on increased importance as in the case of a
special television program such as "Shogun" (p. 3).
Yarbro (1994) also conducted a study focusing on the
interaction between the amount of television viewing and
recognition of stereotypes. Sixty undergraduate students
enrolled in communications courses were shown U.S.-
produced movies, which took place in developing
countries. After viewing the films, they were asked to
rate the positive and negative traits of the characters
or those that they recognized to be stereotypical
characteristics. Once they had finished the
questionnaires, they participated in focus groups to
discuss and expand upon their personal views of the
characters.
The students were separated into "low viewers,"
"medium viewers," and "high viewers." "Low viewers" were
those students who watched television for an average of
less than one hour a day. "Medium viewers" watched an
average of one to two hours a day, and "high viewers"
watched an average of three to five hours of television
on a daily basis.
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40
Yarbro found that overall the "native" characters in
the movies were attributed more negative traits, and the
"white" characters were rated more positively by the
respondents. She also discovered that the extent of
exposure to television was not the sole factor relating
to the respondents' recognition of positive and negative
character traits. In some cases, "It was the race or
ethnic group of the character being assessed that
affected subjects' ratings rather than the main effect of
TV viewing patterns" (Yarbro, 1994, p. 17). The
researchers couldn't fully distinguish if students were
recognizing stereotypes actually depicted in the movies
or were reporting their own underlying stereotypes.
However, the study showed that there was a
significant correlation between the amount of television
viewing and the recognition of stereotypes. Yarbro
suggests that "subjects who watched more may have been
'experts' on symbolic reality. Our subjects who watched
more television were apparently better able to recognize
more negative stereotypes for native characters than for
white characters, while subjects who watched less
television recognized fewer negative stereotypes for
native characters than for white characters" (p. 17).
Moreover, although they recognized what they saw
were stereotypes, they were "at a loss" as to how to go
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41
beyond the stereotypes. For example, during the focus
group sessions, students who had watched films about
Vietnam and China said that their history courses did not
cover the Vietnam war, communism, or Asian history.
Therefore, they felt they did not have a way to determine
with accuracy "the facts" of these movies. However,
regardless of this point, in general, "The less subjects
knew about a culture and the more intense the depiction
of that culture in a film, the more subjects seemed
willing to accept the film's version of the culture" (p.
20) .
The same perceptions could apply to people of all
ages, genders, socioeconomic classes, cultures, and races
"other" than white residing in the United States based on
their representation in American television and films.
Content Analysis Studies
In his 1998 Screen Actors Guild Report: Casting the
American Scene, Gerbner examines the characters who were
featured on primetime and daytime television from 1994 to
1997. The report highlights the following findings about
the portrayals of these characters, some of which are
mis-representations of a segment of society's actual
distribution in society:
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42
• Despite slight progress toward more equitable
representation, men still outnumber women two to
one.
• The representation of African American males (but
not females) increased each year until it reached
171 percent of its real-life proportion.
• Commercial media shun poor people. Low-income wage
earners are virtually invisible.
• Asian/Pacific characters are still less than one
half of their proportion of the U.S. population.
• Latino/Hispanic characters are less than one third
of their real proportion of the U.S. population.
• Television characters in the nineties are healthier
and wealthier than in the eighties.
• The characters (especially women) are also younger.
The stage is set for more younger women-older men
relationships.
• There has been a decline in the number of
characters with disabilities, and disabled
performers still do not play "normal" roles.
• Women age faster than men and as they age they
become more evil.
• Mentally ill characters and "foreigners" fail most
often, and commit most crime and violence, (p. 2)
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43
These data are significant and are exceptionally
important if audiences not only are exposed to these
portrayals, but also perceive them, whether consciously
or unconsciously, to be accurate, even if they may not
be.
However, many studies have been done that examine
the content of television and film for stereotypes and
presume potential impact on audience perceptions without
specifically giving any empirical evidence of the
audiences' actual perceptions.
Blacks in the Media
In relation to the image of Blacks in the media, for
example, Dixon (1998) found that Blacks are more likely
than Latinos or Whites to be presented as criminals on
television news programs shown in Los Angeles and Orange
counties. Moreover, he found that Blacks are over
represented as lawbreakers in contrast to actual crime
reports. He concluded that, "the overrepresentation of
Blacks with law-breaking found in this study may cause
White viewers to cognitively link law-breaking behaviors
with African Americans as a group. This potential
outcome is predicted by the cultivation hypothesis and
theories of stereotyping derived from the social
psychological area of social cognition" (p.l).
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44
Entman and Rojecki (2000) in their book The Black
Image in the White Mind: Media and Race in America
"argue that the modern spectrum of white racial thinking
stretches from racial harmony on one end, through
ambivalence and animosity, to outright racism on the
other end. The media reflect this complexity and have
made enormous progress in portraying blacks. But local
and national news coverage, advertising, television shows
and films still reinforce — mostly unintentionally—
traditional hierarchies, stereotypes and feelings of
racial distance and disengagement" (p.l).
In an earlier article, Entman (1992) asserted that
when people consciously try to reject prejudicial beliefs
their attitudes emerge in other ways. He called this
phenomenon "modern racism," or "a compound of
hostility, rejection and denial on the part of whites
toward the activities and aspirations of black people"
(p. 341). He believes that the presence of Blacks on
television in positions such as newscasters or reporters
may actually engender "modern racism." He believes that
when these Black newscasters assume the same presentation
style as their white colleagues in reporting news about
the world, including news about Blacks, from a white
perspective, rather than from a Black point of view, it
actually encourages this form of racism by unwittingly
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45
indicating to viewers that blacks are no longer
discriminated against. As Yarbro (1994) points out, "the
effect is that white viewers see blacks are capable of
adhering to white values and can succeed in the system.
The "other" can become "one of us" if he or she really
wants to" (p. 10).
Asians in the Media
In another content analysis study, "The Yellow
Menace in American Popular Film: 1991 through 1995," Ho
(1998) analyzes the images of Asian males in the top ten
"money-making American films" from 1991 to 1995. He
states that, "In America, stereotypes about Asians have
existed since the mid-nineteenth century when Asians
first reached American shores seeking work. Since that
time, the American film industry has portrayed Asian
males as nerds, rapists, eunuchs, evil villains, gang
members, kamikaze pilots, and kung fu masters— the white
man's other" (p. 1). While he states that, "It is
difficult to accurately assess the impact these images
have on the viewing audience," he also asserts that the
"portrayal of Asians in the American feature films
reflects and influences white American perceptions of
Asians and Asian-Americans" (p.l).
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46
Latinos in the Media
As Gerbner (1998) suggested, Latinos have been
consistently underrepresented in the media as opposed to
their actual distribution in society. As with Blacks,
who have been overrepresented in the media, Latinos have
also generally been associated with violence and social
problems. Both Gerbner's "cultivation theory" and
Bandura's "social learning theory" would address this
phenomenon by explaining that being underrepresented or
over-represented, although inaccurate representations, is
not the principle issue. The fact that these two sectors
of society are principally portrayed as criminals would
impact viewers' impressions when those viewers' primary
source of information about these groups is the media.
Carlos Cortes, a film historian from the University
of California at Riverside, also believes that one of the
main problems is the portrayal of violence. "Movies like
'Scarface,' a depiction of Cuban-American gang life,
create an impression that Latinos are more violent than
other Americans. The urban "Gangsta" movies of the 1990s
portray Latinos as drug dealers, pimps and social
problems. If Latin women are not portrayed as floozies
or as prostitutes, they are often individuals who sing,
dance, and entertain like Carmen Miranda or Charro"
(DeNoma, 1996).
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47
Jenrette et al (1999), in their article on soap
stereotypes of Latinas, assert that although Hispanic-
American characters have been increasingly integrated
into American, English-language soap operas, their roles
are still marginalized. They are most often portrayed as
poor, servants or as part of a servant family, and in
positions that are secondary to Anglos and Anglo
families. The authors believe that "all the Hispanic-
American female characters on daytime dramas have fallen
'victim' to the dominant culture" (p. 1) and that the
U.S. public's perception of Latinas in a marginal
position will continue unless television programs
"broaden viewers' understanding of women's similarities
rather than presenting certain groups as limited and
marginal" (p.8).
National Survey on Latino's Perceptions of Their Media
Portrayal
Because of the lack of national survey data on
Latino’s perceptions of how they are portrayed on
television, the Tomas Rivera Policy Institute conducted a
national survey in 1998 to obtain this information.
Researchers from the institute surveyed 1,013 Latinos by
phone questionnaire in California, Texas, New York,
Florida, and Illinois, the states with the largest Latino
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48
populations. According to the report, Latinos now
constitute more than 10% of the U.S. population and "more
than 99 percent of Hispanic households have a working
television set in their homes" (p. 1).
The results of the survey showed that the
respondents had conflicting emotions about how they were
presented on television. Although they were generally
satisfied with the presentation of Hispanic stories on
English-language news programs by Hispanic anchors, they
also were critical of some of the predominantly negative
portrayals of the Latino community in news stories and
entertainment programs and the scarcity of Latino
characters on television.
Studies on Violence and Crime
Another major area of research on the impact of
American film and television on American audiences'
perceptions concerns violence and crime. According to
Heath and Gilbert (1996), "Charges that the mass media
create unwarranted levels of fear of crime are almost as
old as the media themselves" (p. 379). These researchers
also state that the framework for most of the studies on
television's impact on fear of crime is based on
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49
Gerbner's cultivation hypothesis. According to Gerbner
et al (1994):
Data from numerous large national probability
surveys . . . indicate that long-term regular
exposure to television, in addition to many
other factors, tends to make an independent
contribution to the feeling of living in a mean
and gloomy world. The "lessons" may range from
aggression to desensitization and to a sense of
vulnerability and dependence. . . For example,
heavy viewers are more likely than comparable
groups of light viewers to overestimate one's
chances of involvement in violence; to believe
that one's neighborhood is unsafe; to state
that fear of crime is a very serious problem;
and to assume that crime is rising, regardless
of the facts of the case. Heavier viewers in
every subgroup (defined by education, age,
income, gender, newspaper reading,
neighborhood, etc.) express a greater sense of
apprehension than do light viewers in the same
groups. Other results show that heavy viewers
are also more likely to have bought new locks,
watchdogs, and guns 'for protection." (p.13)
In Heath and Gilbert's (1996) analysis of the
literature, they found that while Gerbner et al clearly
showed that "the television world contains much more
violence than the real world" (p. 380), the correlation
between television exposure and fear of crime is not
always evident. The authors conclude that for some
viewers, some television programs impart a fear of crime,
but that "Factors such as the type of programming (e.g.,
drama versus news), the credulity of the viewer, the
extent of justice displayed at the program's end, and the
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50
level of apprehension about crime before the viewing all
lead to complex patterns rather than simple main effects"
(p. 381).
Iyengar (1998), for example, suggests that the
television news media in particular is largely
responsible for cultivating the public's perception of
crime. He points out that the
fact that the rate of crime — and violent
crime in particular— has dropped dramatically
over the past decade would seem to suggest that
the public's beliefs about crime are based not
on some personal experience as a crime victim,
but rather, on what they see in the news media,
namely, that violent crime is a frequent daily
occurrence. In the Los Angeles area, a report
on violent crime airs every three minutes
during local newscasts. Murder accounts for
less than one percent of all crime in Los
Angeles but makes up twenty percent of all
local news reports on crime. . . In the sheer
frequency of crime news, Los Angeles is no
outlier; violent crime accounted for two-thirds
of all local news in a recent study of news
programming in fifty-six different U.S. cities
(Klite et al., 1997); (p. 3)
Iyengar (1998) also argued that the most
"unequivocal evidence concerning the racial element of
the crime news script" was found in research he conducted
with Gilliam in 1997 and 1998. The evidence showed that
the "presence of a black rather than white perpetrator in
local news reports is meaningful to viewers" and that
"Specifically, the skin color of the alleged perpetrator
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51
matters to viewers' opinions concerning both race and
crime" (p. 4).
Using computer-based editing techniques, the
researchers present the same individual as
either a white or African-American male. The
results show that when the suspect in the news
was African-American, significantly more
viewers endorsed punitive criminal justice
policies (the death penalty, three strikes,"
increased funding for prisons). In addition,
the racial manipulation strengthened viewers'
racial stereotypes (ratings of blacks as lazy
and unintelligent) and lowered evaluations of
black leaders such as Jesse Jackson (Gilliam
and Iyengar, 1998). However, Gilliam and
Iyengar found that the racial element of crime
news was overshadowed by any exposure to crime
news as an antecedent of racial attitudes.
That is, viewers' tendency to stereotype
African-Americans and their negative
evaluations of black leaders became more
pronounced in response to the crime-no crime
rather than the white perpetrator-black
perpetrator manipulation . . . This result
suggests that viewers have internalized the
racial element of crime news, so much so that
any reference to crime is sufficient to trigger
negative racial attitudes." (Iyengar, 1988, p.
5)
In summary, an overwhelming amount of research has
been done on the impact of American film and television
programs on U.S. audiences, with the majority focusing on
the pervasive medium of television. Most of the studies,
whether via survey or content analysis of films and
programming, concur that these media do have a major
influence on audience perceptions, opinions, values and
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52
beliefs. It is often unclear whether or not the images
cultivated by the media are generated by them, but it is
clear that they tend to reinforce preexisting beliefs.
The Influence of American Film and Television Programs on
Foreign Audiences' Perceptions of American Culture
Over the last 20 years, many studies have
established that American television has also had an
impact on many foreign viewers' perceptions of Americans
and American culture, and many have used Gerbner's
cultivation theory as a framework to analyze this
phenomenon (e.g., Kang and Morgan, 1988; Tan et al 1986,
1987; Tan and Suarchavarat, 1988; Viswanath, 1988; Ware
and Dupagne, 1994; Zaharopoulos 1997; Kwong, 1997, and
Beadle, 1999). Again, cultivation theory asserts that,
"television influences the perception of images about
the real world. The relationship between images in the
media, the amount of television exposure, and the
viewer's belief in the reliability and reality of that
message is the primary focus of cultivation study"
(Beadle, 1999, p.2).
Tan and Suarchavarat's (1988) survey of 279 Thai
undergraduates in Thailand via questionnaire, for
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53
example, measured the following variables related to
American television viewing:
1. Social Stereotypes of Americans.
Respondents were asked to rate each of 36
adjectives on a five-point scale according
to how well the adjective described
Americans in general (from 5, extremely
well, to 1, not at all.)
2. Frequency of viewing American television
programs. A list of all available
television programs in Bangkok was
presented to the respondents, who were
then asked to rate how often each program
was viewed on a five-point scale. The
scale points were every week (5), almost
every week (4), about once a month (3),
almost never (2), and never (1). An
average score was then computed to
indicate frequency of exposure to all
American TV programs.
3. Measures of other variable that might
influence respondents' social stereotypes
of Americans, such as number of American
movies seen in a movie theatre in the last
month, and frequency of contact with
Americans, from 1 (seldom, or once or less
in a few weeks) to 4 (very often or more
than twice a week.)
4. Demographic variables, such as sex,
education, (year in school), and income
(family's annual income.)
5. Accuracy perceptions, American TV.
Respondents were asked to indicate how
accurately American television depicts the
United States and how Americans act on a
five-point scale, from 5 (very accurately)
to 1 (not at all accurate.) (p. 650)
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54
An analysis of their data revealed that an
overwhelming majority of their respondents (the mean was
3.56 out of a 4 point scale) believed that "American TV
programs were accurate depictions of Americans and the
United States" and that the "programs which most
accurately depicted the United States" were "Dallas,"
"Fame" and "Chips"(pp. 650-651). Moreover, the top ten
characteristics assigned to Americans were "pleasure-
loving, athletic, individualistic, sensual, efficient,
musical, scientifically minded, artistic, intelligent and
materialistic."
Clearly, the view of Americans perceived from
American television was mixed and included both positive
and negative traits. Moreover, the analysis of the data
showed that TV was the major source of "social
stereotypes" of Americans received by the Thai students.
A similar study conducted in Taiwan and Mexico (Tan
et al, 1986) found similar results. Variations in the
stereotypes assigned to Americans depended on the
programs watched because "conflicting images of
Americans may be projected by different programs" (p.
813).
In a study in the Philippines (Tan et al, 1987), the
researchers found that "American television programs
present a conflicting cultural image in the Philippines
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55
which leads to an emphasis on non-traditional values of
high school students" (p. 73). Researchers discovered
that the students who watched American television more
often adopted non-traditional values, which were more
similar to those shown by the television programs than to
Philippine traditional values. For example, "pleasure,"
a consistent characteristic shown on American television,
was ranked as more important by more frequent viewers of
American television, but pleasure "was not considered an
important value by our average Filipino respondent" (Tan
et al, 1987, p. 72).
In contrast, the average Philippine student's most
important personal values were reported to be
"politeness, forgiving and obedient," which, according
to the researchers were values "American TV rarely
emphasizes" (Tan et al, 1987, p. 71).
Another study by Kang and Morgan (1988) on the
impact of U.S. television in Korea, found that American
Forces Korean Network (AFKN), which is run by the U.S.
military and broadcasts exclusively American programs,
was shown to have a significant effect on female
viewers. In Korea, there are distinct differences in
the images portrayed in American programs and
traditional Korean values, such as the "appropriate"
roles of men and women, family values, and respect for
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56
parents and elders. Per the study, Korean females,
especially heavy AFKN viewers, were more progressive and
liberal, while male viewers endorsed more non-
traditional values but preferred the Korean family
system. The researchers separated their respondents'
amount of television viewing at the median into "light"
for those who viewed less than an hour daily, and
"heavy" for those who watched one hour or more per day.
They were careful to point out that
Any possible impact of AFKN must of course be
seen in the context of the larger political and
cultural climate of Korea. Korea has changed
dramatically since the 'economic miracle' in
the early 1970s, in which it became one of the
United States'largest trading partners. Trade
with the U.S. has brought on a massive influx
of Western culture, exacerbating the American
military presence and often heightening
conflicts with American culture. While the
messages of American television programs
present clear conflicts with many traditional
Korean values, watching AFKN programs is likely
to be at most only one small aspect of any
larger process of Westernization. (p. 433)
Although many individual studies have been done,
there have been varying results, partly due to the
variation in methodology, selected study characteristics
and different types of dependent variables on effect
sizes (Ware and Dupagne, 1994; Biltereyst, 1996).
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57
In order to generalize results, Ware and Dupagne
(1994) conducted a meta-analysis or "analysis of
analyses" of the "available" English-language
quantitative research on the effects of U.S. television
programs on foreign audiences. The requirements were
that the independent variable had to "measure exposure
to television programming originating in the United
States . . . the programming must be entertainment-
oriented (studies focusing exclusively on news and
educational programs were excluded). Finally, the data
must have been gathered from the population in a foreign
country and not from foreign nationals living in the
United States" (Ware and Dupagne, 1994, p. 949).
34 quantitative studies were originally selected,
but only 17 were used because the other studies "did not
meet the statistical requirements of a meta-analysis"
(Ware and Dupagne, p. 949). Two meta-analyses were
performed in the study. The first used four study
measures as moderators, which were "the developmental
status of the country (developed or undeveloped,)
language of questionnaire (English or non English),
sampling procedure (random and non-random), and age of
respondents (children, high school/college students, and
adults" (Ware and Dupagne, 1994, p. 949).
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58
The second meta-analysis compared different types
of dependent variables. Multiple effect sizes were
derived for 84 separate types of dependent variables,
and six "mutually exclusive and exhaustive categories
were identified" (Ware and Dupagne, 1994, p. 949):
1. Perceptions of America/Americans (e.g.,
violence in society, Americans are
pleasure loving);
2. Preference for American goods (e.g.,
prefer U.S. food, want more U.S.
programs);
3. Attitudes towards own culture/lifestyle
(e.g. Confucianism is old-fashioned,
Canada's culture not worth
preserving);
4. Attitudes towards America (e.g., U.S.
rated
on semantic scale, "specific" attitudes
toward U.S.);
5. Perceptions of own country (e.g.,
violence
in society, fear of crime.); and
6. Desire to emigrate
Based on the 17 studies chosen for the study, the
researchers found that "there was a small, but
statistically significant, association between exposure
to U.S. entertainment programs and attitudes,
perceptions and behaviors of foreign audiences" (Ware
and Dupagne, p. 947) One of their main findings, for
example, was that the largest effect of American
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59
television exposure was cultivation of a preference for
American or western products. Moreover, there was a
variation of results, with those studies using English
questionnaires exhibiting a larger effect.
Since Ware and Dupagne's 1994 article, studies on
the influence of U.S. television overseas have been done
that continue to support the cultivation theory.
Zaharopoulos (1997), for example, studied Greek high
school students' perceptions of American values in
relationship to the amount of U.S. television
programming they watched. He discovered that the
respondents who watched American television programs
more often tended to have a more positive view of
Americans, and that males had a more negative view of
Americans than female students.
Kwong (1997) conducted an investigation on the
relationship between exposure to American television
programs and the perceptions of traditional values among
Chinese youth in Hong Kong. He based his study on Kang
and Morgan's 1988 study of Korean students, but adapted
it to the differences in time, socio-economic and
cultural contexts. 122 respondents, who were university
students with an average age of 23, completely answered
self-administered questionnaires which included questions
on 20 U.S. programs broadcast on Hong Kong terrestrial
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60
channels or shown on satellite and cable channels
available in Hong Kong.
The students were questioned about which shows they
watched and the frequency of viewing. Kwong also derived
dependent variables from responses to a series of
statements he provided which focused on marriage and
family values and sex-role values. Respondents were
asked to respond to categories on five-point Likert
scales from "strongly agree" to "strongly disagree" to
statements such as "unrestricted dating is unethical" and
"it is natural that we should obey our parents at all
times." The students were separated into light viewers
(those who watched less than 12 hours of television in an
average week, and heavy viewers, those who watched more
than 12 hours per week, as the viewing average was
approximately 12 hours per week. The most frequently
watched U.S. programs were "Friends," "ER," "NYPD Blue,"
"60 Minutes" and "The X-Files."
The results showed that overall the light viewers
held more traditional and conservative views and were
more likely to support traditional Chinese viewpoints
about marriage and family, sex-roles, and traditional
cultural values. Kwong concluded that "the amount of
television viewing does have (an) association with
traditional values and U.S. television programs may help
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61
Westernize traditional Chinese cultures and attitudes of
Chinese youth toward traditional values" (p. 6).
In her study about Argentinian businessmen and
women's perceptions of the U.S. lifestyle through the
U.S. media, Beadle (1999) hypothesized that Argentinians'
business communication style may be more impacted by
"exposure to U.S. media than by direct personal contact"
with Americans. The results of her survey of 638
respondents showed that "despite a lack of heavy viewers
and a perception that U.S. media has little importance. .
. Those who perceived television to be more realistic and
accurate about foreign countries agreed more with the
positive factors about the U.S" (3; p.2). However, these
perceptions varied with the type of media watched. For
example, those who watched CNN and read Newsweek had a
more accurate view of living conditions in the United
States, but had a more negative view of Americans'
personal characteristics.
Another important finding made by the author was
that the respondents who had already had face-to-face
contact with American business people had generally more
positive perceptions of Americans. So, per Beadle
(1999), "the results of this study indicate that personal
contact is important in dispelling inaccurate perceptions
of personal qualities of foreigners and may be more
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62
influential for adults than exposure to U.S. media" (4;
p.3).
The Impact of American Television/Film on Foreign
Audiences in the U.S.
Although many studies have been done on the impact
of American film/television on foreign audiences
overseas, relatively few studies have been designed to
determine the impact of these media on foreign audiences'
perceptions of the American culture with foreign
nationals living and studying in the United States.
A statistical study that focused on how knowledge of
American culture affects foreign students' English as a
second language proficiency was conducted by Liu (1994)
at the Department of TESOL at Oklahoma City University.
Liu administered a multiple choice test on American
culture to thirty international students, asked them
separately about the extent of their exposure to aural
and visual/aural media, gave them an oral proficiency
test, and had them take the TOEFL (Test of English as a
Foreign Language). The students' countries of origins
were not specified except to say that 29 of the 30
participants were from "countries in the Far East." All
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63
had resided in the U.S. for two to three years, and had
di f f erent ma j ors.
The researchers performed statistical analyses,
which showed that length of residence, nationality and
major areas of studies did not account for the difference
in performance on the linguistic and cultural tests.
However, significant correlations were found between
media exposure and the cultural test, the oral test and
the TOEFL scores, which indicated that exposure to both
the printed and the visual/aural media may assist the
students in acquiring knowledge about the American
culture as well as help them improve their language
proficiency. Although these findings were determined, no
specific details about students' personal experience
with, attitudes toward or perceptions of Americans or
American culture were explored. Moreover, the area of
cultural knowledge assessed was limited to the multiple-
choice cultural test administered by the researchers.
In a study directly related to foreign students'
perceptions of American culture, Talbot et al (1999) used
focus group discussions to examine Asian International
students' experiences with and attitudes toward African
Americans. The discussions revealed that, "when they
arrive in the United States, Asian students already have
low to moderate level of comfort concerning African
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64
Americans. The participants' initial negative attitudes
and perceptions about African Americans were influenced
most significantly by the negative portrayal of African
Americans in the media," and specifically on television,
in movies and in news reports (p.218). Other sources of
information related to the students' "fears" of African-
Americans originated from "frightening stories" they had
heard from friends and family "about crimes that African-
Americans had committed against Asians" (Talbot et al,
1999, p. 215). Moreover, several students reported that
they had also been exposed to history lessons about the
American Civil Rights Movement, and had learned about
discrimination against Blacks in high school.
Although direct evidence was found showing American
film and television to be the primary source of these
students' perceptions of African-Americans, this study
was not specifically designed to determine the impact of
American television or film on Asian students'
perceptions of African-Americans, and no separate,
systematic research relating to television or media
effects was conducted. The significant information
relating to the source of the students' perceptions was
revealed through direct conversations with the
participants.
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65
In their study "Daytime Television Talk Shows and
the Cultivation Effect among U.S. and International
Students," Woo and Dominick (2001) conducted research
specifically geared to determine the impact of American
television on foreign students residing in the United
States in comparison to American students.
152 American students and 143 international students
participated in the study. The researchers stated that,
"About 69% of the international students came from
Pacific Rim countries," but did not list specific
countries of origin or the nationalities of the remaining
31%.
The researchers distributed a self-administered
survey to the participants that contained pre-established
response categories, asking respondents to select from
statements placed on a variety of scales. In addition to
collecting demographic information, the survey measured
independent variables including: total television viewing
time per day (from "0" to "more than 5 hours,") a "genre-
specific" measure gauging the frequency of watching
specific daytime talk shows (from a list of nine), and
total weekly viewing time of daytime talk shows. In
addition, they divided the participants' total weekly
viewing time by the amount of hours they had watched talk
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66
shows the previous week to obtain what they called "a
dominance measure."
The researchers also used three dependent variables
related to attitudes and perceptions about behaviors in
the United States:
• The first involved perceptions of the
frequency of certain inappropriate or
undesirable behaviors among members of the
U.S. population. . . Respondents were asked
to indicate on an 11-point scale with five-
percent increments ranging from "less than 1
%" (coded as 1%) to "50% or more" (coded as
50%) the percentage of people who engage in
six activities commonly discussed on daytime
talk shows, including infidelity, premarital
sex, and running away from home.
• A second measure examined attitudes toward
four areas of human relationships in the
U.S.: family relationships, relationships
between married couples, romantic
relationships, and friendship. For each
area, respondents filled out seven-point
rating scales consisting of nine pairs of
polar adjectives (dishonest-honest;
disloyal-faithful; untruthful-truthful; bad-
good; aggressive-peaceful; unstable-stable;
superficial-substantial; unfriendly-
friendly; unselfish-selfish.
• The third area concerned how respondents
perceived human relationships in three
areas: (1) general relationships among
people; (2) relationships within the family;
and (3) relationships between spouses. (Woo
and Dominick (2001, p. 5-6)
The researchers performed statistical analyses on
the data. They found that while "the American students
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67
watched more overall television than did the
international students, averaging about 2 hours and 20
minutes compared to 1 hour and 30 minutes (pc.001). . .
the two groups did not differ on talk show viewing
frequency."
They also found that the international viewers who
watched daytime television talk shows more frequently
were more likely to have negative perceptions of human
relationships in the U.S. than American students who
watched the talk shows with equal frequency.
Another finding was that the international viewers
who watched daytime TV talk shows more often perceived a
higher frequency of "improper or undesirable behaviors"
in the United States than American students who watched
the same amount of talk shows. Woo and Dominick (2001)
explained these findings by suggesting that "American
students would presumably have images of interpersonal
relationships drawn from direct experience or from the
increased viewing of other television programs that would
make the talk shows less dense and relatively less
frequent in their memories" (p.9), although they did not
measure or investigate the international students' direct
social experience with Americans or other potential
sources of their perceptions.
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68
Woo and Dominick (2001) also found that "program-
specific measures and viewing dominance measures were
more predictive of a cultivation effect than was the
total television viewing time measure" (p. 8), thus
indicating that the students' behavior frequency
estimates were more closely related to specific program
viewing. They suggested that this result was
understandable in the case of daytime TV talk shows
"given the bizarre, unconventional, and sensationalized
topics that are hallmarks of these programs (p.8). They
also theorized that "the potential messages contained in
this sort of content may only occur by watching this
specific genre" as they are not the types of themes
generally shown on mainstream television programming and
may therefore be the only source of exposure to this type
of "unconventional content" (p.8). These points concur
with Bandura's social learning theory in relation to
vicarious learning.
However, the researchers themselves questioned the
validity of calling this type of genre-specific study
evidence for a cultivation effect, as Gerbner's original
"cultivation theory" model considers the impact of the
totality of messages shown on television across different
genres on viewers' perceptions.
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69
In summary, in the studies cited above pertinent to
the impact of American film and television's impact on
foreign audiences, both overseas and in the U.S.,
researchers found a complex range of effects of these
media on viewers. However, the only study that went
beyond using statistical analyses of data or primary
instruments such as media content analyses and
statistical analyses of standardized questionnaires to
explore the nature of film and television viewers'
perceptions, were Talbot et al. (1999).
Talbot et al. (1999) used focus groups which
permitted direct conversations with participants which
elicited the answers they were looking for, rather than
using a standardized, pre-established set of lists to
rate that may or may not have permitted an appropriate
selection for the participants' true beliefs about the
subject matter to emerge.
Moreover, the scope of the studies done by Liu
(1994) Talbot et al (1999) and Woo & Dominick (2001) on
the perceptions of foreign students studying in the
United States was limited. Talbot et al's study, for
example, only focused on Asian students' attitudes
towards and perceptions of one ethnic group in America,
African-Americans, and where those perceptions were
derived, but did not explore the students' perceptions of
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70
or attitudes toward other Americans or other aspects of
American culture.
Woo and Dominick (2001) also had a narrow focus.
They only explored the effects of American daytime
television talk shows on their foreign student
participants in comparison to their American
counterparts, without regard to the effects of any other
genres of American television programs or films.
Moreover, they failed to investigate other sources of
students' perceptions of or attitudes toward American
culture either before or after their residence in the
United States.
Levin's Qualitative Pilot Studies
In order to obtain a more expansive, richer, more
rounded and in-depth view of the effects of American
films and television on Asian students1 perceptions of
the American culture both prior to and after their
residence in the United States, and in preparation for
this doctoral dissertation, Levin conducted two
qualitative pilot studies at a major university in
Southern California in Spring 1998 and at a Southern
California Community College in Fall 1999. A total of
thirteen undergraduate international students of Asian
background who were enrolled in Academic English as a
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71
Second Language (ESL) programs were interviewed to
determine how they perceived viewing American films and
television programs affected their knowledge of and
attitudes toward American culture.
The students were from Burma, Japan, South Korea,
Macao, Taiwan, and Thailand. One student had been raised
in Brazil but had a Chinese father and Japanese mother,
and considered himself to be Asian. The students were
interviewed individually and in focus groups using an
interview guide approach with a consistent, preset list
of open-ended questions used for each participant and
interview session. Students could expand on the topics
presented and the researcher could clarify any points
that needed further exploration. Students also wrote
reports on the films and television programs they had
seen over the semester.
The interview guide questions were partially
adapted from the general questions of previous studies on
the impact of American television on foreign viewers'
perceptions of American culture, e.g. Tan and
Suarchavarat (1988), Liu (1994) and Kwong (1997). For
example, participants were asked about which television
programs or films they had watched prior to and after
their residence in the United States, the frequency of
viewing, what social contact they had with Americans, the
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72
length of time they had resided in the United States,
types of perceptions of Americans, and about how
accurately American television reflects the United States
and Americans' actions. The difference is that although
the questions in Levin's study were consistent for each
interview so as to cover the same material, they were
open-ended. For example, students were not given a list
of prescribed adjectives or television shows to choose
from as in Tan and Suarchavarat (1988).
The interviewer also requested information about
other sources of knowledge about Americans both prior to
and after students' residence in the United States.
Additional new questions queried whether the films or
television programs viewed were subtitled or dubbed into
the students' language or had been censored, which could
affect perceptions. In addition, questions were asked to
elicit background information about the availability of
American films and television programs in the students'
home countries.
The interviews were transcribed and saved as
computer word documents. The documents were printed and
observed for coding and category formation and cross-
referenced with the written notes taken at the
interviews. Film and TV viewing reports were also cross-
referenced with the other data. By systematically
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73
comparing the interview data with the interview guide
questions, topics were identified and then clustered into
categories.
The data revealed that students perceived the media
to be accurate at times and inaccurate at others based on
the extent of their socialization in American culture.
Socialization was gauged by the type and amount of
exposure students had had to Americans prior to residing
in the United States, the type and amount of contact with
Americans they had while residing in the U.S., and the
amount of time participants had lived in the United
States.
Students had conflicting images of Americans. Most
were positive, but the respondents often found that their
actual encounters with Americans and American culture did
not meet their expectations. For example, the Asian
student who had grown up in Brazil had only seen American
television programs that had been dubbed in Portuguese,
and experienced the Americans to be friendly and warm.
However, when he actually lived in the United States and
viewed the same programs in their original English-
language format, he found the voices and characters to be
less warm. Moreover, when he had actual encounters with
Americans, he was disappointed, as they were not as
friendly and welcoming as he had imagined.
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74
In both studies, the participants clearly expressed
that they had gained knowledge of American culture and
people from watching films and television. Moreover, the
students in the Community College intensive reading
program felt that they received a more accurate picture
of the culture from watching films of the books they had
read rather than reading and discussing them. The images
of American culture recognized by the students were both
positive and negative and were often perceived to be
accurate and realistic.
For example, based on the students' own
observations, the areas they felt were accurate could be
divided into categories such as: Perceptions of
Friendliness and Openmindedness; Perceptions of Freedom
and Independence; Perceptions of Directness; Perceptions
of Racism/Discrimination; Perceptions of Sexual
Behavior/Boundaries; and Perceptions of Language and
Language Learning Usefulness. In the category of
Friendliness and Openmindedness, for instance, the
majority of the students perceived from watching American
films and television programs that the relationships
between doctors and patients, teachers and students, and
parents and children were friendly and relaxed, as
opposed to in their countries. Moreover, their
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75
experience living in the U.S. reinforced these
perceptions, and they considered them to be accurate.
Although many of the respondents believed that they
had received accurate images from American TV and films,
they also revealed that sometimes what they had learned
through these media prior to living in the United States
and after living there and gaining experiences with
Americans was often different than they had expected, as
the Brazilian student experienced.
Moreover, sometimes they were not sure if the images
they perceived were accurate or not. The most frequent
areas they felt were inaccurate were divided into the
categories of: Misperceptions of Heroism; Misperceptions
of the Good Life; Misperceptions of Making Friends; and
Misperceptions of Sexual Boundaries. For example, from
their television and film viewing, two Korean students
had had impressions of Americans as being heroes who
tended to "sacrifice to help the majority" and "worked
for the peace and the justice of the whole nation."
They realized, however, once they had personal and
business encounters with "real Americans" while living in
America, that "there are various kinds of American
people, not only good guys."
In conclusion, a review of the literature has shown
that viewing American film and television programs does
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76
have a significant influence on how foreign audiences
perceive the American culture. However, the majority of
studies cited have been quantitative studies, which
provide a limited scope given the nature of exploring
human perceptions.
Through open-ended questions where the participants
could elaborate on the complexity of their perceptions,
Levin's pilot studies provided a more rich, well-rounded
account of the effects of American films and television
on Asian students' perceptions of the American culture.
However, the studies were done in an informal
context with a small number of students in two different
academic settings one year apart.
Therefore, in order to broaden the scope, this
dissertation will build on Levin's pilot studies in a
more formal, systematic and comprehensive qualitative
research study in one academic setting with a larger .
group of participants. In the process, the study will
explore if the results two years after the initial
studies will be similar to or different than those of the
pilot studies and if they will yield additional
categories of perceptions.
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77
CHAPTER III
Design and Methodology
This chapter provides a description of the research
method used to explore the perceptions Asian ESL (English
as a Second Language) Community College students received
of American culture through viewing American films and
television programs both in their own countries and in
the United States of America.
The chapter is organized to include: the selection
of participants to be interviewed, the interview and
other data-gathering processes, a description of the
procedures used to ensure validity and reliability of the
study, and finally a section on data analyses techniques.
This study was conducted in an
exploratory/descriptive fashion with an emphasis on the
interview as a data collection technique.
Selection of Participants
To select participants for this study, a purposeful
sampling technique was used with a focus on homogeneous
samples. The goal was to target what Patton (1990)
calls "information-rich cases" whose backgrounds were
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78
appropriate for in-depth study relevant to the research
questions. Per Patton (1990), "Information-rich cases
are those from which one can learn a great deal about
issues of central importance to the purpose of the
evaluation, thus the term 'purposeful' sampling" (p. 52).
The study took place during the Fall 2001 semester
at Santa Monica College (SMC), a Community College where
the majority of foreign students are from Southeast and
East Asia. It took place over a 15-week period beginning
August 27, 2001 and ending December 14, 2001.
The study focused on students from Asia as most of
the researcher's students over the past twelve years have
been Asian. Moreover, most of the researcher's current
students are Asian, the majority of foreign students in
the United States come from Asia, and the majority of
international students enrolled at Santa Monica College
come from this region. In fact, as noted in Chapter One
of this dissertation, in the 2000/2001 Academic year, the
majority of U.S. Intensive English Program students came
from three East Asian places of origin: Japan, South
Korea and Taiwan, and China was ranked as the thirteenth
country of origin.
In terms of the criterion of homogeneity, although
the Southeast/East Asian region is heterogeneous, with
people from different countries, backgrounds and
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79
religions, studying foreign students from one region
created a more focused and manageable research than
including students from a variety of regions in the
world.
In fact, it can be shown that there is a
commonality in that they come from what Hofstede
(1985,1986) calls collectivist or high context cultures
versus individualistic or low-context cultures.
Collectivism "stands for a preference for a tightly knit
social framework in which individuals can expect their
relatives, clan, or other in-group to look after them, in
exchange for unquestioning loyalty" (Hofstede, 1985, p.
348). Individualism, on the other hand, "stands for a
preference for a loosely knit social framework in society
in which individuals are supposed to take care of
themselves and their immediate families only" (Hofstede,
1985, p. 348.).
The procedure for recruiting volunteers for the
study included posting flyers describing the study in the
International Programs office and in the ESL classrooms
on the Santa Monica College campus, and distributing
these flyers directly to the students enrolled in the
Intensive ESL Reading Program. A total of 75 flyers were
distributed, and a total number of 23 students
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80
volunteered for the study. All of the respondents were
chosen to participate in the study.
All 23 selected participants were Asian English as a
Second Language (ESL) students enrolled in their first
semester at SMC who volunteered to participate in the
research. The students were enrolled in the two highest
levels of a 20-hour-a-week, non-credit, intensive ESL
reading, discussion, writing and presentation course the
investigator was teaching to prepare them for entrance
into the general education program at SMC.
Out of 34 Asian students enrolled in the classes, 23
volunteered to participate in the study (See Appendix B).
Two of the students were from China, three were from Hong
Kong, five were from Japan, seven were from South Korea,
four were from Taiwan, one was from Thailand, and one was
from Vietnam. The selection of participants represented
the combination of Asian students who generally are
grouped together in these classes, with the exception of
Indonesian students who chose not to volunteer for the
study.
Eight of the participants were male and fifteen
were female. Their ages ranged from 19 to 30 years. As
the participants in the study were volunteers, obtaining
an equal number of students from each country was a
difficult task. However, as the focus is on individuals
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81
from the Asian region and not dependent on numbers or on
generalizing to a greater population, it was felt that
the representation was sufficient.
Finding a gender balance was also difficult;
however, 8 out of 23 participants were male, which
represents a respectable 34% of the pool of participants.
Again, as this research is not necessarily seeking
gender-dependent data, it was felt that this
representation was sufficient and insured that gender
differences were represented.
Regardless of the gender or country distribution,
sufficient data were gained through the interviews and
student journals to answer the research questions.
Data Collection
The main mode of data collection was the interview.
The researcher conducted open-ended interviews using a
general interview guide approach (Patton, 1990), and
interviewed students individually and in small focus
groups.
According to Patton (1987) "A focus group interview
is an interview with a small group of people on a
specific topic" (p. 135). In this study, the focus
groups provided a way to elicit information that might
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82
not emerge in one-on-one interviews. According to
Morgan & Kreuger (1993, as cited in Gibbs, 1997)
The main purpose of focus group research is to
draw upon respondents' attitudes, feelings,
beliefs, experiences and reactions in a way
that would not be feasible using other methods,
for example observation, one-to-one
interviewing, or questionnaire surveys. These
attitudes, feelings, and beliefs may be
partially independent of a group or its social
setting, but are more likely to be revealed via
the social gathering and the interaction which
being in a focus group entails. Compared to
individual interviews, which aim to obtain
individual attitudes, beliefs and feelings,
focus groups elicit a multiplicity of views and
emotional processes within a group context.
(p.2)
Both the intensive open-ended interview and focus
group interviews provided an important way of accessing
the feelings, perceptions, attitudes and knowledge of
participants. The main raw data from these interviews
were direct quotations, as, per Patton (1987) "Direct
quotations reveal the respondents' levels of emotion, the
way in which they have organized the world, their
thoughts about what is happening, their experiences, and
their basic perceptions. The task for the qualitative
evaluator is to provide a framework within which people
can respond in a way that represents accurately and
thoroughly their point of view" (p.11).
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83
There were two individual, in-depth interviews with
each student during the semester, and 18 students
participated in six small focus groups of from two to
four students. Short, informal follow-up interviews to
clarify previous information gathered were also
conducted.
The individual interviews lasted approximately two
hours per student per interview, and the focus group
discussions lasted from two to four hours each. The
individual interviews and focus group discussions were
conducted in familiar, comfortable settings on campus
and at small cafes off campus either before or after
class, according to the students' preferences.
The researcher had prepared a checklist of questions
and issues to be explored which provided a guide to the
interview sessions (See Appendix A). The checklist had
been used in the pilot studies previously conducted by
Levin (1998,1999) The checklist included questions on
basic demographic information such as age, country of
origin, and the amount of English studied as well as
open-ended questions on the nature of the students' film
and television viewing habits in the United States and in
their home countries. The questions also explored how
they felt about American films and television programs
and how they felt viewing them had affected their and
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84
their peers' knowledge of the American culture and their
socialization. (See Appendix B "Student Profiles" for an
overview of the students' age, sex, country of origin,
time resided in the United States at the time of the
interviews, amount of television programs and films
watched prior to and after their residence in the U.S.,
and amount of English studied.)
This format ensured that relevant topics were
covered while allowing flexibility for the students to
provide information in a more free flowing and
spontaneous way than if a standardized question-answer
approach had been used. The issues in the question
outline did not need to be taken in any particular order,
yet detailed probing was still possible.
A constant comparative methodological framework
(Bogden & Bilken, 1992, p. 72) was also utilized to
result in a more accurate and consistent set of
questions. In this process, when the researcher asked for
or received additional information from the respondents
in response to questions that were not on the interview
guide and that were useful to the study, those questions
were added and used in subsequent interviews with other
participants in the study.
For each interview, a separate printout of the
general questions to be asked and a brief demographic
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85
account to keep track of each participant was used as a
place to keep field notes. Each participant was also
furnished with a set of the general questions to ensure
his or her understanding of the language. In addition to
taking notes, many of the interviews were audiotaped when
participants gave their permission. Audiotaping the
interviews allowed the researcher to speak directly with
the students in a more relaxed, conversational way
instead of always busily writing down notes.
In order to vary the mode of data gathering, the
participants were also requested to keep track of
American films and/or television programs they watched
during the semester by keeping journals. Keeping in mind
the ethical issues of using students in the class as
part of a study, writing these journals was on a
volunteer basis and was not addressed during class time.
This type of assignment was at times incorporated in the
classes as the students often watched films based on the
books they read in class, which provided an opportunity
to have a more systematic set of written reports or
commentaries on the films and television programs they
had seen immediately after viewing them.
The subjects were supplied with blank journals in
which to write and instruction sheets which asked for
the title of the film/programs they watched, a short
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86
summary of the content of these shows, and the following
questions:
• What, if anything, did you learn about American
culture from this f ilm/program? What questions
do you have?
• What did you learn about Americans, themselves,
i.e. behavior, values, customs, language,
business, crime, etc. from this film/program?
What questions do you have?
Only three of the participants submitted reports.
For these respondents, the reports also served as
interview guides when meeting with them for a second
time to discuss their perceptions, and provided
additional insights that were not always available
during the initial interviews.
Interview Preparation
Before approaching the students about participating
in the study, the researcher made sure to establish a
good rapport with them and only interviewed them if they
felt comfortable speaking about the topic. Moreover,
students were assured that their participation in the
study would not affect their grades, and that they would
not need to answer any questions which might make them
feel uncomfortable.
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87
Students were asked if they would agree to being
audiotaped. Most of the respondents agreed to have the
interviews recorded. Those who were not comfortable
with this process were not taped. In addition, all
students were assured of their anonymity in the final
report describing the study. Instead of using their
names, the students were assigned code names, such as
"Student C" or "Student F" from China.
Before participating in the study, each participant
received, read, and signed an informed Consent to
Participate in Research form that had been approved by
USC's University Park Institutional Review Board. The
form detailed and confirmed the purpose of the study,
the procedures, the potential risks and discomforts, the
potential benefits to the subjects and/or society,
confidentiality rules, participation and withdrawal
rules, the identification of all investigators, and the
rights of the research subjects. The investigator also
signed the forms and the students received copies. The
formality of the consent forms increased their comfort
about the validity of the study and protection of their
privacy.
These methodological procedures should have
"enhanced the reliability of the generated data"
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88
(Denzin, 1978; Song & Parker, 1995 as cited in O'Connor,
1997, p. 603).
Data Synthesis and Analysis Techniques
While taping the interviews, the researcher
simultaneously used the question checklist to record
notes of the meetings. All recorded interviews were
reviewed and selected recordings were transcribed and
saved as computer word processor documents. The
documents were printed and examined for coding and
category formation and cross-referenced with the written
notes taken at the interviews. Journal entries supplied
by the respondents were also cross-referenced with the
other data. There were a total of 90 hours of
interviews, 50 hours of taped interviews, 54 pages of
interview transcriptions, 28 pages of student journals,
and 500 pages of field notes.
For a chart showing a breakdown of the body of
data, please see "Appendix C: The Body of Data."
The following section explains the procedures used
to manipulate the data for use in a discussion of the
findings.
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89
Analyses Procedures
A non-mathematical procedure was applied to produce
the findings from the interviews. Through a systematic
collection and analysis of data, the researcher
constructed an inductively derived theory of the area
under study (Strauss and Corbin, 1990), which is
presented through a narrative of the situation studied.
The selected procedure was adapted from the five
basic steps taken from Charles' Introduction to
Educational Research (1998, pp 166-169 as cited in Denny
1999, pp. 99 - 100):
• Identify topics — compare interview data with
questions;
• Cluster topics into categories — scrutinize data in
order to create categories;
• Form categories into patterns - to discover
patterns that hold from subject to subject;
• Make explanations from the patterns — think of ways
to explain the patterns; and
• Use the explanations to answer research questions —
present plausible theories to answer the questions.
In order to circumvent the possibility of errors due
to researcher bias and subjectivity of interpretation,
the initial analysis of the data took place immediately
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90
after each participant was interviewed. This procedure
ensured the reliability of the data that was collected.
(Denny, 1999)
According to Denny (1999), "Data analyses and
collection must be tightly interwoven and occur
alternately because such analyses direct the collection
of further data. The outcome of this back and forth
movement between data collection and data analyses
provides an overall theory for the situation being
studied, and resembles Grounded Theory" (Strauss &
Corbin, 1990, p. 100).
The procedures followed in this study permitted the
researcher to create meaning out of the discussions with
the participants while assuring the validity of the
information gathered. Through a careful and systematic
approach, the investigator was able to reduce the biases
potentially engendered by this type of research to
construct an objective account of reality, which closely
resembled the reality of the study's participants.
The purpose of this study was to explore and
understand through categorization and theme building,
details about Asian ESL students' perceptions of the
American culture through viewing American films and
television programs, and to create an understanding of
the topic which may be used in subsequent studies to
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91
further enhance our understanding of the impact of
American film and television on Asian ESL students'
perceptions of American culture. The analyses included
in this study are an interpretation of reality and
should be viewed as such.
The Interviews/Transcripts
The data, in the form of transcribed interviews,
handwritten notes, and written journal accounts, were
coded. The coding, which loosely followed the guidelines
set forth by Strauss and Corbin (1990), separated
sections of data based on responses to similar questions.
Because the open-ended questions asked during the
interview process were mostly the same for all
participants, the answers were similar enough in many
cases to draw comparisons based on the responses
generated by the respondents.
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CHAPTER IV
92
Participant Countries: Film and Television Overview
Introduction
In order to provide a more complete context for
interpretation of the data, this chapter will give an
overview of the film and television industries in the
participants' countries in relation to American film and
television exposure.
The students who participated in this study came
from seven different Asian countries. Please note that
Hong Kong is included in the list of "countries,"
although it is technically an administrative region of
Southeast China. All of these countries had differing
levels of film and television exposure. In addition to
Hong Kong, the countries included China, Japan, South
Korea, Taiwan (Republic of China/ROC), Thailand and
Vietnam. The information provided comes from published
documents as well as from firsthand knowledge provided by
the participants and reflects the film and television
environments around the time of the study.
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93
China/People's Republic of China (PROC)
Television
Traditionally, the Chinese government has strictly
controlled the development, production, and broadcasting
of television programs since its first and principal
national television station, China Central Television
(CCTV), was established in 1958 (Kwong, 1998.) Not
surprisingly, all Chinese mass media are government-owned
and are controlled by the communist party. There are
only two national networks, CCTV and China Educational
Television.
Interestingly, however, although the government
controls the editorial content of its broadcasts, due to
the tremendous growth in China's television broadcasting
networks over the past ten years, the state "increasingly
expects the stations to be self-financing through
advertising" (Hatfield, 2002, p.l). So, while
theoretically Chinese television is still directly
controlled by the government and is supposed to function
as the government's mouthpiece, "competition for
advertising revenue and ratings has become a stimulus for
television operators to improve their broadcasts and
cater to the desires of the general public" (Xiaoping,
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94
2001, p.2). However, per Xiaoping (2001), "the stations
must also satisfy government demands: the media must
steer a middle course between political and economic
pressures. This is the only way to survive in a society
that is both economically competitive and politically
directed"(pp 5-6.).
China has been reported to have approximately 1,108
television channels nationwide and 80 million cable TV
subscribers, (China Online, 2000), with at least "1
billion viewers nationwide" (McCarthy and Florcruz,
1999). Transmissions can reach an estimated 92% of the
population in both urban and rural areas through a
"complementary coverage network that includes satellite
receiving, multichannel microwave broadcasting, wireless
relay, and cable access" (China Online, 2000, p.l).
Urban homes can receive approximately 38 channels whereas
rural households can receive an estimated 12 channels.
According to Qiu (1999), "By 1998, the average urban
household owned more than one color TV set, and the
typical Chinese viewer watched more than two hours of TV
per day" (p. 1.).
Prior to the expansion of cable and satellite and
increased dependence on advertising revenues, regular
(terrestrial) broadcast stations had focused mainly on
news, information, education and cultural programs, with
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95
less emphasis placed on entertainment programming (Kwong,
1998). With these rapid changes in technology, the
booming market economy, increased market penetration and
increased competition, more entertainment programming
began to appear. According to Qiu (1999):
Typical Chinese cable TV programs include
movies, soap operas, game shows, sports
entertainment and news programs, and recently
(the stations] present music video and home
shopping programs. The cable TV industry's
competitive environment induces companies to
purchase new, well-produced programs, many of
which are imported. Music video and sports
shows are among the most popular foreign
programs.
The China TV Program Agency (CTPA) buys an
average of 500 hours of foreign programs each
year, and every provincial-level TV station has
the right to purchase 20 hours of foreign
dramas and movies every year. U.S. shows have
proved to be popular, although in recent years
TV programs from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan and
South Korea have aggressively entered the
programming market. SARFT (China's State
Administration of Radio, Film and Television)
limits the amount of foreign programming
allowed on Chinese stations to 25 percent per
day and to 40 minutes during prime time between
6:00 and 10:00 pm. (p. 2)
Because of the quotas on foreign programs, there is
limited competition between foreign and Chinese
television programs, and foreign television channels can
only "be legally received in the approved areas such as
top-ranked hotels, foreigners' compounds and the Chinese
elite's living areas. . . "(Qiu, 1999, p.5), although
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96
many companies still find ways to install satellite
dishes, which permits their employees to watch such
imported channels as MTV and ESPN.
The American stations officially approved to
broadcast programs in China include: CNN, NBC, CNBC,
HBO, TNT & Cartoon, MTV Asia, Cinemax, Discovery, and
ESPN. Among the foreign channels received, HBO and ESPN
are said to have been among the most popular (Qiu, 1999).
However, the most popular foreign stations and programs
shown on Chinese television come from Hong Kong, Taiwan,
Japan and South Korea, "most likely because their
programs more closely reflect Chinese society" and many
Chinese do not fully understand western humor, customs,
ideologies and life style (Qiu, 1999, p. 6).
Some U.S. television shows that have been successful
are "Growing Pains," a story about a married couple and
their three teen children whose lives are similar to
those of many Chinese families, Disney's "Mickey Mouse,"
cartoons, "Bay Watch," "Hunter," and a Chinese-American
co-production of "Sesame Street" (Qiu, 1999). Most
successful, though, have been American movies. According
to Qiu (1999):
Chinese viewers are especially attracted to
U.S. movies. CCTV Channel 6, the national
network's movie channel, broadcasts via cable
to an estimated 30 million households. CCTV 6
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97
has launched a new program named "A Date with
Film Classics" to spotlight outstanding foreign
and Chinese films. It will feature some award-
winning films and box-office successes such as
"The Fugitive." China only allows around 10
foreign movies to enter the China movie house
market every year. Therefore, cable TV exposes
many more Chinese to foreign movies than the
movie houses do. CTPA buys an average of 120
hours of foreign movies every year, 80 percent
of which are from the United States."
( P.8)
Film
It has been estimated that China has about 70,000
movie screens, 3,100 of which are in urban areas, and the
rest in rural theaters. In contrast, the United States
has approximately 30,000 movie screens nationwide (U.S.A.
Department of Commerce, 1999.) China, itself, only
produces about 150 films each year, and cinema admissions
have decreased over the past 10 years, partly due to the
increasing popularity of satellite channels from
neighboring countries and the availability of pirated
videocassettes and DVDs. (U.S.A. Department of Commerce,
1999.) As noted by Qiu (1999), China only permits 10
foreign movies to be shown in movie theaters every year.
According to "Student C" from China, whose uncle was a
government official responsible for selecting these
films, approximately 80% of these foreign movies are
American-produced. In fact, one of the most popular
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98
films to be released in China was "Titanic" (Platt,
1998).
Hong Kong
Television
According to the Hong Kong government, "Hong Kong's
television viewers have access to over 40 domestic and
non-domestic television programme service channels in
various languages. These include four free-to-air
terrestrial TV channels, over 30 pay TV channels and a
variety of free-to air satellite channels" (Hong Kong
2000: Communications, the Media and Information
Technology, p.2).
Hong Kong's two main free domestic public television
stations are TVB (Television Broadcasts Limited) and ATV
(Asia Television Limited.) TVB and ATV each have one
English-language channel and one Cantonese-language
channel. American television programs such as "Ally
McBeal," "The Practice," "The X Files," "ER," "The West
Wing, ""Chicago Hope," "Friends," "NYPD Blue," and "The
Sopranos" are aired during primetime on the English-
language channels; however, local Cantonese-language
programming generally receives the largest audience
share. Interestingly, however, these successful American
programs have been influencing the local Hong Kong
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99
television productions, which are incorporating the
American format and themes into their series.
(Hollywood Reporter—International Edition, 2000).
American blockbuster movies shown on these channels were
more popular than American television series or
documentaries. For example, "The Rock," "Face Off," "Con
Air" and "Eraser" were very highly rated by audiences,
"with average audience shares ranging from 87% to 95%"
(Television Broadcasts Limited (0511) — Annual Report,
2000, p.11).
HKCTV (Hong Kong Cable TV) is the main domestic pay
television program service and airs American cartoons,
sports, news and movies among its regular fare. Most of
the English-language programs shown are subtitled in
Cantonese, and dubbing into the Cantonese language is
uncommon except for news programs.
Film
Hong Kong has a major film-making industry. In 2000,
150 films were produced in Hong Kong, and 133 films were
screened locally in 2001 (Hong Kong Trade Development
Council, 2002). Despite the substantial number of films
produced locally, foreign films still generated more than
50% of the box office receipts and American blockbuster
films have been the strongest competitor. In fact, in
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100
2000, many of the highest-grossing films were American:
"the biggest box-office hits of the year included Mission
Impossible 2 ($36.1 million) and Toy Story 2 ($35.7
million)" (Film Industry, 2000, p. 1). The home video
market has also expanded in the past few years, and many
moviegoers choose to see films on video rather than go to
the cinemas.
Japan
Television
According to the CIA Factbook (2002), in 1999 Japan
had 7,108 broadcast stations. This number encompasses
seven national television networks, a plethora of
regional networks, and numerous satellite and cable
stations. Many of the stations also broadcast on the
internet (TVRadioWorld-Japan). Moreover, the United
States Armed Forces are served by three television
stations and two TV cable services which broadcast in the
English language. Japanese-produced programming
dominates the Japanese broadcasting system both in
quantity and in ratings. Most of the foreign language
programs shown on the national and regional networks are
dubbed into Japanese. Per Student Y from Japan, many
Japanese like to watch American television shows and
films, but only about 5% of the population have access to
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101
satellite TV and cable, which present the majority of
American fare in its original English language version
with Japanese subtitles. American TV series such as
"Full House," "Beverly Hills 90210," "Doogie
Hauser,""Friends," "Melrose Place," "Dawson's Creek,""The
Simpsons," "Ally McBeal" and "Seventh Heaven" have been
very successful in Japan as well as game shows and talk
shows such as "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," and "The
Jerry Springer Show." Japan also receives American
channels via satellite such as the Discovery Channel,
HBO, CNN and MTV.
Film
American movies are extremely popular in Japan and
most current blockbuster films are screened there. They
are mainly shown in English with Japanese subtitles.
American films are usually the top performers at Japan's
box office. Videos and DVDs are even more popular than
films as they are less expensive and more accessible.
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102
South Korea
Television
South Korea has five national television networks:
Educational Broadcasting System (EBS), Korean
Broadcasting System 1 (KBS TV 1), KBS TV 2, Korean
Central Television Station, MBS (Monhwa Broadcasting
Corporation), and SBS (Seoul Broadcasting System.) EBS
and Korean Central Television Station are government-
operated and controlled. KBS TV1 is a public
corporation, and KBS TV2, MBC, and SBS are private,
commercial networks.
All of these stations broadcast their programming in
the Korean language only. The only exception is the
English language teaching program shown on EBS. Any
foreign programs, including American shows, broadcast on
these channels are dubbed into Korean, and shows with any
sex, violence or drugs are strictly censored.
According to the South Korean participants of the
study, each Korean channel has a movie time. About 70%
of the movies presented during this period are from the
United States, and they are mainly shown during selected
hours on Saturdays and Sundays. In general, about 15%
of the programming shown during the rest of the week is
U.S. produced. Some of the popular American shows have
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103
been "Beverly Hills 90210, " "The X Files," "ER," "The
Cosby Show," and "The Wonder Years."
AFNK (American Forces Network-Korea), sometimes
referred to as AFKN (American Forces Korea Network), is a
regional television network which presents American
radio and television programs entirely in the English
language without Korean subtitles for U.S. military
personnel and their families based in South Korea. As it
is a regional network, there are some areas of the
country, such as Pusan, which do not receive or have
access to AFNK. The station broadcasts current American
news, movies, television series, game shows, soap operhs,
sports, cartoons and music videos
In addition, there are five separate local
television stations, 50% of which are privately owned,
and 50% of which are owned by the government
(TVRadioWorld — Korea, 2002).
South Korea also has approximately 35 cable and
satellite broadcasters, and satellite owners can receive
CNN, the BBC, NBC, ABC, ESPN, and many other foreign
channels. One of the Korean satellite stations, Arirang,
primarily broadcasts American and other English-language
films and television dramas and television series
entirely in English. They also show some Korean dramas
with English subtitles. However, there is a quota on
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104
foreign programming and restrictions on programming
content. Therefore, satellite channels such as HBO Asia
and Star TV have not had access to Korean cable (U.S.
Department of Commerce,1999).
Film
American motion pictures have been extremely popular
in South Korea and all the major American blockbuster
films can be seen there in movie theatres. In fact, they
have dominated the market, although the local Korean film
industry has begun to improve its production quality and
expand greatly over the past ten years. There has also
been a restriction imposed on the amount of foreign
movies shown; Korean regulations require that Korean-
produced films must be exhibited in theaters 146 days out
of the year. Most of the films shown in the theater are
also available on videocassette, and many of the South
Korean respondents reported watching more films on video
than in the movie theaters for various reasons.
Different from the television shows and movies that are
dubbed into Korean, the American films exhibited on video
or in the movie theaters are generally in the original
English language version with Korean subtitles. As on
television, they are strictly censored for sex, drugs and
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105
violence. American films are also accessible on the
internet.
Taiwan (ROC)
Television
Television seems to play an important role in
Taiwanese society, as "nearly 100 percent of Taiwan's
households have television sets" (Taiwan's Media in the
Democratic Era, 1999).
The television industry in Taiwan has gone through a
period of tremendous growth and changes in the past ten
years. Prior to 1997, Taiwan had only three terrestrial
(over-the-air) national television stations: Taiwan
Television Enterprise (TTV), which was founded in 1962,
the China Television Company (CTC), founded in 1969, and
the Chinese Television System (CTS), established in 1971.
In 1994, Formosa Television (FTV) was created as the
fourth nationwide broadcast television station, and the
Public Television Service (PTS) began broadcasting in
1998. The majority of the programming shown on these
stations is domestically produced, with only about 20%
coming from foreign sources (The Asia-Pacific Media
Center, 2000, p.5).
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106
In addition, private cable companies have been
established, and satellite broadcasting has become
increasingly popular. "Legalization of cable TV has led
to an unprecedented growth to over 140 cable TV systems
in operation, each offering over 70 channels of
programming. The penetration rate of cable TV has
increased from 44 percent in 1994 to 80 percent today,
the highest in the Asia-Pacific region" ("Taiwan's Media
in the Democratic Era," 1999, p.2).
In relation to foreign programming, "The Republic of
China Yearbook — Taiwan 2001" reported that
In September 2000, a total of 54 domestic and 14
foreign companies were offering 128 satellite
channels in Taiwan, including a number of
foreign channels like NHK from Japan; Home Box
Office (HBO), Disney, and Discovery from the
United States; . . . The major news and
information channels include . . . the Cable
Hews Network (CNN), the Discovery Channel and
National Geographic. The more popular foreign
movie channels are HBO and Star Movie, both of
which feature Chinese subtitles. . . other
popular channels include. . MTV, which features
rock music videos . . . (p. 4)
Film
Hollywood films are stronger than local productions
in Taiwan. In fact, "Taiwan's film industry has shown
serious signs of decline since the mid 1990s in part due
to the aggressive marketing of Hollywood filmmakers and
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107
in part because of the ROC's continued relaxation of
restrictions on film imports, which is in large part due
to Taiwan's membership in the World Trade Organization"
(The Republic of China Yearbook — Taiwan 2001: Mass
Media," p. 5). Hollywood blockbuster films consistently
outperform even prize-winning Chinese-language films.
Recent examples are "The Lord of the Rings," which earned
more on its opening day than the total box office
receipts of many Chinese-language films combined which
had already been in release for several days (Yahoo!
News, Asia, January 25, 2002), and "Panic Room" which
captured 42% of the market in its debut in Taiwan (YahooI
Entertainment, April 16, 2002).
In addition, Taiwan has traditionally been linked to
pirating of movies on DVDs, videocassettes, and most
recently, the internet, where Movie88.com, a rogue
website operating out of Taiwan "was a virtual video
rental store where visitors could screen some 3,600
films, including Hollywood blockbusters such as
'Gladiator' for just $1 per viewing. Operating out of
Taiwan, Movie88 had no licensing or distribution
agreements with the studios"(Time: Asia, 2002, p.l).
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1 08
Thailand
Television
Thailand has six free national public television
broadcast networks, including Independent TV (ITV), Thai
TV Color Channel 3 (TV3), Royal Thai Army Television
(TV5), Bangkok Broadcasting Television (BBTV-TV7), Thai
TV Color Channel 9 (MCOT- TV 9), and Television of
Thailand (TVT-TV11) (TV Radio Worldi Thailand, Television
Broadcasting, 2002). They are all based in the capital
city, Bangkok, and are broadcast mainly in the Thai
language, with some programs subtitled in English.
English language soundtracks are also available for many
of these stations on FM radio. Three of these free TV
stations, Channel 3, 7 and ITV, are privately owned and
operated, and Channel 5, 9 and 11 are owned and operated
by the military or state agencies.
There is only one cable TV operator that uses
digital satellite television and has approximately 25
channels, including foreign channels such as BBC,
Cinemax, CNN, Discovery Channel, ESPN Sport, HBO, and MTV
(Thailand on-line guide to Thailand, 1999).
Most films shown on satellite are in the English
language with Thai subtitles, and some are dubbed into
the Thai language.
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109
Variety and talk shows from the United States are
popular, and Japanese and American cartoons are also
popular among Thai youth. For example, Student ML
watched shows such as "Lifestyles of the Rich and
Famous," "Jerry Springer," "The Howard Stern Show," and
American daytime soap operas.
Film
While Thailand has its own movie industry, most of
the films produced there are lower budget films that have
"lower production value than their Hollywood
counterparts" (Holland, 2002, p.l). Many of the bigger
budget Thai films are released with English subtitles,
due to the high volume of foreign visitors and the
interest in local films, which are mainly in the genres
of ghost stories, historical dramas, and comedies. Most
major "Hollywood films" are shown in Thailand close to
the time of their release in the United States. American
films are generally shown in Bangkok with their original
English-language soundtrack with Thai subtitles. In the
countryside, however, they are mainly dubbed in Thai.
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110
Vietnam
Television
Vietnam's television industry, like China's, is
tightly controlled by the government with its principal
objective to serve the national party's interests.
Indeed, its mission, as described on the official
Vietnamese Television (VTV) Website is as follows:
Vietnam Television is a governmental institution
assigned with the function of disseminating
information regarding policies adopted by the Party
and Government and being responsible for state
management of TV technical development throughout
the country . . . During both war and peace times,
Vietnam Television has rendered its contribution to
the cause of national liberation, national
construction as well as national defense together
with other mass media. (VTV: General Features of
Vietnam Television, 2002, p.l)
Vietnam has three main national television networks
with limited broadcasting times and limited programming.
The programs, which are produced by the government and
mainly deal with nationalistic themes, are broadcast
almost entirely in the Vietnamese language. VTV 1, the
general channel, operates from 7:00 pm to 11:00 pm with
English and French-language news reports at the end of
the broadcasting period. VTV 2, the scientific and
educational channel, is on the air from 6:00 am to 10:00
am, from 7pm to 9:30 pm and after 11:00 pm. VTV 3, the
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111
Sports, Economic Information and Entertainment Channel,
also operates for selected hours during the week and on
weekends. VTV 4 is the overseas Vietnamese Channel. In
addition, there are five regional television stations and
one local television station, which broadcasts in the
Khmer language (VTV: General Features of Vietnam
Television, 2002, and TVRadioWorld-Vietnam-Television
Broadcasting 2002).
Interestingly, although the government has stressed
nationalistic programming, in 1999, after a crackdown on
piracy in Vietnam, the government admitted that,
"unauthorized performances of U.S. music and television
programming dominated the broadcast spectrum, accounting
for 80% of airtime. It now asserts that U.S. films amount
to only 10% of films shown on the central television
network and that all are licensed" (International
Intellectual Property Alliance, 2001 Special 301:
Vietnam, p. 507).
Some foreign channels are also accessible in Vietnam
via satellite, but, again, reception is controlled by the
government and is limited by economic status. As Student
KG from Vietnam explained, "if you are really rich and
can get a satellite dish, you can get cable and you can
see a lot of channels." People who want to receive
foreign transmissions must apply to a governmental office
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112
to get a satellite dish. They are responsible for
assuming the costs of the dish and its installation, and
many cannot afford this expense.
Film
The motion picture industry in Vietnam is very
different than the television industry. There is a trade
agreement between the United States and Vietnam regarding
importation of American films. However, according to
Student KG, there are few American films shown in
Vietnamese cinemas. He also reported that there is a
dearth of quality movie theaters. Most of the theaters
in Vietnam are not even equipped to show 35mm films,
which are the standard format for theatrical film
exhibition. In addition, according to Hong (2005), "There
are now 50 cinemas in Vietnam, primarily in Hanoi and Ho
Chi Minh City, which is less than you'd expect for a
population of 82 million" (p. 1).
In 1998, approximately 80% of the films imported to
Vietnam were from Hong Kong. Most of them were Hong Kong
television mini-series or action films starring Chow Yun-
fat and Jackie Chan. Other foreign films, mainly
destined for video release, came from Thailand, the
Philippines, Malaysia, Germany and Singapore (U.S.
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113
Department of Commerce, 1998). Moreover, now South
Korean films are becoming more and more popular.
American films are perceived to be of better quality
than motion pictures from Hong Kong and other countries.
"True Lies," an action film starring Arnold
Schwartzenegger, was one of the first Hollywood films
shown legally in Vietnam in 1996, and was very well
received (Competitive Situation, 1998). However, due to
the lack of copyright protection in Vietnam and piracy
issues, most of the members of the Motion Picture
Association, including Disney, MGM, Fox, Universal, and
Paramount, do not want to supply movies until Vietnam's
copyright laws are enforced. According to the
International Intellectual Property Alliance 2001 Special
301 Report on Vietnam,
For the audiovisual industry, Vietnam is, for
almost all intents and purposes, a pirate
market. The government has issued a decree
giving up its monopoly over film importation,
and there have been a few licensed exhibitions
of U.S. movies in Vietnamese cinemas. But most
theatrical exhibition remains unlicensed, as
are the numerous mini-theaters that use pirated
videos for public performances. The video
market for Motion Picture Association (MPA)
member company product remains 100% pirate. . .
pirate videos are readily available throughout
the country. Large video rental outlets in
Hanoi offer pirate versions of current
Hollywood hits for VND200Q (US$0.15 per day),
(p.507)
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114
Student KG reported that most of the films he had
seen were on video and were dubbed into Vietnamese. He
had not watched any American television programs, but had
watched American action and horror films. "Rambo" was
the film that left the biggest impression on him.
In summary, as this overview shows, American films
and television programs are available in the
participants' countries in varying degrees. American
feature films, in particular, are generally more popular
than those of other countries. Variation in what programs
or films are viewed occurs in what resources each student
has access to, what individuals choose to watch, whether
programs are dubbed or not dubbed in the students' own
language, and whether or not they are censored.
The next chapter will present the main findings of
the study.
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115
CHAPTER V
Findings
Introduction
This chapter provides a description of the data
gathered from the interviews and journals supplied by
participants of this study. Through the process of
constantly comparing data and categorizing it both during
and after the data collection period, topics and themes
of major interest emerged. These themes, or categories,
will be presented in this chapter, and will generate
answers to the research questions stated in Chapter I for
later discussion and analysis in Chapter VI.
As a review, the primary goal of this study was to
explore if, how, and to what extent Asian ESL students'
perceptions of American culture were impacted by viewing
American film and television programs both in their own
countries prior to coming to the United States, and while
residing in the United States, and how those perceptions
may have affected their and their peers' behavior and
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116
their social integration into American culture and an
academic college environment.
The main research questions in this study are as
follows:
1. Has watching American films and television programs
shaped Asian students' perceptions of Americans and
American culture either prior to or after their
residence in the United States?
2. If so, how have American films and television
programs shaped Asian students' perceptions of
Americans and American culture either prior to or
after their residence in the United States?
3. What perceptions of Americans or American culture
derived from American film and television viewing
did the students recognize as "accurate"
perceptions, according to their own definitions?
4. What "misperceptions" of American culture did the
students notice they had derived through American
film and television viewing once they had lived in
the U.S., according to their own definitions?
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117
5. How did the students feel these perceptions or
misperceptions might have affected their behavior or
the behavior of their peers and their socialization
into American culture and a college environment?
These research questions were addressed by
describing the results of interviews with students in
narrative form and in their own words and descriptions
from the researcher's perspective. To protect their
anonymity, the students' names were changed, as shown in
Appendix B — "Student Profiles."
The chapter is organized into the different
categorical sections that emerged from the data. These
categories are not necessarily the same as those that
originated from Levin's 1998/1999 pilot studies, although
some of the categories that emerged in this study do
overlap with those of the previous studies. In fact, 29
categories of "Perceptions" and "Misperceptions" emerged
in this study, as opposed to 10 categories in the pilot
studies; thus, the study was indeed significantly
expanded.
Each categorical section is divided first into
"Perceptions" of a particular aspect of American culture
acquired by participants through American TV/Film
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118
viewership, and then into "Misperceptions" of that same
aspect of American culture through American TV/Film
viewership, where appropriate.
They are presented thematically, beginning with the
category of American Culture which was most frequently
cited by participants for both "Perceptions," and
"Misperceptions, namely "Perceptions of Friendliness" and
"Misperceptions of Friendliness." The narrative
continues not by frequency of responses, but by logical
narrative flow. Please see "Appendix D — Main Findings
Summary" for a summary of the response categories and the
number of students responding to each category.
Please refer, as well, to "Appendix E — Main
Findings Summary — Male and Female Responses" for a
breakdown of the categories most frequently answered by
male versus female respondents.
With the exception of "Student KG" (Vietnam) and
"Student HO" (Japan), the respondents reported that their
primary source of information about American culture
before arriving in the United States was American
television programs and feature films which they had seen
in movie theaters, on television, on video or on DVD.
They had also developed many perceptions and attitudes
about American culture derived from viewing American film
and television while living in their own countries.
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119
However, "Student KG" (Vietnam) and "Student HO"
(Japan,) stated they had watched few or no American films
and television programs prior to residing in the United
States, and that the impressions they received primarily
came from TV/film viewing in the United States.
"Student KG" (Vietnam) also reported that, while in his
country he "didn't learn anything about American culture
from watching films," and that his main source of
knowledge about American culture came from reading
newspapers and magazines and through contact with a
"nice" American teacher he had had in Vietnam who had
married a Vietnamese woman. He had watched American
"action films," but didn't remember most of them, with
the exception of "Rambo."
"Student HO" (Japan) also asserted that he "was not
sure what or where" he "learned about American culture"
and did not think he had learned anything about it from
film and television in Japan. He said he had learned from
his father, who worked in an international bank, that
Americans were "friendly and independent," but had no
American friends before his U.S. residence, and had only
watched a few American television programs such as "The
Jerry Springer Show," "The NBA," "MTV," and "sometimes
movies." He did remember watching a movie about "old
surfer culture" that he "couldn't forget" called "Big
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120
Wednesday" about three young male surfers who were trying
to ride a tidal wave which was coming to Long Beach in
California. He said he "only focused on what interested"
him and did not believe he had been influenced by
American television or film. Interestingly, however,
while studying in California, his main interest was
"surfing."
Perceptions/Misperceptions of American Culture through
American TV/Film Viewership
Perceptions of Friendliness
One of the most universal perceptions the
participants reported learning from watching American
films and television programs prior to coming to the
United States (with the exception of "Student H0"/Japan
and Student KG"/Vietnam) was that Americans were "nice,"
"friendly," and "open." As noted in the previous section,
"Student HO" (Japan) and "Student KG" (Vietnam), also
reported perceiving Americans would be "nice" and
"friendly," but said they had not developed these
assumptions from watching films or television programs.
"Student YZ" (Taiwan) reported that he thought
American people would be "friendly, patient, and
relaxed." "Student CD" (Hong Kong) confirmed these views.
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121
She thought people would be "open and nice. . . and
people are always smiling and happy." In contrast, she
said, "It is strange to be friendly in Hong Kong. People
never smile and ask, 'How are you?'" Student "C" from
China added that she believed Americans were interested,
friendly, and open, and team players, and thought they
"liked Chinese and were knowledgeable and open about
other cultures and countries." Student "K" from Japan
echoed the view of the other participants when she noted
that Americans are friendly and make relationships with
other people very easily. From this perception, she
believed that it would be easy to make American friends.
Student "SL"/Taiwan agreed. Prior to her arrival in Los
Angeles, she was very motivated to meet people, and
especially establish friendships with American girls.
From watching shows such as "ER" and "Doogie Hauser,
M.D." Student "MD" (Japan) noticed that doctors were
friendly and that there is a more friendly relationship
between doctors and patients in the United States than in
Japan. She said;
Doctors care about feelings in U.S. In Japan
don't care. Always hurry up in Japan. Here
there are so many for one patient, spend time
for each patient. They ask too personal
questions, but friendly. In Japan they are not
friendly.
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1 22
Students "UN" (Korea), "SJ" (Korea), "SM" (Taiwan),
"MD" (Japan) and "MK" (Japan) also commented on how
"friendly" and relaxed the relationships were between
teachers and students in the American classroom and
between parents and children in American films and
television programs such as "Beverly Hills 90210."
Students and parents seemed approachable. In contrast,
in their countries, the relationships are more
controlled, formal, and hierarchical. Student "MK"
(Japan) noticed, in particular, that there is "no special
polite language between parents and children or teachers
as there is in Japan."
Misperceptions of Friendliness
Many of the students reported that they were
disappointed with the lack of friendliness they
encountered when they arrived in the United States.
Student "SL"/Taiwan and "Student C"/China both
experienced rejection when they tried to make friends
with American girls. It was not as "easy" as they had
expected. Student "SL" said, "Girls are not friendly,
but it was scary" because American men liked her.
Student "MK"/Japan noted that she thought it would be
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123
easier to adapt and make friends, but in
reality, it is hard. I thought I had made
friends because I had a very nice conversation
one day with a girl, but the next day the
person was distant and I found it strange. In
my country, once you have a good and friendly
communication with someone, you continue that
relationship.
Both Students "SL"/Taiwan and "YY"/Japan had
American boyfriends but no American girl friends. The
female respondents "JS," "YH","SJ," "SY," and "UN" also
reported that they had "not yet" made any American
friends. Student "JS"/Korea lived in a "home stay"
situation, but was frustrated that she was unable "to
meet real Americans!" Student "CH"/Korea, reported that
he had only made "one or two American" acquaintances,
"not really friends, one black and one white," who were
both very friendly, but was not sure if his perceptions
were true or not yet. Student "TY"/Korea reported that
he had no real American friends but had many chances to
talk to and observe "four to six Americans in the
dormitories." However, he did note that it was harder
than he had thought to speak with American women. He
thought they were "not interested in Asian men in
general, and their voices are too fast. On TV/Film
women's voices are easier to understand, seem easier to
talk to. Actresses speak clearly, here mumbled."
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1 24
Student "X"/Taiwan had also not yet made American
friends, but had lived for six months in a "home stay"
with a Mexican-American family. Student "YZ"/Taiwan had
also not made any American friends yet, and was
disappointed as well that Americans were "not friendly or
patient, especially with driving. Drivers can't wait."
Student "SM"/Taiwan had not made American friends
yet, and was afraid to because she did not speak English
well, and said she only had contact with American
teachers and an American woman she lived with but saw
rarely in a "home stay" situation.
Student "KG"/Vietnam also had not developed
friendships yet with Americans, but Student "ML"/Thailand
said that she had "a few American friends." Student
"K"/Japan had only made one American female friend who
she said was "nice, and friendly and interested in
Japanese culture, just as she had expected. However, she
found that "all American people were not as friendly as
she had perceived. For example, she said, the "bus
drivers and people in stores are sometimes not kind."
Three of the respondents: Students "C"/China,
"CH"/Korea, "HO,"/Japan found it was easier to make
friends with Black Americans than White Americans because
they were warmer and friendlier. Student "CH" said he
preferred his Black "acquaintance" because of the
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125
"emotional, powerful, heart connection" that he did not
see in the White American.
Student "C"/China also had an American born Chinese
boyfriend. However, Student "F"/China had not yet
developed any friendships with Americans. Neither had
Students "CD" or "MB," from Hong Kong or Student "MK"
from Japan. Student "ST"/Hong Kong had met a friend who
was a "typical American guy" while living in a "host
family," and was surprised at how "fast he speaks."
Student "MD"/Japan had made American friends when she was
in high school in Texas four years prior to the study,
but had not yet made any new friends in Los Angeles.
Perceptions of Openness and Freedom
In terms of "openness," and "freedom," the
participants discussed their perceptions of Americans'
lack of shame or secrecy, their open-mindedness, and
their freedom of physical and emotional expression.
Student "YZ" (Taiwan) noted that Americans "are open
and talk about anything." Student "X" (Taiwan) agreed,
and added that, "Americans are open sexually and with
their opinions." Student "SM" (Taiwan) also noted that
Americans, "talk about sex and about having sex openly."
Student "YY" (Japan) observed, in particular, that
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1 26
American women like those in "Sex and the City" could
"talk about sex and masturbation so freely with their
friends. In Japanese culture this would never happen.
It is taboo." "yy" was also surprised when she saw TV
programs or movies made in the U.S where there were
scenes "that a woman urinated in front of a man." She
reported that:
Indeed, their relationship is between a
boyfriend and girlfriend or a wife and a
husband. However, we, Japanese, don't have
this custom such as women urinate in front of
men. Moreover, we don't go to a restroom with
men. Why U.S. women aren't ashamed? I can't
understand. For example, the TV program "Sex
and the City," the movie "Eyes Wide Shut," "The
Mind of the Married Man," etc. Actually, I've
seen the scene U.S. women urinated in front of
U.S. man many times, but I forgot the movies or
the TV programs' names. Anyway, I'm still
confused whether it is a good custom or not.
It was also not common in the participants'
countries to be affectionate in public, as they saw
Americans behave in films and television programs.
According to Student SM (Taiwan), in America, "couples
kiss each other in public, which would be impossible in
Taiwan."
Student "ML" (Thailand) reported that "People are
open about sex, style; they dress however they want, can
do anything they want, whenever they want." She was
shocked, for example, when she saw "fat people" taking
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127
off their clothes on TV on the "Jerry Springer Show" and
added that, although in Thailand people could wear
bathing suits on television, "In my country we can't take
off clothes on TV shows." Student "TY" (Korea) also
noticed from watching television that "There is a lot of
freedom; everybody is free here," in relation to
Americans showing their bodies. He noted, "People here
don't care about clothing. Here they don't hide their
bodies. In Korea we hide our bodies." Student "K"
(Japan) and Student "F" (China) also noticed when they
saw "The Jerry Springer Show" that the people on the show
were "stupid and crazy." "K" pointed out that "If they
are crazy, they can show their thoughts to many people.
They don't care if they are gay or lesbian. They believe
in themselves."
Student "ML" (Thailand) also noticed the openness
that Americans have in exposing social problems. She had
learned from watching American television and films that
"Americans have homeless people and many teenagers have
drug problems, including heroin addiction," and saw that
these issues were openly explored, unlike in her country.
She stated that, "In Thailand, we don't show the
problems." "Student MK" (Japan) also observed that
mothers of criminals never show their faces in Japan, and
she was very surprised to see how "open" it was here to
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128
show the faces of a criminal's family on television news
reports.
In relation to clothing and hairstyles, Students
"SJ" (Korea) and "UN" (Korea) noticed that American
students also "have liberty." Student "UN" stated that
"school was more free" in the United States. In Korea,
students had to wear uniforms and cut their hair.
According to Student "UN," the teachers in middle school
and high school would cut the students' hair themselves
if the students didn't do it. However, she saw in
American movies and television programs that there was a
lot of freedom in how high school students dressed.
There was no control of fashion or hairstyle, and
American students were allowed to dress to express their
personalities. Student "K" (Japan) noticed that American
high school students do not wear uniforms. She was
envious of their freedom to dress as they liked, their
strength of personality, and their freedom of expression.
She was also particularly surprised that in class
students could raise their hands and speak about their
thoughts and feelings. "In Japan," she said, "most
students don't say anything."
In addition, "Student UN" observed when she saw "The
Oprah Winfrey Show," that in contrast to Korean shows
where people were proper and polite and dressed formally,
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129
Oprah's guests were free to wear whatever they wanted.
She said that in Korea, "Now it's changing; the new
generation wants more freedom too."
According to "Student CH"(Korea) and "Student MD"
(Japan), Americans also show their emotions on their
faces openly. "Student MD" saw Americans express anger,
and said that "Japanese don't show anger." "Student CH"
said that "Americans are not shy. They express emotions
directly and are open," He noticed that American actors
use more physical gestures and facial expressions whereas
Koreans "are passive, shy and indirect." He thought
American actors often "overact" and aren't "real."
Misperceptions of Openness and Freedom
Student "X"/Taiwan was disappointed that "not
everyone is open about sex and sexual opinions," as he
had believed prior to coming to the United States, and
was disappointed, in general in the lack of "openness."
Student "ST"/Hong Kong, however, was actually surprised
at how much more free American students were in their
style of dress. In Hong Kong, he had noticed that women
and young girls wore sexy clothing on television shows,
but when he went to Santa Monica College, he found that
the "sexy clothing on TV is more conservative." He was
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130
shocked that in real campus life the girls' "clothing
sexy, not wearing many clothes."
Perceptions of Television News and Newscasters
Students also noticed differences in the style and
presentation of the news in contrast to their own
countries' news format and presentation.
Per Student "CH"/Korea, Korean newscasters are more
formal, while Americans smile, use their hands and have
personality, similar to American actors. He said,
"Humor, joking, action: too formal in Korea; they can't
do it." Student "JS"/Korea also noticed that American
news anchors "have liberal action and behavior" while
Koreans are stiff. They can't laugh. Are serious."
Moreover, she said that in Korea, all reporters'
hairstyles are the same. Everybody had the same severe
hair cut. There was no individuality. In U.S. news, the
hairstyle is different for everyone. And they exchange
jokes, freestyle." Korean newscasters also have to
memorize the news and cannot use papers or notes. "JS"
saw that on the contrary, in the U.S., reporters can show
papers and pens in their hands.
According to Student "UN"/Korea, through viewing
AFKN news in English, she was able to see a clear
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131
American perspective on the role of the United States in
politics. She noticed the emphasis on "the USA being
the most powerful in the world and can control other
countries. Sometimes they act like friends, and
sometimes use other countries and want to control North
and South Korea."
Student "KG"/ Vietnam, liked the style of the news
here in contrast to in Vietnam, and he had not watched
any American television news programs prior to coming to
the United States. He said that the Vietnamese
government "controls the television news and media, even
on the internet." Therefore, he perceived that the
information he received was limited in Vietnam, but not
in the U.S. He said, "Here there is a lot of
information. It is not controlled on TV." Student
"ST"/Hong Kong, also found the American news more
"professional" than the news he had seen in Hong Kong.
He watched CNN every day and learned about issues in
California such as traffic problems and the homeless.
Perceptions of Patriotism/Heroism/Risktaking
Just as Student "UN" perceived through the AFKN
news that Americans were "the strongest country in
the world," many of the study's participants also
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noticed through watching American films/tv programs
that Americans were shown as patriotic, courageous,
and risk takers. Student CH/Korea, stated that in
films such as "Independence Day," "Often I saw
Americans think America is the best and we will save
the world. We are always heroes, and the heroes
can't die, even if they are shot." Student
"YY"/Japan also remarked that "Americans are #1 in
movies, very patriotic." Student "C"/China stated
that "Men are patriotic, want to protect their
country. That is positive." Student "F"/China
added that from watching a film about the gulf war
starring Meg Ryan and Denzel Washington, he had
learned that both American men and women are
courageous and "tend to sacrifice to help the
majority." He also learned that Americans are
interested in showing their courage and "doing
something the best," including acting "crazy" and
risking their lives in order to achieve their goals.
Student "X"/Taiwan thought that "the country is
safe, under control; the good guys win."
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133
Misperceptions of Patriotism/Heroism/Risktaking
Student "F"/China believed before coming to Los
Angeles that Americans were exciting, crazy, courageous
risk-takers. However, when he encountered real
Americans, he found that what he had learned from
American films and TV was incorrect. He reported that,
China and Chinese are more exciting than
Americans or American people! Americans are
not crazy. Sometimes they are modest, not
exciting, don't take risks, sometimes a little
low key, more conservative. In movies dare to
do everything, but actually in the real world,
they don't want to take a risk and just want to
keep everything the same.
One example he gave was that in the game show "Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire" that he saw in Los Angeles, if
a contestant was "not sure" of an answer, he would just
"walk away," instead of trying to win by risking a
mistake.
Perceptions of the United States/Los Angeles/"The Good
Life"
For many students, watching American films and
television shows such as "Beverly Hills 90210" created
the perception that America would be a beautiful and
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134
exciting place. Per Student "CH"/Korea, "most friends
think of Beverly Hills and image of the U.S. is
beautiful, sunny palm trees, Beverly Hills. People are
all rich, fashionable, handsome, beautiful, live in a
fantasy world like 'Beverly Hills 90210.'" Student
"K"/Japan also perceived that American people were very
rich and fashionable and enjoyed life. And "Student
X"/Taiwan thought, "Life is good, interesting; the
economy is good, never boring."
Student "F"/China thought from watching American
movies, that Los Angeles would be an "attractive, far
away world, exciting, beautiful. The big city will be
like Las Vegas with great nightlife. The real America is
Las Vegas." Students "YZ"/Taiwan and "ST"/Hong Kong, also
thought the nightlife would be exciting, fast-paced and
"fun." Indeed, many students believed that life in Los
Angeles would be much more fun than in their countries.
Student "UN,"/Korea said,
Most children and teens feel stifled in Korea.
They feel "I want to be there (United States),
enjoy life and parties and Halloween and
Valentine's Day" because in Korea all they did
was "study, study, study." They felt the
lifestyle here was "party, party, party."
Student "MB"/Hong Kong, was looking forward to all
the space she noticed in films and television programs.
In her mind, "America was a big place with sufficient
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135
parking with no traffic problems, and not many people
were around." In addition, Students "K"/Japan and
"X"/Taiwan noticed that, "everything is big," including
houses, streets and cars. Per "K," "Even the American
hamburger is too big." She also expected to see a lot of
"big cars," such as Cadillacs. In particular, she noted
that in Japan when she saw "The Simpsons," Homer, the
patriarch of the animated series, had a Cadillac, which
she thought was typically American.
Misperceptions of the United States/Los Angeles/"The Good
Life"
A common complaint from the students was that many
of the perceptions of Los Angeles that they had acquired
from watching American films and television programs did
not prove to be accurate. They had expected to see rich
people and "beautiful, adorable girls and guys,"
everywhere wearing "stylish, cute clothes" and "having
fun." They also expected college students to have more
time to go to parties and spend time with their friends.
However, they were disappointed once they arrived in Los
Angeles. They realized that Americans and the American
lifestyle were not perfect, they did not have a lot of
free time, and life was more expensive than they had
imagined. Students "C"/China and "SL"/Taiwan were
disappointed that the men were "not handsome in real
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136
life" and that the clothing style was "boring, not cute."
Instead of dressing nicely, "most people dressed in t-
shirts, jeans and tennis shoes."
Moreover, after coming to Los Angeles, Student
"X"/Taiwan thought that Los Angeles was "totally
different" than he had perceived it. He felt that none
of his perceptions were true. While before he had
believed that the economy was good and that "most people
were rich," he saw many homeless in Los Angeles. He was
also surprised that homeless people asked him for
cigarettes. "You don't ask in Taiwan; even if you're
poor, homeless won't ask for cigarettes." Student "JS"
also noted that the American films/TV programs she had
seen "only showed the good parts of American life, no
homeless." In Los Angeles she realized that "Americans
have hard work, have poor people, there are not a lot of
parties, and you see many homeless in L.A. and Santa
Monica, everywhere." Student "MB"/Hong Kong was also
disillusioned to see the traffic problems in Los Angeles
when she had anticipated free-flowing traffic and "lots
of space everywhere."
In addition, Student "F"/China was very
disappointed that Los Angeles did not live up to his
expectations. He had thought that Los Angeles would be a
"big, exciting, beautiful city like Las Vegas," but found
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137
it instead to be "more boring than Canton" where he was
from. Even after he lived in Los Angeles, he still could
not believe that Los Angeles was representative of the
"real United States." He held on to his belief that "Las
Vegas is the real United States" and even pointed out
that "Children need Disneyland, and adults, like us, need
Las Vegas." Student "ST"/Hong Kong also found Los
Angeles to be "slower and more boring" than he had
anticipated.
Student "K"/Japan, who had expected to see a lot of
"big cars," including Cadillacs, was very surprised to
see how many smaller, Japanese cars there were in Los
Angeles.
Student "CH" also found his and his Korean friends'
"fantasy" image of the U.S. to be untrue. Moreover,
Student "CD"/Hong Kong was very disappointed because she
"didn't realize Los Angeles would be so cosmopolitan."
She had expected to see many good-looking American men on
the college campus, but instead saw "only foreign
students; hard to see Americans."
Perceptions of Friendship
Although many students thought it would be easy to
make friends with Americans before coming to the United
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138
States based on what they had seen in American films and
television programs, the data revealed they had
conflicting images of what "friendships" were like among
Americans. For example, both Korean male respondents had
different views. Neither had had American friends prior
to coming to the United States. Student "CH" thought that
Americans were more "selfish" and "distant" with their
friends and family than in Korea. He said that in
contrast to Americans,
Korean friends are like part of the family —
have strong relationships and can give or share
mind and material possessions. But in the U.S.
friends are more polite, individual. In Korea,
4 or 5 friends can go over to their friend's
home and have dinner with his parents even if
their friend is not home. Not in America.
On the other hand, Student "TY" stated that he
believed "American friendship is closer than Asian
friendship. We don't have time to meet in Korea. People
feel awkward because don't see each other for a long
time. Here more comfortable."
Another Korean participant, Student "JS", noticed
that teens either "have good relationships or kill each
other like in gang movies," from watching "Dangerous
Minds." She also saw that American teens trust each
other and talk about their fears and feelings with each
other, even males and females. She said that in Korea,
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139
girls and boys are separate and don't have such close
friendships. "It is more mixed" in the United States.
Student "K"/Japan supported Student "CH"/Korea's view
about the lack of depth of American relationships. She
thought in general, "Japanese relationships are more
serious and more deep than American friendships, and
especially relationships between boys and girls."
However, she added that "because American TV shows'
situations change fast between girls' and boys'
relationships" and these shows are popular among teens,
this phenomenon has also actually affected teenagers'
dating behavior in Japan, and girls and boys are now
beginning to have more superficial relationships.
Misperceptions of Friendship
Student "K"/Japan reported from encountering a
couple from Beverly Hills, that her previous conceptions
about the superficiality of American relationships might
not be true. She said, "Beverly Hills relationship deep.
Young Japanese misunderstand American style. Think it's
cool copying but don't really know if true." The other
participants who had developed friendships with Americans
did not report any "misperceptions" they might have had.
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140
Perceptions of American Men
The male and female respondents revealed different
impressions of American men from watching American films
and television programs before coming to the United
States. Student "CH"/for example, a male respondent from
Korea, believed that the "good qualities of American men
are confident and more independent than Koreans; bad
qualities are selfish, sometimes overconfident, and
selfish toward friends and family." Student "TY,"/Korea,
believed through watching movies such as "Cruel
Intentions," that American men like to talk about sex and
girls, and that they feel love is a game. He said he
believed "It often happens, using girls for sex and
game." He also noticed that American men are good
looking, have good bodies (depending on the movie), and
can sometimes have very strange personalities, like the
characters in "Fight Club." Student "F"/China thought
American men would be patriotic, courageous risk takers.
And Student "ST"/Hong Kong noticed how he thought
"typical American guys" make quick decisions and speak
quickly.
The women had a variety of responses, some of which
matched the male respondents' comments, and many of which
were positive. They often seemed to like American men
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141
better than the men of their own countries, based on what
they had seen in American films and television programs,
but some were afraid or wary of American males' focus on
sexuality.
According to Student "SL"/Taiwan, American men were
"hairy like monkeys, but also smart, independent,
handsome, sexy, playboys, gentlemen toward women, dress
well, and responsible toward the family." She made
special note of how American men acted like gentlemen by
"opening doors for women." However, she did not foresee
herself being able to socialize with or date an American
man because, although she thought Americans were
"gentlemanly," she thought they would also be pushy and
have expectations about sex. Ironically, she ended up
marrying a white American man after coming to the United
States.
Student "C"/China also believed American men just
wanted to do "something fun with women and 80% of men are
playboys." She believed they thought, "Sex without love
was okay." Student "YH"/Korea also perceived American
men" to be "liberal and very sexual." And, according to
Student "SJ"/Korea, "American men seem more sexy and more
funny than Korean men." Student "CD"/Hong Kong thought
all American boys would be "cute like Tom Cruise" and was
excited to come here and meet them.
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142
Student "SM"/Taiwan, was impressed with how
expressive and open American men were with feelings. Per
"SM," "Men listen to women more here than Asian men.
Women have a better situation here. American men say 'I
love you.' Asian men don't tell wife 'I love you.'"
Student "SJ"/Korea also felt that "Men's attitude toward
women is more gentle and careful." And Student "K"/Japan
perceived American men were kind because "they respect
ladies and open car doors for them, which Japanese men
don't do."
In contrast to what Student "CH"/Korea believed,
(that American men were selfish toward family and
friends), "Student "SJ"/Korea asserted that American men
"think the family is first and care about the family.
Most Korean men are strict and have fixed thinking. They
think about their job first, but American men think of
family as being number one. Some younger people in the
young generation are a little better."
Misperceptions of American Men
Student "K"/Japan had believed that American men
would be respectful and kind toward women. However, she
had the opposite experience with a male acquaintance she
made in Los Angeles. This man was not "a friend," but
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143
someone she had met through her female American friend.
She considered him to be "pushy" and "selfish" because he
persisted in calling her on the telephone and inviting
her to nightclubs and parties even when she refused and
told him she did not have time.
Interestingly, Student "SL"/Taiwan, who had expected
American men to be pushy, had a different experience. She
met her boyfriend at Starbucks and found him to be
respectful and patient. She said he waited four months
to kiss her, and she ended up marrying him.
Perceptions of American Women
A major theme that emerged was the perception of the
"strength" of American women, their assertiveness,
independence, confidence, open sexuality, and their
equality to men. They also noted what a sharp contrast
there was between Asian and American women.
Student "SL"/Taiwan said, "American women are strong
and can fix problems with the house and car themselves."
She did not agree with this behavior, however, as she
thought American women "need a man. If women take charge,
men will feel less strong." However, she did like the
strength and independence she saw in "Working Girl."
She noticed in this movie that American women were
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144
"smart, feminine, sneaky, and had the right to speak up."
She said she admired these qualities and wanted to be
like the main character. Student "YY"/Japan had also
seen this film and agreed with Student "SL." She added
that, unlike in the movie, "It's difficult in Asian
countries to speak up and disagree with bosses."
Student "X", a male respondent from Taiwan, also
perceived that American women were open about their
opinions. Moreover, per Student SM/Taiwan, a female,
"women's behavior is different from Taiwanese women's.
For example, women and men are equal here and women can
speak up to her husband, but women in Taiwan can't do
anything."
Student "ML"/Thailand saw that women "like to work,
are independent, are strong, and take care of their
children too." Student "SJ"/Korea had a different
perception. She said, "Some women think about only
career and their future jobs; others think about
relationships, boyfriends and husbands. It is similar
thinking to Korean women." And Student "UN"/Korea
thought, " Young single women have a good job, car, and a
nice apartment and a handsome boyfriend and lots of
time." Life seemed easy and she expected she could live
like that on her own.
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145
Student "MK"/Japan also perceived that women were
stronger than Japanese women, had dreams and opinions and
voiced them, and were confident and easygoing. In
contrast, she said that Japanese women are more reserved.
She liked that, but it also made her nervous because she
was worried that she would have to act the same way or be
the same way when she came to the United States. She did
not know if she would want "to be like that or could be
like that" when she came to America.
Student "JS"/Korea was impressed by the boldness of
the women in "Thelma and Louise," where a single woman
and a married woman go on the road and "find their own
personality and character through taking charge and
actually choosing to die" to assert their independence.
In their focus group, the Korean girls also said they
learned about the American working girl's life style from
"The Wedding Planner." The movie was very popular in
Korea, and they particularly focused on how Jennifer
Lopez' character was a popular, successful, single,
working woman who always brought "take-out" food home
instead of cooking herself.
Per Student "CH"/Korea: "American women are
sexually active, not passive, and strong physically and
emotionally." He liked it. In contrast, he noted,
"Usually Korean girls are shy, quiet, act different and
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146
are afraid to show real emotions." Student "SJ", also
from Korea, noticed that "American women have sex easily
and do touching and petting easily."
From the portrayals Student "YY"/Japan saw on
American TV, she believed that American women were strong
and "have male hormones." She loved that the women in
"Sex and the City" could talk about sex and masturbation
so freely with their friends. "In Japanese culture this
would never happen. It is taboo." Interestingly, in
contrast, when Student "HO"/Japan saw "Sex and the City"
in Los Angeles, he stated that he had perceived through
that program that American women are "dirty, oversexed,
nice, funny, too strong, too sexual." He had said
previously that he didn't feel he had learned anything
from films/TV, yet when he mentioned his reaction to that
program, he showed a definite, generalized opinion about
American women. He believed that image was accurate. He
said, "Most American and Canadian women are like this"
because he had a female Canadian roommate in Los Angeles
who exhibited some of the same characteristics as the
women on "Sex and the City." He said, "Every day she
invites different men. But it's not so important. I'm
not interested in American women."
Student "YY"/Japan not only noticed the strength of
American women in their roles and actions, but also in
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147
their voices and word choices. She felt they were equal
to men, both in language and in behavior. When watching
"Sex and the City" in Japan, she had seen Japanese-dubbed
versions as well as English-language versions with
Japanese subtitles. She said that if she had only seen
the series in the Japanese dubbed version, she would have
had a different impression of American women. They would
have seemed less strong. She said it was surprising to
see the difference in strength. In the Japanese version,
the women were much softer and more "feminine" and used
"feminine words." She also noted that, "The American
voice comes from gut and uses strong words. The Japanese
voice comes from the throat, soft words." She noticed
that her perceptions about how American women spoke were
accurate when she came to live in Los Angeles and
observed the relationship between her American
boyfriend's sister and brother-in-law. She said,
I think in America men and women is same
language. Women aren't scared. This is your
language, but for me since we are totally
different, if you learn Japanese you have to
learn women's words and men's words — totally
different. If I say man's words I am a lesbian
or gay.
Student "JS"/Korea also noticed that in Korean-
dubbed American television programs, only the men used
"slang" words, but women did not, which she noticed was
an aspect of Korean culture rather than American culture.
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148
Many participants also noted what they had perceived
about American women's physical appearance and attitude
about their appearance in American films/TV programs.
Prior to coming to the United States, Student
"MD"/Japan thought "all American women had big breasts,
noses, eyes and lips" from watching American films and
television programs. Student "TY"/Korea added, "Some
actresses look ugly in movies and they don't care. They
don't care about their looks." Specifically, he
mentioned "Never been Kissed" with Drew Barrymore, who
did not focus on her appearance and actually "dressed
down." «tY" felt Barrymore was more focused on her job.
"Her job is more important than appearance." And he
considered that a positive attribute.
Student "YY"/Japan wrote in her journal that she had
"noticed something from the movie" "Sex, Lies and
Videotape":
The wife is big. In Japan, actors and
actresses were very skinny. Japanese actresses
weren't needed muscle. They are just skinny
such as refugees. In America, women and men
were needed to be muscular. The wife wasn't
fat. She was very muscular. I though she was
beautiful. . . Anyway, I like American women
such as strong women about both of body and
mind. Because I'm also a strong woman even
though I'm Japanese.
Student "K", also from Japan, also liked American women's
perceived attitude toward their bodies. "American women
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149
are strong and have powerful minds. . . American women
have bigger bodies, but they show their body without
caring. Japanese women care more about their bodies.
Americans are always smiling even if they are a little
fat. They have less complexes and hang-ups."
Misperceptions of American Women
Student "MD"/Japan realized that she had developed a
stereotypical image of American women before coming to
the United States based on the television programs she
had seen. She learned after her arrival that not all
American women had "big breasts, noses, eyes and lips,"
but that there was a wide variety of sizes and shapes.
Student "UN"/Korea also had a misperception of how
"easy" life would be for a single woman in America. She
learned when she came to Los Angeles that life "seems
easier on TV." She saw that many women had small
apartments, not large apartments and houses, and had to
work hard. They did not have a lot of free time.
Perceptions of the American Family
Many of the respondents developed perceptions of the
American family through the American film and television
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150
shows they watched. In particular, they noticed the
close, yet independent nature of family relationships.
Student "MK"/Japan saw that "families are close to
each other; children talk about everything to their
parents, boyfriends, future, etc." She said she could
not even think of discussing personal issues such as
these with her parents. Student "SY"/Korea also noticed
that families like to spend time together and go on
picnics. And Student "K"/Japan agreed: "In American
married couples, men make time to stay with their wife on
the weekend or on holidays. Japanese men don't care."
Student "CH"/Korea believed that "Seventh Heaven" was
representative of a "normal, middle class American
family: peaceful and no worries with a nice house, good
job and perfect family."
Student "SY"/Korea also noticed that, "both women and
men are more responsible than Korean men and women. "They
are independent when they graduate high school at 18. . .
In Korea, their whole life men and women are dependent;
even married couples live with parents. Even if they
don't live with their parents they can't be independent
from parents." Student "UN"/Korea added that, "In
Korea, parents support kids until married. They pay for
their university tuition. But here, the kids make their
own life and leave home. There is lack of family
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151
support." She saw that "most Americans don't ask for
help from their parents.”
Student "MD"/Japan noticed how individual family
members have personal liberty but also have to take
responsibility for themselves and their decisions. She
described it in terms of "territory." From watching
"Seventh Heaven," she noticed that "
Each person in the family has his own
territory. Mothers and fathers don't control
everyone. The parents don't bother their kids
so much. Each child has his own territory.
The family is interdependent or independent.
In Japan, the child does not have his own
territory. People are not independent.
Children are dependent on the parents.
Student "C"/China noticed that perhaps this focus on
independence started with the husband-wife relationship.
Whereas in Chinese families the "women focus on kids
first," the relationship in American families "is more
important between a husband and wife first before the
children." She added that, "In U.S. parents don't
expect children to pay them back. They don't see
children much. After 18, kids have to make their own
money. In China, husband and wife don't focus on love
between them. They focus on responsibility for the
child."
Student "YZ"/Taiwan also saw in the movies that
"parents and kids don't live together. . . in Taiwan all
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152
live with parents if they can." But he also saw public
affection among the family. Family members "can kiss and
hug in public which would never happen in Taiwan because
the older generation have different views of respect."
Student "MB"/Hong Kong also noticed what she thought
was the closeness of the American family from films where
she saw families give "hugs and kisses." "In the movie we
can always see. And at home people don't say, "I love
you, Mom."
When she watched the movie "Meet the Parents,"
Student "YY"/Japan reported observing the "very deep and
close" relationship between "American fathers and
daughters:
For example, the daughter said many time, 'I
love dad' and she kissed her father. I think
that kissing and hugging are American custom.
However, I can't kiss or hug to my father.
Frankly, when I imagine that I kiss my father
and hug my father, I have goose bumps. It's
disgusting!1 Recently, in Japan, most father
was disliked by their family. Some Japanese
daughters say, 'My father's smell bad, so I
don't like him.' My father is same. We can't
respect fathers. Therefore, when I watched the
movie, I was envious American family. If I
have my children, I want my children to respect
my husband.
Student "ML"/Thailand also saw that "teenagers leave
home early and teenagers get pregnant very easily, but
they can get money and take care of themselves." In
addition, she noticed that "divorce was easy" and there
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153
are "lots of single moms." Student "JS"/Korea also
noticed seeing single mothers in American movies/TV who
are "career women and waitresses, from all different
walks of life." In addition, Student "YY"/Japan
perceived that "in U.S., single mothers are common; but
in Japan have to hide." Moreover, she believed that "in
U.S. (single mothers) can still live in luxurious
apartment without good job or working." Interestingly,
Student "YH"/Korea also noticed about divorce that "when
couples break up they can still be friends; not in
Korea."
According to Student "YY", two movies in particular
influenced her original perceptions of American family
relationships. "Magnolia" and "American Beauty" countered
her previous image that "America is no. 1 and people are
always happy with everybody smiling, almost not like
human beings." She saw "sick behavior and sick and sad
feelings" in these movies. She saw that everybody is not
always "happy, optimistic and beautiful" and that here
when people are divorced they have to struggle to live.
She said it "humanized us." "American Beauty" also had an
impact on Student "JS"/Korea, who said through movies
such as this one, she had learned there were "lots of
broken families in the U.S."
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154
Misperceptions of the American Family
Student "CH"/Korea had noticed through American
television programs how the family shared information
openly with each other. However, when he came to Los
Angeles, he realized,
Most Americans think private life, privacy is
so important. Some Korean mothers and fathers
have high school daughters and don't allow them
to have a boyfriend. Look in daughters'
diaries secretly, listen to phone
conversations. Koreans overprotect kids and
don't give privacy. Here there is more privacy
for teenagers and anybody.
Perceptions of Sexual Behaviors, Attitudes, and
Boundaries
All of the respondents remarked upon the lack of
sexual boundaries and the liberality of Americans' sexual
and dating behavior that they had seen in American
television programs and films. They were surprised to
see how couples, even teenage couples, kissed openly in
public and discussed their sex lives so openly on talk
shows, most notably, "The Jerry Springer" show. Many of
them thought the shows were strange and showed "a very
different culture." The students learned from the talk
shows and from shows like "Beverly Hills 90210" that it
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155
was "easy to have sex" and live together before marriage,
whereas in their countries it was more difficult, yet
also mentioned how these shows were affecting the
relationships among young people in their countries.
In Japan, the viewers who had cable could watch the
"Jerry Springer" show regularly. Student "K"/Japan
observed from "Jerry Springer" that
girls and boys break up quickly, don't care
about deep relationships. Young people— junior
high school and college— can make relationships
easily, have sex and change girls quickly.
Teenagers who date cheat on each other all the
time. They just want to have fun. I've never
seen anything like this, but it's everywhere
the same. It's almost the same as in Japan.
The culture is affected by these shows.
Japanese want to be Americanized.
Student "K" added that "Many men think Asian women
are more modest, so cute, but American girls' thoughts
and feelings are the same as Japanese but shown
differently. Asian women also want to have sex easily,
but can't express, but feeling same."
Although Students "K" and "MD" from Japan believed
that what they had seen on "Jerry Springer" was accurate
and that the people on the show were "real people,"
Student "HO"/Japan had a different view of "Jerry
Springer" both before and after he came to the United
States. He said the show was "just fun" and that the
audience was "pretending." He said he "knew this wasn't
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156
American culture, just entertainment." Moreover, from
watching "Beverly Hills 90210," Student "MD"/Japan, was
also cynical about the accuracy of the portrayals of
teenage sexuality. She said, "It's crazy, impossible all
the girls are going out with all the boys. The program
is for rich people in Beverly Hills!" Student
"ML"/Thailand, also had a different view of "American
sexual morality" that she had seen in American television
programs. She noted that, rather than cheating,
"Americans break up first and then go out with someone
else."
Before her residence in the United States, Student
"SY"/Korea had also noticed from viewing American TV
programs and films that there was "a lot of sex with
unmarried people; and anyone can have sex before
marriage." She believed that "Americans were very sexual
but it was okay" because she considered herself "open-
minded." However, the films and TV programs she had seen
in Korea had been censored or dubbed, and the content had
been altered. So, when she came to Los Angeles, "SY"
said she was "shocked" to see American dating game shows
on television such as "Change of Heart" and "Blind Date"
where she saw young men and women "playing games like
Rock-Paper-Scissors where the loser takes off clothes."
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157
She said there were no shows like this in Korea and was
surprised at the extremity of these programs.
Another Korean student, Student "UN", also commented on
the difference she saw in television programs that were
censored in Korea related to sexual themes. According
to Student "UN,"
Beverly Hills 90210" is popular for teenage
girls, but the culture is totally different.
It is conservative, not open like American
culture. Usually the TV shows are censored.
For example in one episode, where Brenda, a
lead teenage character, thinks she is pregnant,
in Korea the story was translated to show she
had a "hormone problem" rather than a pregnancy
problem. In Korea, if a high school or
university student became pregnant before
marriage, their mothers would kill them and
society would look down at them.
From American movies, Student "CH"/Korea also stated
that he had learned Americans "are very free sexually."
He noticed that "the bed scenes in American films are
different and the expressions are different than in
Korean films. In Korean it is slow, romantic, and
usually Korean men smoke cigarettes and the woman is
passive. The men have more power, but it is changing
now." However, in American scenes, he saw that
"especially the woman is active, assertive, have equality
in sex." He thinks that women's roles are changing in
Korea because of the "world flow and westernization. . .
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158
a lot of Western culture is coming from news and movies.
Movies are powerful."
Student "TY"/Korea believed from seeing films like
"Cruel Intentions," "where a "rich guy thinks love is a
game," that "often Americans use people for sex and
games." He also saw that "American women like to have
sex."
Student "MB"/Hong Kong stated that, "Love
relationships — it is easy to make love with someone.
The boundaries is less than in Hong Kong," and Student
"SL,"/Taiwan, said, "Women easy to fall in and out of
love, easy to switch people, relationships have no
depth."
In addition, Student "YY"/Japan said that through
watching American films and television programs she had
learned that Americans are "erotic people" and "even 12
and 13 year olds have sex." Student "SJ"/Korea was
concerned about young people having sex. She asserted
that,
American students' relationships are dangerous
— usually there is sex. In Korea, sex is for
after the wedding. Many Korean students
didn't have the chance to meet men or women
during school time. In America, it is free —
students don't care about sex between men and
women and young men and women. Sex is common
and people change boyfriends and girlfriends a
lot, easy to go in and out of relationships.
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159
Student "YY" was impressed by Americans' ability to
talk about and show the issue of masturbation so openly
in the television series "Sex and the City," which she
had seen in Japan, and "Sex and the Married Man," which
she saw when she came to Los Angeles. She believed the
openness about this topic was common. In her journal,
she wrote about an episode of "Sex and the Married Man
that focused on masturbation. In the episode, an
executive goes to his beautiful female employee's
apartment where she and her roommate are dancing
seductively:
He can't be patient, so he goes to a restroom,
and he did masturbation. However, he doesn't
lock the door, so the two women open the door
and see him. The next day, the woman talks to
him: 'I don't care what you did. Everybody did
it. It's common.' Anyway, I've never seen the
TV program that they talk about masturbation in
Japan except ex-rated TV program. I like this
program. It seems to be real life.
Misperceptions of Sexual Behaviors, Attitudes, and
Boundaries
Some respondents reported that before living in the
United States they had developed some misperceptions
about Americans' sexual behaviors, attitudes and
boundaries.
Student "YY,"/Japan learned that she had had some
misconceptions about the liberalness of Americans' sexual
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160
boundaries when she watched an episode of "The Mind of
the Married Man" in Los Angeles with her American
boyfriend and discussed it with him. In her journal, she
wrote:
The episode was that a man had love affair
with a woman who was his co-worker. He kissed
her spontaneously. Even though she was
surprised his acting, she accept his kisses.
On his way back to his house, he remembered
when he had met his wife. It was sweet
memories. Then, he regretted what he did.
However, it was too late. I saw the program
with my boyfriend. He said that their marriage
was gone. I had no idea why only kisses was
wrong. My boyfriend thought that when a person
seriously love someone, the person can't love
others. Moreover, a wife and a husband is
supposed to believe in each other, so their
married is gone when one of a couple has love
affair. This program seemed to have same
opinion with my boyfriend's opinion. I was
surprised because the opinion is very
conservative. I realized that American people
also have conservative mind such as Japanese.
"Student C"/China realized that it was true that
there were "some people" who had sex without love, but
that there was actually more of this phenomenon on TV
than in real life "because my American friends not the
same thinking."
Student "SY" had lived with an American host family
in Arcada in Northern California before moving to Los
Angeles. Her experience residing with this Christian
family changed the perceptions she had developed about
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161
Americans' sexual behavior. Prior to this experience,
she had believed that "all Americans have sex at a young
age." However, to her surprise, her host sister, a 20-
year-old woman who had a boyfriend, revealed to her that
she was still a virgin and that her friends were also
virgins. She was even more surprised to learn that her
16-year-old "host brother" had not yet had sex.
Moreover, he told her that most of his friends had
already had sex while he had abstained. "SY" was
surprised that her host brother had not succumbed to peer
pressure and had retained his individual values
regardless of what his friends had done.
Student "TY" was also surprised to see that America
could be more conservative than Korea in some instances.
He had seen "Scary Movie" in Korea for the first time.
However, when he saw it again in the United States, he
was shocked that "In U.S., they don't show a big penis"
whereas in Korea they did. He had thought American
society would be more open in showing nudity, but
realized that he might be wrong, and that Americans might
be more conservative and less open sexually in certain
situations.
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162
Perceptions of Portrayal of
Minorities/Discrimination/Racism
The participants revealed a variety of perceptions
they had acquired about the portrayal of minorities in
American films and television programs and about
discrimination. They considered "minorities" to be
Blacks/African-Americans, Asians and Hispanics.
Most participants believed from watching American
films and television programs that there was no
discrimination in America and that they had received
accurate information about minorities. For example,
Student "YZ,"/Taiwan did not believe discrimination
existed, and thought that "Yellow people in movies" were
treated no differently than whites. Student "UN"/Korea
noted that she "didn't see racism in TV or in film." In
very old movies she could see it, for example "with the
KKK against Blacks," but she did not see it in current
films she had seen prior to coming to Los Angeles.
Moreover, Student "C"/China stated that she had not seen
"any Blacks" in the movies she had seen in China before
coming to the United States, but did not perceive that
image to be inaccurate prior to her residence in America.
Student "MD"/Japan perceived that minorities were
integrated in society rather than separated and "were
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163
always mixed on television programs." Students "C"/China
and "SL"/Taiwan did notice discrimination related to
social class as opposed to race in the movie "Pretty
Woman." They specifically noted the scene in a Beverly
Hills boutique where two saleswomen were rude to the
character played by Julia Roberts because she was dressed
like a prostitute and looked like she did not have any
money.
From history classes in Japan and from American
films, Student "K"/Japan said she knew that in America
"Blacks are poor here and they use guns and are more
dangerous." While she was in Los Angeles, she saw the
movie "Training Day" and learned more information about
Black and Mexican culture that corroborated her views.
She saw that they "have guns and marijuana and are
gangsters." She also perceived that "Hispanic people
have strong family relationships, and gangs also become
strong like families." She believed that "Most black
people poor, have to work harder than us to succeed. Are
a little lazy, don't work hard. Want money easily and
sell drugs." She also noted how from watching hip-hop,
R&B, and rap music videos and MTV, most Japanese
teenagers admired Blacks and wanted to look like them.
From watching "Menace to America," Student
"HO"/Japan perceived that "white people and Japanese
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164
people's life style is similar and Black people's
lifestyle is very different," and so he was interested in
them. He agreed with Student "K" regarding Blacks that
"some of them are lazy," and learned that "Blacks in
America have to decide two ways: they will be lazy
gangsters or normal businessmen." He also believed that
"Black people's image is low."
Although they believed the information they learned
about Blacks in America was accurate, in some cases, both
Student "HO" and Student "K" also recognized
discrimination toward Blacks. In one movie, for example,
Student "HO" saw a white policeman hitting black people
without provocation and enjoying it. Moreover, Student
"K" learned from watching films that there was
discrimination toward Blacks in America in regards to
Black-White relationships. In particular, she pointed
out Spike Lee movies such as "Malcolm X" and "Jungle
Fever" which compared "Black and white people's thoughts.
I think they don't like each other and have
misunderstanding." She also saw that "when Black men
love white women, other people cannot understand and
there are problems with interrace relationships."
Moreover, she stated that she had learned why
discrimination happens from an American movie. The
reason, she discovered, was "Discrimination happens
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165
because of misunderstandings. Each one has a fear of each
other."
Although Student "YZ"/Taiwan felt that there was no
discrimination toward or stereotypes of Asians in
American films and television programs, many students
were not sure they were presented accurately.
For example, Student "JS"/Korea reported that in
American movies she saw few Asian actors, and only in
sub-positions, not in main roles. They were "always
killed or a secretary; they don't reflect Asian culture
and Asian people." Students "C" and "F" from China also
reported seeing "few Asians" in American films.
Student "SL"/Taiwan, remarked upon the portrayal of
the Chinese female lawyer on "Ally McBeal" played by Lucy
Liu. She noticed that, "All the lawyers are all like
white people except one Chinese lady and she's mean."
When asked what she thought about this character being
portrayed as "mean," she laughed and said, "I'm proud of
that." However, she was not sure if this portrayal was a
typical stereotype of Chinese women. Student "CH"/Korea
also noticed that Chinese women in American films were
"stronger than usual, but less strong than American white
women."
In her journal that she kept on films and television
programs she had seen in the United States, Student
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166
"YY"/Japan wrote about the misrepresentation of Asian
culture that she had seen in two different HBO comedy
series: "The Mind of the Married Man," and "Curb Your
Enthusiasm."
She noticed the "mistake" the "director or someone
who made this program" had probably made with the
Japanese name "Seshiko," that they had chosen for a
character playing the role of a Japanese massage parlor
girl. "YY" had never heard that name in Japan, and she
thought they probably meant "Setsuko," a common female
name in Japan. She also noticed that the Japanese
massage parlor girl wrote to the American male character,
"Mickey," using a "stereotypical Japanese letter" made of
Japanese rice paper and using a writing brush and ink.
She remarked that:
These days, young Japanese people don't write
such a letter. We use usual paper and pen such
as American style, and Seshiko looks like 20 —
22 years old. Moreover, although Seshiko was a
Japanese, she wore Chinese dress. Probably
American people's images of Japanese and
Chinese or Korean are same (?) However, I also
don't know Western cultures' differences.
Anyway, it was funny.
Another HBO comedy program "YY" watched that made
her believe, "I think sometimes American people
misunderstood differences between Chinese, Japanese and
Korean," was an episode of "Curb Your Enthusiasm"
entitled "The Acupuncturist." The acupuncturist was
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167
supposed to be Japanese, but in the room of the
acupuncturist, "YY" noticed that there were many "Chinese
medicines." She said, "I had fun time because I could
understand that stereotypical Asian whom American people
are thinking."
Misperceptions of Portrayals of
Minorities/Discrimination/Racism
Many participants noticed they had developed
misperceptions of the portrayals of minorities,
discrimination, and racism they saw in American culture
through American films and television programs.
Student "MD"/Japan, for example had thought America
was "all equal" and integrated. She had experienced that
integration in high school in Texas when she was 16 years
old, but in the Santa Monica College cafeteria, she was
surprised to see "all racial groups segregated. Blacks,
whites and Asians all stayed in separate groups."
Moreover, in contrast to what they had perceived,
Students "C"/China, "SL"/Taiwan, and "YZ"/Taiwan all felt
personally discriminated against in the United States by
Americans either because they were Asian or because they
were foreign.
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1 68
Student "SL"/Taiwan reported that she had
experienced discrimination from being Asian in stores
because she could not speak English well. In one boutique
she was not served and the store people were unfriendly.
She also felt that because she was foreign, when she went
to buy a car, the salesman felt he could take advantage
of her. Moreover, she also noticed discrimination toward
"foreigners" when she went to have her telephone
installed and the telephone company made her pay double.
Student "YZ"/Taiwan also saw that "in real life there is
prejudice and discrimination. Americans don't always
treat Asians well. . . Attitude becomes bad in store,
mostly in store like supermarket won't treat you the
same. They speak more loudly with Taiwanese people."
Student "C"/China had felt that Americans would be
open and interested in foreign cultures, but when she
came to the United States, she realized that Chinese
people were more friendly and open-minded than Americans.
She found in Arizona, where she went to college for 10
months before coming to Los Angeles, that "teenagers are
not friendly. It is hard to join life if different
language and background." She lived in a college
dormitory and learned there that Americans "have
stereotypes of Chinese. They think we just study, are
hard workers and know nothing about life. But Chinese
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169
are open to foreigners, love to talk,, but American girls
do not, do not ask what you think." She learned to adapt
to this environment, she would have to become assertive.
Otherwise, the other students would ignore her. She was
disappointed. She was also disappointed that the
American students she met did not "care what's going on
around them, politics in the world." She had thought
they knew about and would be interested in other
cultures, but they were not interested. She concluded
that, "Chinese teenagers know more about the world."
When "C" went to a nightclub in Arizona, she also
encountered discrimination. She said she "was dressed
well and went in a nice car" to the club. However, she
saw that she and her boyfriend were the only non-white
people. When the bouncer saw that she was a foreigner he
said, "No, you can't come because you are not dressed
well."
Students "C" and "F" from China were also surprised
to see how many Asian people they saw "all over the
city," particularly in Hollywood, Santa Monica and
Westwood. They had not realized there would be so many
Asians as they had seen few Asians in American films and
television programs. Student "F" especially noted, "All
pretty Asian girls are in Los Angeles; it is more than in
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170
Canton." He added that it was the only reason he wanted
to stay in Los Angeles.
Student "C"/China had not seen many Black people
either in American films and TV when she was in China.
She said there were also "no Black people" in China and
that she and her "mother and friends think they're dirty
before, like animals. . . they told me don't stay with a
black guy." She reported that she was "shocked" to see
how many Black people there were in the United States and
how popular "Black culture" was. In fact, she became
more "open-minded" toward Blacks and was "more friendly
with them than she is with White Americans. They are
more friendly."
Student "HO"/Japan also experienced a different view
of "Blacks" through developing a friendship with a Black
American who worked in the dormitory he lived in. He
discovered, like Student "C", that Black Americans were
"more friendly, nicer" and "more interested" in getting
to know him than White Americans. He saw there were many
Black students at Santa Monica College. In contrast to
what he saw in American movies, he learned that "Blacks
have good knowledge, wisdom, clever; in movies, only
selling drugs."
In Japan, Student "K" had believed "Blacks" were
"cool" because of watching hip-hop, reggae, and Rhythm
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and Blues music videos, which were popular in Japan. She
had also believed from "history and films" that Blacks
were dangerous because they were poor in the United
States "and here use guns." However, upon arriving in
the United States she said she "doesn't know yet if
Blacks are cool or dangerous." She did not believe or
trust all the information she had acquired from music
videos, films and television programs. Moreover, from a
concept she had learned in class related to the
difference between American culture and Japanese culture,
she observed, "I guess between Black and Japanese culture
there are some differences and some similarities. Asians
are high context. Blacks are high context too. Even
though country culture is different, mind is similar, and
the heart is the same. Asian people don't express, but
Black Americans do express. Both stay in group and have
strong bonds."
Student "K" was also surprised to notice how many
"Spanish people" there were in Los Angeles. She noticed
that "most can't speak English, are working in fast food
restaurants and are a little poor." She had not seen
this side of Los Angeles in the American films and TV
programs she had seen while residing in Japan.
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172
Perceptions of Crime/Violence
Another area that emerged from the data was about
crime and violence in America. Before coming to Los
Angeles, Students "F" and "C" from China had perceived
that the United States was "dangerous, more dangerous
than in China." Students "CD"/Hong Kong, "MK"/Japan,
"K"/Japan, and "SL"/Taiwan also believed from watching
American films that America would be violent. Student
"MK" noted that "American people is violent; there is a
lot of violence and a lot of people have guns. In Japan,
guns are illegal." Students "JS," "SY," "YH" and "SJ"
from Korea were also surprised at the use of "guns,
cocaine and marijuana" they had seen in high school among
high school students in American films. They believed
that was usual in America but not in Korea. In Korea
only cigarette smoking was common. They also believed
there would be a lot of gang activity in Los Angeles. In
contrast, other students, such as Students "ST" and "MB"
from Hong Kong and Student "X"/Taiwan said that they had
perceived that the United States would be "safe" prior to
coming to the United States. Once he came to the United
States, Student "ST"/Hong Kong noticed that the
television dramas he saw in the United States were more
violent than those he had seen in Hong Kong, especially
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173
on cable television. He noticed a lot of "sex and
violence and killing others" on cable television and
decided not to watch television dramas often in Los
Angeles because he did not like "sex and violence."
Student "MB"/Hong Kong also said that she had not worried
about crime until she arrived in New York and watched
television news reports which mentioned "how many rapes"
there were "per minute." That was when she became
"scared" about living in American society. In contrast,
while Student "X" did not believe that crime did not
exist, he believed that the "country was safe.
Everything was under control, and the good guys always
win." He did not believe that Los Angeles would be a
dangerous city.
In relation to crime, real or imagined, some
students observed Americans' obsession with lawyers and
suing. From "Ally McBeal," Student "MD" learned that "for
any problem people call lawyers and that lawyers are very
important in this society." Student "ML" also thought,
"Everyone wants to sue and give tickets."
Misperceptions of Crime/Violence
Although many of the students had believed they
would encounter violence and dangerous situations in the
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174
United States, they discovered that their worries were
unfounded. Student "C" had reported that she and
"everyone in China believed that life in the United
States was dangerous." However, she actually felt it was
safe in the U.S. and the police system was "good, and
fast." Students "F"/China, "JS"/Korea and "MK"/Japan
also found that Los Angeles was not as dangerous as they
had thought. Student "MB"/Hong Kong did not find danger
in Los Angeles either despite the television news reports
she had seen in New York. As Student "JS" put it, the
respondents "never heard the sound of gunfire and never
saw gang violence."
Perceptions of the Educational System
Most of the respondents believed that the school
system in the United States would be more "fun," "free,"
"less strict," and more "flexible" than the school
systems in their countries and that they would have more
time in the United States to socialize with their
friends. The Korean students "JS," "YH," "SY" and "SJ"
believed from watching "Beverly Hills 90210" that most
students did not do homework but spent most of their time
"partying," and were envious that American students did
not have to wear uniforms.
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175
The students all commented, as well, on the more
liberal teaching style where students interacted with
teachers openly and were able to state their opinions.
As Student "SM"/Taiwan noted, "School is different than
in Taiwan. It is more fun. School is boring in Taiwan
there is no talking at all. Here you discuss with the
teacher."
Student "MD"/Japan had also learned from watching
"Doogie Hauser, M.D.," that there was flexibility in the
American education system. The main character in "Doogie
Hauser, M.D." was a teenage genius who graduated school
early and became a doctor while he was still a teenager.
Student "MK" said that in Japan students "could never
skip from Freshman to Junior or Senior Year" and she
believed if she went to the United States, she could
"skip school and get out early." She believed her
perception was "true and good." After seeing this show,
she went to high school in Texas at age 15 for one-and-a-
half years while playing professional tennis. There she
learned her impression of the school system was true when
she saw a "little boy" in her freshman math class.
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176
Misperceptions of the Educational System
Although many participants believed that their
perceptions of the American school system were accurate,
some students were disappointed. It was "not as much fun"
and they had less free time than they had expected. They
also were disappointed to learn that they would have to
work hard to pass their classes.
Perceptions of Speed/Efficiency/High Technology
There were also some mixed views on American "speed
and efficiency. Student "TY"/Korea believed, from
watching American films, that in American offices,
"people work very slowly, very differently from Korean
people. Koreans are impatient with slowness." However,
Student "YZ"/Taiwan and "ST"/Hong Kong thought that
everything would be convenient, that they could do
everything fast, offices such as the DMV (Department of
Motor Vehicles) would be fast, and that everything would
be computerized. Per Student "YZ," "Taiwanese people
think American technology is new, in movie shows new
equipment and the most sophisticated equipment."
However, he also assumed that "since the land was big,
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177
the police system would not be so effective or they
wouldn't care about tickets, etc."
Misperceptions of Speed/Efficiency/High Technology
Both Students "ST"/Hong Kong and Student "YZ"/Taiwan
were surprised and disappointed at the slowness they
encountered in Los Angeles. When he arrived here Student
"YZ" saw that his view of American speed and convenience
was not accurate. However, the police were more efficient
than he had thought. He said, "Everything slow, but
police give tickets fast!"
Perceptions of How American TV/Films Affect the
Participants' Cultures
Respondents provided many examples of how they
perceived American television programs and films have
affected their cultures.
In China, according to Student "C," Chinese
teenagers like to copy "all what they see on TV, how
American girls dress and behave, everything Americans do"
even if they do not completely understand what they see
or know if the behavior is "real behavior." A specific
example she cited was that from films Chinese perceived
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178
that in American culture "sex even without love was okay.
People think that is normal and are not shocked. This
kind of idea affects behavior in China. People follow it
even if it is not true, and think it's true."
In Hong Kong, Student "CD" said, "Younger people are
influenced in fashion from Japan which is influenced by
the U.S. TV."
In Japan, Student "MD" said, MTV music videos and
American television programs such as "The Academy Awards"
show and music awards shows have a big impact on young
Japanese people, especially young girls. She said, "They
love Blacks and want to be like Blacks and have Black
boyfriends. They go to tanning salons for darker skin,
dark makeup, darker hair when they see Academy Awards and
Music awards shows and want to be like Lauryn Hill (a
popular, Black hip-hop artist)." Student "K" agreed and
added, "Japanese people like American style, people,
food, hip-hop clothing and hamburgers through watching
MTV, films and television." Student "MD" also mentioned
that Japanese girls and young women copied fashion styles
from other television programs such as "Ally McBeal."
According to Student "K", young people are also
imitating the "cold" relationship styles they see in
television programs and talk shows. As mentioned in the
category related to perceptions of sexual boundaries, "K"
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179
stated that "girls and boys break up quickly, don't care
about deep relationships. Young people— junior high
school and college— can make relationships easily, have
sex and change girls quickly. It's almost the same as
in Japan. The culture is affected by these shows.
Japanese want to be Americanized."
In Korea, per Student "YH"/Korea, "The Wedding
Planner had a big impact" in Korea. She said, "Lots of
single women are following Jennifer Lopez's lifestyle of
eating fast food instead of cooking at home." She
considered that lifestyle "poor and unhealthy." She also
mentioned that she sees "a lot of people in movies and TV
programs sitting outside in cafes and eating outside at
Starbucks and Coffeebean, and now there are a lot of
Coffeebeans and Starbucks as well and outside cafes."
She also noticed and followed the example from American
films/TV that "people bring cats or dogs, big dogs on the
street walking and jogging. That is very much American
style. And now Korea has inside cafes where people take
their dogs," while sometimes across the street ironically
is a butcher shop specializing in dog meat.
According to Student "JS"/Korea, another influence
from American film/TV on her culture was that "people
drink coke because Americans drink coke." Furthermore,
she said, "Black music" such as "Hiphop, rap and R&B in
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180
Korea is very popular, and many entertainers and young
people follow MTV and American music videos and the hip
hop artists in clothing style and music style."
Especially popular are groups such as "The Fugees" and
"Lauryn Hill".
Student "CH"/Korea stated that because of the sexual
equality shown between men and women in American films
and television, the balance of power between men and
women in Korea is also changing. He said, "The men have
more power, but it is changing now." He thinks that
women's roles are changing in Korea because of the "world
flow and westernization. . . a lot of Western culture is
coming from news and movies. Movies are powerful."
Student "TY"/Korea, reported that he had "learned
about love and romantic ideas through American films."
For example he said he wanted to propose to his fiancee
by putting a ring in her ice cream because he saw it in a
film. However, although he liked the idea, he felt it
would be "impossible for him to do because it is too
childish and dramatic."
In Taiwan, Student "X" also saw the powerful
influence of American films and television. He said,
"from TV and movies' influence, the society is changing;
men are getting less powerful, women are changing and are
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181
more open and less caring. Before in Asian culture men
had power; now men and women are equal."
Perceptions of Language and Language Learning Usefulness
Significantly, all of the students responded that
they felt their listening skills had greatly improved as
well as their knowledge of "slang" and "bad language"
from watching American films and television programs. In
terms of listening, Student "X"/Taiwan felt that he
"understands people faster" from watching these media.
As with most of the respondents, one of the main tools he
perceived useful for improving his listening was watching
English-language programs with English subtitles (closed-
captions).
In addition, most of the respondents with the
exception of Students "C"/China and "ML"/Thailand,
reported that they perceived they had learned more about
American culture and language, including pronunciation,
from watching American films and television programs
versus reading English-language books. Student "F"/China
said that "American TV shows/movie is an easy, helpful
tool to find information about America, but the best way
to discover real American culture is to study here and
work here."
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In conclusion, there is clearly a wealth of data
that emerged from the individual interviews, focus
groups, and journals provided by the participants. The
following chapter will provide a discussion of the main
findings of the study.
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183
CHAPTER VI
Discussion/ Analyses/ and Conclusions
Introduction
This final chapter will discuss the main findings of
the study, provide analyses and conclusions, and explore
implications and recommendations for future studies.
The main purpose of this study was to discover if,
how, and to what extent Asian ESL students' perceptions
of American culture were impacted by viewing American
films and television programs both in their own countries
prior to coming to the United States and while residing
in the United States, and how those perceptions may have
affected their behavior and social integration into
American culture and an academic college environment.
Discussion and Analyses
As shown in Chapter V, the participants in this
study revealed a wide range of perceptions that they had
acquired about American culture from viewing American
films and television programs both in their countries and
in the United States. Moreover, the majority of
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184
respondents believed that their primary sources of
information about American culture prior to residing in
the United States were American films and television
programs. Prior to their arrival, with the exception of
Students "HO" and "MD" from Japan, the students confirmed
that they believed they had received accurate images from
watching these media. Student "HO" was skeptical about
the reality of "The Jerry Springer Show," and Student
"MD" was cynical about the accuracy of portrayals of
teenage sexuality that she had seen in television shows
such as "Beverly Hills 90210."
The majority of participants also reported that they
had developed most of their perceptions from these media
prior to their arrival in the United States. Only 9 out
of 23 students watched more television in the U.S. than
they had in their home countries, and 17 out of 23
students viewed fewer American films in theaters or on
video or DVDs once they arrived in the United States.
The findings also showed the areas where the
participants believed they had developed misperceptions
of American culture through these media prior to living
in the United States. The students revealed that they
had become aware of these misperceptions after residing
in the United States and having actual versus symbolic
learning experiences.
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185
Indeed, the more direct experiences students had
with Americans, especially those involving interactive
discussions versus observation, the more they were able
to distinguish which images they had derived from
watching American television programs and films were
accurate or inaccurate. For example, as Student "YY"
from Japan observed in Chapter V under "Misperceptions of
Sexual Behaviors, Attitudes, and Boundaries," she had
believed from watching American television programs and
films that in America, if a married man or woman kissed
another person passionately outside the marriage, it
would not be a serious threat to the marriage and was
relatively unimportant. However, from viewing an episode
of "The Mind of the Married Man" with her American
boyfriend where such an incident occurred, and discussing
his feelings about this situation, she learned that he
considered "the kiss" outside a committed marriage a
serious betrayal, and that consequently the marriage
would end. She asserted that she "was surprised because
the opinion is very conservative. I realized that
American people also have conservative mind such as
Japanese."
Without such an intimate dialogue, "Student YY" may
not have discovered that her previous perception could
have been inaccurate, at least in the case of her
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186
boyfriend. Unlike "YY," most of the students in this
study had not yet established friendships, or had only
had minimal, superficial contact with Americans where
they did not feel comfortable discussing their
perceptions. They were able to discern "misperceptions"
they had gathered from watching American films and
television programs, but may not always have been able to
distinguish reality from distorted reality primarily from
observation.
For example, in some cases, such as with "Student
K"/Japan, the contrast of images provided by the film and
television world versus the "real world" experiences of
living in the United States created confusion as to what
constituted real or distorted perceptions. For "Student
K," the confusion related to how she felt about Blacks,
or African Americans. As explained in Chapter V
"Misperceptions of Portrayals of
Minorities/Discrimination/Racism," she was not sure yet
whether they were "cool or dangerous" because she had not
had enough direct contact with them.
In relation to how students felt their perceptions
or misperceptions might have affected their behavior or
the behavior of their peers and their socialization into
American culture and a college environment, the students
provided many examples. Some indicated a general impact
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187
on students within the respondents' countries, and others
focused specifically on individual experiences related to
socialization in the United States.
As reported in Chapter V in "Perceptions of How
American TV/Films Affect the Participants' Cultures,"
Students from China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea and Taiwan
noted how young people in their countries emulated the
versions of American culture they observed from watching
American films and TV in areas ranging from sexual
behavior and fashion, to lifestyle choices such as
drinking coffee at Starbucks and eating fast food. A
common theme was that young people "want to be
Americanized." Women, especially, want to have a
stronger role and attain more equality in their
societies, as they perceive American women have. Indeed,
two of the male participants, Student "CH"/Korea and
Student "X"/Taiwan perceived that due to the influence of
American films and television, the balance of power
between men and women in their countries is changing, and
women are becoming more powerful. As stated by Student
"CH"/Korea in relation to the changing role of women, "a
lot of Western culture is coming from news and movies.
Movies are powerful."
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188
On an individual basis, the observations of three
participants, in particular, stand out: "Student
C"/China, "Student SL/Taiwan" and "Student MK"/Japan.
"Student C" had expected that it would be easier to
make American friends prior to coming to the United
States based on the information she had obtained from
watching American films. She had also believed American
teens would be open to foreigners. However, she saw once
she arrived, that "teenagers are not friendly," and in
order to "fit in" to the college environment she would
have to become less passive and more "assertive," like
Americans. So, she changed her behavior. Otherwise, she
realized, the students would ignore her. She had
developed a false belief before arriving in the U.S., and
was unprepared for and disappointed about having to make
behavioral adjustments.
"Student SL" from Taiwan had also believed she would
be able to make friends easily with American girls from
her observations of relationships in American films and
television programs, and she was highly motivated to
establish friendships with American females. Moreover,
although she had believed that American men were
gentleman prior to coming to the United States, she was
afraid to socialize with them based on her fear of their
emphasis on sexuality. Consequently, at the beginning of
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189
her residence in the United States she initially avoided
contact with American men. However, to her surprise, she
had difficulty establishing friendships with American
females, and was able to develop a relationship with an
American man who was respectful and not sexually
aggressive.
Student "MK"/Japan was also afraid and confused
about how to behave in America and adapt to American
college life based on her perceptions of American women
derived from viewing American films and television
programs. She admired the strength and confidence of
American women and their ability to voice opinions.
However, she was nervous because she was concerned that
she would also have to behave in the same way when she
came to the United States. She was not sure if she would
"want to be like that or could be like that" when she
came to America.
In regard to male versus female responses (please
refer to "Appendix E"), although this subject was not the
main focus of this study, some interesting observations
could be made. In most categories, there were not
significant differences. However, women showed a
substantially more frequent response rate than men in the
areas of "Perceptions of the American Family" (25% of the
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190
males responded versus 73% of the women) and "Perceptions
of Crime/Violence" (38% of the men responded versus 80%
of the female participants.) Moreover, 38% of the males
had developed "Perceptions of Speed/Efficiency/High
Technology" prior to coming to the United States, whereas
no females revealed similar perceptions. The reasons for
these differences were not addressed in this
dissertation, and could merit exploration in future
studies.
In relation to the quantity of American television
programs or films watched, while students who had watched
more programs prior to residing in the United States
could obviously report more perceptions, regardless of
the amount, what they observed had a definite impact on
them. A good indication of the power of television can
be shown with the example of Student "MB" from Hong Kong.
Student "MB" had reported watching only one hour of
American television per week prior to arriving in the
United States and had watched only two American films per
month in movie theaters. Only Student "C" from China and
"Student KG" from Vietnam had watched less television,
reporting that they had watched no television programs
prior to living in the United States. Student "MB" had
reported that she had considered the United States to be
a safe place and had not perceived crime to be a problem.
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191
However, when she arrived in New York from Hong Kong for
a brief stop on route to Los Angeles and watched a
television news report which mentioned how many rapes
there were per minute in the United States, she became
frightened and anxious. She believed what she had seen
until she actually lived in Los Angeles and had direct
life experience there.
Thus, as Bandura has theorized, and as Shatzer et al
(1982) so aptly stated, "When few information sources and
experiences are available, then relatively infrequent
spurts of information or symbolic experience may take on
increased importance." (p.3) The case of student "MB"
provides a counterpoint to Gerbner's theory that the more
television watched by viewers, the more likely they are
to believe the television version of reality. As shown in
this case, it is not necessarily the quantity of
television or film watched, but the medium of symbolic
learning that makes an impact on viewers.
The data also support Yarbro's (1994) findings
regarding stereotypes that "the less subjects knew about
a culture and the more intense the depiction of that
culture in a film, the more subjects seemed willing to
accept the film's version of the culture." A case in
point would be Student "HO"/Japan's belief from watching
American films that some American Blacks "are lazy," and
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192
that "Blacks in America have to decide two ways: they
will be lazy gangsters or normal businessmen." He also
believed that "Black people's image is low." However,
when he spent time in the United States and developed a
friendship with an African-American male, in contrast to
what he had seen in American movies, he learned that
"Blacks have good knowledge, wisdom, clever; in movies,
only selling drugs."
Clearly, the quality of the participants' direct
experiences, interpersonal communication and observations
were important in dispelling or confirming the strong
perceptions that had been shaped from watching American
films and television programs.
Limitations
This study was limited in scope and depth due to a
variety of factors. One principal limitation is that the
number of participants was dependent on the students who
volunteered for the study. As in most studies, however,
the number of participants must be limited to a
reasonable quantity in order to complete the research in
a timely yet complete manner.
In addition, there was a limited time frame within
which to complete the study, as the research was
collected during the students' first semester at Santa
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193
Monica College, and it would have been difficult to gain
access to them once the semester had ended. Many
students had not yet had the opportunity to develop
friendships or substantial contact with Americans, which
may have affected their perceptions or recognition of
"misperceptions."
Moreover, as the study was done on a volunteer
basis, only three out of 23 students submitted written
journals of the American films or television programs
they had watched during the semester. Student "YY" from
Japan provided the most detailed, thoughtful, and
thorough reports, which clearly showed the value of this
form of data. It would have been preferable to have
obtained a more consistent set of written reports or
commentaries from more students, which would have
provided a more thorough, rich set of data for analysis.
Implications and Recommendations for Future Studies
Despite these limitations, the study has shown that
Asian ESL Students' perceptions of American culture are
strongly impacted by what they have seen in American
films and television programs, whether consciously or
subconsciously. Many of the students in this study were
highly motivated to socialize with American students in a
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194
college environment prior to their arrival in the United
States based on these perceptions; however, some were
also afraid and anxious about integrating into American
society and the educational system. All were interested
in the media and believed they helped them in achieving a
higher level of English language proficiency as well.
In the context of higher education, one strategy for
making use of the media's effects, increasing foreign
students' language proficiency, and social integration,
would be to create a course which would incorporate the
teaching of media literacy. For example, students would
be assigned different American films and television
programs on a regular basis either inside or outside of
the classroom and be asked to provide written reports and
reactions related to the perceptions of American culture
derived from these media. Subsequently, the class would
discuss the various reactions. Such a course would not
only help American teachers understand their students
better and obtain a view of how others see their culture,
but would also assist students in clarifying their
understanding about American culture and perhaps
alleviate the process of integration into an academic
setting.
Further studies related to this topic could focus on
the impact of American films and television on
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1 95
international students from other parts of the world,
either in comparison to Asian students, or on a country-
by-country basis. Moreover, more concentrated analyses
could be done on female versus male viewers, or on
specific Asian countries in relation to other Asian
countries.
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196
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APPENDIX A 205
Interview Guide
1. Where are you from?
2. How long have you been here in the United States?
3. How long had you studied English before coming
here?
4. Have you lived in any other countries?
5. Did you have American friends, acquaintances,
teachers, or other exposure to U.S. culture in your
home country or in any other country you lived in?
What was it? Where did you get most of your
information about America .from?
' '* '
6. How many TV stations are there in your country?
7. How much American/English language programming is
there?
8. Is it subtitled or dubbed? For video/TV/films in
the theater, internet viewing?
9. How much TV/film/video did you watch per week/per
day/month? How much was American? How often did
you see films in movie theaters? How many were
American films?
10. What were your favorite films/programs? News? Soap
Operas ( i.e. "Melrose Place"?) Dramas? Comedies?
Game shows? Action/adventure? Talk Shows?
11. What was your impression of American TV? What was
your impression of American culture from watching
American TV/Films? Give examples, i.e.
impressions of the language, people, minorities,
women, family, friendship, love relationships,
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12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
male/female relationships, attitudes toward 206
sexuality, crime, social issues, school, etc.
What was your motivation to meet or socialize with
Americans before you came here? Did film/TV, etc.
have anything to do with that?
Did you have any ideas before you came over here
about Americans that were different from or the
same as what you watched on television or saw in
movie theaters? If so, what were they?
How many television programs/films have you seen
since you've been here? What programs/films have
you seen?
What have you learned about American culture
through TV/films since you've been here?
Do you think watching TV/Film helps you understand
pronunciation, facial expressions, jokes, or other
ways of communicating? Is it different being in
the United States vs. watching programs in your
country? Were your impressions correct or
incorrect? Why or why not? Do you understand
the TV/film more since you've been living here?
Has your impression changed about Americans/TV/film
since you've been living here?
Do you think the portrayals of characters in
American films/TV are accurate or not accurate?
In what ways?
How much have you interacted with Americans since
you've been here?
Do you think that watching TV/films/videos has or
has had an impact on you or others in your country?
What have you learned from reading and discussion
in the classroom vs. watching films?
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207
22. Do you think watching TV/seeing films is helpful in
learning about the culture?
23. Is there any censorship in your country? Do you
see a difference in the programming here? What do
you think about it?
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Appendix B
Student Profiles
Name Age Sex Country Time in US TV pre. U.S. Films pre U.S. TV-U.S. Films U.S. Eng.study
Student C 20 F China 1 year none 8/month 1 hr/day 4/year 7 years
Student F 29 M China 1.5 months 4 hrs/week 4/month 4 hrs/day 3/month 6 years
Student CD 20 F Hong Kong 1.5 months 1 hr/day 1 /month 2 hrs/day 1/month 10 years
Student MB 24 F Hong Kong 2 months 1 hr/week 2/month none none 10 years
Student ST 19 M Hong Kong 1.5 months 4 hrs/day 1/month 1 hr/day 1 /month 10 years
Student MD 22 F Japan 1 month 4 hrs/day 4/month 2 hrs/day 4/month 3 years
Student MK 22 F Japan 5 months 2 hrs/day 2/month 2 hrs/wk 1/month 6 years
Student HO 20 M Japan 1 year 1 hr/day 4/month 1 hr/day 4/month 6 years
Student K 20 F Japan 4 months 1 hr/day 10/month 1 hr/day 1/month 9 years
Student YY 30 F Japan 9 months 2.5 hrs/week 4/year 2.5hrs/wk 6/year 7 years
Student TY 24 M Korea 6 months 1 hr/day 4/month 1 hr/day 1 /month 6 years
Student CH 28 M Korea 10 months 8 hrs/week 14/month 2 hrs/day 3/month 8 years
Student JS 23 F Korea 2.5 months 3 hrs/week 8/month 3 hrs/day 1/month 6 years
Student YH 21 F Korea 10 months 3 hrs/day 16/month 3hrs/day 4/year 6 years
Student SY 21 F Korea 6 months 10 hrs/week 12/month 3 hrs/day 1/6 months 6 years
Student SJ 21 F Korea 6 months 2 hrs/day 12/month 3 hrs/day 1 /month 10 years
Student UN 24 F Korea 1 year 3 hrs/week 4/month 1 hr/wk 1 /month 10 years
Student SL 25 F Taiwan 2.5 years 4 hrs/day 3/month 4 hrs/day 1/month 2.5 years
Student X 25 M Taiwan 11 months 6 hrs/day 4/month 2 hrs/day 4/year 12 years
Student YZ 22 M Taiwan 3 months 2 hrs/day 1/month none 2/month 7 years
Student SM 24 F Taiwan 6 months 10 hrs/week 8/month 2 hrs/day 5/month 3 years
Student ML 25 F Thailand 2 months 6 hrs/day 2/month 1 hr/day 1 /month 7 years
Student K G 24 M Vietnam 4 months none 1/month 6hrs/day 7/year 1 year
208
APPENDIX C:
209
The Body of Data:
Data Type Volume
1 . Initial Individual Interviews 46 hours (2 x 23 students)
2. Follow-up Interviews 25 hours
3. Focus Groups (6 groups - 18/23) 19 hours
Total Interview hours: 90 hours
4. Audiotapes 50 hours
5. Student Journals (3 submitted) 28 pages
6. Interview Transcriptions 54 pages
7. Fieldnotes 500 pages
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210
APPENDIX D:
Main Findings Summary
Self-Reported Student Perceptions!Misperceptions
Responding
(23 total)
1. Perceptions of Friendliness
21/23
2. Misperceptions of Friendtiness
21/23
3. Perceptions of Openness and Freedom
21/23
4. Misperceptions of Openness and Freedom
2123
5. Perceptions of Television News and Newscasters
5/23
6. Perceptions of Patriotism/Heroism/Risktaking
6/23
7. Misperceptions of Patriotism/Heroism/Risktaking
1123
8. Perceptions of the U.S./L.A./”The Good Life”
12/23
9. Misperceptions of the U.S./L.A./”The Good Life''’
12/23
10. Perceptions of Friendship
4/23
11. Misperceptions of Friendship
1/23
12. Perceptions of American Men
11/23
13. Misperceptions of American Men
2123
14. Perceptions of American Women
13/23
15. Misperceptions of American Women
2/23
16. Perceptions of the American Family
13/23
17. Misperceptions of the American Family
1123
No. of Students
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
18. Perceptions of Sexual Behaviors, Attitudes, Boundaries
23/23
19. Misperceptions o f Sexual Behaviors, Attitudes, Boundaries
4123
20. Perceptions of Portrayals of Minorities/Discrimination/Racism
11/23
21. Misperceptions of Portrayals of M inorities/Discrimination/Racism
7/23
22. Perceptions of Crime/Violence
15/23
23. Misperceptions o f Crime! Violence
5123
24. Perceptions of the Educational System
21/23
25. Misperceptions o f the Educational System
5123
26. Perceptions of Speed/Efficiency/High Technology
3/23
27. Misperceptions o f Speed! Efficiency! High Technology
2123
28. Perceptions of How American TV/Films Affect Participants’ Cultures
9/23
29. Perceptions of Language and Language-Learning Usefulness
23/23
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212
APPENDIX E:
Main Findings Summary - Male and Female Responses
Total Number of Respondents (23)
M = Number of Male Respondents (8 total)
F = Number of Female Respondents (15 total)
Self-Reported Student Perceptions/Misperceptions Number of M/F
1. Perceptions of Friendliness
Responses and
Percentages
M/F
6 (75%) /
15 (100%)
2. Misperceptions of Friendliness 6(75%) /
15 (100%)
3. Perceptions of Openness and Freedom 6 (75%) /
15(100%)
4. Misperceptions of Openness and Freedom
0
5. Perceptions of Television News and Newscasters
2 (25% ) /
3 (38%) / 2
(13%)
6. Perceptions of Patriotism/Heroism/Risktaking 3 (38%) / 3
(20%)
7. Misperceptions of Patriotism/Heroism/Risktaking 1(13%)/0
8. Perceptions of the U.S./L.A./’The Good Life” 5 (63%)/7
(47%)
9. Misperceptions of the U.S./L.A./’The Good Life” 5 (63%)/7
(47%)
10. Perceptions of Friendship 2 (25%)/ 2
(13%)
11. Misperceptions of Friendship 0/ 1 (6%)
12. Perceptions of American Men 4 (50%)/7
(47%)
13. Misperceptions of American Men 0/2(13%)
14. Perceptions of American Women 4 (50%)/9
(60%)
15. Misperceptions of American Women 0/2(13% )
16. Perceptions of the American Family 2 (25%)/II
(73%)
17. Misperceptions of the American Family 1 (13%) / 0
18. Perceptions of Sexual Behaviors, Attitudes, Boundaries 8(100%)
/15 (100%)
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19. Misperceptions of Sexual Behaviors, Attitudes, Boundaries
(20%)
20. Perceptions of Portrayals of Minorities/Discrimination/Racism
(47%)
21. Misperceptions of Portrayals of Minorities/
(27%)
Discrimination/Racism
22. Perceptions of Crime/Violence
12 (80%)
23. Misperceptions of Crime/Violence
(27%)
24. Perceptions of the Educational System
15(100%)
25. Misperceptions of the Educational System
26. Perceptions of Speed/Efficiency/High Technology
27. Misperceptions of Speed/Efficiency/High Technology
28. Perceptions of How American TV/Films Affect
(40%)
Participants’ Cultures
29. Perceptions of Language and Language-Learning Usefulness
15 (100%)
1(13%)/3
4 (50%)/7
3 (38%)/4
3 (38%) /
1 (13%) / 4
6 (75%) /
0/5(33%)
3 (38%) / 0
2(25%)/0
3 (38%) / 6
8 ( 100%)/
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Levin, Tracy Frances
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Core Title
The impact of American film and television on Asian ESL students' perceptions of American culture
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Rossier School of Education
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy
Degree Program
Education
Degree Conferral Date
2005-08
Publisher
University of Southern California
(original),
University of Southern California. Libraries
(digital)
Tag
anthropology, cultural,education, bilingual and multicultural,mass communications,OAI-PMH Harvest
Language
English
Contributor
Digitized by ProQuest
(provenance)
Permanent Link (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c16-446648
Unique identifier
UC11336755
Identifier
3196841.pdf (filename),usctheses-c16-446648 (legacy record id)
Legacy Identifier
3196841.pdf
Dmrecord
446648
Document Type
Dissertation
Rights
Levin, Tracy Frances
Type
texts
Source
University of Southern California
(contributing entity),
University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses
(collection)
Access Conditions
The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...
Repository Name
University of Southern California Digital Library
Repository Location
USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus, Los Angeles, California 90089, USA
Tags
anthropology, cultural
education, bilingual and multicultural
mass communications