한국전쟁 당시 미국잡지에 실린 한국 이미지 분석

Abstract

The Korean War is a "forgotten war" to Americans. Situated between the World War II, or known as 'the great war,' and the Vietnam War, or known as 'the bad war,' the Korean War lacked any heroic war stories or great achievements, but only the tiresome tug-of-war. Even though a large number of U.S. and U.N soldiers lost their lives in Korea War, it ended in armistice which could hardly be defined as either a victory or a failure. On the other hand, the Korean War was the beginning of the Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Although the Korean War was instigated due to the North Korean crossing of the border, it was hardly a war between the North and the South. It was rather a proxy war between the U.S. and the Soviet and China. All three superpowers needed to win the Korean War to prove their ideologies and themselves as the true superpower. However, Korea was an unknown country to American public. The inscription of the Korean War Veterans' Memorial describes Korea as "a country they never knew and a people they never met." Moreover, the Korean War broke out shortly after World War II, so American people were rather reluctant about the idea of engaging in another war. Therefore, U.S. government needed effective propaganda to draw more support from their people and to win the 'ambivalent, yet important war.'The role of the media was a crucial factor in the government's propaganda efforts. The Korean War was a transitional period between World War II and the Vietnam War, and the media's attitude changed greatly during that period. Strong anti-Communist sentiment was prevalent in America and the government enacted several laws to strictly prohibit the media from reporting anything that might be harmful to U.S. On the other hand, the Vietnam War was just the opposite of World War II. After the 'Pentagon Papers Revelation' and the 'Watergate Scandal,' the media became highly skeptical of the government activities. In addition, since the Vietnam War was a guerilla war, there was no set defense line which allowed the reporters to witness firsthand the cruelty of the war. With the increasing number of TV sets in each homes, American public was exposed to the gruesome images of the war. Situated in this transitional period of the changing media attitude, this paper examines the U.S. popular magazines during the period of the Korean War. If the Vietnam War was a 'television war,' the Korean War was a 'magazine war,' and American public was largely influenced by the magazines. After carefully studying the images of Koreans in U.S. magazines, this paper came to following conclusions: Firstly, among the Koreans' images, Korean soldiers were almost absent, and even when they made appearances, they were limited as either off-focused or background. Secondly, Korean men's images were almost absent, and most of the images were those of women or children. Thirdly, the stories of American soldiers who saved suffering Korea orphans or children were repeated. Lastly, U.S. was depicted as the 'good and kind,' while demonizing the Soviet Union and China. Aforementioned results are related to the circumstances of the time. First of all, the absence of men's images is due to the fact that they were taken during the war when most of the young men were drafted into the military. Moreover, since South Korea's defense capability of that time was rather meager because of the long history of Japanese Occupation, South Korean role in the Korean War was limited to assisting position to the U.S. On the other hand, the repeated images of Korean children and orphans saved by U.S. soldiers were the result of the Cold War rhetoric and the U.S.'s need to gain support from its people. By demonizing the Soviet and North Korea as evil forces that hurt small children, U.S. could depict themselves as the good force who cured and rescued them. Moreover, that kind of rhetoric earned sympathy from its people.