This research focuses on the contexts of Korean women professional golfers’ transnational migration, and the ways that US and Korean media represent those athletes. A theoretical framework informed by sociology of sport, postcolonial and transnational feminist studies was employed to illustrate the contexts of the women’s golf migration, and to investigate how transnational Korean women professional golfers are represented in both US and Korean media from 1998 to 2009. Elite discourses—941 media texts from both nations together with government/institutional documents—were collected, Korean texts were translated into English, and document analysis, critical discourse analysis and intersectional analysis were employed. The results illustrate that globalization and neoliberal capitalism, patriarchy, and colonial and imperial history all help to shape the women golfers’ transnational migration paths. The complex contexts also shape the media representations of the women golfers in the two nation-states. In US media, the Korean women golfers are constructed as a racialized and gendered Other within the context of Orientalism, and selective knowledge production in the media maintains and ensures global White supremacy. In Korean media, the women golfers are portrayed as winners under hypermasculine Western forms of globalization and neoliberal reformation of the world order but, at the same time, as keepers and performers of Korean traditional Confucian values. Further, Korean media explain the women’s transnational success as a result of following traditional Korean values and norms; therefore, the women are represented as proud symbols of Korean nationalism and ideal models of productive female subjects in neoliberal globalization. In sum, the Korean women professional golfers are taken up by media in both nation-states as an effective discursive contact zone for making sense of the changing power dynamics of race, gender, and nation under a period of rapid changes of world order.

This research focuses on the contexts of Korean women professional golfers’ transnational migration, and the ways that US and Korean media represent those athletes. A theoretical framework informed by sociology of sport, postcolonial and transnational feminist studies was employed to illustrate the contexts of the women’s golf migration, and to investigate how transnational Korean women professional golfers are represented in both US and Korean media from 1998 to 2009. Elite discourses—941 media texts from both nations together with government/institutional documents—were collected, Korean texts were translated into English, and document analysis, critical discourse analysis and intersectional analysis were employed. The results illustrate that globalization and neoliberal capitalism, patriarchy, and colonial and imperial history all help to shape the women golfers’ transnational migration paths. The complex contexts also shape the media representations of the women golfers in the two nation-states. In US media, the Korean women golfers are constructed as a racialized and gendered Other within the context of Orientalism, and selective knowledge production in the media maintains and ensures global White supremacy. In Korean media, the women golfers are portrayed as winners under hypermasculine Western forms of globalization and neoliberal reformation of the world order but, at the same time, as keepers and performers of Korean traditional Confucian values. Further, Korean media explain the women’s transnational success as a result of following traditional Korean values and norms; therefore, the women are represented as proud symbols of Korean nationalism and ideal models of productive female subjects in neoliberal globalization. In sum, the Korean women professional golfers are taken up by media in both nation-states as an effective discursive contact zone for making sense of the changing power dynamics of race, gender, and nation under a period of rapid changes of world order.

The purpose of this study was to find out how Korean newspapers covered women's professional golf tournaments held in Korea and the United States. Additionally, an attempt was made to ascertain any trends in the newspapers' coverage of players and activities associated with both tours. This study focused on one daily sport newspaper (Ilgan Sports) and one general newspaper (Chosun Ilbo) from 2004 through 2008. The two newspapers produced 1,699 stories related to the LPGA (n=1,234 articles) and the KLPGA (n= 465 articles). Thus, the newspapers covered the LPGA (72.6%) much more frequently than then KLPGA (27.4%). The newspapers covered the LPGA more in all three categories, with the LPGA receiving 79.4% of the large articles, 74.1% of the medium stories, and 68.7% of the small articles. In addition, the newspapers provided the LPGA more feature story coverage (83.9%) and more photographic coverage (75.7%). It is notable that this study's principal innovation is the finding of changes in the overall approach of the Korean media over the five-year analysis. Specifically, the coverage devoted to the KLPGA tour increased from 21.9 % (2004) to 36.13 % (2008) of the total coverage given to women's golf by the selected newspapers.

With the LPGA's 'Drive On' campaign, Dr. Kelly Price says "the brand of the LPGA is alive and well"... but it hasn't always been that way.