May the Circle Stay Unbroken: Friends , the Presence of Absence, and the Rhetorical Reinforcement of Whiteness
2008; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 25; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/15295030802031772
ISSN1529-5036
Autores Tópico(s)Media Studies and Communication
ResumoAbstract Whiteness has been broadly conceived as a subject position that is discursively negotiated and maintained, yet rarely explicitly addressed in the social discourse. The television series Friends demonstrates how media texts as largely visual forms of rhetoric function to reinforce notions of racial identity without overtly speaking race. Presenting the closed circle as a visual metaphor, Friends turns to the presence of absence to achieve two rhetorical aims: to perpetuate whiteness as a subjectivity that claims an exclusive racial position, and to defend whiteness' perceived purity through active exclusion of Others. Keywords: WhitenessRhetoricVisualAbsence Friends Acknowledgements The author would like to thank Dr. Eric King Watts and the anonymous CSMC reviewers for their insightful comments and valuable suggestions regarding previous drafts of this essay. Notes 1. See, for example, Armstrong (1992 Armstrong, G.B. 1992. 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