Linsay Cramer | Coastal Carolina University (original) (raw)

Papers by Linsay Cramer

Critical Studies in Media Communication

Communication & Sport, 2019

On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a pre... more On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a press conference in which he fined the then-owner of the Los Angeles (L.A.) Clippers, Donald Sterling, 2.5 million dollars and banned him for life from any affiliation with the NBA due to racist comments that Sterling made to his then-girlfriend in a recorded phone conversation that was released to the public. This article examines how Silver, through his leadership performance and the global news and sports media reactions to his performance, rhetorically advanced postracism logics and hegemonic masculine ideals through mythological constructions of White masculinity. This rhetorical analysis and critique revealed that Silver's press conference and the global news and sports media's response to it obviate the racial and gender structures of NBA administrative positions that favor White masculinity while simultaneously advancing hegemonic ideals that function to marginalized those who do not occupy White masculine positionality.

Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 2021

Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to U... more Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to United States news and sports media usages of “Angry Russell” as a name for National Basketball Association (NBA) star Russell Westbrook. Focusing on media coverage of an 11 March 2019 incident in which a Utah Jazz fan allegedly yelled racist and homophobic taunts at Westbrook during an Oklahoma City Thunder game against the Utah Jazz, we map how the mediated attention to Westbrook’s “anger” and so-called threatening behavior is a form of spatiotemporal collapse that situates Black male bodies as menacing and violent sites of subordination to whiteness. We then interrogate how player statuses and the intimacy of NBA arenas themselves, like Vivint Smart Home Arena, operate as sites of spatiotemporal excess by signaling a recognition of race as unable to be contained within the racial categories established by whiteness.

Howard Journal of Communications, 2022

Using Casey Ryan Kelly’s theorization of White masculine victimhood and Claire Sisco King’s conce... more Using Casey Ryan Kelly’s theorization of White masculine victimhood and Claire Sisco King’s conceptualization of abject hegemony, this manuscript rhetorically examines the 2017–2019 Netflix series, Marvel’s The Punisher, and its surrounding discourse. The analysis reveals an emotional-moral framework of White masculinity that thrives on and finds pleasure in an unending, inhumane, and cruel treatment of racial and gender Others, while investing in one’s own perpetual claims to victimization and disposability. Furthermore, abject con- structions of White victimization and ressentiment subjugate and depend upon Black masculinity to sustain its abject hegemony, thereby extending current understandings of White masculine vic- timization and Black masculine subservience to whiteness in film and television.

Southern Communication Journal, 2022

This racial rhetorical analysis draws from strategic whiteness to examine the 2007–2019 TV sitcom... more This racial rhetorical analysis draws from strategic whiteness to examine the 2007–2019 TV sitcom, The Big Bang Theory (TBBT)’s construction of Asian Indian characters, Raj and Priya Koothrappali. This critique maps how Priya, through White racial bonding, is rhetorically developed as the wary antago- nist of TBBT, and Raj is constituted as childlike and sexually ambiguous. Subsequently, both are situated as unappealing romantic partners to those within the bounds of whiteness, and serve as catalysts for White racial coupling, thereby maintaining White normativity and power. The paper closes with a discussion of the analysis’s ideological implications within a historical context characterized by the racialization, exclusion, and mal- treatment of Asian Americans within the U.S.

Howard Journal of Communications

Abstract Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique... more Abstract Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique, and informed by critical whiteness studies (Nakayama & Krizek, 1995) and Black feminist thought (Collins, 1991), this project argues that NFL North Carolina Panthers' quarterback Cam Newton and NBA Oklahoma City Thunder's point guard Russell Westbrook rhetorically perform an alternative Black masculinity that symbolically contests whiteness's surveillance of male bodies who occupy Black positionality in the NFL and NBA via their performance of cool pose (Majors & Billson, 1992). Focusing on news and sports media coverage in the 2015–2016 season, this project also interrogates whiteness's strategies to reconstitute Newton and Westbrook's expressions of cool pose by inscribing Black masculinity with belittling and dehumanizing controlling images that favor whiteness and White masculinity. This manuscript closes with a discussion of the harmful repercussions of whiteness's strategies in pro sports as well as the possibilities that athletes like Newton and Westbrook bring forth for social justice initiatives.

Communication Studies, 2016

Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationsh... more Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationships, the writers, creators, and producers of the modern TV medical drama Grey’s Anatomy strategically portray a racially progressive, postracial, and color-blind society. By utilizing Scott’s (1993) absence as presence, the creators, writers, and producers situate the characters as race neutral or White and enable the dismissal and forgetting of racism’s long history and its impact on the current structures that produce and reproduce racial inequality. By doing so, they obviate contemporary racism’s presence and its influence at both the societal and individual levels, thus contributing to postracism (Ono, 2011).

Communication Education, 2016

This paper argues that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver’s rhetorical performance in response to the r... more This paper argues that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver’s rhetorical performance in response to the racist comments made by former L.A. Clippers owner Donald Sterling in April 2014 exemplifies whiteness and contributes to what Eduardo Bonilla-Silva (2014) calls colorblind racism. The paper examines how Silver’s rhetorical performance resembles that of David Stern’s performance of White hegemonic masculinity in response to “Malice at the Palace”, as identified by Griffin and Calaffel (2011), but differs in many regards, exemplifying the complex and often dialectical nature of “new racism”. Running Head: ADAM SILVER AND THE COMPLEXITY OF NEW RACISM ! 2 NBA Commissioner Adam Silver and the Complexity of New Racism They caught big game on a slow news day, so they put his head on a pike, dubbed him Lord of the Flies, and danced around him whooping. I don’t blame them. I’m doing some whooping right now. Racists deserve to be paraded around the modern town square of the television screen so th...

Howard Journal of Communications, 2019

Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique, and inf... more Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique, and informed by critical whiteness studies (Nakayama & Krizek, 1995) and Black feminist thought (Collins, 1991), this project argues that NFL North Carolina Panthers’ quarterback Cam Newton and NBA Oklahoma City Thunder’s point guard Russell Westbrook rhetorically perform an alternative Black masculinity that symbolically contests whiteness’s surveillance of male bodies who occupy Black positionality in the NFL and NBA via their performance of cool pose (Majors & Billson, 1992). Focusing on news and sports media coverage in the 2015–2016 season, this project also interrog- ates whiteness’s strategies to reconstitute Newton and Westbrook’s expressions of cool pose by inscribing Black masculinity with belit- tling and dehumanizing controlling images that favor whiteness and White masculinity. This manuscript closes with a discussion of the harmful repercussions of whiteness’s strategies in pro sports as well as the possibilities that athletes like Newton and Westbrook bring forth for social justice initiatives.

Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 2021

Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to U... more Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to United States news and sports media usages of “Angry Russell” as a name for National Basketball Association (NBA) star Russell Westbrook. Focusing on media coverage of an 11 March 2019 incident in which a Utah Jazz fan allegedly yelled racist and homophobic taunts at Westbrook during an Oklahoma City Thunder game against the Utah Jazz, we map how the mediated attention to Westbrook’s “anger” and so-called threatening behavior is a form of spatiotemporal collapse that situates Black male bodies as menacing and violent sites of subordination to whiteness. We then interrogate how player statuses and the intimacy of NBA arenas themselves, like Vivint Smart Home Arena, operate as sites of spatiotemporal excess by signaling a recognition of race as unable to be contained within the racial categories established by whiteness.

Howard Journal of Communications, 2020

Drawing from strategic whiteness and postracism as critical frames, and utilizing critical rhetor... more Drawing from strategic whiteness and postracism as critical frames, and utilizing critical rhetorical analysis, this manuscript argues that the 2016 Disney animated hit film Zootopia is a postracial narrative developed by the White imagination to embody an ideal diversity that sustains whiteness. This project seeks to expose how, within the film Zootopia, whiteness toils as a strategic rhetoric to maintain its dominance, benefiting logics of postracism that hinder White liability and any possibilities for White ally-ship. This project offers two identified primary themes. First, the metropolis, Zootopia, is strategically constructed a postracial space of the White imaginary. Second, the film reinscribes racial “Otherness” on Black masculine bodies while centralizing whiteness and romanticizing racism through the common anti-racist White hero trope.

Communication & Sport, 2019

On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a pre... more On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a press conference in which he fined the then-owner of the Los Angeles (L.A.) Clippers, Donald Sterling, 2.5 million dollars and banned him for life from any affiliation with the NBA due to racist comments that Sterling made to his then-girlfriend in a recorded phone conversation that was released to the public. This article examines how Silver, through his leadership performance and the global news and sports media reactions to his performance, rhetorically advanced post- racism logics and hegemonic masculine ideals through mythological constructions of White masculinity. This rhetorical analysis and critique revealed that Silver’s press conference and the global news and sports media’s response to it obviate the racial and gender structures of NBA administrative positions that favor White masculinity while simultaneously advancing hegemonic ideals that function to marginalized those who do not occupy White masculine positionality.

Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationsh... more Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationships, the writers, creators, and producers of the modern TV medical drama Grey’s Anatomy strategically portray a racially progressive, postracial, and color-blind society. By utilizing Scott’s (1993) absence as presence, the creators, writers, and producers situate the characters as race neutral or White and enable the dismissal and forgetting of racism’s long history and its impact on the current structures that produce and reproduce racial inequality. By doing so, they obviate contemporary racism’s presence and its influence at both the societal and individual levels, thus contributing to postracism (Ono, 2011).

Media literacy is necessary to understand communication, as media is the most powerful transmitte... more Media literacy is necessary to understand communication, as media is the most powerful transmitter o f attitudes, values, and beliefs in contemporary society. Focusing on the Media Education Foundation's Circle o f Empowerment as a definition o f media literacy, a rationale for why media literacy should be incorporated into the basic communication course is provided. Tluough a summary o f the state o f the basic course, the current standards for media literacy in K-12 education and undergraduate media and communication programs, and Len Mastennan's (1985) seven reasons for media literacy education, an argument for media literacy standards for higher education is also developed.

Critical Studies in Media Communication

Communication & Sport, 2019

On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a pre... more On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a press conference in which he fined the then-owner of the Los Angeles (L.A.) Clippers, Donald Sterling, 2.5 million dollars and banned him for life from any affiliation with the NBA due to racist comments that Sterling made to his then-girlfriend in a recorded phone conversation that was released to the public. This article examines how Silver, through his leadership performance and the global news and sports media reactions to his performance, rhetorically advanced postracism logics and hegemonic masculine ideals through mythological constructions of White masculinity. This rhetorical analysis and critique revealed that Silver's press conference and the global news and sports media's response to it obviate the racial and gender structures of NBA administrative positions that favor White masculinity while simultaneously advancing hegemonic ideals that function to marginalized those who do not occupy White masculine positionality.

Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 2021

Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to U... more Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to United States news and sports media usages of “Angry Russell” as a name for National Basketball Association (NBA) star Russell Westbrook. Focusing on media coverage of an 11 March 2019 incident in which a Utah Jazz fan allegedly yelled racist and homophobic taunts at Westbrook during an Oklahoma City Thunder game against the Utah Jazz, we map how the mediated attention to Westbrook’s “anger” and so-called threatening behavior is a form of spatiotemporal collapse that situates Black male bodies as menacing and violent sites of subordination to whiteness. We then interrogate how player statuses and the intimacy of NBA arenas themselves, like Vivint Smart Home Arena, operate as sites of spatiotemporal excess by signaling a recognition of race as unable to be contained within the racial categories established by whiteness.

Howard Journal of Communications, 2022

Using Casey Ryan Kelly’s theorization of White masculine victimhood and Claire Sisco King’s conce... more Using Casey Ryan Kelly’s theorization of White masculine victimhood and Claire Sisco King’s conceptualization of abject hegemony, this manuscript rhetorically examines the 2017–2019 Netflix series, Marvel’s The Punisher, and its surrounding discourse. The analysis reveals an emotional-moral framework of White masculinity that thrives on and finds pleasure in an unending, inhumane, and cruel treatment of racial and gender Others, while investing in one’s own perpetual claims to victimization and disposability. Furthermore, abject con- structions of White victimization and ressentiment subjugate and depend upon Black masculinity to sustain its abject hegemony, thereby extending current understandings of White masculine vic- timization and Black masculine subservience to whiteness in film and television.

Southern Communication Journal, 2022

This racial rhetorical analysis draws from strategic whiteness to examine the 2007–2019 TV sitcom... more This racial rhetorical analysis draws from strategic whiteness to examine the 2007–2019 TV sitcom, The Big Bang Theory (TBBT)’s construction of Asian Indian characters, Raj and Priya Koothrappali. This critique maps how Priya, through White racial bonding, is rhetorically developed as the wary antago- nist of TBBT, and Raj is constituted as childlike and sexually ambiguous. Subsequently, both are situated as unappealing romantic partners to those within the bounds of whiteness, and serve as catalysts for White racial coupling, thereby maintaining White normativity and power. The paper closes with a discussion of the analysis’s ideological implications within a historical context characterized by the racialization, exclusion, and mal- treatment of Asian Americans within the U.S.

Howard Journal of Communications

Abstract Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique... more Abstract Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique, and informed by critical whiteness studies (Nakayama & Krizek, 1995) and Black feminist thought (Collins, 1991), this project argues that NFL North Carolina Panthers' quarterback Cam Newton and NBA Oklahoma City Thunder's point guard Russell Westbrook rhetorically perform an alternative Black masculinity that symbolically contests whiteness's surveillance of male bodies who occupy Black positionality in the NFL and NBA via their performance of cool pose (Majors & Billson, 1992). Focusing on news and sports media coverage in the 2015–2016 season, this project also interrogates whiteness's strategies to reconstitute Newton and Westbrook's expressions of cool pose by inscribing Black masculinity with belittling and dehumanizing controlling images that favor whiteness and White masculinity. This manuscript closes with a discussion of the harmful repercussions of whiteness's strategies in pro sports as well as the possibilities that athletes like Newton and Westbrook bring forth for social justice initiatives.

Communication Studies, 2016

Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationsh... more Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationships, the writers, creators, and producers of the modern TV medical drama Grey’s Anatomy strategically portray a racially progressive, postracial, and color-blind society. By utilizing Scott’s (1993) absence as presence, the creators, writers, and producers situate the characters as race neutral or White and enable the dismissal and forgetting of racism’s long history and its impact on the current structures that produce and reproduce racial inequality. By doing so, they obviate contemporary racism’s presence and its influence at both the societal and individual levels, thus contributing to postracism (Ono, 2011).

Communication Education, 2016

This paper argues that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver’s rhetorical performance in response to the r... more This paper argues that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver’s rhetorical performance in response to the racist comments made by former L.A. Clippers owner Donald Sterling in April 2014 exemplifies whiteness and contributes to what Eduardo Bonilla-Silva (2014) calls colorblind racism. The paper examines how Silver’s rhetorical performance resembles that of David Stern’s performance of White hegemonic masculinity in response to “Malice at the Palace”, as identified by Griffin and Calaffel (2011), but differs in many regards, exemplifying the complex and often dialectical nature of “new racism”. Running Head: ADAM SILVER AND THE COMPLEXITY OF NEW RACISM ! 2 NBA Commissioner Adam Silver and the Complexity of New Racism They caught big game on a slow news day, so they put his head on a pike, dubbed him Lord of the Flies, and danced around him whooping. I don’t blame them. I’m doing some whooping right now. Racists deserve to be paraded around the modern town square of the television screen so th...

Howard Journal of Communications, 2019

Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique, and inf... more Using critical rhetorical analysis (McKerrow, 1989) as a method of analysis and critique, and informed by critical whiteness studies (Nakayama & Krizek, 1995) and Black feminist thought (Collins, 1991), this project argues that NFL North Carolina Panthers’ quarterback Cam Newton and NBA Oklahoma City Thunder’s point guard Russell Westbrook rhetorically perform an alternative Black masculinity that symbolically contests whiteness’s surveillance of male bodies who occupy Black positionality in the NFL and NBA via their performance of cool pose (Majors & Billson, 1992). Focusing on news and sports media coverage in the 2015–2016 season, this project also interrog- ates whiteness’s strategies to reconstitute Newton and Westbrook’s expressions of cool pose by inscribing Black masculinity with belit- tling and dehumanizing controlling images that favor whiteness and White masculinity. This manuscript closes with a discussion of the harmful repercussions of whiteness’s strategies in pro sports as well as the possibilities that athletes like Newton and Westbrook bring forth for social justice initiatives.

Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 2021

Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to U... more Using racial rhetorical criticism, we apply and extend Flores’s theory of racial recognition to United States news and sports media usages of “Angry Russell” as a name for National Basketball Association (NBA) star Russell Westbrook. Focusing on media coverage of an 11 March 2019 incident in which a Utah Jazz fan allegedly yelled racist and homophobic taunts at Westbrook during an Oklahoma City Thunder game against the Utah Jazz, we map how the mediated attention to Westbrook’s “anger” and so-called threatening behavior is a form of spatiotemporal collapse that situates Black male bodies as menacing and violent sites of subordination to whiteness. We then interrogate how player statuses and the intimacy of NBA arenas themselves, like Vivint Smart Home Arena, operate as sites of spatiotemporal excess by signaling a recognition of race as unable to be contained within the racial categories established by whiteness.

Howard Journal of Communications, 2020

Drawing from strategic whiteness and postracism as critical frames, and utilizing critical rhetor... more Drawing from strategic whiteness and postracism as critical frames, and utilizing critical rhetorical analysis, this manuscript argues that the 2016 Disney animated hit film Zootopia is a postracial narrative developed by the White imagination to embody an ideal diversity that sustains whiteness. This project seeks to expose how, within the film Zootopia, whiteness toils as a strategic rhetoric to maintain its dominance, benefiting logics of postracism that hinder White liability and any possibilities for White ally-ship. This project offers two identified primary themes. First, the metropolis, Zootopia, is strategically constructed a postracial space of the White imaginary. Second, the film reinscribes racial “Otherness” on Black masculine bodies while centralizing whiteness and romanticizing racism through the common anti-racist White hero trope.

Communication & Sport, 2019

On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a pre... more On April 29, 2014, National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver delivered a press conference in which he fined the then-owner of the Los Angeles (L.A.) Clippers, Donald Sterling, 2.5 million dollars and banned him for life from any affiliation with the NBA due to racist comments that Sterling made to his then-girlfriend in a recorded phone conversation that was released to the public. This article examines how Silver, through his leadership performance and the global news and sports media reactions to his performance, rhetorically advanced post- racism logics and hegemonic masculine ideals through mythological constructions of White masculinity. This rhetorical analysis and critique revealed that Silver’s press conference and the global news and sports media’s response to it obviate the racial and gender structures of NBA administrative positions that favor White masculinity while simultaneously advancing hegemonic ideals that function to marginalized those who do not occupy White masculine positionality.

Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationsh... more Through the strategic absence of discourse about race within the portrayed interracial relationships, the writers, creators, and producers of the modern TV medical drama Grey’s Anatomy strategically portray a racially progressive, postracial, and color-blind society. By utilizing Scott’s (1993) absence as presence, the creators, writers, and producers situate the characters as race neutral or White and enable the dismissal and forgetting of racism’s long history and its impact on the current structures that produce and reproduce racial inequality. By doing so, they obviate contemporary racism’s presence and its influence at both the societal and individual levels, thus contributing to postracism (Ono, 2011).

Media literacy is necessary to understand communication, as media is the most powerful transmitte... more Media literacy is necessary to understand communication, as media is the most powerful transmitter o f attitudes, values, and beliefs in contemporary society. Focusing on the Media Education Foundation's Circle o f Empowerment as a definition o f media literacy, a rationale for why media literacy should be incorporated into the basic communication course is provided. Tluough a summary o f the state o f the basic course, the current standards for media literacy in K-12 education and undergraduate media and communication programs, and Len Mastennan's (1985) seven reasons for media literacy education, an argument for media literacy standards for higher education is also developed.