Mpongo, Sipho

Muldoon, Meghan L.

English

Digital Commons @ TRU Library (Thompson Rivers University)

Critical Tourism Studies Proceedings
Volume 2019 Article 33
2019
Music Video Representations of the Township: A
Resident, a Tourist, and a Critical Discourse
Analysis
Meghan L. Muldoon
HNU-ASU Joint International Tourism College, China
Sipho Mpongo
Cape Town University, South Africa
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Recommended Citation
Muldoon, Meghan L. and Mpongo, Sipho (2019) "Music Video Representations of the Township: A Resident, a Tourist, and a Critical
Discourse Analysis," Critical Tourism Studies Proceedings: Vol. 2019 , Article 33.
Available at: https://digitalcommons.library.tru.ca/cts-proceedings/vol2019/iss1/33
CTS 2019 
Title: Music Video Representations of the Township: A Resident, a Tourist, and a Critical 
Discourse Analysis 
 
Authors: 
 
Meghan L. Muldoon 
HNU-ASU Joint International Tourism College, China 
 
Sipho Mpongo 
Cape Town University, South Africa 
 
Abstract: 
The co-authors of this research, Meghan and Sipho, met when Meghan offered to support 
Sipho’s dissertation research into tourism in the townships of South Africa. He used his 
experiences participating in two music videos filmed in his home township of Langa to illustrate 
how visitors to the townships can decide to interact with this space and its residents in different 
ways. 
Employing a critical discourse analysis, which is concerned with the ways in which texts 
(in this case the images of the music videos) are constructed within, and constitutive of, the 
world around us (Woods & Burns, 2018), the authors independently and collaboratively 
examined the texts produced in the two music videos from their very different vantage points. 
Critical discourse analysis examines relationships of power, which are multimodal and 
multidirectional, and asks what discourses and the ways in which they are produced and 
reproduced tell us is ‘true’ about the world. In this study, the authors consider how the texts 
accomplish a kind of persuasive work, in what are they trying to persuade us to believe is true 
about the township and its residents (Fairclough, 2003; Hyland & Paltridge, 2011; Machin & 
Mayr, 2012; Van Dijk, 1995; Woods & Burns, 2018, p. 31). We sought to learn how the images 
presented in the videos reinforce existing stereotypes or ways of knowing about the townships 
and their residents, and, conversely, in what ways do they resist and counter these familiar ways 
of knowing (Woods & Burns, 2018)? 
In this presentation, the researchers, one white female Canadian and one black male 
South African, discuss their co-construction of a critical discourse analysis of two music video 
texts. This study is based in postcolonial theory, which suggests that ways of knowing about the 
foreign Other reflect and replicate colonized ways of knowing (Mouffakir & Reisinger, 2013; 
Urry, 1990). This representation of the Other usually done unconsciously, but not innocently. 
The authors used the texts of the music videos in order to explore what we felt were the 
assumptions that visitors to townships bring with them about the residents and the physical 
space. Our work examines processes of representation, postcolonial tourism, and interacting with 
the Other as hosts and guests. Through this work, we aim to demonstrate that representation is 
never innocent nor apolitical, though it may be unconscious, and has implications far beyond the 
immediateness of the tourism encounter. 
 
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Muldoon and Mpongo: Music Video Representations of the Township: A Resident, a Touris
Published by Digital Commons @ TRU Library, 2019
CTS 2019 
Fairclough, N. (2003). Analysing discourse: Textual analysis for social research. New York: 
Routledge. 
Hylans, K. & Paltridge, B. (2011). Continuum companion to discourse analysis. London: 
Bloomsbury. 
Machin, D. & Mayr, A. (2012). How to do critical discourse analysis: A multimodal 
introduction. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. 
Moufakkir, O. & Reisigner, Y. (2013). The host gaze in global tourism. Wallingford, 
Oxfordshire, UK: CABI. 
Urry, J. (1990). The tourist gaze. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. 
Van Dijk, T. (1995). Aims of critical discourse analysis. Japanese Discourse, 1, p. 17-27. 
Woods, A. & Burns, L. (2018). Conscious hip hop: Lupe Fiasco’s critical teachings on raced and 
gendered representations. Journal of Popular Music Education, 2(1-2), p. 29-44. 
  
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Critical Tourism Studies Proceedings, Vol. 2019 [2019], Art. 33
https://digitalcommons.library.tru.ca/cts-proceedings/vol2019/iss1/33


Music Video Representations of the Township: A Resident, a Tourist, and a Critical Discourse Analysis

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Music Video Representations of the Township: A Resident, a Tourist, and a Critical Discourse Analysis

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