This thesis explores textual and visual images of the EU in South Korea's three prestigious popular newspapers - Chosun Ilbo, Dong A Ilbo and Joong Ang Ilbo - and compares them to the imagery created by the internet versions of these newspapers. In recent years, much scholarly work has been done on the topics of EU imagery in print media, but no systemic attempt has yet been made to EU imagery in internet media. The thesis analyses EU news monitored daily in 12 months of 2008 (a year of the first G20 Summit in Washington and the 6th and 7th rounds of EU-Korea FTA negotiations).

This study is interdisciplinary. The thesis draws on several significant theories and concepts from the media studies and linguistics. On top of this, a wide range of approaches of content and visual analysis were reviewed. The study then considers and adopts a multimethodological approach of content analysis (studies by Chaban and Holland) and of visual analysis (by Bain) based on visual semiotics. However, to cope with internet media it also adds several categories which add the notion of interactivity to the original content analysis. It incorporates categories originating from a social semiotic approach (elements of interactive and compositional meta-functions) into the original visual analysis.

The results of this study are presented in three case studies. In the first section of each case study the thesis provides a comprehensive overview featuring the latest information and various perspectives (political, economic, social, environmental and developmental). The second section presents formal characteristics of EU images in print newspapers and their internet versions. The third section covers substantive characteristics in both versions. The last section suggests the results of visual analysis. The results of this thesis contribute to two areas of studies: EU external perception studies and internet communication studies: as well as enhancing a deeper understanding of EU-Korea relations.