The Rising Sun Flag at the Olympics: Determining South Koreans’ Perspectives Using Semantic Network Analysis

The political conflicts between South Korea (from now on, Korea) and Japan occurred whenever the Rising Sun Flag (RSF) appeared at sporting events. This study investigates why Koreans react sensitively to RSF how perceive RSF. gathers data using TEXTOM, a big text mining program uses UCINET 6 conduct semantic network analysis for drawing diagrams of social networks. confirmed that reminds Japanese militarism colonial period; thus, displaying in sports is problematic from Korean perspective. paper contributes literature on mega sport event-related politics provides academic evidence supports prohibiting use also serves raise awareness symbols can be embedded with historical associations politically sensitive