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--></style><title>Announcement of Ph.D. dissertation on Korean
adoption/adop</title></head><body>
<div><font face="Garamond" color="#000000">On December 2, 2005, Tobias
Hübinette will defend his Ph.D. dissertation in Korean Studies<i>
Comforting an Orphaned Nation: Representations of International
Adoption and Adopted Koreans in Korean Popular Culture</i> at the
Department of Oriental Languages, Stockholm University, Sweden<br>
<br>
Supervisors: Professor Staffan Rosén, Department of Oriental
Languages, Stockholm University, and Dr. Lars Lindström, Department
of Political Science, Stockholm University<br>
External examiner: Dr. Koen De Ceuster, Centre for Korean Studies,
Leiden University<br>
Examining committee members: Professor Raoul Granqvist, Department of
Modern Languages, Umeå University, Professor Tiina Rosenberg, Center
for Gender Studies, Stockholm University, and Professor Johanna
Schiratzki, Department of Law, Stockholm University<br>
<br>
<br>
The dissertation can be read and downloaded at the Swedish Digital
Scientific Archive:</font></div>
<div><font face="Garamond"
color="#000000"
>http://www.diva-portal.org/su/theses/abstract.xsql?dbid=696<br>
<br>
The dissertation has also been accepted for publication by the Korean
Jimoondang Publishing Company (</font><font face="Garamond"
color="#0000FF"><u>http://www.jimoon.co.kr/</u></font><font
face="Garamond" color="#000000">) as monograph No. 7 in the Korean
Studies Dissertation Series.<br>
<br>
<br>
Abstract<br>
International adoption from Korea constitutes the background to this
study. The forced migration of Korean children has by now continued
for over half a century, resulting in a population of 156,000 overseas
adopted Koreans dispersed among 15 main host countries on the
continents of Europe, North America and Australia. Both the
demographic scope, the time span and the geographic spread are
absolutely unique from a comparative child migratory perspective, and
still over 2,000 children leave Korea annually for international
adoption. This massive intercontinental trafficking of Korean children
was for many years silently taking place in the shadow of Korea's
rapid transformation from a war-torn and poverty-stricken country to a
formidable success story in the postcolonial world. Even if the
subject of international adoption and adopted Koreans turned up now
and then in the political debate throughout the years, it was not
until the end of the 1980s that a comprehensive discussion started.
Ever since then the adoption issue has been haunting Korea, from the
mid-1950s and up to the mid-1990s the leading global exporter of
children and by far the country in the world having sent away the
highest number of its own citizens for international adoption in
modern history.<br>
This is a study of representations of adopted Koreans in Korean
popular culture. The study is carried out by examining how adopted
Koreans are represented in four feature films and four popular songs.
After having given the cultural background to adoption in Korean
tradition, the history of international adoption from Korea, an
account of the development of the adoption issue in the political
discourse and the appearance of adopted Koreans in Korean popular
culture, the first reading takes up the gendering of the colonised
nation and the maternalisation of roots in Chang Kil-su's film<i>
Susanne Brink's Arirang</i> (1991) and Sinawe's song<i> Motherland</i>
(1997), drawing on theories of nationalism as a gendered discourse.
The second reading examines the issue of hybridity and the
relationship between Koreanness and Whiteness in Kim Ki-duk's film<i>
Wild Animals</i> (1997) and Moon Hee Jun's song<i> Alone</i> (2001),
including its album cover, related to the notions of third space,
mimicry and passing. Linked to studies of national division,
reunification and family separation, the third reading looks at the
adopted Koreans as symbols of a fractured and fragmented nation in
Park Kwang-su's film<i> Berlin Report</i> (1991) and Clon's song<i>
Abandoned Child</i> (1999). The fourth and last reading focuses on the
emergence of a global Korean community in Lee Jang-soo's film<i>
Love</i> (1999) and Sky's song<i> Eternity</i> (1999), including its
music video, with regards to theories of globalisation, diasporas and
transnationalism. At the end, the study argues that the Korean
adoption issue can be interpreted as a national trauma threatening to
disrupt the unity and homogeneity of the Korean nation and to question
the country's political independence and economic success story that
is so valorised in the master narrative of the nation.</font></div>
<div><font face="Garamond" color="#000000"><br>
Keywords: Korean studies, international adoption, adopted Koreans,
postcolonial studies, cultural studies, nationalism, diaspora,
representation, popular culture, reconciliation</font></div>
<div><br></div>
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<div><br>
<br>
Tobias Hübinette a.k.a. Lee Sam-dol<br>
<br>
Ph.D. candidate in Korean Studies<br>
Department of Oriental Languages<br>
Stockholm University<br>
SE-106 91 Stockholm<br>
Sweden<br>
<br>
Tel: 46-8-16 15 88<br>
Fax: 46-8-15 54 64<br>
E-mail: tobias@orient.su.se<br>
<br>
Presentation:<br>
http://www.tobiashubinette.se</div>
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