[KS] Monday, October 14 at UC Berkeley (Kyu Hyun Kim): "We Are Not Fighting Against the Commies"...

Wed Oct 9 14:04:55 EDT 2013

*The Center for Korean Studies*

*University of California, Berkeley*

*Cordially invites you to the following colloquium*

*
*

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*'We Are Not Fighting Against the Commies:' The War Film Genre and Politics
of History in Recent South Korean Cinema*

Colloquium: Center for Korean Studies | *October 14 | 4 p.m.* |  Institute
of East Asian Studies (2223 Fulton, 6th
Floor)<http://www.berkeley.edu/map/3dmap/3dmap.shtml?b2223>

Speaker: *Kyu Hyun Kim* <http://history.ucdavis.edu/people/kyukim>, Associate
Professor of History, University of California,
Davis<http://history.ucdavis.edu/people/kyukim>

In this talk, designed to be a part of my ongoing engagement with the
problem of representing history in Korean cinema, I will focus on a select
group of recent Korean films directly depicting or set against the
North-South conflicts following the 1945 liberation, culminating in the
Korean War (1950-1953), including *Welcome to Dongmakgol* (2005), *71 Into
the Fire* (2009), *A Little Pond* (2009), *In Love and the War* (2010), *The
Front Line* (2011) and *Jiseul* (2012), to discuss how these films address
the question of historically representing the war experience. My
interpretations of these films will differ significantly from the existing
academic analyses (heavily psychoanalytic or otherwise textually-focused)
in that I will try to illuminate these films in view of their interactions
with the genre conventions of war film, as well as in relation to the
changing socio-cultural perceptions of the post-liberation history and the
Korean War that cannot be entirely attributed to shifting tides in the
politics of left and right. I will hopefully demonstrate that, instead of
simply following the (elite- or media-generated) politically charged
understanding of the post-liberation history, these films are reflecting
complex patterns of interaction among cinematic conventions, cultural
habitus, select invocation of memories and historical data, and the
anxieties and fantasies of contemporary Koreans in relation to global
modernity.

Event Contact: cks at berkeley.edu, 510-642-5674

_______________________________________

*And other upcoming events at CKS…*

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Panel on 1970s South Korean Literature, Film, and State-sponsored Visual Art

Panel Discussion: Center for Korean Studies | *October 24 | 4 p.m.* | Barrows
Hall <http://www.berkeley.edu/map/3dmap/3dmap.shtml?barrows>, Barbara
Christian Conference Room (554)

Panelist/Discussants: *Youngju
Ryu*<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/asian/aboutus/faculty/ryuyoungju_ci>,
Assistant Professor of Modern Korean Literature, University of
Michigan<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/asian/aboutus/faculty/ryuyoungju_ci>
; *Ji Sung Kim* <http://fm.berkeley.edu/ji-sung-kim/>, Department of Film &
Media, UC Berkeley; *Yuri
Chang*<http://www2.binghamton.edu/art-history/graduate/grad-students.html>
, Department of Art History, Binghamton
University<http://www2.binghamton.edu/art-history/graduate/grad-students.html>

Moderator: *Elaine
Kim*<http://ethnicstudies.berkeley.edu/faculty/profile.php?person=8>,
Professor, Department of Ethnic Studies, UC
Berkeley<http://ethnicstudies.berkeley.edu/faculty/profile.php?person=8>

Sponsors: UC Berkeley Ethnic Studies
<http://ethnicstudies.berkeley.edu/>, Center
for Korean Studies (CKS) <http://ieas.berkeley.edu/cks/>

Literature: In 1970s South Korea, poet Kim Chi Ha became an international
symbol of democracy when he challenged – in writing, in prison, and on
trial – the legtimacy of the military dictatorship. Last year, Kim returned
to center stage as a staunch ally of the dictator’s daughter and a
mouthpiece of the ultraconservatives who supported her election as South
Korea’s president. This talk will explore the changing place of committed
literature in the ongoing struggle over the meanings of South Korean
modernization.

Film: South Korea has often been touted as the quintessential demonstration
of the superiority of free market capitalism for ‘developing’ the Global
South. This talk explores the experience of neoliberalism from the vantage
point of post-IMF South Korean cinema. In films like ‘The Host,’ for
instance, the monster can be seen in relation to U.S. empire-building in
South Korea, which has served as a ‘host’ for the American military for
almost seven decades.

Visual Art: This presentation explores the politics of representation of
power and memory in public space by examining cultural exhibitions – in
particular the monumental art projects sponsored by the South Korean
government for the 1988 Seoul Olympics and the 1995 Gwangju Biennale - as
attempts to manipulate traumatic historical memory with a spectacle of
capitalist success.

Event Contact: cks at berkeley.edu, 510-642-5674

Event Contact: cks at berkeley.edu, 510-642-5674

For updates on upcoming events, please visit:

CKS Website: http://ieas.berkeley.edu/cks/ or follow us on [image:
cid:image013.png at 01CD9CBD.DAB6FDB0]<http://www.facebook.com/pages/UC-Berkeley-Center-for-Korean-Studies/136279193071270>

If you wish to be removed or would like to update your information in our
mailing system, please do so by visiting the following
link<http://ieas.berkeley.edu/cks/mailing.html>
.
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