Back in September 2021, I had the pleasure of speaking with Jorlen Garcia, a student journalist at Claremont McKenna College. We talked about wide-ranging topics such as K-pop (of course), spy cams, and overall climates of patriarchy and gender inequality in South Korea. She did an amazing job editing the interview, which is published online at Asia Experts Forum.… more
I’m giving a talk in LA on Wednesday, October 23 about protest cultures in Korea and the Korean diaspora, co-presented with Jennifer Chun on research we’ve been doing for a while. We plan to do a little more than a typical academic talk with multiple projectors and audiovisual materials. An event organized by GYOPO. Please do RSVP.
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I visited GuUi (Gu-Åi, pronounced as Goo-yi) Station to pay respect and took a few photos. I happened to drop… more
Two articles recently published. ‘Our Past, Your Future’ discusses Korean missionaries’ work in East Africa and ‘Urban megachurches and contentious religious politics in Seoul’ is about E.Land labour organizing and connections to Somang Church.… more
Download Sewol Ferry Fact Sheet 2015 (PDF). Sewol Ferry Disaster in South Korea: Fact Sheet This fact sheet was researched and written… more
A matter of law enforcement or livelihood struggles of the urban poor? Winter is high season for street vending and urban crackdown as can be seen in the recent violence against street vendors in Gangnam district of Seoul. With hundreds of city-hired security contractors (a.k.a. “thugs”) recorded on video overturning carts and destroying vendor property, it’s also high time to consider the urgent questions of informal economy, urban poverty, and state violence. Are legalization and taxation the obvious solution? It’s not such a simple matter, the article argues. For one, there is an enormous range among street vendors, from corporate to livelihood-based, income levels, and vending forms…… more
Apparently Mayor Park yielded under pressure of extreme rightists and conservative protestant groups of South Korea. These groups of bigots have persistently pathologized and stigmatized sexual minorities and gender nonconforming people. They have been virtually following every public event held by LGBTQ groups to violently disrupt those scenes and attack the participants for last few years.… more
Seoul Mayor Park has reportedly reassured the leadership of the Christian Right that he “does not support homosexuality,†which meant that he’s taken their side. That’s the wrong side. He should have taken the side of human dignity and justice.… more