Korean Studies

Journal of Asian Studies

New writing: “Out of Place in Time: Queer Discontents and Sigisangjo” (2022)

This article in The Journal of Asian Studies discusses queer and transgender voices that took part in the South Korean Candlelight Protests of 2016–17 but became sidelined during the special election that followed. Drawing from theories of queer temporality and feminist critiques of homogenous time, I argue that idioms of postponement (najunge) and prematurity (sigisangjo) have significantly shaped liberal political discourses regarding the timing and timeliness of social change and minority politics in South Korea.… more →

Interview on South Korean feminism

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 →

End the Korean War

“Although the July 27, 1953 Korean War armistice recommended that the United States, North Korea, and China to negotiate a permanent peace agreement in three months time, the Korean War persists today in the ongoing division of Korea, the continued U.S. military occupation of South Korea, the U.S.-led sanctions regime against North Korea, and the unabating militarization of the larger region.”… more →

Book cover image of Digital Lives in the Global City (2020)

New writing: “High-Altitude Protests and Necropolitical Digits” (2020)

This was one of the quickest writings I’ve done, conceived and drafted almost entirely on one night in 2015. It’s a short, creative piece, packed with dates and other kinds of digits that have become a key part of my research on protest cultures. I wanted to tie these numerical digits to the idea of “digital lives,” making sense of protests that persist over time and hang precariously on the verge of death.

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Oct 23 in LA: Protesting Seoul: Resistance in Precarious Times

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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