Sorry for the slow posting everyone, but my daughters are off this week, and indeed one’s even sitting on my shoulders as I type this (“Whee! Happy woman Daddy! Why’s she smile?”). I’ll start writing again once they return to kindergarten next week.
When I do, every week from then to the end of the year I’ll be posting longer analytical pieces on Mondays, the Korean Gender Reader on Wednesdays, and translations on Fridays, either of K-pop songs or (more likely) gender issues-related news that would otherwise never see the light of day in English. I realize I have a terrible track-record of posting when I say I will, but hey – it is a new year after all, and for a variety of personal and professional reasons I’d really like to stick to my commitment this time.
If anyone would like to help me with that, I’d very much appreciate any donations via the “donate” button at the end of every post, no matter how small. Don’t worry, I won’t be making a habit of asking, and in fact will make the request just two more times this year: when my $17 domain renewal comes up in March, and my $30 no-advertisements renewal does in August. But it’d be really nice if I could break even with those at least! :)
Well, not quite everything, but I did indeed just get interviewed about blogging by Gwangju Foreign Language Network (광주영어방송), which you’ll be able to listen to here at 6:15pm on Tuesday (I’ll add an MP3 file when it becomes available). It’s very short, but I’d be happy to expand upon anything mentioned in the interview here, or answer any other questions that readers may have.
For anyone that does listen to the interview, here’s the post about criticisms of Korean female – Caucasian male relationships that I mentioned, as it seemed to resonate with a lot of people.
Update – Unfortunately, WordPress.com doesn’t allow me to upload the WMA file that I was sent. Sorry!
As this post goes up, I’ll be at Gimhae Airport picking up my father, then taking him and the rest of the family to the Daegu 2011 IAAF World Championships this weekend and next. We’d like to stay there for the entire nine days (he will!), but unfortunately next week we have to move apartments on Wednesday, and then I start teaching again the next day. Needless to say, I’ll be too busy to write again until he leaves on the 7th of September.
Until then, please feel free to raise and discuss anything sociological, gender, advertising, K-pop, and/or athletics-related here, and sorry for not being able to complete any song translations this month. But I do have five that I’ve been working on, which I’ll put up as soon as I’m back!
Update, September 7th: I won’t bore you with the details, but I’m afraid my “comeback” with have to be pushed back to Monday the 12th. Sorry!
For about a year now, I’ve been tweeting about all the interesting Korean gender issues, advertising, and pop-culture stuff (and much more) that I don’t get a chance to blog about, but a lot of readers have suggested that it’s high time I created a Facebook page also. With apologies for the wait then, here it finally is, and I definitely hope to make it a site in its own right, not just a glorified RSS feed for the website proper.
To that end, I’ll not just be providing cool stuff that you won’t see here, and taking advantage of the opportunity to interact more with readers, but I plan to let my hair down and be a little less intellectual on Facebook too.
For instance, as a dispassionate critical commentator on Korean girl groups K-pop, normally I would never ever reveal that there’s something about Love Alone (러브얼론) above by Miss A (미스에이) that has me smiling radiantly almost every time I listen to it. Indeed, although I was initially very disappointed that there wasn’t a proper music video produced for it, now just seeing the members being themselves in it has me smiling all the more!
(2:29)
Granted, all of them being attractive women certainly helps, but I genuinely think that some unique combination of the music, voices, and lyrics makes this an incredibly warm song, especially for what can often be very tinny and artificial-sounding K-pop.
Any other fans?^^ Call me naive, but I’ll be investing 660won (US$0.61) in the MP3 as soon as I finish typing this!
Update: See here for some high quality screenshots of the video.
I won’t bore you with the details, but just a quick note to let you know that after receiving some atrocious service from WordPress.com recently, I’ve decided to host this blog myself from now on.
Yes, I’m surprised it took me so long too.
Apologies in advance for any problems that may arise as I go to town playing with new themes and plugins make the transition over the next week or so then, and for those of you that subscribe to the RSS feed, please note that the old thegrandnarrative.wordpress.com one will no longer work once I’ve finished sorry. Those of you that already use the thegrandnarrative.com one though, shouldn’t have any problems.
Meanwhile, I’ll still be posting as normal, and if anyone can recommend a web hosting service and/or give any advice about making the transition from WordPress.com to WordPress.org, then that would be really appreciated!
To any readers that missed it, just a quick reminder that I’ll be giving a lecture at Wellesley College in Boston this Friday!
Tentatively titled Peeling Back the Veneer of Modernity: An introduction to Korean gender issues through advertising and popular culture, it will be held at 4:30pm in the Pendleton Atrium, on the 2nd floor of Pendleton Hall (see here or here for directions). All are welcome.
Meanwhile, apologies for the lack of posting, but, what with having an horrendous flu last weekend, my eldest daughter catching bronchitis (which meant 6 hours in hospital today), and a huge pile of editing work to get through, then not only am I still finishing the lecture, but I’m afraid my blogging plans went completely out the window!
But things will be back to normal next week, and should it not be possible to record the lecture itself – unfortunately the Pendleton Atrium is not really set up for it – then I’ll make sure to write a blog version of it shortly thereafter.
Until next week then!^^
p.s. Don’t worry, my daughter is fine now! And, apologies again, but there’ll be a small charge of $5 for non-campus guests.
A quick admin note first: following the advice of a friend, I’ve decided to change the format of the Korean Gender Reader posts, as the previous commentary and information-dense one was often a little overwhelming for many readers (3000 words is not a “summary” of the week’s events!). Instead, this lighter version means more frequent and timely links for you, still leaves me the possibility of expanding upon the more interesting stories in later posts, and, probably most importantly, an extra 8+ hours a week to write!
I hope you like the change, and, following the lead of commenter Tbonetylr who let me know about the above advertisement, this post’s 10 stories (my new maximum) will all be loosely related to the media and pop-culture. Another post later in the week will focus more on sexuality, although of course many stories could easily be in either.
1) First up, Dramabeans discusses the recent trend of absurd age gaps in casting choices in dramas, with one drama having a “mother” only 3 years older than her “daughter” in real life! As described there:
This growing trend has some audiences doubting the believability of such casting choices, and wondering if there’s such a dearth of actresses out there. Personally, I don’t think the general trend is that crazy, given that the 30-something single girl is only lately becoming a viable option, in the last few years. Before, actresses had to go straight from twenty-something maiden to 30-something ajumma. Now there’s more of a range, and it isn’t a new thing for actors to be cast off-age.
2) At an average age of just 15 years old, GP Basic is set to debut as Korea’s youngest girlgroup. As Extra! Korea aptly puts it, “Stop the Madness“, and notes that he is not the only one concerned about their welfare.
3) Just out of curiosity, as anybody seen this new contraceptive pill commercial on TV?
Vodpod videos no longer available.
4) Shin Min-ah (신민아) happily acknowledges that her jean advertisements are heavily photoshopped. Meanwhile, in both a bizarre case and ultimate judgment, 92 netizens sued by SM Entertainment for posting up photos of Girls’ Generation (소녀시대) members’ faces superimposed onto photos of naked women will not be prosecuted, primarily because of a petition by the members themselves.
For anyone further interested, note that SM Entertainment has quite a history of suing people for any negative imagery of Girls’ Generation, even for simple cartoons.
6)After School’s (애프터스쿨) UEE gets criticized by netizens for her “bellyfat” again, to which unfortunately she responds with “slim” photos rather than defiance at the absurd weight standards (and required dress) for female idols.
7) In a story that sounds all too familiar, 2PM attracted a lot of criticism for the overly sexual content of their first solo concert last week. But as VixenVarla of SeoulBeats notes however, far from this being a case of Koreans being prudes and/or subject to excessive censorship, it would probably have been fine with a age rating higher than, well, 8 plus. Moreover, would anyone expect anything less from management company owner JYP anyway?
Meanwhile, see KBites for details of the latest batch of K-pop songs to indeed get banned by MBC, this time for mentioning brand names and/or websites (and see here for more on Korea’s draconian indirect advertising laws).
8) After a proposal made in the story last month, there is now the strong possibility of the first gay wedding ceremony to be depicted in a drama soon, and accordingly anti-homosexuality groups have already put out newspaper advertisements in opposition (see #12 here for more on those).
Unfortunately the cast and crew themselves are also a little divided about the possibility, but regardless the drama itself – the first to feature gay characters – remains very popular, and has just been confirmed for a 13-episode extension.
10) Finally, in a classic case of the pot calling the kettle black, Korean netizens have criticized a Japanese talk show for excessively focusing on the bodies of members of Korean girl group KARA (카라), currently on a big promotion drive there. Fortunately however, not everyone has joined the hypocritical, nationalist fray, some noting that “When this is done in Korea it’s ok, but when it’s done in Japan it’s wrong?” for instance.
Sorry everyone, but having just had 15cc of blood removed from my 2 week “swellbow” this afternoon, then I’m going to have to have to take a break from writing for a few more days. Fortunately for my sake though, my reading for August came just after I arrived home from the hospital, and I’d love to hear from any readers who have also read Japanese School Confidential, and/or Guyland as I get stuck into them this week. And The Girl With the Dragon Tattootoo of course, but comments about that would be better placed in this earlier comments thread!
But please feel free to discuss any other issues that interest you, and on that note now seems as good a time as any to mention that I’m now open to anyone guest posting on the blog also, on any Korean sociological, gender, and/or advertising-related topic, as frankly I lack the time to cover even just those I’m especially interested in these days, let alone anything else. It would be great to hear both fresh perspectives on those and/or about new topics though, so if you’re interested please either email me or leave a note in the comments!^^
Always just an experiment really, after last week’s open thread received no comments whatsoever then I deleted it and thought I’d call it a day, but I’ve relented and decided to give the open threads one more shot: after all, all the others received many. So, if you’d like a forum to talk about virtually anything Korea-related each weekend (albeit with a preference for sociology and pop-culture), and perhaps most importantly one that is moderated also, then please do make sure to contribute this time!
But please don’t get the wrong impression: of course I’ll be a little disappointed if the open threads don’t take off, but I don’t mind really, as keeping you entertained and informed is my prime concern (call me selfish, but I would like to get paid to write eventually, and this is how I learn how!). And with that in mind, in lieu of an extra post this weekend I’m starting this open thread a little early to give me more time to work on several in-depth ones I’ve been promising for a while.
Before I go though, an admin note for RSS feed subscribers: I recently bought the domain “http://thegrandnarrative.com”, which the old “http://thegrandnarrative.com.wordpress.com” now automatically redirects to, but I’ve noticed that although the feed for the latter still works just fine in Google Reader, the feed for the former is completely haywire, throwing up any post I simply edit even if it is several years old. That wouldn’t normally be a problem, but then I’m doing some major spring cleaning as it were, editing a month’s worth of old posts at a time, and this has meant that sometimes 20 very old posts have been arriving in your feed each day, which must be a little annoying. Sorry about that, and unfortunately I don’t know what I can do about it until I finish in a couple of weeks, but if you’d like to receive notification only when new posts arrive in the meantime, then please consider changing the feed to the old wordpress one, or alternatively you can subscribe by email via the button on the right.
Update, Monday 26th – Apologies, but those posts will have to be postponed a little, and this week’s Korea Gender Reader to next week: our landlord has just informed my wife and I that she wants to raise the rent, and so much of today has been spent looking at apartments online. We might be moving in less than 2 weeks!
Apologies for the 6-day hiatus everyone: my 3 year-old daughter Alice caught Swine Flu from someone in her kindergarten earlier last week, then my 1 year-old daughter Elizabeth from her, then my wife. Frankly, I’m amazed that I haven’t caught it myself yet.
Testament to my eating a clove of garlic everyday since November? Who needed friends anyway…
Seriously though, naturally I was a little worried when I first heard the news about Alice on Monday, and especially Elizabeth on Wednesday, small for her age. But fortunately all 3 are almost better (my daughters were put on Tamiflu), although Elizabeth is still coughing a little.
Meanwhile, now that things have settled at home, I’m able to concentrate on catching up with writing posts and responding comments and emails and so on. That will take a lot of work though, so I’ve decided to skip adding more by forgoing this week’s open thread sorry. Merry Christmas until the next one on the 26th though!^^
p.s. For those of you wondering when my Korean Gender Reader posts will restart, apologies for the delays, and that will be on Monday the 4th!
Apologies for not having a post up since Monday everyone, but for some reason my daughters have been running around until late every night this week, demanding to climb up me to do back-flips, or that I help them build Lego houses. Yesterday, I vaguely recall, I even fell asleep on the lounge floor while watching them…and they proceeded to use the side of my head to put their Lego bricks on.
This morning though, my eldest one thrust the above into my pockmarked face while I was drinking the first of many coffees, loudly exclaiming “Chorok-sek (green) one YOO Daddy! A toast please!”. I decided to forgive her.
I’ll do my best to have one ready by tomorrow. Post I mean. Meanwhile, here is an example of the budding artist’s work from July if you’re curious, and also a brief examination of the gender stereotypes in a popular Korean children’s song if you can’t wait until tomorrow for that sort of thing. But be warned: I wear rather less clothes in Korean summers…
With the proviso that most visitors to a blog about gender and sexuality are usually rather disappointed with what they find(!), the good news is that the popularity of my blog has grown dramatically in recent months, and I really enjoy and appreciate all the additional comments and emails I’ve been getting as a result.
Unfortunately though, all that’s coincided with a much heavier workload at my job. And with a non-working spouse and two young daughters on top of that, then I literally have only about an hour each night to devote to the blog these days.
You’ve probably already noticed the reduction in the number of posts. While I think I’m still pretty good at responding to comments though, that’s definitely at the expense of emails from readers, and I constantly have a backlog of about 20 or so in my in-box. Usually relatively long, intelligently written, and interesting, I consider it a real achievement if I manage to reply to about 3 or 4 in a week.
And as new ones come in, then older ones tend to get further and further down the screen. Some people must surely have given up on me by now, for which I apologize.
But I don’t want to give the impression that I don’t want to be emailed: quite the opposite. And the delay with some isn’t entirely due to my lack of time. More, it’s because I’m not actually the most appropriate person to answer their questions, either because I simply don’t know, and/or I can’t help, however much I’d like to.
In nine-tenths of those cases though, I’d be surprised if readers couldn’t.
I realize what that may sound like: getting my readers to do my work for me. And sure, maybe I am.^^ But by no means is anybody obliged to(!), and regardless it’s surely better to have questions and requests for help getting to the right people rather than have them languishing in my in-box.
Those are just one purpose of having a weekly open thread though, and not necessarily the primary one. The other is to give me a place where I can mention things that are still interesting but which I don’t have time to further develop into a blog post, or – more importantly – for you to bring up and discuss things yourself. Naturally I’d prefer things related to gender, sexuality, advertising and pop-culture, and preferably Korean too, but I’m extremely flexible. And by all means please feel free to link and discuss your own blog posts and so on: with my schedule, that’s probably the only way I’d ever find out about them!
With that in mind, let me provide a few things to get the ball rolling. First, a problem someone emailed me about. I’ve removed the author’s details because – surprise, surprise – I haven’t had time to ask permission to reproduce it publicly sorry, but I’ll make sure to let them know as soon as I can!
…Adoptees, such as myself, who have visited Korea often tend to come back either angry or induced with yellow-fever. It has often left me wary of my own trip, pending next year and I have been trying to acclimate myself about Korea & culture before visiting. Korean immigrants often wax poetic about their home country and refuse to discuss anything negative about it.
The reason I’m contacting you, besides to thank you for the well-written pieces, is because I wondered if you have any insight into the adoption attitude in Korea. So much of what I have read in articles about Korea and how they are addressing adoption is very optimistic and pro-active – they have stated they intend to phase out all international adoptions by 2012. Yet, from what I understand from other adoptees and social workers, the reason why Korea has such a history of adoption-“exportation” is partly due to the attitudes of single mothers, contraception, and blood-only attitudes. Most Korean immigrants or visitors immediately apologize when the issue of adoption comes up but then refuse to discuss the topic. I still don’t have a clear picture of the Korean attitude and was wondering if you have any insight to share.
And now an interesting point from another email to get some discussion going:
…I enjoy reading your blog tremendously, it is exactly the sort of things I like to think about. I’ve obviously noted that women here in Korea act more “childish” and traditionally feminine than in Europe. In [the European country I’m from] there isn’t really a strong focus on gender or gender roles that much, but women act much more masculine, engaging in sports frequently and heavy drinking. The behavioral difference between genders there is not so great. Still, men occasionally make their silent effort to “out-man” women, by not allowing their girl to become stronger than them, or by trying to unnerve them or trying to have the upper hand. This is all very subtle, and they won’t admit to it usually. In Korea, where the threshold for being more masculine than your girl is so low, it isn’t strange that men allow themselves to adopt relatively feminine characteristics. At the same time they maintain a very macho attitude, to contrast the very femi attitude adopted by women. This is confusing, but interesting all the same.
I’d never considered that, and it puts a interesting spin on all the posts about the development of Korean heterosexuality I’ve written (see “My Constantly Evolving Thesis Topic” on my sidebar). If that’s not up your alley though, then consider Brian in Jeollanam-do’scomment to this post of mine instead, in which he suggests that bottoms are generally viewed asexually in Korea. After reading it, I decided to test his hypothesis by taking a poll of my students’ opinions of the advertisement I wrote about there:
And I’d be interested in hearing what your own (adult) students and Korean friends and partners think too. Personally, while my two classes of 20 and 30-somethings are hardly representative of Koreans as a whole, I see no reason to think that they’re particularly unrepresentative either. And guess what? Only about a fifth of them saw the dancing in that as at all sexual, which simply astounded me…
Finally though, this is the weekend, so the person who writes the best caption to this next wins a free beer when they’re next in my part of Busan!
If you reside in South Korea, you can donate via wire transfer: Turnbull James Edward (Kookmin Bank/국민은행, 563401-01-214324)
(Source)
Source: 
The Grand Narrative 
