Discussion on Gender and Domestic Violence in Korea

THE CENTER FOR KOREAN STUDIES,
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY
cordially invites you to the following COLLOQUIUM

Representing Nation and Gender on the Vernacular Korean Internet:
The Case of Lee Kyung-sil

Roger L. Janelli (Indiana University, Bloomington) and Dawnhee Yim
(Dongguk University)

Friday
January 30, 2004
4:15 p.m.

Institute of East Asian Studies
2223 Fulton Street
6th Floor Conference Room

Within the past few years, the Korean-language Internet has emerged as one of the foremost technological devices for public debate and political mobilization. Several online newspapers, hundreds of thousands of bulletin boards, and a variety of other Internet sites offer individuals opportunities to present views, concerns, and opinions, usually anonymously. As a result, diversity of thought is revealed more starkly than in newspapers, television, or other more established media. This presentation focuses on an incident of February of 2003 that captured major public attention and motivated well over a thousand internet postings. Lee Kyung-sil, a popular television personality, was brutally attacked with a baseball bat by her husband, and this instance of domestic violence soon became a focal point for debating gender roles, sexual morality, and many other aspects of contemporary life in South Korea. The posted commentaries offer an opportunity to understand better the extensive disparity of thinking
about gender and national culture today.
Yim, Professor of History at Dongguk University (Seoul), now serves on the International Jury for the proclamation by UNESCO of Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity. Janelli, Professor of Folklore and
Ethnomusicology and of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Indiana University (Bloomington) is a member of the Committee on Korean Studies of the Association for Asian Studies. Their current research focuses on the vernacular Internet in Korea.

FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

...for more information, visit our website at
http://ieas.berkeley.edu/cks/!

The Center for Korean Studies
University of California
2223 Fulton Street, Room 508
Berkeley, CA 94720
(510) 642-5674