The Politics of Korean Queer Cinema : Investigating Korean Queer Films in Politics, Economy and Queer

Ryu, Jaewook and Bettinson, Gary and Munby, Jonathan (2021) The Politics of Korean Queer Cinema : Investigating Korean Queer Films in Politics, Economy and Queer. PhD thesis, Lancaster University.

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Abstract

This thesis discusses various issues around queer in the Korean film industry, looking at different perspectives, such as gender, politics, and economy. In particular, this thesis may be the first that investigates Korean queer films in various domains. Unlike earlier research looking into Korean queer films, this thesis focuses on exploring a variety of contexts and texts related to queer. Just beyond film analysis, in a tour approach, this thesis deals with multiple perspectives from politics, the economy (including film industry analysis), queering, queer films and alternative movements, such queer film festivals and the queer pride parade. Indeed, it will examine the context of production (industry, director and politics), texts (queer films, genre and queering non-queer films) and circulation (film festivals and the place of queer in queer culture). These are all related to further understanding the meaning of queer film making in Korean society. First of all, this thesis explores the political role of film in Korea by looking at political Korean film history including various issues that the Korean film industry has faced. This thesis also provides evidence about why Korean films are so political. Second, to further understand the Korean film industry it investigates the economic particularity of the Korean film industry. Third, this thesis investigates several non-queer films in terms of queer reading. By analysing films with a possibility of being viewed in a queer reading, it discusses various discourses from film texts. Fourth, this thesis hypothesises that there are certain ways to represent queer in contexts around the heteronormative film industry. Thus, to further understand Korean queer films and to seek implications about the political purpose of queer film making in Korea, this thesis looks into them. Lastly, this thesis looks into alternative perspectives about queerness in Korea in addition to focussing only on Korean films. Therefore, this thesis deals with alternative perspectives including the queer film festival and the place of queer in Korean society.