“Taegeukgi Rallies” as a New Form of Local Cold War Mass Politics
Prof. Suk Koo Rhee, Yonsei University
Thursday, February 2, 4 PM
UCI Humanities Gateway 1010
Reception to follow
The American Cold War episteme in South Korea had been upheld for so long both by Rhee’s regime and by the military dictatorships that followed that it has penetrated deeply into the minds of the citizenry. In this way, the anti-Communist social order of South Korea has been reinforced. This study starts with directing attention to the ideological conflict between the liberal-left and the rightwing conservatives that have been reignited since the reign of President Roh Moo-hyun. If, in the old days, the ideological clashes between the military regime and democratic activists primarily involved conflicts over the issues of the national security law, workers’ rights, and political reform, the frontline of this ideological war has more recently been redrawn in such a way as to polarize the masses themselves into two very large hostile groups. As a result, conservative citizens who call themselves Taegeukgi protesters and ultra-rightwing Christians have positioned themselves at the one end of the ideological spectrum, with the liberal and liberal-left citizens are positioned at the other. This study focuses on the significance of the appearance of this new form of mass politics in South Korea in terms of the local Cold War. It analyzes both the ultra-rightwingers’ rallying calls and their use of national flags in particular. This far-rightist group earned the nickname of “Taegukgi protesters” because of their use of the Korean national flags at their political protests. However, at a certain point, they started to use both “Taegeukgi” and the US Stars and Stripes. Later, interestingly enough, even the Israeli national flags were waved along with these two flags. The use of these national flags, this study argues, can be interpreted as an ultra-rightist attempt at expanding the battle formations of local Cold War into an international arena.
Suk Koo Rhee is Professor of English at Yonsei University, Seoul, where he teaches courses in postcolonial literature and theory, British American Postmodernism, Asian American Novel and Asian cinema. He serves as the Managing Editor of Situations: Cultural Studies in the Asian Context. His essays have been published in a number of journals including Journal of Asian Studies, International Journal of Children’s Literature, Canadian Journal of Film Studies and Genre. His four Korean monographs on postcolonial literature and theory received such major awards as The Yonsei Academic Excellence Award, The Best Monograph of the Year Award (2011, 2021) from The English Language and Literature Association of Korea, The 2022 Korean Ministry of Education Award for the 50 Best NRF-Funded Research Projects. He is appointed as the Underwood Distinguished Professor during the term of 2022 to 2025, a prestigious award given to a Yonsei faculty member who is internationally recognized for his or her research accomplishments.
For any questions, please contact at ccks@uci.edu