• Date: April 27th, Wednesday, 2022 10:00 – 11:40
• Online via Zoom

Presenter: Sojeong Park (Co-Researcher, Center for Hallyu Studies, SNUAC)
Discussion: Ji-Hyun Ahn (Univ. of Washington at Tacoma), Kyung Hyun Kim (UC Irvine)
Moderator: Wonjung Min (Center for Hallyu Studies, SNUAC)

This book provides a postcolonial perspective on mibaek, or skin-whitening culture of South Korea. While mibaek is the essential aesthetic of Korean media culture and everyday practice of beauty, social and academic discourse on it is lacking. Moreover, Eurocentric discourses have interpreted skin-whitening practices of colored people as white envy, mimicry, the negation of self-identity, or a form of pathological aesthetics. Refuting this hegemonic discourse and mobilizing a de-imperialized, posthuman, and affective framework of the Deleuzian philosophy, the book analyzes ‘mibaek assemblage’ which is an intricate network of people, technologies, and desires. Investigating mibaek in terms of desire, power, body, and identity, the book reveals the multi-layered cultural politics of mibaek, thus providing an interpretation on mibaek that is not bound by Western-centric representation and exploring the imperialist desire that is newly formed within Korean society.