Topics in East Asian Cinema

What is Korean cinema? And what do the history, forms, and aesthetic of Korean cinema tell us about itself? This course aims to present the changing faces of Korean cinema in response to historical and social/political/cultural events: colonialism, war, dictatorship, social movements, capitalism, and globalization. It also aims to delve into what makes Korean cinema national, international or transnational, and post-national simultaneously. Paired with scholarly readings, a broad selection of fiction and nonfiction films from the colonial era to the platform age invites students to review the development of Korean cinema in a chronological sense. Intersecting the readings and films, students will be encouraged to confer with each other about how “the national cinema” as a concept has been negotiated, challenged, and redefined through diverse ways in which each film is produced, circulated, and consumed.