Korean Cinema Updated

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The following syllabus may be modified and the number of screenings adjusted.

Korean Cinema Instructor: Michelle Cho Contact: mhcho@uci.edu Yonsei International Summer School This course offers an introduction to South Korean cinema, proceeding chronologically through its development and transformation from the post-war period to the present. Throughout the course, our task will be to think about cinema's roleas a medium for visual storytelling and as a site for producing cultural norms and valuesin assessing the consequences of historical events and in helping to construct official histories. We will begin with the earliest examples of popular film, in Korean cinema's "golden age" in the early 1960's, and move towards the contemporary era of globalized, transnational genre films. As our time will be brief, our ambitions will not go beyond a preliminary mapping of the questions, themes, and debates on the formation and effects of South Korea's cinematic imaginary of nation. Course Requirements: Regular attendance at all classes and screenings. Per the Yonsei Summer School Guidelines, absences in excess of 5 are grounds for failure in the course, regardless of performance on exams and assignments. 2 tardies (more than 5 minutes late) will count as 1 absence. No exceptions to this policy can be made. Quizzes (20%) Daily quizzes will cover readings and film screenings and will be graded on the basis of your ability to demonstrate that you are keeping up with course material. Quizzes will be administered in the first 5 minutes of class, and will be the method by which you receive credit for attendance. Film Notes (20%) you are required to take notes on each film screened. These notes should then be typed up and organized according to the guidelines provided. The purpose of the film notes is to ensure focused, attentive viewing, to prepare you to analyze the films in detail. Film notes will be collected twice during the term: at the end of the 3rd week (Thursday, 7/14); and on the last day

of the course (Thursday, 8/4). Group Project (25%) details to be announced in class Final Exam (35%) multiple choice and short essay exam

Course Texts/Materials In class film screenings, will constitute the primary sources of our analysis. A course reader containing all course readings is required and will be available for purchase during the first week of class. Week One: Reading: Nancy Abelmann and Kathleen McHugh: Introduction from South Korean Golden Age Melodrama: Gender, Genre, and National Cinema, Eds Nancy Abelmann and Kathleen McHugh. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2005. Eunsun Cho, The Stray Bullet and the Crisis of Korean Masculinity in South Korean Golden Age Melodrama. Kim Soyoung, "Questions of Women' Film: The Maid, Madame Freedom and Women," in South Korean Golden Age Melodrama. Screening: Aimless Bullet (Obalt'an) Yu Hyun-mok, 1960, 110 min. Madame Freedom (Chayu puin) Han Yng-mo, 1956, 125 min. Week Two: Itself Reading: Kim, Hyung Hyun, "Lethal Work: Domestic Space and Gender Troubles in Happy End and The Housemaid." in South Korean Golden Age Melodrama. Chris Berry, Scream and Scream Again: Korean Modernity a House of Horrors in Seoul Searching: Culture and Identity in Contemporary Korean Cinema. Ed. Frances Gateward. Albany: SUNY Press, 2007. Chandan Reddy. "Modern," in Keywords for American Cultural Studies, Ed. Bruce Burgett and Glenn Hendler. New York: NYU Press, 2007. Kim, Kyung Hyun. "Male Crisis in the Early Films of Park Kwang-su." The Golden Age cont. and the Korean New Wave: Society Talking to Golden Age Cinema: Postwar Subjects Onscreen

Remasculinization of Korean Cinema. Durham: Duke University Press, 2004. Screening: The Housemaid (Hanyeo) Kim Ki-Young, 1960, 108 mins. Chilsu and Mansu, Park Kwang-su, 1988, 109 mins. Week Three: Kwon Taek Reading: Darcy Paquet. New Korean Cinema: Breaking the Waves, (New York: Wallflower Press, 2009. Ch. 1 A New Society, 1-43. Hyangjin Lee. Chunhyang: Marketing an Old Tradition in New Korean Cinema. New Korean Cinema. Eds, Julian Stringer and Chi-yun Shin. New York: NYU Press, 2005. 63-78. Screening: Sopyonje, Im Kwon-taek, 1993, 112 mins. Chunhyang, Im Kwon-taek, 2000, 120 mins. 1st Installment of Film Notes Due: 7/14 Week Four: Reading: Choi Jinhee, The South Korean Film Renaissance: Local Hitmakers, Global Provocateurs. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2010. Blockbusters, Korean Style, 31-60. Darcy Paquet. New Korean Cinema: Breaking the Waves, (New York: Wallflower Press, 2009. The Boom, 61-79. Ching, Leo. "Globalizing the Regional,7 Regionalizing the Global: Mass Culture and Asianism in the Age of Late Capital." Public Culture 12:1 (Winter 2000): 233-57. Screening: Shiri, Kang Je-gyu, 1999, 125 mins. JSA, Park Chan-Wook, 2000, 110 mins. Week Five: Korean Cinema to the World III: Genre-bending Korean Cinema to the World II: The Age of the Blockbuster Korean Cinema To the World I: National Cinema Auteur Im

Reading: Choi Jinhee, The South Korean Film Renaissance: Local Hitmakers, Global Provocateurs. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2010. Riding the New Wave, 164-182. Darcy Paquet. New Korean Cinema: Breaking the Waves, (New York: Wallflower Press, 2009. New Ambitions, 92-112. James Bell. "Interview: James Bell talks to Kim Ji-Woon" Sight and Sound 16:2 (2006) 20. Screening: The Host, Bong Joon-ho, 2006, 110 mins. The Good, the Bad, the Weird, Kim Ji-Woon, 2008, 120 mins. Week Six: Reading: Arjun Appadurai, "Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy." Modernity at Large: The Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996, 27-47. Screening: Jeon Woo-chi: the Taoist Wizard, Choi Dong-hoon, 2009, 136 mins. Final Exam and 2nd Installment of Film Notes Due: 8/4 Postmodern Returns

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