Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-wq2xx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T06:44:37.665Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - The Politics of Postponement and Sexual Minority Rights in South Korea

from Part III - Mobilizing Rights for the Marginalized

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 April 2021

Celeste L. Arrington
Affiliation:
George Washington University, Washington DC
Patricia Goedde
Affiliation:
Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul
Get access

Summary

Despite some policy gains and expanded civil liberties, sexual minorities in South Korea face challenges from both conservatives and liberals. While anti-LGBTI conservatives seek to block equal rights and antidiscrimination laws, many liberal politicians have been reluctant to embrace sexual minority rights as fundamental human rights. In many instances, they portray sexual minority rights as premature, rather than permanently impossible, asserting that it is “not yet” the right time in Korea. This chapter discusses early LGBTI mobilization in the 1990s in three parts: the solidarity politics cultivated with labor and emerging human rights activism against state violence and national security surveillance; the untimely deaths of LGBTI activists; and so-called youth protection policies that deferred freedom and empowerment for LGBTI youth. This discussion is paired with an analysis of how LGBTI rights activism fared during and after the Candlelight Protests in 2016–17 in what I call a “politics of postponement.”

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Berlant, Lauren. 2011. Cruel Optimism. Durham: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Chang, Paul Y. 2015. Protest Dialectics: State Repression and South Korea’s Democracy Movement, 1970–1979. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Cho, Ara. 2016. “Seongsosuja rideo inteobyu – Sarangbadeul yonggi” [Sexual minority interview – Courage to be loved]. Daehangnaeil [University Tomorrow], January 14, 2016.Google Scholar
Cho, Kuk. 1997. “Tension between the National Security Law and Constitutionalism in South Korea: Security for What.” Boston University International Law Journal 15(1): 125–74.Google Scholar
Chua, Lynette J. 2015. “The Vernacular Mobilization of Human Rights in Myanmar’s Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Movement.” Law & Society Review 49(2): 299332.Google Scholar
Chun, Jennifer Jihye. 2009. Organizing at the Margins: The Symbolic Politics of Labor in South Korea and the United States. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Daehakdongseongaeja ingwonyeonhap (Daedongin) [University Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Alliance], 1998a. Dyke 1 (March 15).Google Scholar
Daehakdongseongaeja ingwonyeonhap (Daedongin) [University Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Alliance], 1998b. Dyke 2 (May 15).Google Scholar
Dillon, Stephen. 2013. “‘It’s Here, It’s That Time:’ Race, Queer Futurity, and the Temporality of Violence in Born in Flames.” Women & Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory 23(1) (March): 3851.Google Scholar
Gilmore, Ruth Wilson. 2007. Golden Gulag: Prisons, Surplus, Crisis, and Opposition in Globalizing California. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Gwak, Sang’a. 2017. “Seonggonghoedae chonghaksaenghoejang huboga malhaneun ‘naega keomingautan iyu’ (inteobyu)” [‘The reason I came out’ according to the candidate for President of the student government at Sungkonghoe University (interview)]. Huffington Post Korea, March 29, 2017. www.huffingtonpost.kr/2017/03/29/story_n_15673314.html.Google Scholar
Han, Ju Hui Judy. 2015. “Kwieo jeongchiwa kwieo jijeonghak” [Queer Politics and Queer Geopolitics]. Munhwa gwahak 83 (September): 6281.Google Scholar
Han, Ju Hui Judy 2018. “Shifting Geographies of Proximity: Korean-Led Evangelical Christian Missions and the U.S. Empire.” In Ethnographies of U.S. Empire, edited by McGranahan, Carole and Collins, John, 194213. Durham: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Han, Woori. 2018. “Proud of Myself as LGBTQ: The Seoul Pride Parade, Homonationalism, and Queer Developmental Citizenship.” Korea Journal 58(2) (June): 2757.Google Scholar
Hankyoreh. 2017. “Much work remains to be done on first anniversary of candlelight revolution.” Hankyoreh, October 28, 2017. www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_editorial/816448.html.Google Scholar
Hong, Grace Kyungwon. 2015. Death beyond Disavowal: The Impossible Politics of Difference. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Im, Kim Oju. 2003. “‘Dangsindeuldo da dongseongaejaya? Bukkeureoun jul ara’” [Are you all homosexuals, too? You should be ashamed of yourselves]. Cham Sesang, July 30, 2003. www.newscham.net/news/view.php?board=news&nid=22462&page=1998&category2=1.Google Scholar
Kim, Nan. 2017. “Candlelight and the Yellow Ribbon: Catalyzing Re-Democratization in South Korea.” The Asia-Pacific Journal 15(4) (July 15, 2017).Google Scholar
Kim, Nan. 2018. “The Color of Dissent and a Vital Politics of Fragility in South Korea.” The Journal of Asian Studies 77(4) (November): 971–90.Google Scholar
Kim, Sunhyuk. 2000. The Politics of Democratization in Korea: The Role of Civil Society. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.Google Scholar
Kwon Kim, Hyun-young, and Cho, John. 2011. “The Korean Gay and Lesbian Movement 1993–2008: From ‘Identity’ and ‘Community’ to ‘Human Rights’.” In South Korean Social Movements: From Democracy to Civil Society, edited by Shin, Gi-Wook and Chang, Paul Y., 206–23. Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Lee, Namhee. 2007. The Making of Minjung: Democracy and the Politics of Representation in South Korea. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
New York Times. 1996. “Ghosts of dictatorship in South Korea.” The New York Times, December 30, 1996.Google Scholar
Siu. 2018. Kwieo apokallipseu: Saranggwa hyeomoui jeongchihak [Queer apocalypse: Politics of love and hate]. Seoul, Korea: Hyeonsil Munhwa.Google Scholar
Yang Jeong, Ji-geon. 2003. “Hangiyeon, hangichonge ‘dongseongaeja jugeum’ sajoe yogu” [Hangiyeon demands apology from Hangichong for the death of a homosexual]. News N Joy, May 31, 2003. www.newsnjoy.or.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=4544.Google Scholar
Yi, Sang-heui. 2013. “Dongseongaejaui gomindo ‘eumnanmulideon geuttae” [When gay worries used to be considered obscene]. Hankyoreh 21, May 10, 2013. http://h21.hani.co.kr/arti/society/society_general/34481.html.Google Scholar
Yi, Se-a. 2017. “‘Peminiseuteu daetongnyeong’ doegetdaneun Mun Jae-in, seongsosuja ingweoneun ‘najunge’?” [‘Feminist President’ Moon Jae-in, are sexual minorities’ human rights for later?]. Yeoseong Sinmun, February 17, 2017. www.womennews.co.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=111816.Google Scholar
Yi, Yong-pil. 2017. “Moon Jae-in ‘Dongseongae jiijihaji anchiman, chabyeolbadaseon andwe’” [‘I don’t support homosexuality, but you shouldn’t face discrimination’ says Moon Jae-in]. News N Joy, February 13, 2017. www.newsnjoy.or.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=208845.Google Scholar
Yun, Hyeong-jung. 2017. “Bangimun deoktaege mutge dwaetda … dongseonggyeolhone chanseonghasinayo?” [Thanks to Ban Ki-moon, we can ask … do you support same-sex marriage?]. Hankyoreh, January 31, 2017. www.hani.co.kr/arti/politics/polibar/780780.html.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×