Monday, 7/30, morning session - Suk-Young Kim, UCLA

[cgao]

Professor Kim will have two presentations: 

1) the history of North Korean film 

2) K-Pop and South Korea's Global Reach

Please download and read the two assignments below. 

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[Wen Shi]

Hi Catherine

Is there any reading assignment questions that we need to answer?

[Donna Jamshidnejad]

Professor Kim's lecture and film discussion was fascinating. Many of my students are engaged in class when we watch short film clips. Dr. Kim's ability to use short film clips to demonstrate the cultural and political changes in Korea encouraged me to do something similar. I use the Standford History Education Group's lesson on the Korean War. In addition to this lesson, I would like to work in documents related to the Sinchun massacre and focus on sourcing the events. For this lesson, I can work in North Korean films depicting the war. For example, we watched a scene from Choi Hak-sin Family (1966). In a history classroom, we typically use written sources and images to compare perspectives, however I now see the benefit of using films as well. 

[Jane Shen]

Through professor Kim's first part  lecture today about the North Korean movies from late 60s to early 90s. Although born and grew up in China during the same era, I had watched several movies that Pro. Kim presented. One of them was "Flower Girl" which was made in 1972. I remembered I watched this movie in China while I was in nursery with my mother. I did not understood any of the political manuplation from the movie makers with Kim Jong-il's supervision, however, the theme songs in the movie and the sad story line incribed in my memery. 

Another movie the Pro. Kim presented today "Love, Love, My Love" made in 1984 ,  I don't remember watching this movie, however I knew the theme song very well, I can also sing the song even now. It has been so popular in not only N. Korea, but also among the Korean Chinese living in the Northeast of China. This song is one of the most popular song even perfomed in nowaday stages in both N. Korea and China.

Another interesting finding from the late 60s to early 90s N.Korean movie, I found the same movie trend in China, from political revolutionized national loyalty movies in 60s, to emotional manupulating political story movies in 70s, then to love stories and martial arts movies in 80s while Hong Kong Martial art movies dominating the world movie markets. In movie "Hong Gil-Dong" ( 1986) ) made by the  Shin Sang-ok , I saw so similar movements and filming techs which were seen in the Chinse movies and dramas. 

It is very astonishing to watch the N.K movies and compare them with the Chinese movie trends. Great experice today!!

[Ruth Hickman]

I am really enjoying Professor Kim's energy and her passionate lecture and film discussion. I want to incorporate the use of short clips of Korean Films in my classes to expose students to a different culture and approach to filmmaking themes and ideas. I also would like to incorporate K POP videos as a project that students have to design and create for both my TV/Video Production and Digital Photography courses. For example, students would have to write a treatment, storyboard, shot list, for a K POP video and have to shoot and edit the content.

[Juan Liebana-Mena]

The first session of this program by Dr. Suk-Young Kim was quite interesting and refreshing. I learned a lot of new things about North Korean films and K-Pop that were completely new to me.

Regarding North Korean film, I learned about the importance of the 1970’s in order to layout the aesthetics and standards of North Korean film. When Kim Jong Il was chosen as the heir in 1997, he had to prove himself as the powerful leader, and a prosperous North Korean cinema was a very effective way to do so. In addition, the easy distribution of films, the novelty of the medium, and its controlled art form make film a very important in for North Korea. This shows the essential role that North Korean films play at legitimizing the leader. Film ritualizes staging of the political authority, serves as educational propaganda, and serves as entertainment (especially the movies created after the 1980’s).

The clip Dr. Suk-Young Kim showed us about the 1984 movie Love, Love, My Love was quite interesting to watch since it presented a deviation from the standard of revolutionary themes and focused more on the individual. This movie dealt with the idea of love between two individuals and with a theme related to the government, which shows how themes started to change in the decade of the 1980’s to become a bit more entertaining and deal with ideas that before would have been considered selfish as they didn’t talk about the revolution.

The section about K-Pop was quite interesting and unveiled a way of marketing music and multimedia in a quite diverse and global way. It was eye-opening to know that artists with these massive video productions rarely tour, and when they do they can’t just survive touring in South Korean only. Hence the importance of marketing a product that looks like a live performance via super produced videos that will be consumed in computers and telephones mainly.

It’s important to notice the close relationship between K-Pop and YouTube. In fact, YouTube loves K-Pop since it brought a massive traffic to its site. Both benefit each other. K-Pop provides YouTube with content that is going to generate massive traffic and views, whereas YouTube provides K-Pop artists with a massive platform from where to launch their product to a global market and generate significant revenue.

[Juana Evink]

Professor's Kim presentation on North Korea film was wonderful. I don't remember ever watching a North Korean film, until this morning. The scene from "Flower Girl", was hearthbreaking as a mother, I almost missed the political message, because of it.

[Juana Evink]

After this morning's amazing lecture from professor Kim, the article on "The Many Faces of K-Pop," was brought to life. Professor Kim does a great job describing the K-pop video Twinkle. The reading describes excactly what the video shows, the sprakle, girly geminity, and catchy lirics that some many young fans are attracted to. I found my self fascinated by the reading and the video, that I now want to go home and watch this twinkle video again, eventhough I don't understand the words.

[Daniel Horowitz]

I agree I feel the filmakers were creating empathy on a primordial level by showing us an anguished child crying for a long period of time. Viewers would of course feel sympathy for the child and familty, but they would also gain anger towards the colonial family for not only creating the situation where the tragedy occured, but also by responding so heartlessly to the situation by saying the "brat should be punished".

[Donna Jamshidnejad]

Hi Jane, you made an interesting point about watching Flower Girl and being unaware of the political message. You also comment on the political agendas of Chinese films from the 60s to 90s. When watching these films, was the political message clear to you? I often see propaganda in American film, especially those that glorify war and demonize our political enemies. I wonder how consumers view Chinese and Korean films and the messages embedded in them. 

[Midori Sanchez]

First of all, thank you to Professor Kim for her insightful lecture. I appreciated being exposed to more information on North Korean as well as South Korea. I am an English teacher and have had the opportunity to teach about WWII and the use of propaganda during the war to 8th grade students. I chose to do a mini unit on propaganda (past and present), and could see myself using the posters and the film "Lazy Pig" in the classroom in conjunction with looking at images from "Trust No Fox", an anti-semitic children's book, to show influence over children within the country; both film and images are something that my students could pick up even before the audio/text of a language they don’t understand. I agree with Donna that engagement in the classroom goes up when there is a mixture between images and film; they are also great ways to encourage “think, pair, share” to discuss findings and the author’s message.

Additionally, I saw a connection since I have taught a fairy tales and folklore class with “Lazy Pig” and the fairy tales from especially Germany; they both serve to teach important lessons/morals to children in a way that could come across as scary or disturbing to even adult audiences in the United States. This can also facilitate discussion and foster questions since the presentation and message of these pieces require putting on a cultural lens to better understand why the story needed/should be told.

[Midori Sanchez]

LBUSD focuses on sectors; this means that within lessons we embed connections to the future workplaces and opportunities outside of school. One of the sectors is on Film, Media, and Entertainment that my particular SLC (small learning community) focuses on. Many of my students are interested or involved in music; often times I have several students at least in class that are obsessed with K-Pop even if they often don’t know what the lyrics mean.

While teaching “The Great Gatsby”, I used this sector to develop several lessons to explore music and dance of the 1920s while reading and where it can be found/seen today i.e. The Simpsons and Will I. Am. and Fergie’s “Bang Bang”. I believe that using “Twinkle” could be a fun way to engage more students that may not be fans of KPop as well as continue to drive the idea that the 1920s has an influence within the U.S. and worldwide. I can see a connection to the “American Dream” to the “Korean Dream” with KPOP starts; the idea that there are many ways to achieve success and to rise up the social class that Gatsby also strives for. Like the KPOP stars, Gatsby’s life seems to be a dream and perfect but there are sacrifices that he and the KPOP stars make: Gatsby sacrifices his reputation, friendship, puts any shot at love on hold for an unattainable woman, and even gives up his life and KPOP stars sacrifice their youth, their health, their social life, and are owned by their record companies.

[Carissa Sadlier]

In the morning lecture by Dr. Kim Suk-Young, I really resonated with her statement about perspective. The idea of what we hear vs. what is really happening, and teaching the children all perspectives without judgment and letting them decide for themselves. The media, in general, shows us someone's agenda and in North Korea this would be to show the leader as the great star. How fascinating to learn about the film star that was possibly abducted and her director husband and see how they changed Korean film from one that was love for the state, to one where love could be between people. There is a This American Life podcast on this I plan to listen to on my flight home - https://www.thisamericanlife.org/556/same-bed-different-dreams - 

Though educated in the bay area, I never learned about Korea. My father was in the Korean war and it wasn't something that was talked about. I think it wasn't more that he didn't offer, but that I didn't know to ask. Learning about the museums in North Korea whose main goal is to make sure that N. Koreans don't forget the great atrocities that were committed to them, to continue to hate Americans doesn’t seem different than our news ( museum) where through the info agenda Americans are also taught to hate North Korea. 

When I think of all the anger and hate and then watch the clip of the movie, Love, Love, My Love (1984) with the film star and husband that were possibly abducted, it makes me think there was a time in our history that there might have been an opening for all the anger and hate to be resolved. Yet, these two “turned their backs” on Kim Jong Il and if there was an opening, it closed with his grief and anger. 

 

[Daniel Horowitz]

I have to admit I wasn't looking forward to this lecture as I don't regard the K-Pop "revolution" as a significant musical development but more a "prefabricated" commercial venture. Professor Kim's lecture doesn't avoid this aspect of the genre- she dived right into it.

[cgao]

No reading assignment questions. You can freely discuss your thoughts/reactions to the readings and lectures. Most importantly, please include ways in which you can use these in your classroom.

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