An Informal Review of Sun Jung’s “Korean Masculinities”: Part 2, or Why We’re Not Going to Talk about Bae Yong Joon

So, Nabi has given you a pretty good overview of the book and our general observations of it. Chapter 2 includes Sun Jung’s reading of the masculinity represented by Bae Yong Joon. We here at KPK have pretty strong opinions because most of the time, we are fairly confident in what we’re talking about.  This is the reason why I’m not going to talk about Sun Jung’s analysis of Bae Yong Joon. I haven’t seenWinter Sonata, so I can’t tell say anything about her reading of the way “middle-aged Japanese women” (her phrase) read Bae Yong Joon’s masculinity.

But that’s doesn’t mean I don’t have things to say about this chapter, because she talks about more than Bae Yong Joon. I was really struck by the way she framed her discussion of Bae Yong Joon by talking about “pretty boys” in Korean popular culture in general.

Read more at kpopkollective.com (Originally published on July 22, 2011)