About the lecture
The sinking of the South Korean ferry, MV Sewol, on April 16th, 2014, claimed 304 lives, 250 of whom were high school students on a fieldtrip to Jeju Island.
The Disaster, broadcasted real-time, incited a widespread movement calling for remembrance, investigation, and accountability. Bringing together bereaved families, progressive activists, and citizens previously far from political, Sewol activism has witnessed mobilization of a scale unprecedented for a post-disaster activism in Korea.
This lecture considers Sewol activism within the broader lineage of South Korean social movements, through particular attention to its key tactics and repertoires.
Focusing on the heterogeneity of its constituents, the softer, cultural modes of resistance through which the movement is diffused, and how the boundary between ‘citizens’ and ‘activists’ is blurred, the lecture seeks to refine our understanding of what it means to ‘act’ in the political arena in contemporary South Korea.
About Sara Yeong Park
Sera Yeong Seo Park is an associate lecturer at the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of St Andrews.
Her research focuses on activism and social movements in South Korea, the moral dimensions of social life, and emotions and affect.
Previously, she was an affiliated lecturer and postdoctoral research & teaching associate at the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of Cambridge, where she completed her PhD on the social movement that emerged in the aftermath of the Sewol Ferry Disaster in South Korea.