Oh, sorry, I should have made it clear: I was talking about characters from You're Beautiful with Mi-nyeo (who is the main crossdressing heroine) and He-yi (who is the pop star and secondary female lead who is in love with Jang Geun-seok's character). From what I've heard of the drama, Mi-ho is most definitely not a traditional girl like Mi-nyeo. ^^
Hm, I think the conflation of "supernatural power" and "female sexuality" doesn't necessarily have to be problematic in and of itself. Because in a cultural backdrop of where female sexuality is denied and unacknowledged, the idea of female sexuality as power is, well, empowering, but where the story failes for me is when it gets painted as "frightening, bad, evil power". I have no idea how Legend of the Gumiho's Child handled it (huh, didn't realize that was the English version) since the acting wasn't compelling enough to keep me watching. (My mentioning it was certainly not intended as a rec!) But there have been other K-dramas as well, such as 구미호 외전/Nine-Tailed Fox (http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Nine_Tailed_Fox), as well as manhwa (I think I linked you to it before, but Miho's Story is a good example: http://comic.naver.com/webtoon/list.nhn?titleId=188197&weekday=thu).
As a footnote, one area where I think mainstream media has done a good job in reclaiming female sexuality is in the figure of the gisaeng.
In my personal experience, it's more common for Korean-Americans (including myself) to be more conservative than Koreans living in Korea, due to the whole pattern of preserving one's social and cultural mores in stasis from the time of immigration. That isn't to say there isn't a cultural element as well--certain customs that appear shocking to Western eyes because they are not norms in Western cultures--but I've generally found that it's easier to find the progressive/radical voices within Korea (possibly because they get more visibility in a Korean-language setting).
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Date: 23 Nov 2010 07:03 am (UTC)Hm, I think the conflation of "supernatural power" and "female sexuality" doesn't necessarily have to be problematic in and of itself. Because in a cultural backdrop of where female sexuality is denied and unacknowledged, the idea of female sexuality as power is, well, empowering, but where the story failes for me is when it gets painted as "frightening, bad, evil power". I have no idea how Legend of the Gumiho's Child handled it (huh, didn't realize that was the English version) since the acting wasn't compelling enough to keep me watching. (My mentioning it was certainly not intended as a rec!) But there have been other K-dramas as well, such as 구미호 외전/Nine-Tailed Fox (http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Nine_Tailed_Fox), as well as manhwa (I think I linked you to it before, but Miho's Story is a good example: http://comic.naver.com/webtoon/list.nhn?titleId=188197&weekday=thu).
As a footnote, one area where I think mainstream media has done a good job in reclaiming female sexuality is in the figure of the gisaeng.
In my personal experience, it's more common for Korean-Americans (including myself) to be more conservative than Koreans living in Korea, due to the whole pattern of preserving one's social and cultural mores in stasis from the time of immigration. That isn't to say there isn't a cultural element as well--certain customs that appear shocking to Western eyes because they are not norms in Western cultures--but I've generally found that it's easier to find the progressive/radical voices within Korea (possibly because they get more visibility in a Korean-language setting).