[Feature] Feminist Criticism and the Perspective to Interpret "Hate" / Baik Ji-yeon
The Quarterly Changbi 176, Summer 2017
Abstract
The feature of current issue deals with the significance of feminist perspectives in interpreting literature. Feminist readings have not been discussed in depth in the realm of literary works, while social concerns for feminist issues in other fields of our society have been soaring since the murder at Gangnam Station and the controversy over sexual violence within the fields of art and literature. Baik Ji-yeon, giving proper survey to the complicated topography in the feminist arguments, points out the limitations found in some critical responses to woman hate. These responses are framed in terms of victims vs. assailants, particularly when they are in league with neo-liberal discourse. Furthermore, she argues that the intensification of the attacker-victim dichotomy will degrade feminist movements, and even make it split away from the general concerns for socio-economic inequality. Through the balanced analysis of Kim Seung-ok's "The Tour to Mujin" and Kim Aeran's "The Covering Hand", she delves into the theme of masculine subjectivity and misogyny, and the symptom of hate in general.