Border-crossing literature from Korea and beyond

Korean Studies Electives

This course is an advanced seminar course on Korean literary texts from Korea and beyond in the 20th-21st centuries. Border-crossing literature challenges the normative national, ethnic, and linguistic boundaries of “Korea.” Boundaries sometimes consist of geographical demarcations, such as the contours of the Korean Peninsula itself and the 38th Parallel line separating North and South Korea, but they also construct the ideal figure of the “Korean people” as an ethnically/racially and linguistically homogeneous and heteronormative group. Thinking through the idea of “border-crossing,” the course examines a selection of literature under the theme of colonialism and imperialism, “division literature” (bundan munhak, literature after the North/South split), Korean diasporic literature, and world (or transnational) literature. The course will survey major literary texts by Koreans living in China, Japan, and Americas. All readings are in English. The course will supplement literary works with theoretical texts and recent scholarship on Korea.