development
203490
The End of South Korea's Rural Schools
Every Wednesday I teach at what must be one of the smallest public schools in South Korea: Anpyeong Middle School, home to just seven students. Seven students. That’s two 7th graders, three 8th graders, and two 9th graders. The school is set to close next year. Its closing represents
South Korea's Real Culture of Shame
Academic literature has extensively documented the so-called ‘culture of shame’ in East Asia, and South Korea is no exception to the phenomenon as a national collective that suffers acutely from fear of losing one’s face — chemyeon as they say in Korean. Shame over possible loss of one’s
Inside the Noraebang: Power Ballads and Neoliberal Capitalist South Korea
South Koreans aspire to be the best. ‘Challenge’ and ‘fighting’ are imperative verbs plastered across billboards. From English-learning to b-boying, society is suffused with the message that if you practice for hours daily, for years at a time, you can succeed. For example, consider ballerina Kang Sue-jin, a master of
No Country for Old People: South Korea's Dire Problem of Elderly Poverty
Living in South Korea, I find it hard not to notice the old. The subway is full of them at every time of the day, presumably because seniors over the age of 65 get to use the system for free. It is difficult to take a seat because soon enough
600 Years vs. 17 days: Pyeongchang Olympic Games' Environmental Cost
Before the end of the month, the construction of a downhill ski slope in a remote part of South Korea’s countryside is set to begin, demolishing a centuries-old forest. With little time left to act, environmentalists are urgently searching for ways to halt the project and protect the land.
South Korea's Military Industrial Complex
Source It is a strange phenomenon that nation-states hold public exhibitions and expositions of objects which cause human fatalities and mass misery. The purpose of these exhibitions is the very sale of weapons that obliterate human beings in a near or far geographical location and leave them without limbs or