Jeehey Kim

Interests

Research

As a scholar of East Asian visual culture, my interest in the politics of memory has led me to explore the ethics of representation and the ways in which colonial legacies have structured trans-Asian modernity. My research encompasses the history of photography, visual culture, and film studies in East Asia. I have been writing articles on vernacular photographic practices as well as on documentary films and visual culture in relation to the Cold War and to gender politics in East Asia. As a curator, I have organized exhibitions such as the recent “Pyongyang Bookstore,” at Seoul Metropolitan Library, which presented North Korean artists of the 1950s and ’60s.

Teaching

As a teacher, my goal is to help students understand that artistic and literary works are more than mere reflections of cultural themes, but are also means of engaging social issues, politics, and ideology. My classrooms are highly interactive environments, as I endeavor to engage every student in critical dialogue about the course material. When teaching about societies that are unfamiliar to my students, I strive to relate the subject matter to the students’ historical and cultural contexts through film, literature, and art from the countries whose materials we are studying. In so doing, I stress the importance of closely scrutinizing complex ideas and utilizing textual evidence to support arguments. The results can be rewarding for both the students and me. For example, I learned that students would acquire better knowledge of historical contexts by viewing films, while students learned how visual artists share concepts with novelists and poets.

Courses

Scholarly Contributions

Books

• Kim, J. (2021). Photography and Korea. London: Reaktion Books; distributed by University of Chicago Press.

Chapters

• Kim, J. (2023). International Photography Competitions and Internationalism of Korean Photography in the 1950s-1970s. In Inside Out: A History of Korean Photography, 1929-1982(pp 64-84). Seoul: Museum Hanmi.
• Kim, J. (2023). Photography of Korea in the United States. In Wonders and Witness: Contemporary Photography from Korea(pp 139-145). Seoul: National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art.
• Kim, J., Hung, W., & Foxwell, C. (2020). Photography and Ghost Marriage in East Asia. In Photography and Arts in East Asia. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Kim, J. (2020). Shini-e (death prints). In Exhibition Catalogue on the Collection of Terry and Sandy Kita. Valparaiso University, IN: Brauer Museum of Art.

Journals/Publications

• Kim, J. (2020). Contemporary Photography Magazines in Korea and Taiwan: Vostok & Voice of Photography. Trans Asia Photography Review, 10(2).
• Kim, J. (2017). Wandering Ghosts of the Cold War: Military Sex Workers in the Film Tour of Duty (Kŏmi ŭi ttang). The Journal of Korean Studies, 22(2), 413-431. doi:10.1215/21581665-4226505
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  AbstractThis paper explores the memories of military prostitutes in US camptowns in South Korea through the film titled Tour of Duty (Kŏmi ŭi ttang, 2012). The film experiments with a genre of documentary, showcasing stories of three ex-prostitutes who struggle with their past experiences with US GIs. One of them carries on numerous dialogues with evil spirits, which give her physical and psychological pains that haunt her endlessly. Another woman keeps wandering in search of traces of her mother and friend, both of whom were prostitutes for US soldiers. She traces her memory of them around the ruins of what was called the monkey house, where US military prostitutes with venereal diseases were relocated. The film shows three women haunted by ghosts of the Cold War while remaining invisible and often forced to be silent within Korean society. The paper deals with gendered memory of the Cold War through the stories of wandering ghosts in the dilapidated streets of US camptown sites in South Korea. Pak Kyŏngt’ae and Kim Tongnyŏng, the directors of the film, challenge the boundaries of documentary film, experimenting with various filmic strategies such as interviews, monologues, fantasies, and personal memories.