Just Looking ...

This explanation seemed rather essentializing, and I never felt completely comfortable with it. As discussed (in class), consumerism operates on a number of levels and we're much more savvy than simply striving to conform to a hegemonic "western standard". So - I'm mostly going to talk about women here, cause they have a particular relationship with national culture and identity that i think is at play (sorry). I had read something really interesting about women's bodies and their relationship with confucianism in Korea and feel that it connects with how women often function in society as both the face of modernity and also that of tradition, and also how this informs our relationship to consumerism.

I'm going to say right now that this is all just observational and I sincerely apologize for any misrepresentations, bad assumptions, etc. I'm definitely not Korean, and am no expert on Korean culture/history.

In a really super brief look at recent Korean history, it originally existed as a confucian society, underwent colonization by the Japanese, and then experienced the civil war that divided it into North and South. Following the last two stages of their history, they emerged as a capitalist democracy which relegated confucianism to the realm of cultural and national identity, rather than being the whole social/political system (as it had been previously).

An aspect of this confucian cultural identity is that the individual is linked to the social body through spritual interconectedness (Ki). Women (who can not attain sagehood) are important in this system insofar as they give birth to sons (who can). Their fertility was therefor most valued. After the civil war, when the nation needed rebuilding, the somewhat authoritarian government encouraged the consumption of Korean made products as a way to stimulate the economy, and ownership of these products was an indication that you were taking part in the rebuilding of the nation - that you belonged, and that you cared (the capitalist approach). With the increasing introduction of global products, consumption came to signify modernity and membership in the world economy, as it does anywhere. Women were important in this regard as they were (and usually are) socially positioned as representitives of nationhood (representing purity, tradition and Korean modernity simulateously).

The theory is that strict social regulations traditionally applied to women's behavior and bodies (called T'aegyo), originally established and valued to protect the womb for offspring (so that they may successfully produce sons and pass on Ki) were translated into the modern capitalist enviornment through participating and belonging in the consumerist sense (social behavior like shopping and image). Social and spiritual interconnectedness were paralled. Although it's not regulated socially to the same extent as T'aegyo, I definitely encountered young boys claiming they could not respect a woman who did not wear make-up or dress "well". I constantly faced a barage of unsolicited opinions from old men and ladies on the street about my clothing choices while in public, or alternately very animated praise for being "beautiful" when I put on a dress to go for a walk.

The popular western notion of consumerism is that it allows one to assert their individualism, exnominating its underlying purpose of establshing group belonging. Korean advertising emphasizes this aspect of group belonging, and for that reason seems offensively conformist to western sensibilities. Same choices, different reasons.