Popular reasoning of South Korean melodrama films (1953--1972)

This dissertation examines the relationship between the melodramatic mode of representation and contour of nation-ness with emphasis on popular South Korean films from 1953 to 1972. Melodrama became the dominant form of cinematic expression against the historical backdrop of tumultuous events in post-war South Korea. This dissertation aims to elucidate the historical sensibility or structure of feeling of South Korean cinema by interpreting its reasoning function. In other words, it addresses the historical and ideological significance of melodrama as a kind of "popular reasoning" during times of psychological shock, political repression, social dislocation, uneven economic development and nation building.; South Korean melodrama is crucial for cultural inquiry of the nation because it takes part in formation, circulation and representation of certain social and cultural values associated with the nation. The melodrama films also intersect with discursive boundary of modernity, where enunciation of nation takes a special place. Among different modes of modernity, this dissertation pays close attention to the socio-political mode and their representations in films.; The first chapter focuses on the representation of Protestantism. It first addresses the historical significance of melodrama to both political discourse of nationalism and imagination of spiritual salvation. The film analysis then brings attention to the way Protestant moral values operate to regulate the terms of gender relations and to criticize the dominant nationalist ideology. The second chapter examines the unique melodramatic mode of historicizing in historical drama films. Central to this modality is persistent thematization of burden of history and trauma of historical agency.; The third chapter is about the logic of militant nationalism in Manchurian action films. Propagandistic on surface, this genre nevertheless entails contradictions and ambiguities in confronting issues of colonialism. The last chapter brings attention to the concept of popular justice in courtroom drama films. Set against the discriminatory family law, the films offer the imagined space of social justice for the women who have suffered prolonged marginalization and exclusion. This dissertation is an exploration of affective moral reasoning that govern representation of these socio-political themes in South Korean films.