“The Story of You and Me”: Strategic Ambiguity in the Paratextual Reception of Kim Ji-Young, Born 1982

ABSTRACT

This article explores the connection between the online commentary on the South Korean novel, and later film, Kim Ji-Young, Born 1982 (2016; film released in 2019), and the perception of feminism within South Korea. To capture how Kim Ji-Young’s “meaning” is entangled with popular beliefs about feminism, I analyze audience reception through Kim Ji-Young’s paratexts: (a) tweets and (b) comments responding to newspaper articles mentioning the novel and/or film Kim Ji-Young from the Korean platform Naver. I examine paratexts to reveal that the “meaning” Kim Ji-Young has in online spaces is not determined solely by the novel or film-as-referent. I show that Kim Ji-Young the source text has become inextricable from the mélange of preconceptions regarding what constitutes a “feminist” stance in Korea, ranging from the stereotype of the selfish “feminist” who shirks her maternal duty towards the nation to the discontent of stay-at-home moms. I show that online misogyny has forced those who support Kim Ji-Young’s feminist message to employ what rhetorician Leah Ceccarelli describes as “strategic ambiguity.” This involves simultaneously disavowing Kim Ji-Young‘s feminism while praising the text’s feminist politics, a tactic used to shield themselves from attacks by misogynistic trolls.

KEYWORDS:

• Kim Ji-Young, Born 1982
• paratext
• South Korea
• anti-feminism
• strategic ambiguity

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank the editor and anonymous reviewers for their comments. The author would also like to thank Jinsook Kim for her feedback on an earlier version of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplemental data

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/14680777.2024.2363853.

Notes

1. This article has anonymized comments and tweets by only including the month and year when the tweets or comments were published.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

JiHae Koo

JiHae Koo is an Assistant Professor in the School of English Language and Literature at Kookmin University, South Korea. Her research interests include but are not limited to the late nineteenth century to early twentieth British literature, digital literacy and rhetoric, and online feminism.