From Consciousness And Discourse To Activism: The Online Origin Of South Korean Feminist Movement

In recent years the feminist movement has spread in South Korea.This study is about how feminist consciousness was formed from online,how feminist discourses were developed and how it was carried out with action,how feminism was expanded to offline activities through online activities,and what the differences are between these feminist movements and general social movements.The feminist movement in South Korea has been ongoing since the1980 s,but it is restricted by the laws and regulations and the dominance of elite women.Especially,it has been repeatedly pointed out that the feminist movement had been regulated and thus it had lost its momentum since the establishment of the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family.But after the appearance of an online feminist community,many young women have started to participate in feminist movement.The online feminist community has made a fundamental change in public’s understanding of feminism,providing the new environment.According to the need to pay attention to the structural changes in this environment and its context,this study selects three typical cases in the hot feminist movements from 2015 to 2019.The first case is the formation of online feminist community triggered by MERS(Middle East Respiratory Syndrome)in 2015,it is important because it provided a direct opportunity for the emergence of online feminist community.The second case is feminist discourses and its action since 2015,which can be regarded as combination of online and offline feminist movement.The third case is “Hyehwa Station Demonstration” in 2018,which has a great influence in all aspects,such as scale and influence.The recent South Korean feminist movement is in the process of online to offline transformation.In this process,these three cases are closely related to each other and affect the other next cases.Therefore,this study focuses on the online feminist communities formed from MERS affair and traces their influence on this process,adopting a process-tracing method.First,it explores the formation of feminist consciousness by analyzing the background of MERS affair and the emergence of online feminist community.Second,it explores feminist discourses and its actions leading by Megalia and WOMAD.Finally,it explores how feminist consciousness and discourses develop into a social movement by analyzing “Hyehwa Station Demonstration” case.Through tracking of these processes,this study finds out what are the theoretical characteristics of the recent feminist movement in South Korea.