A gender-disguise plot from 2007, read for its assumptions rather than its jokes
22 March 2027
Before the screening#
Watch the assigned episodes. This week’s discussion opens with a shared ground rule, not a debate — read the lecture’s approach note before you arrive.
In the screening#
We treat the disguise premise as evidence of what a 2007 audience needed to find plausible, rather than as a verdict on anyone’s actual beliefs, then trace what’s changed and what hasn’t since. Diversity of view within Korean society, then and now, stays part of the discussion throughout.
Afterwards#
The same discipline — separating what a drama represents from what a whole society believes — returns explicitly in weeks 10 and 11, on materialism and beauty standards.
The spec
What you bring to the session. Written so a reader can tell whether it has been met without asking you.
- you have watched the assigned episodes before arriving
- you can state the discussion's ground rule in your own words --- represents, does not verdict, a whole society's beliefs
- you can name one assumption the disguise premise makes about its audience
Teaching team
- May Rhee — convenor