Week 2: Social Empahy

Week 2

ASA 141
Qiuying Lin (Britney)

In my childhood, a famous Korean drama, Dae Jang Geum, left me a great impression of Korean national culture, especially the actress with Hanbok. At that time, I started to connected the Korean image with traditional Hanbok. As Micheal says in the article "Clothing, social empathy and the power of stepping into someone else's shoes", fashion is one way to place objects and people from different nations, places and cultures into direct semiotic (aesthetic) conversation. I feel the same way. If I visit Korea, wearing Hanbok in front of Gyeongbokgung Palace and taking photos is one of the things in my to-do list. Because I want to use this way to embrace the culture of Korean. It's also true that drama just is an entrance for me to learn the culture. I can't feel the same social empathy as a citizen in Korea through drama. 

When I see the pictures that the Vietnamese model wears modern Hanbok, standing at the stairs, the visual of art changes my view. The "hot authenticity" expressed through the camera builds a bridge for me to feel the Korean social empathy in a different way. This picture and also the modern Hanbok have a lot of new elements added by the new generation. The model wears Converse I also have one, not the clothes shoes in the drama I mentioned above. It's easy for me to focus on and understand Korean culture in this way. I really love the idea in the essay that using media to convey the empathy of culture in Korean Hanbok fashion. I realize the power of "hot authenticity" in this article. The drama is a fictitious thing, but Hanbok is a real thing that I can touch, I can wear in my own style, I can communicate this fashion topic with the same generation... I feel a sense of belongings under the power of Hanbok, although I'm not a citizen of Korea.

But I still care about the traditional Hanbok. I hear some criticism that the modern Hanbok deviates from the tradition form so that they can't represent the national culture. It seems like every country image is related to traditional fashion like Chinese Cheongsam. But I think we should not be restricted by the traditional fashion form. We should have a revolution in fashion so that people can easily accept their country culture and also easily feel social empathy. Therefore, I wonder how to find a balance between traditional and modern forms of fashion. More specifically, How to design a modern Hanbok and not to lose the traditional value?