Welcome to Saturday University, a monthly lecture series featuring experts from around the world. Gain new insights on Asia throughout time as our visiting scholars, authors, artists, and thought leaders delve into new themes each season. Tickets include gallery access.
Always Already Ours: Representations of Transnational Adoptees in Contemporary Korean Dramas
Kira Donnell
This presentation examines the emerging trend in contemporary South Korean television of incorporating transnational Korean adoptee characters into its narratives. Once marginalized, adoptees are now depicted as symbols of South Korea's global success, revising transnational adoption history to position them as always already integral to the nation's identity. With the global rise of the Korean Wave, or Hallyu, Korean dramas increasingly feature adoptee characters as cosmopolitan and accomplished. However, beneath these portrayals lies an ongoing state of unbelonging, revealing deeper tensions in their representation within South Korea's national narrative.
Kira Donnell is a transnational, transracial Korean adoptee scholar, educator, and advocate. Her research focuses on Korean adoptees as individuals with agency and the development of an individual and collective Korean adoptee identity particularly as expressed through analysis of cultural productions. Dr. Donnell is a Lecturer Faculty member in the Asian American Studies department at San Francisco State University.