Soft power - the ability to shape the preferences and behaviors of others through attraction and persuasion, rather than coercion, holds a significant place in today’s global landscape. Through a seemingly innocuous sport, the U.S. and China were able to thaw icy relations in the 1970s - “ping-pong diplomacy” - showcasing how cultural exchanges can bridge political divides. Korea has captured international attention through the global phenomenon of K-pop groups BTS and BlackPink, to Netflix’s most streamed show Squid Game, to the adaptation of Korean skincare. These show that soft power fosters understanding and appreciation and facilitates dialogue that can shape global perception in our interconnected world.
About the Performer:
Yeeun Kim is a jazz pianist, arranger, composer, educator, singer-songwriter, and pipe organist from South Korea. She us currently pursuing her Doctor of Musical Arts in Performance with a concentration in Jazz Studies from the University of North Texas. Kim currently serves as the Director of Choir and Organist at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Fort Worth, Texas. She is a former jazz pianist for the prestigious One O’clock Lab band and was selected in the 2022 Sisters in Jazz Collegiate Combo Competition of Jazz Piano. Kim actively performs in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in various performances such as the Sundance Square Music Series, Fever Dallas Candlelight Jazz Concerts, and Flamenco Dallas Festival.
About the Speakers:
Jenna Gibson is a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of Chicago, specializing in International Relations. Her research interests include diplomatic rhetoric, public and cultural diplomacy, soft power, South Korean politics and social issues, and U.S.-Korea relations. Gibson was a regular contributor to the Korea column for The Diplomat for three years and has also written about Korean social issues for other outlets including Foreign Policy, NPR, and the Carnegie Endowment. She was director of communications at the Korea Economic Institute of America. Previously, she lived in Korea as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant. She holds a Master of Science in Foreign Service degree from Georgetown University in 2015, and a Bachelor of Journalism from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2011.
Suk-Young Kim is a professor of theater and performance studies and the associate dean of faculty and students at UCLA’s School of Theater, Film, and Television. Her focus is on unearthing the historical roots of today’s popular culture. She is the author of many books, including Utopia: Theater, Film, and Everyday Performance in North Korea, DMZ Crossing: Performing Emotional Citizenship Along the Korean Border, K-pop Live: Fans, Idols, and Multimedia Performance, and Way Ahead of Squid Game. She also co-authored Long Road Home: Testimony of a North Korean Camp Survivor and edited Cambridge Companion to K-Pop. Kim currently serves as a member of the Hong Kong Research Council and co-edits the Columbia University Press’ new book series Critical Voices from East Asia. Her commentary on Korean politics has been featured on major media outlets, such as: Billboard, CNN, NPR, NYP, WSJ, LA Times, and NBC.
About the Moderator:
Karl Ho, Ph.D. is Professor of Instruction and Director of Graduate Studies of Political Science in the School of Economic, Political and Policy Sciences at the University of Texas at Dallas. His research and teaching areas cover elections, public policy and political economy with a regional focus on East Asia and data science methods including survey data collection and analytics, big data collection and production, text mining and machine learning models. He is the co-Principal Investigator of the Hong Kong Election Study project, collecting election survey data since 2015. He is the author or co-author of various Asian focused articles in journals. His recent works were published in the books The Taiwan Voter (University of Michigan Press) and Taiwan's Political Re-Alignment and Diplomatic Challenges (Lynne Riener). He is co-editor of the 2021 book Taiwan: Environmental, Political and Social Issues (Nova Science).
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2 окт 2024
