KJCKorea
Journal Central

This study examines visual art materials published in the North Korean popular magazines Inmin Choson and Choson in the 1950s, focusing on the media characteristics of the two magazines, the publication patterns of art images, their major themes and genres, and their significance as sources for those who study North Korean art history. Although neither magazine was a specialized art journal, both functioned as illustrated mass media that conveyed current issues and achievements in the fields of “society, politics, economy, and literature and the arts” in North Korea during the postwar reconstruction period through visual images. In particular, art images repeatedly published in the two magazines were arranged differently according to each magazine’s media character and readership, confirming how their meanings changed in different page contexts. Furthermore, color plates and exhibition-related articles help fill gaps in source materials for North Korean art research and provide a basis for examining artists’ activities, the production of artworks, and exhibition circumstances. This study therefore brings renewed attention to visual art materials published in North Korean popular magazines of the 1950s and reassesses them as major visual sources for the study of North Korean art history.

This study examines the problem of powerlessness and social isolation among Japan’s younger generation. First, it reviews the current state of youth labor and isolation―including NEETs, the “8050 problem,” rising job turnover rates, and the emergence of resignation agencies―along with the theoretical debates in Japanese youth sociology surrounding these issues. It then traces how the Japanese government’s youth consciousness surveys have shifted their focus from “employment” (就労) to “relationships and ibasho” (居場所), diagnosing changes in youth consciousness that corroborate the conditions identified above. The study analyzes the Japanese govern- ment’s policy responses―epitomized by “work-style reform” and the Freelancer Protection Act―and their limitations, examining the limits of the state-led model with particular attention paid to the development of mental health policies and the constraints faced by frontline youth-support institutions such as Regional Youth Support Stations and Hikikomori Regional Support Centers. Finally, it examines cases of Japanese youth and stakeholders who have independently created social value without relying solely on government support. In doing so, the study argues that solutions to youth issues can move beyond the mere distribution of jobs toward relational autonomy grounded in youth agency, the revitalization of ibasho’ s functions, and the creation of social value.

This study reexamines the tendency to understand the post-coup pro- democracy movement solely through a narrative of suffering and sacrifice by focusing on young Myanmar participants in the civil disobedience movement (CDMers) living in exile in Mae Sot, a Thai border city. The coup not only deprived them of political rights but also shattered the sensory world of freedom, culture, and taste that had arisen during the democratization period. In the process of exile and subsequent settlement, taste functions not as mere consumption or escapism but as a life technique that regulates affect, “patches together” everyday life, and sustains revolu- tionary engagement. The practice of taste extends beyond personal recovery to an ethic of respecting others’ preferences and to forms of communal mutual care, while also intersecting with revolutionary support through donations, employment, and fundraising. For CDMers, pleasure and taste do not stand in opposition to revolution; rather, they constitute an everyday foundation that maintains the rhythm of revolutionary life at the intersec- tion where life and politics converge under the instability of exile.