@article{ART003220588},
author={Kong Im Soon},
title={The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s},
journal={Journal of Popular Narrative},
issn={1738-3188},
year={2025},
volume={31},
number={2},
pages={167-204}
TY - JOUR
AU - Kong Im Soon
TI - The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s
JO - Journal of Popular Narrative
PY - 2025
VL - 31
IS - 2
PB - The Association of Popular Narrative
SP - 167
EP - 204
SN - 1738-3188
AB - The forced discontinuation of Yadam and True Story under the authority of Military Government Ordinance No. 88 marked a symbolic moment in the censorship of popular magazines in late-1950s South Korea. However, this incident was neither sudden nor exceptional. Prior to it, other magazines such as True Story(실화), Interest(흥미), Youth(청춘), Couple(부부), and Yahwa(야화) had also been banned or suspended on grounds of violating public morals. Throughout the decade, the expansion of popular print culture and the persistence of state censorship existed side by side. Against this backdrop, this paper revisits the category of “literary offense”(필화 사건) not as an exclusive domain of mainstream journalistic media, but as one applicable also to popular magazines.
Chapters Two and Three examine the obscenity controversy surrounding the two subgenres—true story and yadam-which were directly implicated in the Yadam and True Story incident. The severe disciplinary response to this magazine was closely tied to the controversy around its sensational advertisement, “Has 60% of Seoul’s maidens already lost it?”, which promoted what came to be known as the “Korean Kinsey Report” before its release. The clash between the magazine’s defense of scientific sexual statistics and the state’s denunciation of it as fabrication exemplifies the asymmetrical power dynamic between popular print culture and government censorship. Nonetheless, this tension gave rise to a sexualized economy of gossip-oriented exposé narratives, as discussed in Chapter Two.
Chapter Three turns to the yadam genre, highlighting its erotic recombinations involving taboo, crime, the female body, and the grotesque. Through a close reading of Choi Jong-seon’s serialized tales, the paper argues that the success of these specialized yadam writers represented a culturally resonant yet marginalized current of the 1950s. The final chapter concludes by noting how, even into the 1960s, popular magazines continued to grapple with the shifting boundaries of permissibility and censorship under new campaigns of obscenity and purification.
KW - Yadam and True Story;Obscenity Controversy;Censorship in 1950s Korea;Literary Offense(필화 사건);Gossip-Based Exposé Narrative;True Story;Choi Jong-seon’s Erotic Yadam
DO -
UR -
ER -
Kong Im Soon. (2025). The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s. Journal of Popular Narrative, 31(2), 167-204.
Kong Im Soon. 2025, "The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s", Journal of Popular Narrative, vol.31, no.2 pp.167-204.
Kong Im Soon "The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s" Journal of Popular Narrative 31.2 pp.167-204 (2025) : 167.
Kong Im Soon. The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s. 2025; 31(2), 167-204.
Kong Im Soon. "The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s" Journal of Popular Narrative 31, no.2 (2025) : 167-204.
Kong Im Soon. The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s. Journal of Popular Narrative, 31(2), 167-204.
Kong Im Soon. The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s. Journal of Popular Narrative. 2025; 31(2) 167-204.
Kong Im Soon. The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s. 2025; 31(2), 167-204.
Kong Im Soon. "The Yadam and True Story Censorship Case and the Obscenity Controversy Surrounding Two Subgenres in 1950s" Journal of Popular Narrative 31, no.2 (2025) : 167-204.
