@article{ART003260641},
author={Moon-woo LEE},
title={Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom},
journal={Journal of Popular Narrative},
issn={1738-3188},
year={2025},
volume={31},
number={3},
pages={103-144}
TY - JOUR
AU - Moon-woo LEE
TI - Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom
JO - Journal of Popular Narrative
PY - 2025
VL - 31
IS - 3
PB - The Association of Popular Narrative
SP - 103
EP - 144
SN - 1738-3188
AB - This paper examines lesbian romances depicted in three films set in colonial Kyungsung—The Silenced, The Handmaiden, and Phantom—and explores how these relationships imagine alternative forms of the nation.
While many works that reconstruct colonial Kyungsung often merge the historical background of colonial Korea with heterosexual romance, women therein have typically been objectified, serving as passive figures who either await rescue or function as catalysts for men’s return to the nation. Such “colonial romance” articulate imperial struggle and patriotic duty but lack visions of new nation. By contrast, the three films discussed here foreground relationships between women outside heterosexual structures. The Silenced is read through queer-horror and SF imaginations, where the final fantasy scene envisions a promiscuous caring community of human and nonhuman others as a potential form of new nation. The Handmaiden presents the return to a lesbian nation through the symmetrical imagery of women’s bodies, particularly in the enclosed ship cabin sex scene that erases class, ethnicity, and individuality. The Phantom, while echoing the “colonial romance” structure by portraying lesbian independence fighters, reveals a movement toward the post-queernation sustained through solidarity between queer and non-queer subjects suggesting a direction aligned with intersectional feminism.
In doing so, this study underscores the significance of lesbian romances in reimagining both decolonial possibilities and alternative nations, thereby expanding the scope of queer film studies.
KW - Colonial Kyungsung;Lesbian Colonial Romance;The Silenced;The Handmaiden;The Phantom;Promiscuous Caring Community;Lesbian Nation;Post-Queernation
DO -
UR -
ER -
Moon-woo LEE. (2025). Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom. Journal of Popular Narrative, 31(3), 103-144.
Moon-woo LEE. 2025, "Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom", Journal of Popular Narrative, vol.31, no.3 pp.103-144.
Moon-woo LEE "Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom" Journal of Popular Narrative 31.3 pp.103-144 (2025) : 103.
Moon-woo LEE. Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom. 2025; 31(3), 103-144.
Moon-woo LEE. "Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom" Journal of Popular Narrative 31, no.3 (2025) : 103-144.
Moon-woo LEE. Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom. Journal of Popular Narrative, 31(3), 103-144.
Moon-woo LEE. Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom. Journal of Popular Narrative. 2025; 31(3) 103-144.
Moon-woo LEE. Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom. 2025; 31(3), 103-144.
Moon-woo LEE. "Colonial Kyungsung, Lesbian Romance, and the Imagination of a New Nation: Focusing on The Silenced, The Handmaiden and The Phantom" Journal of Popular Narrative 31, no.3 (2025) : 103-144.
