@article{ART003235380},
author={},
title={The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye},
journal={The Journal of Korean drama and theatre},
issn={1225-7729},
year={2025},
number={85},
pages={213-258}
TY - JOUR
AU -
TI - The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye
JO - The Journal of Korean drama and theatre
PY - 2025
VL - null
IS - 85
PB - The Learned Society Of Korean Drama And Theatre
SP - 213
EP - 258
SN - 1225-7729
AB - This study examines three Korean television dramas from the 1990s that center on issues of aging and care. The dramas include Where Should We Go?(1992) and Life(1995), two three-part special dramas written by Kim Su-hyeon and aired on SBS, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye(1996), a four-part special drama written by Noh Hee-kyung and aired on MBC. Through these works, the study explores how the vulnerability associated with old age and the burdens of caregiving are represented in Korean television during this period. Recent Korean TV dramas have begun to portray aging and death in more concrete terms, imagining alternative forms of care beyond the confines of the family. Prior to this shift, however, care was largely relegated to the background, taken for granted as a responsibility of women within the family and rarely addressed as a social issue. In the 1990s, care began to be problematized and brought to the forefront in the form of special drama series. Kim Su-hyeon’s Where Should We Go? and Life scrutinize the process through which the caregiver is selected, highlighting the burdens placed on women in the family and inviting reflection on care as a broader social issue. Where Should We Go? focuses on how care labor is assigned to a daughter-in-law and explores the moment in which an untransferable relationship between caregiver and recipient is formed. Life deals with the ethical dilemmas involved in the decision to institutionalize a family member requiring long-term care. Meanwhile, Noh Hee-kyung’s The Most Beautiful Goodbye explores maternal love and “labor of love” through the figure of a woman who becomes both the provider and recipient of care. These television dramas portray the dependent condition of elderly care recipients in concrete ways, allowing viewers to recognize the weight borne by caregivers. However, the typical modes of representation employed in these works simultaneously produce audiovisual shock, naturalize women’s care labor, and impose particular notions of vulnerability onto the subjects being represented. In order to move beyond such “fantasies” of care, we must seek an ethics of affective equality that not only attends to caregivers but also imagines the position of care recipients.
KW - Affective Equality;Aging;Care;Dementia Narrative;Kim Su-hyeon;Life;love labour;Noh Hee-kyung;The Most Beautiful Goodbye;Vulnerability;Where Should We Go?
DO -
UR -
ER -
. (2025). The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye. The Journal of Korean drama and theatre, 85, 213-258.
. 2025, "The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye", The Journal of Korean drama and theatre, no.85, pp.213-258.
"The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye" The Journal of Korean drama and theatre 85 pp.213-258 (2025) : 213.
. The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye. 2025; 85 : 213-258.
. "The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye" The Journal of Korean drama and theatre no.85(2025) : 213-258.
. The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye. The Journal of Korean drama and theatre, 85, 213-258.
. The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye. The Journal of Korean drama and theatre. 2025; 85 213-258.
. The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye. 2025; 85 : 213-258.
. "The Gendering of Elder Care in 1990s Korean Television Dramas — Focusing on Where Should We Go?, Life, and The Most Beautiful Goodbye" The Journal of Korean drama and theatre no.85(2025) : 213-258.
