Disciplinary Images of “Korean-Ness”

The purpose of this study is to generate complicated conversationsabout identity and culture with an examination of various panoptic technologies,including separation, invisibility, control, and productivity. Drawn from Foucault’spanopticism, the author examines how discipline operates as a controlling power inseveral Korean institutions of schools, the seminary, and the military. Thisautobiographical self-reflexive research explores disciplinary images of “Korean-ness,”which has been discursively and materially constructed and embodied via panoptictechnologies. These counter-narratives do not support for the advancement of theuniversalized version of the “Korean” identity. Rather, the author theorizes Koreanidentity as discursive practices in modern power structures, while dealing with the“political ‘double bind’” of (a) individualization through instruments of discipline and(b) the reinforcement of Confucian ideal of proper human relationships. This articleprovides educators with a lens to examine the ways in which disciplinary power/knowledgeoperates to control students’ ways of thinking, behaving, and living, in relation to“self,” “others,” and institutions. By opening possibilities to examine culturalidentity beyond discovering “true” self, the author emphasizes the analyses of power inits examination of cultural sameness/difference in multicultural curriculumstudies