Cinema, censorship, and consumerism: mass culture and discursive transformations in film censorship in late 1970s South Korea

Abstract

ABSTRACT The emergence of ‘erotic films’ (ero yeonghwa) in the 1980s has generally been discussed in the context of the Chun Doo-hwan regime’s ‘3S Policy,’ a series of policy changes that relaxed the stringent censorship regulations first implemented under Park Chung Hee’s military rule. Rather than a distinct rupture, this article argues that these changes were part of a larger shift in the perception of films that began in the late 1970s – a new conception of films as a commercial product. Whereas film audiences had long been dismissed as faceless masses with ‘vulgar’ tastes by both film personnel and government officials, the growing commercial power of films underscored the importance of the audience as consumers. Through a close reading of various newspapers and Performance Ethics (Gongyeon yulli), the official newsletter of the Public Performance Ethics Committee, this article traces the development of various discourses around film, the public audience, and mass culture. Ultimately, this article argues for a more nuanced approach towards examining censorship practices by looking beyond the state and its regulatory institutions and accounting for an array of continuously shifting discourses around medium-specific characteristics, structural changes in society and economics, and the general public.