아줌마와 그들의 디지털미디어 사용에 관한 이야기, The story about ajummas and their use of new media (e.g. smartphones)
This category is for readers who is familiar with communicating in English than Korean
Image from <http://m.blog.naver.com/eogkstkfkd07/220139510037>
Happy Gaechunjeol (National Foundation Day of Korea)!!! I couldn’t write blog entries last few days because of many things that I have to finish by this month. But I will post blog entries about smart Ajumma asap. ^__^
Nishimoto Kimoko (87). A 87-year-old Japanese grandmother stages herself In twisted selfies. In her portrait photos, I can find humor, creativity and her life. I am more than happy to see the selfies of grandmothers. I hope there are any selfie-lovers of grandmothers in Korea as well.
Also this grandmother is now living with her friend (humanoid robot, Pepper). Such a cool grandmother!! (All the images below are from
(All the images below are from http://m.media.daum.net/m/media/world/newsview/20160921163919512
I saw very good photos that were under the title of ‘Mobile moment’ from Facebook today. So I use that title for today’s blog entry. 페이스북 친구가 ‘Mobile moment’라고 제목을 붙여 올린 모바일사용자들의 모습을 담은 사진을 보고 나도 우리 아줌마들의 모바일모먼트 사진을 올려보았다. 개인의 프라이버시를 위해 얼굴은 모자이크 처리를 했다. 다양하게 모바일모먼트를 즐기는 우리의 엄마, 이웃, 친구인 대한민국의 아줌마들 모두 화이팅! 멋지고 아름답습니다!
Ajumma’s Mobile moment, Seoul, South Korea, August 2016
이미지 출처: 조선일보 (http://news.chosun.com/)
어렸을때 티비에서는 한창 ‘썰렁 시리즈’가 인기였었다. 말그대로 썰렁개그는 웃지도 울지도 못하는, 리액션을 어떻게 해야하면 좋을지 고민하게 만드는 ‘썰렁’해지는 개그를 일컫는 말이었다. 말장난을 하거나 허무하게 끝이나는 이야기를 포함하는 썰렁개그 혹은 허무개그는 그렇게 한때 사람들 사이에서 인기였었다. 다양한 종류의 ‘~시리즈’가 시대를 타고 만들어지고 또 다시 새로운것에 밀려나기를 반복하면서, 내가 어렸을때 깔깔대고 좋아하던 그 ‘썰렁개그’도 잊혀졌었다. 하지만, 요즘 다시 그 ‘썰렁개그’는 ‘아재개그’라는 새로운 이름으로 재등장했다.
아주비의 경상도 방언으로, 작은아버지의 뜻으로 사용되어졌다가 지금은 아저씨를 일컫는 말로 쓰이고 있는 ‘아재’. 아저씨를 낮추어부르는 말이라고 알려져 있지만 사실 그렇지는 않다. 또한, 인터넷에서의 ‘아저씨’회원들을 아재라고 부르고 있으며 특히 야구팬을 일컫는 인터넷용어이기도 하다. 대부분의 ‘국민학교 세대’는 아재에 속한다고 볼 수 있다. (30대 중후반 이후)
이러한 ‘아재’들이 올해부터 갑자기 인기를 끌고 있다. 몇몇 ‘아재’세대 방송/연예인들이 나와서 하는 썰렁한 개그를 ‘아재개그’라고 칭하기 시작했고, ‘아재말투’, ‘아재패션’등 ‘아재’들에게 관심이 쏟아지기 시작한 것이다. 얼마전에 우연히 보게된 한 시사교양 프로그램에서는 ‘아재들이 뜬다’라는 제목으로 50이 넘었어도 젊은이들 못지않은 패션센스와 몸매를 자랑하는 아재들에 관한 영상물을 보여주었다. 현재 대부분의 (우리나라) 미디어에서 보여지고 있는 아재의 이미지는 낡고,촌스럽고,뒤떨어지고 교양없는 기존의 ‘꼰대’ 혹은 ‘개저씨’의 이미지에서 발전한 푸근하고, 정이가고, 열심히 살아가고, 나름대로 그들만의 문화와 유머코드를 가지고 있는 친근한 이미지의 ‘아재’가 대부분이다.
가족을 위해 사회에 나가서 돈을벌고 (물론 엄마도 번다), 일에치이고 돈에치이고 사회에치이고 때로는 가족에게 치일지라도 썰렁개그와 소주한잔으로 웃어 넘기는 아재들의 모습이 개저씨의 모습으로 그려지지 않고 긍정적으로 보여지고 있는것은 매우 반가워할 일임에 분명하다. (물론 세상에는 아직도 개저씨가 있다, 성별과 나이를 떠나서 ‘인간쓰레기’는 아직도 어디에나 있다) 하지만 아쉬운점이 있다. 이러한 ‘아재문화’ 그리고 ‘아재’에 대한 이미지는 어떻게 말하면 긍정적으로 보여지고 받아들여지고 있는데, 왜 아줌마는 아직도???
왜 아줌마는 안되고 아재는 되는것인가? 아줌마라는 뜻에 부정적인 의미가 있다고 말하는 사람들은 뭔가 뜻을 잘못 알고 있는듯한데, 사실 아줌마도 ‘작은어머니’라는 뜻이었고, 그 이후로 친인척이나 가까운 중년여성에게 쓰는 호칭이었다. 미디어에서 그리고 우리 사회에서 잘못 불려지고 삐딱하게 받아들여진 ‘아줌마’라는 호칭은 아무 잘못이 없다. 아저씨는 괜찮고 왜 아줌마는 안되는건가? 꼰대 아저씨는 ‘아재’가 되었는데 왜 아줌마는 아직도 불편한 아줌마로 남아있어야 하는가? 아줌마라는 호칭은 무례하고 아주머니나 사모님이라는 표현이 더 고급스럽고 예의를 갖춘 표현이라는 생각은 어디에서 시작된 것인가 도대체?
우리나라는 ‘호칭’이 매우 중요한 사회라는 걸 안다. 아직도 ‘아줌마’는 티비에서, 길에서, 우리의 삶속에서 불려지고 싶지 않은 호칭임은 사실이다. (나와 몇몇 사람들을 제외하고) 하지만 아줌마는 아무 죄가 없다. 아줌마에 대한 인식도 아재들처럼 변화해야 한다고 생각한다. 아니 이미 변했어야 했다. 왜 아재는 아재가 되는데 아줌마는 아주머니나 사모님이 되어야 하는가? 내 논문에서 아줌마라는 단어를 제목으로 쓴걸 매우 불쾌해했던 어떤 사람이 생각난다. 논문에 대한 내용을 이야기 하면서 그저 아줌마라는 단어자체가 같은 중년여성으로써 불쾌하니 지워줬으면 한다는 의견을 줬던 그 사람은, 이미 자신과같은 중년여성인 ‘아줌마’에 대한 편견을 가지고 있는 것이다. 한국 중년여성에 대해 부정적인 시각을 한국밖의 사람들에게 보여줄 수 있는 내 논문은 문제가 있다고 이야기 했던 그 사람은 아줌마에 대한 피해의식을 갖고 있음이 분명하다. 아줌마에 대한 스테레오타이핑으로 (촌스럽고 무식하고 무례한 ‘전업주부’ 라고 표현했음) 같은 ‘아줌마’가 다른 ‘아줌마’를 디스하고 있는것이라고 밖에는 볼 수가 없다. 아줌마는 무식하고 아주머니는 우아한가? 무식과 우아함을 나누는 기준은 무엇이며 또한 왜 무조건 우아함만이 우위가 될 수 있는건지 나는 도무지 알 수가 없다. 덧붙여, 사회에 진출해 하루하루를 전쟁처럼 살고 있는 워킹맘만 힘든게 아니라, 전업주부들도 그렇게 힘들고 치열하게 하루하루를 보내고 있음을 반드시 알아줬으면 좋겠다. 그리고 아직도 우리사회는 워킹맘 뿐만이 아니라 전업주부들에게도 불공평한 사회이다. 워킹맘보다 전업주부가 못하다는 생각은 집어치워주길. 제발.
Recent heat waves have lasted almost one month in South Korea. We had to endure the tropical nights. In this heat I sank into a state of torpor. I must confess, I couldn’t do anything during last one month include blogging. But there’s an end to everything and I finally could smell a bit of ‘autumn’ from the wind during the last weekend. No more heat waves and I don’t need to endure and worry about the tropical nights anymore. Autumn has come at last I see, smell and feel.
And I got a new idea to start as a part of my personal research project from this September. (I know there’re so many things that I tried to do last few months and I finally found this idea as a new project that I will be doing for next few months) I will connect two different time and spaces through using digital mobile devices or social media. This will be about a Korean woman who lived a life of extreme ups and downs. I will explain more about this new project in the next blog post.
Autumn has come at last and hot summer has gone.
I found this photo from one of my twitter friends today. These two ajummas put their mobile phone on the triport and watching TV through DMB (Digital Multimedia Broadcasting) while they’re travelling in the subway in Seoul. They share the earphones as well.
I already wrote about how the subway is important for Seoulite’s daily life in my Master’s thesis that is called ‘Mobile Bang (2010)’. The subway shouldn’t be considered as just a sort of public transport. Rather it means a lot more for people in Seoul or South Korea. I call it as a Mobile Bang (room in English) and commuters do various things in the subway especially through uaing their smartphones while they’re travelling.
We’re now having very hot and humid days in South Korea (35c/70-80 % humidity). People want to find any place where they can avoid hot and humid weather. The subway could be one of those places I think. So I really love this photo and want to share these Smart Ajummas in Mobile Bang with you.
Thank you for my friend (from twitter) who allowed me to use this photo for this blog.
I can hear so many ajummas call other middle-aged women as ‘Ajumma’. For example, middle-aged women customers (ajummas) call other middle-aged women sellers, “Ajumma! How much is this?”. But when seller ajummas call customer ajummas, “Ajumma! Try some our Kimchi!”, customer ajummas feel uncomfortable. (I experienced so many times these situations when I went to market to buy something) In fact, the seller ajummas never call customer ajummas as ‘Ajumma’. Never!
This is irony because ajummas call other ajummas as an ajumma but those ajummas don’t want to be called as an ajumma by others include ajummas.
Why? What’s wrong with that?
I found some art project about ajummas. These exhibitions were already over but I would like share some images and webpage links with anyone who are interested in art project about ajummas.
1.아줌마 부루스 展/ Ajumma Blues
(click the image to visit the website)
2.괜찮아 잘될거야 조진성/It will be okay by Jin Sung Cho
(click the image to visit the website)
3.연극 ‘뽀글이 아줌마 봉숙이’/The play ‘Curly hair ajumma, Bong-Sook’
(click the image to visit the website)
I keep thinking about making any ‘art’ project about ajumma but I need some more time. The project should be related to my previous video, ‘Digital Ppal-let-ter’.
As I mentioned how the first-birthday party (Dol Jan-chi) is important in Korea, most of parents (especially mothers) prepare the birthday party table with all their hearts for their birthday baby and the guests. At the birthday party, the party host (parents) share their baby’s growing diary during last 1 year through showing photos and a video. Furthermore, various interactive activities about their baby between the guests and the host such as quiz bring the guests to enjoy the baby’s first-birthday party better. Yes, this is a predictable baby’s first-birthday party even though you never experience it in Korea. (because birthday party is birthday party!)
But, one thing that I would like to introduce to you today is, there is an online first-birthday party in Korea today! The online first-birthday party (Online Dol Jan-chi) is literally means a birthday party for a baby who became 1 year old in an online space such as blog and social media. This online first-birthday party is now the trend among young Korean mums. Once they have the offline first-birthday party, then they celebrate their babies’ first-birthday party in online spaces (e.g. their blogs). For the offline birthday party, the guests are mostly their family members, colleagues and anyone who are very close to the baby’s parents. However, our mums and ajummas are now smart Ajummas (or smart mums)! They frequently cross the online and offline spaces through using the Internet connection and digital mobile devices such as smartphones in their everyday lives. These smart mums and ajummas enrich their networks wider and enjoy daily lives better through having unconstrained and borderless communication with their contacts in both online and offline spaces. Thus, the online first-birthday party (online Dol Jan-chi) is held for mums’ contacts whom are mostly ‘blog neighbours’. (blog neighbours= bloggers become neighbours through communicating in blog space, it is similar to follower or friends)
On online first-birthday party day, the host informs the date and time for the party through a blog post or a message. The party goes usually for 24 hours or few days. Then what the guests do or how do they enjoy the online party? It is very simple. The guests visit the blog and then they will watch a video or photos of baby’s growing diary for last one year. And usually there is a special event for the guests such as a quiz or leaving message for a baby on the blog. Once they write answers for the quiz or left birthday messages for the baby on the blog, the host (parents) pick some guests randomly to give lucky gifts. (Lucky gifts for the online first-birthday party are various such as a mobile voucher (Starbucks drink voucher), baby goods, cosmetics, movie tickets and etc.) The guests for this online first-birthday party are mostly ‘mums’ or ‘ajummas’ today, so the lucky gifts are prepared for especially for mums.
Online first-birthday party (online Dol Jan-chi) will be proliferating continuously with the use of digital mobile technology is pervasive in our everyday lives, especially mums and ajummas in Korea. I think this (online first-birthday party [online Dol Jan-chi] could be explained as the digital remediation. However, it should be developed continuously. In other words,this kind of Korean traditional culture should be recreated and developed more to establish the unique Korean culture in online space rather than repeating the same thing (e.g.birthday party/online birthday party) by only changing the spaces (online or offline). Then we will have distinct traditional Korean culture that exist in online and offline (or in between online and offline). These two culture that are in different spaces develop their characters differently (because of the difference of spaces) but still, they were derived from the same root.
What do you feel about the first-birthday party? Of course, I don’t remember my first-birthday party but I do know my parents, grandparents and anyone who knew me came to the party to celebrate my first-birthday party almost thirty something years ago. We call it ‘Dol Jan-chi’ in Korean which means Dol is for first birthday and Jan-chi is for party. On first-birthday party, mothers (and fathers as well) prepare the special feast table, Dol-sang. On the Dol-sang, usually a book, money, rice, noodle, jujube, a pencil, thread are placed beforehand. When parents seat the baby in front of the table, the baby picks up one of the objects for fun, which helps the family to foretell the baby’s future. For example. if the baby picks thread, it means she or he will live a long life. There is a traditional Korean style Dol-sang for the baby’s first-birthday party, but mothers also do prepare the modern type of Dol-sang in these days. As other countries (I experienced that Australian people also think the first-birthday part is important like as Korean people) think the first-birthday party is important because the baby grows well last 12 months (1 year) and the parents also hope their baby lives well for the rest of her (or his) life. At the same time, the parents want to share the happiness with the guests and express appreciation to the guests as well. So they share the food that the parents prepared for and the guests give words of blessing to the birthday baby.
Like this, the first-birthday party is a big thing for the parents and the baby. So they try to prepare the ‘best’ birthday party for their baby and the guests. In my case, my grandma and mum prepared all the food at home for lots of guests. Yes, it was the home party which is very classic and traditional style of the first-birthday party. At that time (about 30 something years ago) this kind of first-birthday party was the only and common thing for everyone. How about today?
Some of my friends got babies and whenever I saw the photos of the first-birthday party on the Instagram, it is quite different from my birthday party. These days, the birthday table becomes more fancy (e.g. matching colours with dishes, flowers and props on the table) and the parents also prepare the ‘online first-birthday party’ besides the actual birthday party (offline birthday party).
In 2006, there was a service for a party given to a hundred-day-old baby in Cyworld. Similar to the first-birthday party (Dol Jan-chi), the hundredth day since the baby was born is important day to celebrate in Korea. Usually, this 100th day party isn’t as big as the first-birthday party but the parents still prepare the ‘white rice cake’ for 100 people includes their family, neighbours, friends or anyone they know. For the baby’s 100th day, Cyworld provided a service for the parents who wanted to celebrate their baby’s 100th day through Cyworld in 2006. Through using the baby Cyworld (specially designed for the parents who want to have online space for their baby), the parents were able to celebrate their baby’s birthday with their Cyworld Il-chon (Cyworld’s friends). Also, Cyworld gave 100 white rice cake for baby’s 100th day birthday, so the parents could send cyber-rice cake item to their fiends in Cyworld. With this cyber-rice cake, people could decorate their mini hompy. (It is common thing to distribute 100 white rice cake to people on baby’s 100th day birthday in Korea. People believe that distributing the white rice cake will bring the baby’s healthy life)
–I couldn’t find any image reference of the white rice cake item on Cyworld and the baby Cyworld couldn’t be found anymore.
Image from SK communications, <http://www.newswire.co.kr/newsRead.php?no=123837>
Blog post about ‘online first-birthday party’ will be uploaded soon.
Yesterday, the bus tickets to Sokcho (a city close to the border with North Korea) were almost sold out. The news about Pokemon Go was rapidly spread out to people in Korea through various social media. Actually, it was impossible to play that game because of some issues of using Google maps in South Korea. But, Pokemon is found in Sokcho!!!
As you can see the map above, the yellow areas are restricted to play Pokemon Go but the pink triangle zone (Sokcho) is the only location that people do catch Pokemon in South Korea. Sokcho is too close to the border of North Korea, so some experts explained that Sokcho has not been classified as South Korea territory. Luckily (maybe?) we are now allowed to play Pokemon Go in South Korea but we have to go to Sokcho to play it. It takes almost 3 hours by car or bus from Seoul to Sokcho. But people are now heading to Sokcho to meet Pokemon through using their smartphones.
In accordance with the global Pokemon Go fever, the city hall of Sokcho prepared the Pokemon special package hastily. It provides the map of free wifi zone for Pokemon Go players who visit Sokcho city on its Facebook page and Twitter account. (see https://www.facebook.com/dreamsokcho/) Also there is a Pokemon Go team page (https://pokemongoclankorea.herokuapp.com) that allows Korean Pokemon Go players to join three different team group from all over the world to share information about Pokemon Go such as game tips.
Free wifi map by Sokcho city
And the social commerce such as Tmon (ticketmonster.co.kr) sells the special shuttle bus package from Seoul to Sokcho for Pokemon Go hunters. People can purchase cheaper price of shuttle bus tickets through this social commerce website by using their smartphones.
Tmon’s special shuttle bus package for Pokemon Go in Sokcho, image from (www.ticketmonster.co.kr)
My timeline of Twitter is now all about Pokemon Go in Korea. It’s been only 1 day since people have found Pokemon Go is available in South Korea (Sokcho). There will be more stories and photos will be coming continuously for sure. So far, it is very interesting and exciting to see this unexpected AR (augmented reality) mobile game phenomenon in South Korea because we couldn’t expect that we can meet Pokemon in South Korea at all! I will keep reporting the news about Pokemon Go in Sokcho. (The bus tickets were already sold out for this coming weekend…you know what this means…)
I cannot go to Sokcho right now but I still can see and read other hunters’ stories and photos through social media. Oh!!! and I can’t catch Pokemon because they didn’t visit Seoul for this time, but I can ‘find’ or ‘catch’ Yakult Ajumma through using Yakult Ajumma app on my smartphone.
d-:
스마트 아줌마 Smart Ajumma 