{"id":2200318,"date":"2023-03-03T19:02:09","date_gmt":"2023-03-03T10:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/koreapro.org\/?p=2200318"},"modified":"2023-11-20T18:58:02","modified_gmt":"2023-11-20T09:58:02","slug":"video-games-are-the-latest-cultural-battleground-between-south-korea-and-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/koreapro.org\/2023\/03\/video-games-are-the-latest-cultural-battleground-between-south-korea-and-china\/","title":{"rendered":"Video games are the latest cultural battleground between South Korea and China"},"content":{"rendered":"
South Korea\u2019s National Assembly is set to vote on a bill targeting what many South Koreans believe to be Chinese distortions of their history and culture.<\/span><\/p>\n The bill <\/span>proposes<\/span><\/a> adding a member focused on historical issues to the country\u2019s <\/span>Game Rating and Administration Committee<\/span><\/a>. There\u2019s currently no legal process or consultative body dealing with such matters in South Korea.<\/span><\/p>\n CULTURAL APPROPRIATION<\/b><\/p>\n According to ruling People Power Party (PPP) lawmaker <\/span>Kim Seung-su<\/span><\/a>, the bill is a practical way to intercept China\u2019s cultural appropriation of Korean culture through video games.<\/span><\/p>\n Cultural appropriation has been a source of contention and heated arguments between South Koreans and Chinese for years. In one of the more recent examples, last year\u2019s Beijing Winter Olympics <\/span>opening ceremony<\/span><\/a> featured a performance with people wearing clothes representing China\u2019s various ethnic groups. One of those performers wore a hanbok, Korea\u2019s traditional attire.<\/span><\/p>\n Although the Chinese Embassy in Seoul issued a <\/span>public statement<\/span><\/a> clarifying that the Korean people living in China are one of the 56 ethnic groups that make up the country and that the performance was not an attempt to appropriate Korean culture, the incident still sparked outrage in South Korea.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n It even prompted Lee Jae-myung, the current leader of the opposition Democratic Party (DP) and then-presidential candidate, to <\/span>post<\/span><\/a> on his social media page, \u201cDo not covet others\u2019 culture. Oppose cultural appropriation.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n For South Koreans, China\u2019s cultural claims of its heritage or perceptions harken back to the <\/span>Northeast Asia Project<\/span><\/a>. A research project conducted by the Research Center for Chinese Borderland History and Geography, an institution affiliated with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), from 2002 to 2007, the project <\/span>referred<\/span><\/a> to Goguryeo as a \u201cregional kingdom of an ancient ethnic Chinese group.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Goguryeo is an ancient kingdom that spanned present-day North Korea, most of the South and into Manchuria, and both Korean states consider it a central part of their historical identity.<\/span><\/p>\n