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Alex Taek-Gwang Lee

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Alex Taek-Gwang Lee
OccupationProfessor
Academic background
Alma materPusan National University

University of Warwick

The University of Sheffield
Academic work
DisciplinePhilosophy and Cultural Critic
Sub-disciplineFrench and German Philosophy, Deleuze & Guattari and Post Media
InstitutionsKyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea

Alex Taek-Gwang Lee (born 29 February 1968) is a South Korean professor of philosophy and cultural studies. He is a faculty at the School of Communication and founding director of the Centre for Technology in Humanities at Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea.

He is a researcher and author, his specialties include French and German philosophy and its non-Western reception, Deleuze and Guattari, Korean cinema, popular culture(K-Wave), art, and politics. He has authored Communism After Deleuze, Colors of the Concepts: Philosophers on Paintings and others. He has co-edited a book 'The idea of Communism 3', with Slavoj Žižek. He also edited the book 'Deleuze, Guattari and the Schizoanalysis of Postmedia'.

Early life and education

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He was born on 29 February 1968 in Chilgok County, North Gyeongsang Province, South Korea.[citation needed]

He completed his Bachelor and master's degrees in English literature from Pusan National University, Korea. Later, he went to UK and done another MA in philosophy from University of Warwick and Doctorate in Philosophy and Comparative Literature, The University of Sheffield, UK.[1]

Work and reception

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Alex is a philosopher and cultural critic, working as a professor at School of Global Communication, Kyung Hee University, South Korea.[2][3][4][5] He is also a visiting professor at the Centre for Culture, Media and Governance at Jamia Millia Islamia (India),[6][1][4] the Centre for Applied Philosophy, Politics and Ethics at the University of Brighton (UK)[7] and Graduate School at The University of Santo Tomas (Philippines).[1]

He has worked on various philosophical themes and cultural issues, such as French and German philosophy and its non-Western reception, Korean cinema[8], popular culture, art, and politics.[9][10][11]

French and German philosophy: Deleuze and Guattari

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His studies focus mainly on 20th century thinkers. He discusses the concept of 'end of the history' in relation of South Korea.[12] Slavoj Žižek used his statement in this same context - Žižek writes, Lee suggests that if Alexander Kojève were alive today, he would see South Korea as a contemporary example of the “end of history,” just as Kojève once saw Stalinist Russia and later Japan as places that had reached a final, stable social order. Lee's point is subtle, as he implies that it is impossible to understand South Korea's position in the context of this “end of history” without considering North Korea. This is due to their interconnectedness and shared history.[13]

His research interest in communism and Deleuze's studies led him to write on these topics. He organised the Idea of Communism conference in Seoul, South Korea along with Alain Badiou and Slavoj Žižek. Later he edited the volume of The Idea of Communism 3 with Salvoz Zizek.[6][14][15] It also includes perspectives from across Asia, notably from Chinese scholar Wang Hui, who provides a regional perspective on communism at a time of global economic crisis and political upheaval.[16]

In the context of concept creation, Alex stand his position with the term 'Third World'. 'Third World' likely means ideas, concepts, or language that exist outside of the mainstream or established philosophical “territories”. He along with Deleuze and Guattari's concept deterritorialisation, deals in breaking the exist idea of concept creation.[17]

The Korean Issues

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The phrase "eschatological force," was introduced by Him in the context of the Korean War. It refers to a powerful, almost fateful presence of unresolved historical trauma that " haunts" the Korean Peninsula.[18] With this phrase, Lee means that- Koreans live in a state of contradiction—advanced yet constantly threatened by destruction. The ideological clash of the Korean War deeply shaped both nations, with the border symbolizing unresolved tensions. For Koreans, this "Cold War" remains dangerously alive, a fragile peace on the edge, as if the doomsday clock still ticks without a fresh battery.[19]

Lee discussed the Korean Civil War and the Cold War in South Korea as international issues. He suggested that these incidents were not just incidents but phenomena that started internationally, especially on 3 April 1948. From the perspective of clarifying the truth, April 3 should be internationalised.[20]

Alex Taek-Gwang Lee's work on Korean society and popular culture examines how South Korean people and media is changing it global image. He criticises the new face of capitalism, in issues of managing finances, young Koreans have been changed a lot. They believe in splurge. Because, in the economy, savings have not remained a guarantee for a better future, so, the trend of investing in the present is on the hike.[21] He challenges the establish notion with Korean culture and obscenity's by saying that mainstream Korean culture is highly moral, suggesting instead that it is merely an obscene fantasy often used as a scapegoat for such 'obscene' issues.[22]

Lee's book, Witch Frame, offers a compelling analysis of the origins of witches and contemporary witch hunts through the lens of frame theory. He delves into the underlying reasons behind these phenomena. The author views the witch framework as a fundamental tenet of modernity, and suggests that, although the concept of the witch has disappeared historically, the witch framework remains embedded in the logic of the modern state as a tool for defining specific goals.[23]

In addition, Lee provides insights into the evolution of trot (ppongjjak) music in South Korean culture, contrasting it with mainstream K-pop. While K-pop is commercialized and idol-focused, trot emphasizes musical skill and artistry, rooted deeply in Korean history. This connection to traditional culture gives trot enduring value, appealing to Koreans seeking cultural ties. Its adaptability has enabled trot's revival and continued relevance, even as other music genres come and go.[11] Korean cinema, and Korean drama become globalized products that reflect Korean society's ambitions, struggles, and identity in the modern world.

Alex Taek-Gwang Lee views Han Kang's Nobel Prize in Literature as a significant milestone for South Korean literature and feminism.[24] He sees it as a reflection of the growing influence of feminist movements in reshaping the literary landscape, moving male writers to the background. While he shares some criticisms of the Nobel Prize, he finds Han Kang's win particularly meaningful as she is the first female Asian writer to receive the honour. He also expresses hope that this achievement will encourage global readers to explore Asian literature more deeply.[24]

Alex views on K-Pop has also been recorded by Aljazeera in a short video documentary.[25]

Conference, lectures and papers

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In academic settings, Lee has delivered specials lectures and papers at conferences at universities and institutions such as Cornell University[26] (USA), University of the Philippines Baguio,[7] and Jamia Millia Islamia[27] (India).

His academic work has been published in many journals and books such as Deleuze and Guattari Studies-Edinburgh University Press Journal,[28] Angelica,[29] Kritike, Studies in Philosophy and Education-Springer[30] and others.

Member and association

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Lee is the founding member and in the advisory board of the Asia Theories Network.[31][6] He is also the International Board Member for Critical Island Studies Consortium.[32] He is also in the advisory board of the journal 'Symploke' where Ian Buchanan is associate editor and Jeffrey R. Di Leo is the editor-in-chief.[33] He is on international editorial board of UNITAS.[34]

Publication

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Books

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Editors

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  • The Idea of Communism 3:The Seoul Conference (co-edited with Salvoz Zizek), 2016; Verso (UK), ISBN 9781784783945[15]
  • Deleuze, Guattari and Schizoanalysis of Postmedia (co-edited with Joff Bradley and Manoj NY), 2023, Bloomsbury, (UK) ISBN 9781350180512[36]

Book Chapters

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  • 2025 “Literature as a Global Theory”, Theory as World Literature (edited by Jeffrey R. Di Leo and Thomas Oliver Beebee and published by Bloomsbury, UK), forthcoming[37]
  • 2024 “Lenin and Artificial Intelligence”, Lenin: The Heritage We (Don't) Renounce (edited by Hjalmar Jorge Joffre-Eichhorn and Patrick Anderson and published by Daraja Press, Canada)[38]
  • 2023 “Hegel and Netflix”, Outspoken: A Manifesto for the Twenty-First Century (edited by Adrian Parr and Santiago Zabala and published by McGill-Queen's University Press, Canada)[39][40]
  • 2021 “Worlding Cinema”, The Bloomsbury Handbook of World Theory (edited by Jeffrey R. Di Leo and Christian Moraru and published by Bloomsbury, UK)[41]
  • 2021 “Walter Benjamin, Gilles Deleuze, and Mickey Mouse: Animation in the Age of Technical Reproducibility”, Thinking with Animation (edited by Joff P.N. Bradley and Catherine Ju Yu Cheng and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing, UK)[42]
  • 2021 "The Ghosts of Civilized Violence", Conversations on Violence: An Anthology (edited by Brad Evans and Adrian Parr and published by Pluto Press)[40][10]
  • 2020 “The Specter of the 1930s in Asian Nation-Building: Global Fascism, Colonial Biopolitics, and the Origins of Modern Asia”, Back to the ’30s?: Recurring Crises of Capitalism, Liberalism, and Democracy (edited by Jeremy Rayner, Susan Falls, George Souvlis, and Taylor C. Nelms and published by Palgrave Macmillan, UK)[43]
  • 2018 “The Ghostly Presence of an Untranslated Book: The Korean Reception of Race, Nation, Class”, in Balibar/Wallerstein's Race, Nation, Class: Rereading a Dialogue for Our Time (edited by Manuela Bojadzijev and Katrin Klingan, published by Argument-Velag, Germany)[44]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c "ORCID". orcid.org. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  2. ^ Remoto, Danton (2024-10-26). "Multiple views on Han Kang's Nobel Prize for literature". The Manila Times. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  3. ^ Bloomsbury, The. "Alex Taek-Gwang Lee". The Bloomsbury.
  4. ^ a b "Alex Taek-GwangLee". Sublation Media. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  5. ^ Bradley, Joff P. N.; Kennedy, David (2021-05-13). Bernard Stiegler and the Philosophy of Education. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-000-35331-0.
  6. ^ a b c "Notes on Contributors". Deleuze and Guattari Studies. 15 (2): 318–319. May 2021. doi:10.3366/dlgs.2021.0441. ISSN 2398-9777.
  7. ^ a b "Alex Taek-Gwang Lee in UP Baguio". College of Social Sciences. 2023-08-10. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  8. ^ "SU Humanities Center hosts lectures by renowned cultural critic March 27-28 NEWS of the College of Arts & Sciences at Syracuse University". 2017-08-24. Archived from the original on 2017-08-24. Retrieved 2024-11-05.
  9. ^ Welt, Haus der Kulturen der (2021-07-23). "Alex Taek-Gwang Lee". HKW. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  10. ^ a b Evans, Brad; Parr, Adrian (2021). Conversations on Violence: An Anthology. Pluto Press. ISBN 978-0-7453-4168-2. JSTOR j.ctv1h0nv1c.
  11. ^ a b Balmont, James (2022-06-08). "'It's like oxygen – it's everywhere!' Why Korea is hot for trot, the cheesiest pop imaginable". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  12. ^ Žižek, Slavoj (2024-11-02). "We already live in the end of the world – Sri Lanka Guardian". slguardian.org. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  13. ^ Žižek, Slavoj (2024-10-31). Against Progress. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1-350-51587-1.
  14. ^ Lee, Alex Taek-Gwang (2025-02-06). Communism After Deleuze. Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 978-1-350-47403-1.
  15. ^ a b "The Idea of Communism 3". Verso. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  16. ^ "The Idea of Communism 3". Verso. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  17. ^ Gray, Chantelle (May 2021). "A Thousand Plateaus : 40 Years of Revolutionary Philosophy". Deleuze and Guattari Studies. 15 (2): 173–177. doi:10.3366/dlgs.2021.0434. ISSN 2398-9777.
  18. ^ Wright, Brendan (2023-04-03). "Kinship Killings, Taesal and Biologized State Violence During the Korean Civil War". Journal of Genocide Research. 25 (2): 157–171. doi:10.1080/14623528.2021.1986273. ISSN 1462-3528.
  19. ^ "Histories of Violence: The Ghosts of Civilized Violence". Los Angeles Review of Books. 2019-10-07. Retrieved 2024-11-04.
  20. ^ 기자, 조수진 (2022-07-28). "4·3, 이념 논쟁 아닌 국제적 담론이 되기 위해선?". 제주투데이 (in Korean). Retrieved 2024-11-05.
  21. ^ Kim, Jeongmin (2019). "Why Young Koreans Love to Splurge: Sometimes blowing your paycheck can be a rational choice". Foreign Policy (233): 3–5. ISSN 0015-7228. JSTOR 26750361.
  22. ^ "왜 한국문화는 음란한가". 한겨레21. Retrieved 2024-11-05.
  23. ^ Young-hyun, Kim (21 February 2021). ""오늘날 우리는 마녀이자 마녀심판자"". Yonhap News.
  24. ^ a b Remoto, Danton (2024-10-26). "Multiple views on Han Kang's Nobel Prize for literature". The Manila Times. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  25. ^ McBride, Rob. "K-pop controversy: Questions over BTS mandatory military service". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  26. ^ "Alex Taek-Gwang Lee, "Humanities and Plastic Surgery: The Logic of Human Capital in South Korea"". Cornell. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  27. ^ "Jamia to complete 100 years, organises World Congress on Deleuze and Guattari". India Today. 2020-02-15. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  28. ^ Taek-Gwang Lee, Alex (August 2024). "Deleuze's Unwritten Marx". Deleuze and Guattari Studies. 18 (3): 319–332. doi:10.3366/dlgs.2024.0560. ISSN 2398-9777.
  29. ^ "Publishers Panel". anglica-journal.com. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  30. ^ "A Pedagogy of the Parasite". ouci.dntb.gov.ua (in Ukrainian). Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  31. ^ "Board & Partners". Asia Theories Network. 2017-03-30. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  32. ^ "Critical Island Studies Consortium –". Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  33. ^ "Editors". symplokē. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  34. ^ "UNITAS Journal - Editorial Board". UNITAS Journal. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
  35. ^ "Colors of the Concepts". AnthemPress. Retrieved 2024-11-05.
  36. ^ "Deleuze, Guattari and the Schizoanalysis of Postmedia (Schizoanalytic Applications) (Paperback)". Left Bank Books. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  37. ^ Di Leo, Jeffrey R., ed. (2025). Theory as world literature. Literatures as world literature. New York: Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 979-8-7651-0868-0.
  38. ^ ROAPE (2024-02-06). "Lenin The Heritage we (Don't) Renounce". ROAPE. Retrieved 2024-11-02.
  39. ^ Outspoken: A Manifesto for the Twenty-First Century. McGill-Queen's University Press. 2023. doi:10.2307/jj.3078900. ISBN 978-0-2280-1692-2.
  40. ^ a b Evans, Brad; Parr, Adrian (2021). Conversations on Violence: An Anthology. Pluto Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctv1h0nv1c.21. ISBN 978-0-7453-4168-2. JSTOR j.ctv1h0nv1c.
  41. ^ Moraru, Christian; Di Leo, Jeffrey R., eds. (2022). The Bloomsbury Handbook of World Theory. doi:10.5040/9781501361975. ISBN 978-1-5013-6194-4. Retrieved 2024-11-02. {{cite book}}: |website= ignored (help)
  42. ^ Bradley, Joff P. N.; Cheng, Catherine Ju-Yu, eds. (2021). Thinking with Animation. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publisher. ISBN 978-1-5275-7166-2.
  43. ^ Lee, Alex Taek-Gwang (2020), Rayner, Jeremy; Falls, Susan; Souvlis, George; Nelms, Taylor C. (eds.), "The Specter of the 1930s in Asian Nation-Building: Global Fascism, Colonial Biopolitics, and the Origins of Modern Asia", Back to the ‘30s? : Recurring Crises of Capitalism, Liberalism, and Democracy, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 331–346, doi:10.1007/978-3-030-41586-0_17, ISBN 978-3-030-41586-0, retrieved 2024-11-02
  44. ^ Bojadzijev, Manuela; Klingan, Katrin; Balibar, Étienne, eds. (2018). Balibar / Wallerstein's Race, nation, class: rereading a dialogue for our times. Hamburg : Berlin: Argument Verlag ; Haus der Kulturen der Welt. ISBN 978-3-86754-511-2.
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