Lecture: to be a citizen in u-Korea

Yesterday I gave a lecture for the Master's Program of Civil Society Studies at University of Jyväskylä. I talked about the role of the citizen in the South Korean ubiquitous society vision. See the slides here.

Brief points of the lecture:

• Korea is a country of Big Projects: u-Korea is one of them
• Technonationalism helps to create a positive spiral of enthusiasm to clear the path towards u-Korea
• u-Korea vision is TOTAL, meaning that, at least in rhetoric, it changing the whole society in a revolutionary way
• The emotional value and anthropomorphization of technology are unique to the Korean vision
• Ethical discussion of the issues of intimacy, control and surveillance in u-Korea is almost non-existent - perhaps because Koreans see more value in the application of new technologies than fear the dangers of it

Korean Ubiquitous Society Vision: abstract and lecture

I finished the abstract for Culture Abound. It's titled Ubiquitous Society City - Korean Future Vision of Humans and Technology in the Urban Space. Like I discussed earlier, in the final article (deadline in May 2009) I will discuss the Korean ubiquitous society vision and the interrelation between humans and technology in an urban context in it.

Next I will do a little preparing for my lecture next week. The theme of the lecture is related to the abstract as I will talk about the role of a citizen in u-Korea. (More about my lecturing schedule.)

Future lectures

Here's my updated schedule for lecturing:

• December 17th: "The Role of the Citizen in the Korean Ubiquitous Society Vision" as a part of The World of Civil Societies lecture series at University of Jyväskylä Department of Social Sciences and Philosophy
• Feb-Mar, 2009: "Suomalaisuuden myytit ja symboliikka: kansakunnan kulttuurista tarkastelua [= The Myths and Symbolism of Finnishness: Cultural Analysis of a Nation]," lecture series at University of Tampere School of Modern Languages and Translation Studies
• February 11th, 2009: "Korean Media Culture" as a part of the Transnational Asian Media Cultures lecture series of University of Tampere Department of Journalism and Mass Communication

Plus I'm the examiner of Indian Studies (part of Intercultural Studies) at the University of Jyväskylä Department of Communication and Language and Communication in East and Southeast Asia by the Finnish National University Network for East and Southeast Asian Studies.