Podcast Summary

Podcast: New Books Network – New Books in Korean Studies
Episode: Serk-Bae Suh, "Against the Chains of Utility: Sacrifice and Literature in 1970s and 1980s South Korea" (U Hawaii Press, 2025)
Date: January 7, 2026
Host: Leslie Hickman
Guest: Dr. Serk-Bae Suh

Episode Overview

This episode explores Dr. Serk-Bae Suh’s new book Against the Chains of Utility: Sacrifice and Literature in 1970s and 1980s South Korea. Suh investigates how Korean literature in this period proposed anti-utilitarian visions of sacrifice, pushing back against the dominant developmentalist, utility-driven ethos of state and society. Drawing on literary critics and writers such as Kim Hyun, and theoretical perspectives from Georges Bataille, Suh argues that “uselessness” and anti-utilitarian sacrifice offer new ways to understand literature’s relationship to politics, society, and human connection in an era obsessed with productivity.

Dr. Suh’s Background and Inspirations

[02:00–06:24]

• Professional Context:
  Dr. Suh is a professor at the University of California, specializing in Korean literature, translation, sacrifice, colonialism, and nationalism.

• Motivation for the Book:
  Suh wanted to interrogate “what makes literature political” and rethink “the politics of literature” (04:00). Inspiration struck after hearing an Israeli military officer dismiss Derrida as “useless” for urban warfare tactics, sparking Suh’s interest in “uselessness as resistance” and motivating a return to Korean critic Kim Hyun’s defense of literary irrelevance (05:20).

  “Maybe this uselessness could be an avenue for registering the current state of the world.” — Serk-Bae Suh [05:13]

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Pure vs. Engaged Literature; Kim Hyun’s Critical Project

[06:31–13:29]

• Kim Hyun:
  A central figure in modern Korean literary criticism, Kim sought to reconcile or transcend the binary between so-called “pure” (apolitical/art-for-art’s-sake) literature and “engaged” (politicized) literature, ultimately “upholding uselessness as an essential element of literature” (12:00).

  • The binary traces back to colonial-era debates:

    • “Pure literature” as protected from politics;
    • “Engaged literature” addressing social and political issues.

  • Kim criticized both:

    • “Literature for literature’s sake” (pure);
    • “Subordination of literature to politics” (engaged).

    “[Kim] upheld the uselessness of literature… to rethink literature's relevance to society.” — Serk-Bae Suh [12:13]

• Georges Bataille:
  Bataille’s theories on sacrifice (as opposition to utility) deeply informed Suh’s reading of Korean literature.

  “His anti-utilitarian view of sacrifice was pivotal for my thinking of the issue of utility, literature, and anti-utilitarian sacrifice.” — Serk-Bae Suh [13:19]

2. The Ascendancy of Utility: Park Chung Hee and Developmentalism

[13:50–17:40]

• Park Chung Hee’s “Our Nation’s Path”:
  Park’s book articulates a vision wherein “the individual’s desire for economic success is aligned with the grand vision of national development” [15:25]. Sacrifice is framed as renunciation for collective gain: “working hard, saving, being useful” for the nation’s economic goals.

  “He demands Koreans enact this utilitarian sacrifice… to renounce immediate gratification… [for] economic development.” — Serk-Bae Suh [15:54]

• Critique:
  Kim Hyun and others saw this prioritization of development as impoverishing the depth of human life.

3. Sacrifice and Anti-Utilitarianism: The Dwarf

[17:40–30:27]

• Park’s Conventional Sacrifice vs. Literary Subversion:
  Park’s view echoes mainstream sacrificial logic—giving up something now for greater ends (16:50). By contrast, The Dwarf (Cho Se-hui) models anti-utilitarian “sacrifice” via a character, Sine, whose excessive, irrational violence cannot be justified instrumentally.

• Memorable Scene: Sine, in a burst of non-rational violence, attacks her neighbor’s attacker with knives—an act “not rational, it exceeds that rational justification” and shatters her isolating, utilitarian worldview.

  “She loses her grip on herself… she completely escapes from that world… It’s what Bataille calls the profane world.” — Serk-Bae Suh [24:21]

• Literature as Portal:
  This mythic violence signals a rare, accidental community between disparate individuals (Sine and the Dwarf)—a communion not based on calculation or similarity, but chance and radical empathic breach.

  “Shina’s act of excessive violence portends this possibility… of communion between completely different individuals…” — Serk-Bae Suh [29:55]

  • Quote:

    “Literature can have an impact… not by addressing thematically some social political issues… but through its aesthetic effect…” — Serk-Bae Suh [39:10]

4. The Trope of the "White Hand" (Paek-Su): Literature and Joblessness

[31:04–40:15]

• Definition & Literary History:
  “White hand” signifies joblessness or uselessness, often connoting parasitism (31:22), recurrent in 20th-century Korean literary debates—sometimes as target of scorn, sometimes as figure of radical alterity.

• Kim Hyun's Reframing:
  Instead of lamenting its uselessness, literature-as-white-hand possesses aesthetic, not utilitarian, social significance.

  • Critiques thematic relevance; elevates aesthetic impact and empathy.

    “For him, literature can and should make an impact on society, not by addressing thematically… but aesthetically.” — Serk-Bae Suh [38:16]

5. Liminality: Park Sang Myung’s A Study of Death

[40:15–49:35]

• Novel’s Uniqueness:
  Written in exile, filled with scandalous and violent acts (41:00). Characters and events are pervasively liminal (“in between”): monks who are also prostitutes, betrayers who become successors.

• Literature’s Liminal Location:
  Mirroring Bataille’s sacred/profane threshold, literature becomes a space belonging in between, irreducible to social utility (46:44).

  “Literature is neither completely insulated from society nor completely subordinated… That liminal location… is related… to literature’s political relevance.” — Serk-Bae Suh [48:45]

6. Weakness as Power: Depictions of Jesus in Poetry

[49:35–56:23]

• Poetic Jesus:
  Poems from the era (Ko Jeong-hee, Jeong Ho-seung) portray Jesus as “weak, powerless, helpless”—defying instrumental logic ("one dies so many may live"), instead offering a figure of useless aesthetic presence.

• Poetry’s (Useless) Power:
  Poetry’s language is open, “expands our horizon,” allows us to encounter the irreducible other—its power is not pragmatic, but transformative for those willing to listen.

  “Poetry primes us to encounter other beings as the other with alterity… This is very immaterial… But it is still relevant.” — Serk-Bae Suh [54:31]

• Memorable Reference:
  Inspired by Corinthians 1:25:

  “The weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.” — [61:40]

7. Concluding Arguments: Uselessness, Autonomy, and Relevance

[57:20–61:49]

• Utility vs. Relevance:
  Suh draws an analogy with the Crucifixion—instrumentalized sacrifice (for redemption) vs. the weak, open promise of another world.
  Uselessness ensures critical distance and autonomy; autonomy is tied to sovereignty (58:23).
  This enables literature to act as “outcry of protest against the chains of utility” (60:38).

  “The uselessness of literature ensures its critical distance from society… this autonomy involves literature’s sovereignty… it is not subordinate to utility, but still relevant.” — Serk-Bae Suh [58:32]

• Contemporary Relevance:
  In a world reducing all value to monetary terms, the “powerless” but sovereign literature retains “redemptive force.”

8. Looking Ahead: Next Project

[61:59–64:17]

• New Research:
  Suh pursues accidental, chance-based encounters in literature, seeking ways to imagine community beyond pre-determined common grounds.

  “I want to offer some vision… of human association… occasioned by sheer chance.” — Serk-Bae Suh [64:10]

Notable Memorable Quotes

• “Maybe this uselessness could be an avenue for registering the current state of the world.” — Dr. Serk-Bae Suh [05:13]
• “Literature can and should make an impact on society, not by addressing thematically… but aesthetically.” — Dr. Serk-Bae Suh [39:10]
• “She completely escapes from that world… It’s what Bataille calls the profane world.” — Dr. Serk-Bae Suh [24:21]
• “Shina’s act of excessive violence portends this possibility… of communion between completely different individuals…” — Dr. Serk-Bae Suh [29:55]
• “The uselessness of literature ensures its critical distance from society… this autonomy involves literature’s sovereignty.” — Dr. Serk-Bae Suh [58:32]
• “The weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.” — Dr. Serk-Bae Suh referencing Corinthians [61:40]

Timestamps of Key Segments

• 02:00 – Dr. Suh’s personal and academic background
• 04:00 – Origin of his interest in the topic
• 06:31 – Pure vs. Engaged Literature; introduction of Kim Hyun
• 13:50 – Utility in Park Chung Hee’s ideology
• 17:40 – Notions of sacrifice in The Dwarf
• 31:04 – “White hand” trope and literature’s (useless) value
• 40:15 – Park Sang Myung’s A Study of Death and literary liminality
• 49:35 – Portrayals of Jesus and the theme of weakness in poetry
• 57:20 – Concluding reflections: autonomy and sovereign uselessness of literature
• 61:59 – Preview of Suh’s current research project

Takeaways for New Listeners

Dr. Serk-Bae Suh’s work challenges listeners to rethink what it means for literature—or art—to be “useful.” By tracing how Korean writers and critics invoked themes of uselessness, sacrifice, and sovereignty, he illuminates how acts and texts that refuse instrumental value can remain vital—offering a form of protest, solidarity, and human communion in a world obsessed with social and economic productivity.

In the host’s closing words:
“You might think your argument is more pessimistic—I found the book quite encouraging. Push back against everything having to have a use…” — Leslie Hickman [61:06]