포스트식민 소비에서 글로벌 위계 조정자로: 한국 소비문화의 변형과 재구성

초록

This study investigates how Korean consumer culture participates in the restructuring of global recognition hierarchies, with particular attention to its postcolonial dimensions. While previous scholarship has largely centered on the mimicry of Western culture by consumers in the Global South, this research shifts the focus to Korea’s emergence as a producer of global consumer culture, despite its colonial past. Drawing on the concepts of “hegemonic mimicry” and “recognition reversal aspiration”, the study conceptualizes Korea’s cultural practices not merely as imitative, but as strategically appropriating existing cultural power to reposition itself as a new standard of value. “Hegemonic mimicry” refers to the ambivalent and performative way in which a formerly colonized society internalizes dominant cultural forms while rearticulating them. “Recognition reversal aspiration” captures the affective and strategic desire for one's culture to become the object of imitation and admiration by others—thereby shifting recognition structures without entirely dismantling them. The study argues that Korean consumer culture exemplifies a postcolonial reconfiguration of cultural power, where symbolic elevation is pursued through selective modification rather than outright reversal. Future research should explore whether such aspirations are historically specific to Korea’s geopolitical trajectory or reflect broader structural patterns in global cultural dynamics.

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