HYPER HYPO SEOUL / QUEER URBANISM
QUEER URBANISM Urban Ecology of the LGBTQ Community in Itaewon
The LGBTQ community in Korea have long been marginalized and oppressed politically and socially. This created an underground network which allowed the community to congregate in seedy backstreets of Myeong-dong, Euljiro, Cheonggyecheon, Jongno and Itaewon. Most gathering spots have been undercover, but in Itaewon, which as the biggest US Army base town, has always had a high percentage of american and foreign residents, the LGBTQ establishments have been able to operate more openly. And since the 1990s these establishments started to congregate around what is called the "Itaewon Fire Station Street". The delapidated backstreet of Itaewon became the cultural, social and political center of the LGBTQ rights movement in Korea. But with rising interest in redevelopment of the Itaewon area and the rise in realestate prices, the LGBTQ spaces have been loosing ground and are in danger of dissappearing. In 2013, the Park Geunhae government announced the "creative economy" as a national strategy and major federal funding were funneled into "creative innovation centers" to support "creative industries". This was in line with policies being pursued by other countries and cities like China where keywords like "creative" and "culture" became central in urban economic policies. But the Korean as well as the Chinese government's interpretation of "creative industries" ignores the key aspect of Richard Florida's "successful cities" theory, which argues that cities with higher levels of diversity and tolerance attract the "creative class", who in turn engenders economic prosperity of cities. Florida even developed a "Gay Index" where cities with higher number of LGBTQ residents had higher economic succes. In countries like Korea and China, where "hobos" and "gays" were shunned upon, these correlations were ignored and only the "creative" catch phrase was promoted. Whether Florida's theories were valid or not, diversity and tolerance are essential aspects of the urban environment and supporting the rights of minority groups is critical to the success of our cities. We hope to investigate the urban ecology of the LGBTQ community to identify the informal strategies of diversity, inclusion and tolerance.
sources: Yu Seok Han, “Appropriation of Space and Community Making by Sexual Minorities: A Case Study on Itaewon Fire Station Street”, Seoul City Research, Vol. 14, Issue 1, 2013, 253-269.
Seoul National University Graduate School of Environmental Studies Dept. of Landscape Architecture + Graduate Program for Urban Design URBAN TERRAINS LAB / Program Director, Yehre Suh / Investigator, Haein Choi
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