고정희의 『밥과 자본주의』 연작시와 커먼즈 연구

Abstract

This article explores the meaning of poet Go Jung-hee’s “Rice and Capitalism” series of poems while reading the poem as a practice of “the commons.” The commons movement is the act of pursuing the value of cooperation, sharing, and caring by individuals, which goes beyond the state-led “public” and isolated individuals coming into conflict with the problems of the neoliberal order and capitalist world systems. When discussing the need to realize the “common’s,” historians of Korean literature should pay attention to poet Go Jung-hee’s “Rice and Capitalism” series. The series, which is known to have been written during the poet’s six-month stay in Manila in the Philippines from August 1990 to February 1991, not only denounces the arrest of “Asian people” and “women,” but also organizes a living life beyond structural problems. By e xamining the “Rice and Capitalism” series, which is based on F.R. Leavis’s theory of community, this paper argues that living individuals practice “impersonality” and “interactive creativity” on top of the “rich indigenous languages” formed by their community’s history. Chapter 2 examines the situation in which “rice” appears in the series of “Rice and Capitalism,” which goes beyond the realm of public and private affairs, mediating the realm of “impersonality” in which “everyone” takes care of each other, thereby visualizing the voices of those who participate. Chapter 3 examines works that utilize traditional forms of prayer and song in the psalms of “Rice and Capitalism” series, demonstrating that this could be a way for members to work together to transition to another society. This attempt not only sheds light on the radicality of the poet’s “transformation” since 1987, but also re-focuses our attention on the value needed in today’s society which has been thrown into crisis by the neglect of “cooperation,” “sharing,” “caring,” and “living together. The “Rice and Capitalism” series shows that the work of poetry being written and read may be part of the “commoning” that expands “us” while actively forming a community.