UC Irvine

This dissertation analyzes cross-cultural theater and performance vis-à-vis Korean history and culture co-produced by Zainichi Koreans and Japanese in the twentieth century. While contextualizing the cultural production processes in relation to Korean and Japanese historical incidents, I examine primary texts, such as theater scripts written by Zainichi Korean and Japanese writers. In doing so, this dissertation exemplifies the complex nature of their transnational interactions at three margins: a gray zone of the Japanese empire between Koreans and Japanese; spaces of incomplete cultural productions; and regions beyond Korea and Japan.

These marginal spheres of Japan offer a potential space for both Japanese and Zainichi Koreans to transcend the (post)colonial hierarchical relationships between the colonizer and the colonized and between the majority and the minority. I argue that cultural hybrid theater and performance engendered by cross-border interactions between Zainichi Koreans and Japanese can generate and expand marginal yet productive spheres of Japan, in which both peoples simultaneously participate in the process of decolonization. By bringing recognition to the transnational spaces of theater and performance productions at the margins, this dissertation broadens the analytic frameworks of Zainichi Korean culture and history without confining them only to the matters of a specific language, identity, or community.