[Kzyxtalk] North Korea on KMEC Radio -- Monday, January 12, at 1 PM

[sako4 at comcast.net]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 




"All about Money" returns to KMEC Radio on Monday, January 12, at 1 PM, Pacific Time, with host, John Sakowicz, and guest, Christine Hong. We'll be talking about North Korea. 




Our broadcast is heard at 105.1 FM in Ukiah, California. We also stream live from the web at www.kmecradio.org 




KMEC Radio's studio is located in the Mendocino Environmental Center. 




Our shows are archived. 




CHRISTINE HONG 




Hong is a professor at nUniversity of California at Santa Cruz. She said recently: “There’s almost a total dearth of knowledge about North Korea in the United States. It has been called a ‘black hole’ by U.S. intelligence, and it’s against this backdrop of near-total ignorance not only about North Korea but also the brutal legacy of U.S. involvement and intervention on the Korean peninsula that Hollywood churns out films that walk in lockstep with a U.S. policy of regime change. North Korea as a ‘bad guy’ is not only the stuff of U.S. fantasies, but also serves as the cornerstone of Obama’s ‘Pivot’ policy toward Asia, in which intensified U.S. militarism in the region that is actually aimed at containing China is overtly justified by an ‘armed and dangerous North Korea.’ 




“The discussion of ‘freedom of expression’ when it comes to the film, ‘The Interview,’ is a total red herring. Culture when it comes to U.S. enemies has always been a terrain of manipulation and war. During the Korean War, which has never ended, 2.5 billion propaganda leaflets were dropped by the United States on North Korea, and the National Endowment for Democracy, which is completely Congressionally funded, sponsors defector narratives about North Korea as the truth about North Korea. For those who profess to be so concerned about democracy when it comes to the release of ‘The Interview’ as ‘freedom of expression,’ it’s important to consider the profoundly undemocratic implications of Obama’s militarized ‘Pivot” toward Asia and the Pacific.” 




“In this case, consider the collusion between Sony executives, the State Department, and Bruce Bennett, a North Korea watcher at the military-funded RAND corporation in the endorsement of ‘The Interview’ as a regime-change narrative.” See: “Sony Emails Say State Department Blessed Kim Jong-Un Assassination in ‘The Interview’.” Hong appeared recently on “Democracy Now!” with journalist Tim Shorrock. 


Research Interests 




Hong's research interests include the following: Asian American literature and cultural criticism; African American literature and black freedom studies; Korean diasporic cultural production; Pacific Rim studies; postcolonial theory; comparative critical race studies; human rights; law and literature; narrative theory; film and visual studies. 




Biography, Education and Training 




Hong specializes in transnational Asian American, Korean diaspora, critical Pacific Rim, and comparative ethnic studies. At UC Santa Cruz, she has organized with students, staff, and faculty for Critical Race and Ethnic Studies. Dr. Hong received my PhD from the UC Berkeley English department and is at work on a book project titled “Blurring the Color Line: Racial Fictions, Militarized Humanity, and the Pax Americana in the Pacific Rim,” which examines the historic relation of post-1945 Afro-Asian human rights literature to the Pax Americana, the U.S. military "peace" that restructured the Asia Pacific following Japan’s Pacific War defeat. She is an executive board member of the Korea Policy Institute, a coordinating committee member of the National Campaign to End the Korean War, a steering committee member of the Alliance of Scholars Concerned about Korea, and a member of the Working Group on Peace and Demilitarization in Asia and the Pacific. 


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