Review on the article: “Of Prince Charming and Male Chauvinist Pigs: Singaporean Female Viewers and the Dream-World of Korean Television
Dramas” – Chan B, Wang X
Review on article:
“Of prince charming and male chauvinist pigs: Singaporean
female viewers and the dream-world of Korean television
dramas.”-Brenda Chan & Wang Xueli
Iris Minkenberg (A0121269J)
National University of Singapore
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Review on the article: “Of Prince Charming and Male Chauvinist Pigs: Singaporean Female Viewers and the Dream-World of Korean Television
Dramas” – Chan B, Wang X
Introduction
The reading describes how Singaporean women and especially the ethnic Chinese women in
Singapore interpret Korean drama series. A case study is described and three interpretive repertoires
are discussed. Since living in Singapore society feels as being part of a rat race for the women,
watching Korean dramas is becoming part of popular culture. It is an escape from the real world and
the everyday stress they encounter. Korean dramas have an utopian feeling, they picture the perfect
love and the perfect life, refer to the traditional values of the ethnic Chinese but also show some
disliked gender inequality.
Articles strengths
The focus group interviews they used as a methodology to conduct the research gave me some
insightful information about how Singaporean women think about their own life and what attracts
them in the Korean dramas. Having an informal kind of chitchat about these TV dramas resulted in
easy understandable data which showed the emotion and personality of these women. This
contributed to getting an understanding on the popular culture amongst women in Singapore.
Participants within these focus groups do not just agree with each other they also misunderstand one
another, question one another, try to persuade each other of the justice of their own point of view
and sometimes they strongly disagree. (Kitzinger Z, 2008, p113) Therefore the data gets interesting.
The article shows various viewpoints on the way Singaporean women interpret the Korean dramas.
The article differentiates itself from other articles about transnational culture because it uses feminist
concepts to explore the ways in which female viewers in Asia interpret the popular Korean dramas
instead of attributing the popularity of the shows to cultural proximity. This causes that the reader
gets an idea of the feelings and lifestyle of the Singaporean women which of course contributes to
the understanding of popular culture, since lifestyle, certain values and opinions are part of culture.
(Storey J, 2001)
The article shows some conflicting ideas about the Korean dramas this makes the article more
insightful and corresponds to the complexity of understanding popular culture. In the first place it
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Review on the article: “Of Prince Charming and Male Chauvinist Pigs: Singaporean Female Viewers and the Dream-World of Korean Television
Dramas” – Chan B, Wang X
explains about how Korean dramas function as an escape from the rat race that these women
encounter. It explains the way Korean dramas can be seen as an utopia, a dream world where
everything is perfect, where there is no stress and where love is all around. Furthermore it explains
about the moral values which are shown in these dramas which correspond with the values of the
ethnic Chinese. On the other hand these values can conflict with the modern and western culture
which has been introduced in Singapore and when it comes to gender inequality there is also
disagreement with these TV dramas. The text shows the similarities and differences between cultures.
The ethnic Chinese in Singapore can strongly relate to the moral value of family love of the Koreans
but on the other hand disagree with the gender inequality. This has to do with a mixture of cultures
within one society. The article gives insights in this complex mixture of cultures and therefore
contributes to the understanding of culture in Singapore.
Articles weaknesses
The three interpretive repertoires which are explained throughout the article lack background
information in order to completely understand why these women see Korean Drama as an escape
from the stressful lives they live in Singapore. The authors don’t give enough information about the
background of Singapore society and the role of the government and rules and regulations. It would
make it easier to understand why Korean dramas function as an escape from reality if there was an
explanation about this reality and the problems that these woman are facing. Working women are
facing role struggles. Woman have to fulfill multiple roles within the family next to their careers. All
these responsibilities cause a work-family conflict. (Kim J. L. S. and Ling C. S., 2011)
Moreover the data is not trustworthy since I believe 48 participants cannot represent Singaporean
women. The group is way too small. But the most remarkable issue is that 98% of the focus group
exists of ethnic Chinese. When you are talking about Singaporean woman there are also other ethnic
groups which should be taken into account.
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Review on the article: “Of Prince Charming and Male Chauvinist Pigs: Singaporean Female Viewers and the Dream-World of Korean Television
Dramas” – Chan B, Wang X
In order to put the article to a more abstract and higher level the authors could have made the link to
resistance/oppositional culture. The article shows how Singaporean women disagree with the current
state of society which can be seen as resistance and opposition.
Conclusion
The article definitely contributed to the understanding of popular culture in Singapore. The
methodology of the focus groups gave insightful information about the lives of women in Singapore
and the contradictory feelings they have. On the other hand the size of the group was too small and
only exists of one ethnic group which doesn’t correspond to the multicultural society of Singapore.
The article introduced some interesting topics such as gender inequality, cultural moral values and the
escape from the rat race in Singapore. These various topics and the various viewpoints on these
topics contribute to the understanding of popular culture in this particular society. The article could
have given some more background info about the status of women and the work-family dilemma
they encounter every day. Moreover it would put the article to a higher level when the authors should
have linked the phenomena of Singaporean women watching Korean dramas to resistance culture. All
together the article showed the complexity of popular culture and the contradictions between cultures
and values that exist in one society.
Bibliography
Kim J. L. S. & Ling C. S. (2001). Work-family conflict of women entrepreneurs in Singapore
Women in Management, Retrieved from
http://www.greatworksolutions.com/download/Work-Life%20Papers/workfamily%20conflict%20of%20women%20entrepreneurs%20in%20Singapore.pdf
Kitzinger Z. (2008) The methodology of Focus Groups: the importance of interaction between
research participants, Sociology of Health & Illness Vol. 1, Retrieved from
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-9566.ep11347023/pdf
Storey J. (2011). What is Popular Culture?, Cultural Theory and Popular Culture
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