Loli Kim
Teaching:
Lecturer on Modern Korea
Trinity Term 2024: Sociology, Popular Culture, Modern History, Politics
Trinity Term 2025: Sociology and Popular Culture
Research interests
My interests lie in Asian socio-multimodality, with a large part of my work on South Korea – so I am fortunate to be able to work across systems of communication – from the linguistic, to the socio-pragmatic, and the intertextual, to the various mediums of multimodal communication – and across multiple regions of East and South Asia. The approaches I am most interested in are cross-cultural perspectives that address untranslatability in cultural interpretation, and I am also keen on research and outreach that supports Asian representation. Much of my work involves formal, multimodal discourse analysis, or the development of such methodologies for cross-cultural analysis of Asian multimodal mediums, such as film, and person-to-person communication.
Current projects
I currently hold the position of post-doc on the Sea, Song and Survival: The Language and Folklore of the Haenyeo Women project at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, where I am primarily responsible for the transcription and analysis of the Haenyeo’s multimodal communication.
I am also working on a number of research projects independently and collaboratively with my colleagues too:
- East Asian representation in UK children’s picture books
- Foodscaping Asia
- The socio-pragmatic landscape of Joseon Dynasty period fashion
- A theory of intertextuality as translanguage
- The logic of Korean conversation
Earlier projects
- Survey of narratives of 3,460 South Korean (Korean) feature films 1960-2018, using synopses, in order to identify narrative and production conventions.
- Analysis of changing representation of womanhood in Korean films, including analysis of 3,460 films synopses 1960-2018.
- Multimodal film discourse analysis pilot study (large 160 shot analysis) The Crow(1994) testing SFDRS method.
- Multimodal film discourse analysis pilot study (Korean film) Hanyeo(The Housemaid) (1960).
- Semantic analysis of villainy pilot study (Korean film) The Housemaid(1960) Pilot study to test whether SFDRS method could be used to find conventions in Korean films.
- Multimodal film discourse analysis pilot study (Korean film) Old Boy (2003), Sympathy for Lady Vengeance(2005), and The Man from Nowhere (2010).
- Multimodal film discourse analysis pilot study (Korean film) Old Boy(2003), Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (2005), The Man from Nowhere (2010), and Bedevilled (2010).
- Multimodal film discourse analysis pilot study Kill Bill(2003) and The Crow (1994).
Additional Affiliations:
Visiting Lecturer on Korea
Oxford Brookes
Oct 2024 – Present
Visiting Lecturer on Visual Communication
Universitas Airlangga (Surabaya, Indonesia)
Aug 2024 – Present
Editorial Work:
Assistant Editor of European Journal of Korean Studies
Feb 2023 – Present
General Editor of 'Foodscaping Asia' series (and Editor on all regional sub-series)
Bloomsbury
Nov 2023 – Present
Expert Reviewer (East Asian voices in children’s literature, especially picture books)
Children's Literature in Education journal
Jul 2024 – Present
Talks and Hosting:
Honorary Speaker
World Convention of the Korean Language symposium
Oct 2023
Talk title- Interpreting Korean Film Discourse: Towards a new paradigm for Korean-English cross-cultural multimodal analysis.
Guest Speaker
The University of Edinburgh
Nov 2023
Guest speaker at Asian Studies Seminar Series.
Talk title - Interpreting Korean Film Discourse: Towards a new paradigm for Korean-English cross-cultural multimodal analysis.
Co-host of Translating Squid Game talks
Korean Cultural Centre UK
Oct 2021 - Dec 2021
A series of interactive online talks with participants from around the world.
Host of a talk in a series of talks on Korea
Korean Cultural Centre UK
Dec 2020 - Dec 2020
Host of a webinar on Korea, one in a series of webinars
Korean Education Centre UK
Sep 2020 - Sep 2020
Co-Host of talk Conflict, Tension, Humour
Korean Education Centre UK
2021
Talk Title: Translating Meaning in Korean Films
Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Oxford
2019
Talk Title: Semantics and the Korean Film Wave: a new perspective on the reconstruction of film conventions.
Global Philosophy Graduate Workshop, University of Oxford
2019
Talk Title: Analysing Meaning in Korean Film: Three pilot studies utilising ‘Segmented Film Discourse Representation Structures’
Oxford Korean Popular Culture Symposium, University of Oxford
2019
Talk Title: A Korean 'Segmented Film Discourse Representation Theory' For Korean Film Analysis
Multi-modal translation of East-Asian pop culture: the case of Korea and Japan workshop
2019
Talk Title: Conventions in Korean Revenge Cinema: Three pilot studies using ‘Segmented Film Discourse Representation Structures’
4th Bremen Conference on Multimodality
2019
Talk Title: Transition to transnational: A semantic approach to violence in South Korean cinema
The Senses and the Meanings of Modernity in East Asia, 1890–1945 and Beyond workshop, SOAS University, London
2018
Talk Title: Women’s movement in the moving image: Insights on the changes to Korean women’s film narratives and archetypes 1960-2018
The Agency of Korean Women workshop
Wolfson College, University of Oxford
September 2018
Talk Title: Beyond The Subtitle: Deconstructing Invisibility in South Korean Film
Multimodality in Film, online with Bremen University
2020
Upcoming Talks
Invited Speaker at Leiden Asia Centre, Leiden University
2025 (TBC)
Invited Speaker at SOAS CTS Global Seminar Series
January 2025
Presenter at the Bremen-Groningen Online Workshops Series on Multimodality
13th December 2024
Talk Title: Towards a new paradigm for cross-cultural multimodal analysis: the case of Western European Researchers and Asian film discourse.
More Information: https://bit.ly/BreGroMM
Guest Speaker
Korea TESOL International Conference
Sookmyung Women's University, Seoul, South Korea
Invited May 2025
Theme: Embracing Humanity in the Age of AI: Enhancing ELT Through Emotional Intelligence, Creativity, and Innovation.
Conference Organiser:
East Asian Foodscaping panel: Organiser
28th Asian Studies Conference
Sophia University, Japan
July 2024
Foodscaping Asia I, II, & III organiser at ICAS 13 conference (2024)
Surabaya, Indonesia
Aug 2024 - Aug 2024
Co-organised 2 panels and 2 workshops on Foodscaping Asia and presented on 'Foodscaping Asia I' that looked at remote regions of Asian and chaired on 'Foodscaping Asia II'. Presented paper on Foodscaping Asia I.
Paper title: Foodscaping Remote Asia: Framework and Methodology Through the Foodscapes of Geumneung's Haenyeo
The International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS) in Leiden (in progress)
Currently planning an event on Asian representation with The International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS) in Leiden, for 2026 at Seoul National University, South Korea
Education and Research Experience:
DPhil Asian and Middle Eastern Studies (specialising in Korean Studies)
Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Oxford
Supervisor Young Bin Min KF Professor of Linguistics, Dr Jieun Kiaer
2019 October - 2022 July
AKSE Graduate Scholar
University of Oxford
Jul 2021 - Jul 2022
Worked on a range of monographs about Korean pragmatics, syntax, and semantics, including both the verbal and non-verbal; primarily cross-cultural perspectives involving both English and Korean, and in some cases Japanese, Chinese, and other Asian cultures and languages. Also involved in the organisation and delivery of regular workshops, seminars, and talks, and in the writing of several applications which successfully secured funding (including both successful Leverhulme and Association of Korean Studies grants in 2022).
AKSE Research Assistant
University of Oxford
May 2022 - Jun 2022
Research Assistant working on a monograph about the pragmatics of the Korean language, gesture, and multimodality, at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies.
Honours & Awards:
Hendrick Hamel Prize
Awarded for innovative contribution to research for the book Understanding Korean Film: A Cross-Cultural Perspective (2021, with Jieun Kiaer).
Link to University of Oxford article: https://www.ames.ox.ac.uk/article/jieun-kiaer-and-loli-kim-awarded-hendrik-hamel-prize-korean-studies#:~:text=Loli%20Kim%20were%20recently%20awarded,European%20languages%20or%20in%20English.
Link to Association of Korean Studies in Europe article: https://www.koreanstudies.eu/winners-of-the-hendrik-hamel-prize-for-korean-studies-in-europe-2023/
Association of Korean Studies Research Assistant Grant
May 2022
Association of Korean Studies Graduate Scholar Award
Jul 2021
Successful Funding Proposals:
AKS Core University Project (2021-2026) Building K-wave Hub (received by Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Oxford)
The Leverhulme Research Project Grants (2022-2025) Sea, Song and Survival: The Language and Folklore of the Haenyeo Women (received by Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Oxford)
Recent Publications:
Mongraphs
Akamine, Jun, Cheung, Sidney, Winstanley-Chesters, Robert, and Kim, Loli. (2030, forthcoming). Foodscaping the Shima: Foodscaping Japan. Edited by Loli Kim, Niamh Calway, and Robert Winstanley-Chesters. London: Bloomsbury.
Calway, Niamh, Loli Kim, and Robert Winstanley-Chesters. (2025, forthcoming). Foodscaping the Seoul Metropolis: Foodscaping Korea. Edited by Loli Kim, Niamh Calway, Jieun Kiaer, and Robert Winstanley-Chesters. London: Bloomsbury.
Kim, Loli, Calway, Niamh, and Jieun Kiaer (2029, forthcoming). Foodscaping the Korean Seom: Foodscaping Korea. Edited by Loli Kim, Niamh Calway, Jieun Kiaer, and Robert Winstanley-Chesters. London: Bloomsbury.
Kim, Loli. (2026, forthcoming). It’s Not All About the Gat. London: Bloomsbury.
Kim, Loli, and Jieun Kiaer. (2025, awaiting publication). East Asian Voices in English Children’s Picture Books. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kim, Loli. (2025). Interpreting Korean Film Discourse: Towards a new paradigm for Korean-English cross-cultural multimodal analysis. Routledge. Kim, L., Kiaer, J. (2024 forthcoming).
Kiaer, Jieun., Kim, Loli., & Calway, Niamh. (2024). The Language of Food in East Asian films. London: Routledge.
Kiaer, Jieun. & Kim, Loli. (2024) Embodied Words: A Guide to Asian Non-Verbal Gestures Through the Lens of Film. London: Routledge.
Kiaer, Jieun., Lord, Emily. & Kim, Loli. (2023) Understanding the Korean Wave on Screen. London: Routledge.
Kiaer, Jieun. & Kim, Loli. (2021) Understanding Korean Film: A Cross-Cultural Perspective. London: Routledge.
Winstanley-Chesters. Robert, Calway, Niamh, and Loli Kim (2027, forthcoming). Foodscaping the Seoul Streets: Foodscaping Korea. Edited by Loli Kim, Niamh Calway, Jieun Kiaer, and Robert Winstanley-Chesters. London: Bloomsbury.
Chapters and Journal Articles
Kim, Loli (2025, forthcoming) “The Chains of Asian Misrepresentation in Literature, Film, and Television” In Slavery and Freedom in the Contemporary World: A Sociological Lens. British Sociology Association journal (special issue), edited by Angelo Martins Junior, Samuel Okyere, Pankhuri Agarwal, and Julia O’Connell Davidson.
Kim, Loli (2025, forthcoming) “Eat Meat!”: Cultural intertexts of the Korean War and Japanese colonisation and their use in the language and moral processes of caretaking by older generations in Korea.” British Sociology Association journal (special issue).
Kim, Loli. (2025, forthcoming). “Infallible Mermaid Grannies: A comparison of the sociological discourses in Korean film and literature and in the haenyeo’s own words.” In Ageing Asia: multimedia representations of ageing and the elderly in Asian societies, edited by Bernard Wilson. Springer.
Kiaer, Jieun, & Loli Kim. (2024). “The Voices of East Asian Families in Literature, Film, and Media.” In The Asian Family in Literature and Film: Changing Perceptions in a New Age, Volume 1 The East, edited by Bernard Wilson and Sharifah Aishah Osman. Palgrave Macmillan.
Kiaer, Jieun., Kim, Loli, & Lo, Alfred. (2024). “Koreans Are Always Nodding or Bowing”: K-Wave Fandom’s Perception and Learning of Non-Verbal Politeness. In Kim, m. (ed) Korean (Im)politeness from Multidisciplinary and Multimodal Perspectives - Diverse Interactional Contexts and Communication Platforms. Springer.
Kiaer, Jieun., Kim, Loli., Zhu, Hua. & Li Wei. (2022) ‘Tomorrow? Jayaji! (자야지) Translation as Translanguaging in Interviews with the Director of Parasite’. Translanguaging and Translation in Multilingual Contexts journal.
Kiaer, Jieun. & Kim, Loli. (2021) One-Inch-Tall Barrier of Subtitles: Translating Invisibility in Parasite. In Y. Kim (Ed.), Soft Power of the Korean Wave: Parasite, BTS and Drama. London: Routledge.
Kim, Loli. (2025 forthcoming) “Infallible Mermaid Grannies: A comparison of the sociological discourses in Korean film and literature and in the haenyeo’s own words.” In Ageing Asia: multimedia representations of ageing and the elderly in Asian societies, edited by Bernard Wilson. Palgrave Macmillan.
Kim, Loli, and Niamh Calway. (2024). “SFDRS as a Metalanguage for ‘Foodscaping’: Adding a Formal Dimension to an Interdisciplinary, Multimodal Approach to Food.” In Drawing Multimodality’s Bigger Picture: Metalanguages and Corpora for Multimodal Analyses, edited by Janina Wildfeuer. Frontiers in Neuroscience.
Kim, Loli. (2024 awaiting publication). “Translingual Trinkets of the Korean Wave: Deconstructing the Transnational Power of the Hybridity in K-Objects.” In From Koreanness to K-Ness: Contemporary Korean Language, Culture, and Society, edited by Seryun Lee. London: Unknown distributor.
Kim, Loli. & Kiaer, Jieun. (2024 awaiting publication). Intercultural Encounters: Understanding Intercultural Multilingualism and Translingualism in Éric Lartigau’s #JeSuisLa.
Kim, Loli. (2025 forthcoming). “Political Threads: Unpicking the Discourses of Taiwan’s Colonial-Era Fashion Landscape.” Routledge Fashion Theory Journal Routledge, no. Special Issue.
Kim, Loli. & Kiaer, Jieun. (2021) “Conventions in how Korean films mean: A pilot testing ‘Segmented Film Discourse Representation Structures”, in J. Pflaeging, C. Ng, J. Wildfeuer, J. Bateman (eds) Empirical Multimodality Research: Methods, Evaluations, Implications. De Gruyter.
*New books and series in-prep with Bloomsbury and Macmillan currently – at risk of making this a thesis, so I’ve left those out, but happy to give the details on request*
Conference Papers
Foodscaping Remote Asia Framework and Methodology Through the Foodscapes of Geumneung's Haenyeo. ICAS 13 conference (Surabaya, Indonesia) · Jul 30, 2024
Bibliographies
East Asian Diaspora Children's Language Acquisition and Translanguaging
Oxford Bibliographies: Childhood Studies
Forthcoming (2025)
Thesis
- Kim, Loli. 2022. “A Theory of Multimodal Translation for Cross-Cultural Viewers of South Korean Film.”University of Oxford.
Publicity and Interviews
Book review
Understanding Korean Film' book seeks to tackle invisibilities in K-film translation by Sun-hwa Dong of the Korea Times: https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/culture/2023/12/135_324013.html
Interview (online)
Korean studies struggles to grow despite success of K-pop, K-dramas by Sun-hwa Dong of the Korea Times: https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/art/2024/01/398_331941.html
Interview (in print)
Squid’s In: Squid Game is Gory and Controversial – so why is it so popular all over the world? by Kelly-Anne Taylor.
