The Digital Wash Place: Mobile Messaging Apps as New Communal Spaces for Korean ‘Smart Ajummas’

Abstract

This chapter seeks to uncover some of the complex ways in which we might reconsider prevalent conceptions about one of the most misunderstood and most stigmatized demographic group in contemporary Korea: the ajumma (아줌마), which roughly translates to a middle-aged, married woman. It seeks to debunk problematic stereotypes about such women particularly by recasting them as new media users and paying attention to their redefined role in Korean culture. It examines how ajummas in Seoul have become ‘smart ajummas’, embracing smartphones in their daily lives to communicate with each other in today’s so-called ‘smart world’. This chapter particularly sheds light on how these women share mobile intimacies in KakaoTalk group chat rooms similar to the relationships built in the wash place (ppal-let-ter, 빨래터) in the 1960s. By going beyond the usual focus on Korean youth as new media ‘digital natives’, it seeks to contribute to a more nuanced understanding of gendered new media practices in what is often described as a media innovative country.