An Office Lady and Aunty in K-Dramaland: Transnational Feminine Mobilities of Little Women and Ajoomma

Abstract In the globalizing world of Korean Dramas or K-dramaland, there are femininised spheres of iconic tourist landmarks for romantic encounters and domestic heartlands of soap operas, and masculinised opposite of international geopolitics and national histories. To explore the transnational cinematic feminine mobilities that potentially cut across K-dramaland’s gendered power-geometries, this article analyses the journeys of two unlikely protagonists: an ordinary “Office Lady” ( ol ) from the Netflix series Little Women (2022) and a retired “aunty” widow from the film Ajoomma (2022). Amidst uncovering both personal memories as well as buried national traumas, such mobilities in the characters’ regional tourist sojourns can potentially unearth the regional memoryscapes of K-dramaland.