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Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the activism of South Korean citizens who have not been directly affected by the Sewol Ferry Disaster, yet have stood in solidarity with the bereaved families' search for truth and justice. I consider the ethics and affect of 'besideness' as the basis of this solidary relation.

Paper long abstract:

The sinking of the Korean ferry, Sewol, on April 16th, 2014, claimed 304 lives, 250 of whom were high school students on a fieldtrip. The Disaster, broadcasted real-time, incited a widespread movement founded on condolence for the victims, and a collective determination that ‘things have to change’. Bringing together bereaved families, progressive activists, and ordinary citizens previously far from ‘political’, Sewol activism has witnessed mobilization of a scale unprecedented for a post-disaster activism in Korea.

Based on 15 months of ethnographic fieldwork, I reflect on the activism of my non-bereaved interlocutors, who have stood in solidarity with bereaved families’ demand for truth and justice. In particular, I ask how activists who have not been directly affected by the disaster have come to devote themselves to Sewol activism, to the extent of completely having reorganized their lives around this movement.

I unpack the complicities and responsibilities that drive the activism of my non-bereaved interlocutors, and their commitment to witnessing the pain and grief of the bereaved. The paper suggests that it is affective presence with and for the bereaved family members that drives the non-bereaved citizens to stand in solidarity, both at the frontlines of political rallies, and at the quiet backdrops behind such events of pronounced impact. Focusing on what my interlocutors call ‘gyeot’ or ‘side’, I consider the ethical and affective potentials of solidarity founded on, and performed through this ‘besideness’.