Travels to the DMZ: conducting fieldwork in the Inter-Korean border

The recent proliferation of border studies that accentuate the surreality of the DMZ as an empty no- man’s-land often contributes to this perception that has sustained and developed over time. With so much focus on the border itself, however, everything else around it seems to get neglected. And often, desperate to find something different or unique about this border condition, it fails to inquire deeper into the everyday life of the people living in the frontier. From the very onset of my field work, it was clear that the views of the frontier and its associated villages were radically different between the state and those who live there, writes Alex Seo.