Biography
Alex Wolff is a PhD candidate in the department of Anthropology at the University of California, Irvine (UCI). They received their M.A. in Anthropology from UCI, and their B.A. in Visual and Critical Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Their research examines how LGBTQ+ young adults in South Korea are navigating rapidly changing economic, political, and social circumstances. As a result of post-IMF crisis economic changes, it is becoming harder for young adults in participate in a heteronormative life-course of financial stability, housing independence, marriage, and parenting. With a majority of young people indefinitely postponing and delaying these processes, it may be allowing LGBTQ+ young adults new opportunities to subsist, and perhaps even thrive, in the present. This project explores how LGBTQ+ college students and recent graduates deal with this situation, as well as how they organize social relationships and political activism in the face of marginalization and discrimination. Ultimately this project asks what futures these young adults are imagining and pursuing for themselves, individually and collectively., Alex Wolff is a PhD candidate in the department of Anthropology at the University of California, Irvine (UCI). They received their M.A. in Anthropology from UCI, and their B.A. in Visual and Critical Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Their research examines intersections among economic insecurity, temporality, and sexuality, through a focus on the political activism of LGBTQ+ young adults in South Korea.