Thursday, November 3, 2011

(colonial days) pre 1945 Korea photos at Library of Congress

View this rich collection of pre-1945 Korea photos now available at the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs room. The images seem to come from a Japanese photographer, judging by the hand writing on the back of the images. While the collection has been recently catalogued at http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2010645655 the images have not been fully processed for routine viewing or online reference. So to seem them in person you must follow the special procedure there.
 
Those able to read the handwritten Japanese notes that appear on the back of many photos are particularly encouraged to give the meanings or reflect on the wider significance depicted.
There are three ways to engage these reference copy images:
A. Cursor rapidly through the 250 images (some duplicates; observe only; no Japanese) in this large file, http://bit.ly/loc-colonialkr-pdf  [about 14mb, hosted on google docs]
 
B. View paired pages: obverse shows 4-6 pictures, reverse shows the Japanese writing penciled on
http://pre1945korea.blogspot.com (blog platform allows viewers to write identifying information)
Each entry gives the option to download the 2 page PDF set for easy printout, too.
[hosted on blogger.com]
C. Bundle of all 27 paired (obverse/reverse) PDF sets in one file
http://tinyurl.com/bundle27pre1945kr
[about 14mb, hosted on sites.google.com]

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Korea and Koreans as featured in literary works by non-Korean(ist) writers


collected responses by the readers of the e-list, KoreanStudies.ws in early October 2011:


There is "Kim of Korea" by Faith Norris and Peter Lumm ( a pseudonym that Bernard Malamud used when collaborating with another writer) New York: Julian Messner, Inc. 1955. It is a story about a Korean boy and an American soldier set during the Korean War.


Faith Norris was the daughter of Joan Grigsby ( http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/GrigsbyPreface.htm ) who lived in Seoul 1929-1930, and the story (meant for younger readers) includes mentions of the house Dilkusha where they lived. She imagined the war had left in ruined (not so it still stands, more or less). Faith Norris and Malamud taught together for a time at Oregon State College and Faith says that they sympathised as fellow Jews (she believed that her great-grandfather had been a Jew, a fantasy of her mother's invention).


Otherwise there is always the "Missionary Fiction" of the early 1900s by Lois Hawks Swineheart : "Jane in the Orient", "Sarange: A Child of Chosen" and "Korea Calls!" available to download at http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/BooksKorea.htm


Oddjob, the villain with the lethal bowler hat in Ian Fleming's Goldfinger, was Korean, though in the film, as I recall, he was portrayed as a generic inscrutable oriental.


The male protagonist of Han Suyin's A Many Splendored Thing, dispatched (fatally, as it turns out ) to report on the Korean War, makes the curious observation that "Korean women are not beautiful."


Incidentally, I seem to remember David Lodge confused Kyongju and Kongju (as then spelt) in Small World.


Chaim Potok's novel set in Korea and featuring Korean protagonists is I am the Clay, which was translated into Korean as ??? ? (hanjum-ui heuk--a
handful of earth). I found it stark and haunting. Potok was an army chaplain in Korea around the time of the war. A character who appears at the end of
the book is based loosely on him.


Potok?s book [is] as good a character study of Koreans as any written by Koreans. By the way, Potok was a rabbi, not the more likely
Christian or Catholic chaplains whose faiths had established missionary infrastructures in Korea and the USA Army. His cultural sensitivity is based
upon a very different understanding and affinity for social constructs of family / community, the value of education, etc.




Eunice Park, in Gary Shteyngart's Super Sad Love Story.


...Someone is venturing into Inspector O territory. Adam Johnson's next novel, The Orphan Master's Son, is set in North Korea. An extract is available here
(part of which I fear qualifies as an entry for the Literary Review's annual Bad Sex award)
http://electricliterature.com/blog/2010/09/03/excerpt-%E2%80%9Cfor-the-love-of-juche%E2%80%9D-by-adam-johnson/


Pearl Buck's novel set in Korea was The Living Reed, published in 1963 or 64 and again in 2004.


Isabella L. Bird?s diary like account of her travels, Korea and Her Neighbors, contains many portraits, although the work is non-fiction.


Popular culture also includes the books and scripts that led up to several American films and TV programs about the MASH units. I would venture to say that more Americans have been exposed to something they think (if at all) about Korea from the still in reruns TV series which presented various Korean ?types? in complex stituations.


In 1953 Humphrey Bogart starred as a MASH surgeon, along with June Allison as an Army nurse, in the film Battle Circus set in a Korean War MASH. In 1968 the novel Mash: A Novel About Three Army Doctors by

Richard Hooker brought the drama of the MASH units fully into public view, and became the basis of Robert Altman's 1970 film , followed by the 1972-1983 smash hit TV series. MASH became a permanent fixture of American culture. (source: http://olive-drab.com/od_medical_treatment_mash.php).


This for sure is not literature -- but I thought I mention it anyway, given how important Chinoiserie and Japonism were for upper class arts and art collectors in Europe and North America, but that there was never anything like Koreanism -- this is as close as you get: "Die Braut von Korea" (The Bride from Korea) a ballet from 1897
Music: Joseph Bayer (1852-1913), choreography: Josef Hassreiter

http://www.book1950.co.kr/main.html?menu=view&uid=283 (click small image to magnify)http://www.bildindex.de/obj07053790.html costume sketch by Franz Gaul (click small image to magnify)

The ballet was performed 38 times between 1897 and 1901 at the Wiener Hofoper (Vienna Court Opera)--that was the time when Gustav Mahler was the director there.




Perhaps this one is too well known to mention, but Jack London, who visited Korea when he was covering the Russo-Japanese War as a correspondent forHearst Newspapers, included a chapter set in Korea (Chapter 15, very loosely based around Hendrik Hamel's experiences) in his work *The Jacket *(*The StarRover* in the US), which was published in 1915 by Mills & Boon. See http://www.archive.org/details/jacketthestarrov00londuoft


Thursday, September 29, 2011

new book - Buddhist temple history of Okcheon-am


Through the power of the Internet, the Venerable Woon Saan discovered the old Korea photos selected from Library of Congress' Prints and Photographs collection and displayed online at http://old-koreaphotos.wikispaces.com and included these in the (Korean language) book about his temple history and traditions. He will donate a copy to the LoC by way of thanks, too.


[photo shows book jacket; contact Woon Saan-sunim at Woonsaan Seok, woonsaan [at]empas DOTcom]

Thursday, September 8, 2011

old photos by A. Mattice - naval photographer USS Juanita

Asa Mattice, a naval engineer and photographer attached to the *USS Juanita*.
Related is the *Syracuse University Magazine* article about an exhibition of the photos and more on how they were acquired.

Mattice Photos, http://jdstockphoto.zenfolio.com/p77737632
*Syracuse University Magazine* article, http://sumagazine.syr.edu/archive/winter03-04/viewfromhill/index.html

Monday, September 5, 2011

Korea in 1925 - one hour archival footage


... fascinating hour-long film made by a German Catholic priest/missionary (Father Norbert Weber (sp?), a Benedictine monk or priest) in 1925

...also contains still photos Weber shot on an earlier trip to Korea in 1911. It shows a lot of things that none of us, and almost no living Korean, has ever seen. I think it should be shared widely

...put together as a KBS Special but somehow comes to us through Chinese hands.


or paste the URL it into your browser


--more background:

Norbert Weber, the former arch abbot of St. Ottilien and the author of the documentary from 1925, passed away in 1956 (his dates are 1870-1956). The missionary you interviewed, I would think, was probably Corbinian Schr?fl (???, 1901-1990). Schr?fl had been a missionary in Yanji /Y?n?gil (in former Pukkando), and then later in the South, after the communists cosed down the abbeys in NE China and North Korea.


see also, http://tinyurl.com/3w82cdd [old images, but from a separate person's documentary sources]

Friday, August 19, 2011

glimpse of (Leprosy) Hansen's Disease

August 2011 presenter for the Korean-American Educational Commission
168-15 Yomni-dong, Mapo-gu |Seoul 121-874 http://www.fulbright.or.kr
Hansen's disease in Korea historically existed at endemic levels until effective drugs became available in the 1930s to 1950s.  It has been
referenced in Korean literature for centuries even including some Chosun era mask dances.  In the 20th century, Hansen's disease patients became
what professor Jeong Keun-Shik of Seoul National University refers to as "the most significant social other" in ethnically homogeneous Korean
society.  They have alternately been used as symbols of national shame, Christian salvation, Japanese imperial benevolence, and finally Korea's
national "han," or sorrow.
Joji Kohjima's research deals with the efforts of Hansens's disease patients to tell their own story, and to seek restitution for their
treatment under Japanese colonialism and post-colonial Korean governments.  He has been researching the social and medical conditions
of Hansen's disease in modern Korea in conjunction with several institutions including the Catholic University Medical School's Leprosy
Center in Seoul, the 518 Memorial Hall at Jeonnam National University, Aeyangwon hospital in Yeosu, and Sorokdo National Leprosy Hospital in
Sorok Island, Jeollanamdo.  This forum will explore leprosy in Korean society as a phenomenon originating at the microscopic level of bacteria
but extending to the level of social constructs in the discrimination, otherization and isolation faced by leprosy patients.  Largely
originating in Japanese colonial policy, patients have historically faced quarantine, forced labor, and forced sterilization as they were
caught in the triangle of Japanese colonial government, missionaries, and an often hostile Korean population.

:::Biography:::
Joji Wilson Kohjima is originally from Tacoma, Washington.  He is the great grandson of Robert Manton Wilson, an American missionary who
worked as a doctor on Hansen's disease in Korea from 1907 to 1941.  Joji graduated in International Studies from the University of Washington
where he also studied pre-medicine with a focus on biochemistry.  He will apply for medical school to begin in 2012.  He hopes to continue
studies in medical anthropology in conjunction with medical school.

Saturday, August 13, 2011

funeral, Lee Han-yeol photos from 1987

...pictures during the funeral and march for Lee Han-yeol on July 9, 1987, a watershed event for democracy in South Korea, in which over one million people participated. 
After many years, I finally put the pictures up on the web at http://chwe.net/hanyeol/

From: MichaelChwe, michael@chwe dotnet

Friday, July 29, 2011

late July 2011 landslides, Seoul

about 500mm of rain led to the flooding and landslides,

Thursday, July 28, 2011

bronze age - so many dolmens on the SW Korean peninsula

www.dolmen.com has an option for English and Japanese, too. The site dates to 2001, so there is not a lot of video, blog feedback or panoramic views and maps, but it does introduce this wealth of ancient society, quoting that 19,000 of the world's known 55,000 dolmens are located in the Jeollanam-do (sw province) of South Korea.

Monday, July 25, 2011

film list - possibly some formerly banned ones

www.koreanfilm.org (including articles in English)
 
=====titles that are available on DVD with English Subtitles:
"Guro Arirang" (no English subtitled DVD)
 
=====Or a little more recently:
"Yellow Hair" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Hair
"Timeless, Bottomless Bad Movie" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_Movie

Thursday, July 14, 2011

border crossing people smugglers to Korea

Defecting from North Korea is a dangerous  business.
It comes at a high price and there's no guarantee of  success.
Many make the journey to South Korea with the help of  brokers - individuals and organisations who smuggle people along the illegal  overland route
known as the "Underground  Railroad". For Assignment, Lucy Williamson meets some of the  brokers in Seoul who make a living helping people escape North  Korea.
RELATED  LINKS
Download this episode  (mp3)  http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/docarchive

SHADOWY WORLD OF KOREA'S PEOPLE  SMUGGLERS
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-14044794
"I'm  not a drug-dealer. I'm not bad, I'm just bringing people out. I'm
doing  something the South Korean government can't do."

Monday, July 11, 2011

famous image discussion

[KoreanStudies e-list member F.Hoffman reponds to request to identify an iconic image]

Sin Yun-bok and "Miin-do" are good keywords.
The most famous one by Sin Yun-bok is this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hyewon-Miindo.jpg
The one you find in every tourist booklet, on umbrellas, as ball pen designs, etc. The term "miin-do" seems to be a generic term, not an actual title. You also find miin-do
paintings in China and Japan, also in later periods (e.g. during the Taisho period in Japan).  That is a genre that traveled and changed throughout the centuries, was kind of "back-introduced" in a modern version to Korea in  the 1920s.

The one you have there, the one the stage image is based on, looks to me like a 19th century work based on Sin Yun-bok. Especially the way the face is done would to me indicate that it is later than Sin Yun-bok's period. The Japanese National Museum in Tokyo in whose collection it is gives the painter as "anonymous."

Painter:  anonymous, 114.2 cm x 56.5 cm, colors on paper, Collection: Tokyo National Museum (in Ueno Park), http://www.tnm.jp/?lang=en

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Seoul stream restoration of the Cheonggye- Article

Flowing Back to the Future: The Cheongye Stream Restoration and the Remaking of Seoul
by Hong KAL
 
Abstract: This article concerns how the urban life in Seoul under the Lee Myung-bak government, which pursues neoliberal political economy, has come to present an immense accumulation of spectacles. It examines the Cheonggye stream restoration promoted as upgrading Seoul to become a cleaner, greener and competitive global city. The Cheonggye stream project points to a new form of governance in which the display of national progress through conventional museums or monumental structures, as previous regimes once did, is no longer effective. Instead, the representation of progress of the city and the nation is increasingly being portrayed through the popular use of urban space.
 
Key words: the Cheonggye stream restoration, Seoul, spectacle, urban redevelopment, public space, national identity, neoliberalism 

Introduction:
Public space has gained new centrality in the life of Seoul in contemporary Korea. Noticing the political potential as well as the threat of public space, in 2005 the government formally designated the area in front of the City Hall as the Seoul plaza and opened it with an official spectacle, "Hi Seoul Festival". With the construction of the Kwanghwa square in 2009 in front of the KyÇ’ngbok palace of the ChosÇ’n dynasty and the new city hall building expected to be completed in 2012 in a design more transparent and open to the public, downtown Seoul is becoming a city of "public spaces." In the remaking of the city through a display of people and participation, the most prestigious and controversial site is probably the new Cheonggye stream. While the Cheonggye stream restoration was aimed at making Seoul a cleaner, greener and competitive global city, it actively employs discourses of restoration, history and people. It is a site that stages images of the collective national body rooted in shared ancestry and historical experience. It makes the current urban transformation historically necessary and even natural and frames collective national subjectivity within the mutually constituting narratives of nationalism and globalization.
 

Monday, June 27, 2011

East Asia in the Middle School (lesson plans)

Teaching East Asian in the Middle School Web site at http://www.iu.edu/~easc/outreach/educators/teams/index.shtml .
These lesson plans were originally published in 1996-98, but most of them still have relevance today.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Watch KR television dramas on Hulu.com

Korean dramas are available on Hulu.com, one of the most popular American TV internet sites. Over 50 Korean dramas are available to view for free. 
Visit www.hulu.com and search for "Korean Dramas".  They are all subtitled (not dubbed). 

Saturday, April 16, 2011

old Korea (and Japan) photos

late 19c. and early 20c old photos of Korea by three very prominent Americans, housed in the American Geographical Society Library at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee,
http://collections.lib.uwm.edu/cdm4/results.php?CISOOP1=any&CISOBOX1=korea&CISOFIELD1=CISOSEARCHALL&CISOROOT=all&CISOSTART=1,41

1. George Clayton Foulk Collection (1883 -1887): 59-64, 150-178, 182-185, 188, 190-194

2. Shanon Boyd-Bailey McCune Collection(1938-1939): 65-148, 180, 182-185, 188-194

3. Mary Jo Read Collection(1935): 179-181, 186-187, 189 (duplicate)

:::Notes
  1. George Clayton Foulk was Acting  U.S. Minister to Korean Court, 1884-1887
  2. Shannon Boyd-Bailey McCunem was director of the American Geographical
Society of New York from 1967 to 1969. Won Medal of Freedom.
His Father, George Shannon McCune was Dean(1929-1936) of Sungsil Christian
Collage, Pyonggyang, center of anti Japanese activity.
His brother George McAfee "Mac" McCunne born in Pyongyang, developed with
Edwin O. Reischauer, McCune-Reischauer romanization of Korean in 1937.
His extensive collection of Old Korean Maps is now at the Library of
Congress, Washington, D.C.
  3. Mary Jo Reed was a Geography Professor at University of Wisconsin -Milwaukee
See also: early photos from the Prints and Photograph collection at Library of Congress,
 http://old-koreaphotos.wikispaces.com
See also, -post this item below from the H-Japan e-list of www.h-net.org (April 6, 2011).
> The East Asia Image Collections, an open-access digital repository hosted at Lafayette College, has recently added 259 postcards and 300 negatives. The website now contains over 3700 records of imagery from East Asia, mostly from the period 1905-1945, with one subcollection of images from 1950s Japan.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

series - Korean Food flavors

[weekly story in the Amazon.com Food Blog; click headline for full text] Korean Cuisine: Gimbap More and more these days, I see sushi and sashimi showing up at Korean restaurants. You'll find the traditional Japanese raw fish versions, but "Korean sushi" or gimbap is gaining popularity too. As we have the past few Sundays, we're talking Korean food. Today we're talking gimbap... Korean Cuisine: Roasted Corn and Barley "Teas" You may eat corn and barley in a variety of ways, but you ever tried them roasted and made into tea? Today I'm talking Korean cuisine, like I have these past few Sundays. Not long ago, Al Dente reader Phyllis mentioned corn tea, and I couldn't wait to discuss oksusu cha and boricha, roasted corn and barley tea, respectively... Korean Cuisine: Dukbokki Dukbokki is one of my sister's favorite Korean dishes. It's made with noodles. People expect Korean cuisine to include rice, but most people are surprised to learn how popular rice noodles are. (My sister always keeps a package in the freezer.) Dukbokki is a spicy hot stew made with rice noodles (duk) that are long and tubular and really, really chewy. It's a very common dish in Korean homes, though I don't see it on a lot of restaurant menus. (Of course that just could be the case because my Korean is not yet up to snuff.) Korean Cuisine: Red Beans and Rice On Sundays I talk Korean food here at Al Dente, a cuisine that I love and that I love to share with others. Have you already discovered Korean cuisine? If so, I'd like to hear from you. If not, I'm discussing Korean food, dish by dish, so you can become familiar with the wonders of rice and spice. Korean Cuisine: Soft Tofu Soup I've long been a fan of Korean cuisine and instrumental in introducing the fascinating foods of this country to my friends. When Korean cuisine turned up on the 2011 trend list compiled by Epicurious, I couldn't have been more pleased. Finally, Korean food would be known to the masses. At least I hope... Korean Cuisine: Dumplings for Beginners by Tracy Schneider on February 27, 2011 If you're new to Korean food, then one of the best places to begin is with mandoo (or mandu), Korean dumplings. Dumplings are popular all around the world. Japan has its gyozas. China has its potstickers. Russia has its pelmeni, Poland has its pierogi. I love them all... Korean Cuisine: A Feast at Every Meal on February 20, 2011 I have a penchant for Korean food. Given an opportunity to eat out, I'll look for the best Korean restaurant in the area. How about you? Are you acquainted with cuisine of Korea? For years, prognosticators have been saying that Korean food would soon come into its own in the U.S, the way Japanese and then Thai food did over the last twenty years...

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

rare photos from the March 1, 1919 uprising/movement

scenes of the Independence Movement and of the effects of the reprisals
[blog entry from 2008]

Sunday, February 13, 2011

book, A Year in Pyongyang

A Year in Pyongyang by the late  Andrew Holloway.

There's a link to buy the book at Tim's  website: http://sites.google.com/site/nihilistorguk/_ This offers other items of interest too,  including:
* a Kanji font of his devising; and
* his own travelogue of a visit to the DPRK in  2002.

Alternatively, you can order A Year in  Pyongyang directly at
_http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/a-year-in-pyongyang/14737249_

In the UK the price is just ?4.93, plus ?2.99  postage.
(I gather that US dollar and euro prices, also  modest, are applied if you order from outside the UK.) If you prefer a downoad, this will cost you the princely sum of ?0.66! That's barely a dollar, and less than a  euro.

The books are made to order, which takes 3-5  days.

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

short fiction collection

via koreaweb.ws on Feb. 8:
 
...*Waxen Wings: The* Acta Koreana *Anthology of Short Fiction from Korea*, edited by
Bruce Fulton and published in the United States by Koryo Press.

[short extract from the editor's introduction]

The short story has been the genre of choice for writers of literary fiction
in modern Korea and it continues to thrive in the new millennium. *Waxen
Wings: The* Acta Koreana *Anthology of Short Fiction from Korea* offers a
diverse sampling from a century of modern Korean short fiction, beginning
with stories from two early masters (Yi Hyos?k and Ch'ae Manshik) and ending
with works by four of the most imaginative contemporary writers (Kim Y?ngha,
Ha S?ngnan, P'y?n Hyey?ng, and Kim Chunghy?k). In between are the two
writers who are primarily responsible for the visibility enjoyed by Korean
women fiction writers today (O Ch?ngh?i and Pak Wans?), and a writer, Kim
W?nil, who has made it his lifework to address the territorial and spiritual
division of the Korean peninsula. The title of the anthology, from Ha
S?ngnan's 1999 story, suggests the transcendental qualities of the finest
Korean short fiction.

The book can be purchased on-line from Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

Monday, January 3, 2011

official titles during Joseon times

 list of all official titles (via KoreanStudies e-list)

1. http://blog.daum.net/_blog/BlogTypeView.do?blogid=07zRU&articleno=13222003&categoryId=373242®dt=20090807211630#ajax_history_home


2. ????? without job description
http://people.aks.ac.kr:7080/front/tabCon/tabConGanadaList.aks?conType=POS&classCode=MN&choiceGanada=%EB%8B%A4&isEQ=true&kristalSearchArea=P

Thursday, December 30, 2010

e-Digital Asia projects at U. Oregon

cross-posting from e-list, KoreanStudies:
University of Oregon e-Asia Digital Library

...the University of Oregon Libraries are embarked on numerous digital projects, one of which is the e-Asia Digital Library located at http://e-asia.uoregon.edu/ ...The materials available for Korea (pre-1950 Korea is identified with South Korea in the indexing) are both ancient and modern, and in a variety of formats, pdf and Microsoft Reader mainly. Particularly valuable are the single articles from rare journals, including the Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society Korea Branch, also a few from The Korean Repository. I have included a short list of about 60 of the titles available in PDF format in my list of Old Books About Korea   http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/BooksKorea.htm  because the U Oregon page does not seem to offer that kind of overview, you need to search by category etc.

Brother Anthony at Sogang University / Dankook University / RASKB

Monday, December 20, 2010

maps & koryo period (medieval times)


[reply on e-list for KoreaStudies]
Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2010
Subject: Re: [KS] inquiry of Koryo period during the Yuan period

Mapmakers are not comfortable with ambiguity. Koryo was largely autonomous in its internal affairs, but had been incorporated into the Mongol empire and therefore was under the overall authority of the Yuan dynasty. The reason why Silla and Choson are shown as independent countries on maps and Koryo during the Mongol period is not is that the Mongols exercised much more control over Koryo than Tang ever did over Silla or Ming and Qing ever did over Choson. A careful mapmaker might try to draw the distinction between fully independent countries and countries that are autonomous within a larger empire by using dotted lines for the border between Koryo and the territory the Mongols ruled directly, and solid lines to distinguish the Yuan empire from countries it never drew into its orbit. Did that map do that?
---D Baker, Professor at the University of British Columbia

More details, 20 Dec 2010: G. Ledyard
...No doubt the Mongols probably had the general idea that Korea was theirs. From 1231 to 1259 they struggled without success to overthrow the Koryo state, which, with its governing institutions secure from assault on Kanghwa Island, maintained its weakened hold on the peninsula. In 1259 the Mongols succeeded in forcing the capitulation of King Kojong, and sending his eldest son and heir to Peking, where he was married to a Mongol princess and made to establish his household in Peking. Within two months Kojong had died, and the heir then returned to take the Koryo throne as King Wonjong (r. 1269-1274), while leaving his own son and heir in Peking in his own princely household with HIS brand new Mongol princess-wife.

For almost a hundred years this process repeated itself. The uxorilocal matrimonial institution was a widely used strategy by the Mongols to keep control of conquered territories by keeping the heirs of their various rulers hostage in Peking, where they would grow up speaking both Mongolian and Korean and even assuming Mongol names. But in Korea, on the record, they kept the royal Koryo surname, Wang. As each king died or abdicated, his Mongolized heir and his Mongol queen would replace the preceeding royal couple. This situation continued until 1356, when King Kongmin militarily succeeded in expelling the Mongols from Korea. By that time they were a weak and dying regime.

So during all that time and through all those sucessions, the Koryo dynasty, through the suceeding male heirs to the throne, maintained its existence, and also the laws, institutions, and the Korean-staffed bureaucracy that governed Koryo. For a few decades in the late 1200s the northwestern area of the Korean peninsula had been formally annexed to the Yuan dynasty, but that was discontinued before the century ended. Cheju, earlier declared a direct Mongol holding, was also restored to Koryo around that time. Finally the Hamgyong coastal area was also Mongol territory throughout most the occupation, but those lands were recouped by King Kongmin in 1356. But from 1259 to 1356, the Koryo dynasty existed and governed, and retained the key populated areas of the nation, though with Mongols watching the situation.

Though the Mongols had the capability to seize the whole country, in fact they never did.Even if Khubilai Khan, who after all was Emperor of Yuan dynasty China, had resorted to the Chinese tributary system to maintain a controlled relationsip with the Korean kingdom, that institution would still not have dissolved the Koryo state. For all of its embarrasing elements of superior-to-inferior relationships, its general purpose was to recognize such outlying countries and to relate to them using its power and prestige rather than its military to run them as Chinese colonies, while offering them peaceful access to China's markets and culture. From China's point of view, this offered much more stability than if they had tried to rule the smaller states themselves. And it was certainly cheaper than having to support armies to conquer and repress unhappy neighbors.

Thus Korea, which for the Chinese dynasties of the last thousand years was considered the most important and highest ranking tributary in the system, actually had a practical interest in maintaining this relationship, with Korea remaining a Korean kingdom with a Korean king, governed by Korean laws and a Korean bureaucracy.The relationship of China to Korea was very different than its relationship to some other nearby ethnicities. During the Qing dynasty, for instance, administration of the Korea relationship, and the tributary system in general, was the responsibility of the Board of Rites, while its relationship with many of its ethnic minorities and/or neighbors, such as the Uighurs, Mongols, and Tibetans, was administered by the Lifanyuan, an entirely different institution with different goals.

When one talks with ordinary Chinese people, one finds that they often have the idea that because Korea was a tributary state of China it was also a part of China. The fact that Korea in the dynastic days was a paragon of Chinese culture, Confucian values, and a master of its classical language might explain such impressions. But one wonders if they have not unconsciously assumed that all near neighbors are in the same category. But today China recognizes two Koreas and deals with them in terms of international protocol, while the situation with the Uighurs, Inner Mongolians, and Tibetans is still pretty much a continuation of the Qing dynasty.

Friday, November 12, 2010

film collection (listings, UCLA)

The Korean Heritage Library of the University of Southen California has thousands of Korean films and dramas, thanks to the Korean Collections Consortium of North America grants from the Korea Foundation.  To see USC's extensive Korean film collections, please go to the following site, maintained by my colleague, Sun-Yoon Lee:

http://libguides.usc.edu/content.php?pid=19365&sid=143425
 
Recent acquisitions are listed at the top.  Collection listings include the categories:
> Korean American Videos
> North Korean Documentary
> North Korean Feature Films
> South Korean Documentary
> South Korean Feature Films
 
Joy Kim, Curator
Korean Heritage Library, East Asian Library
University of Southern California
Joy Kim, joykim@usc .dotedu
 
--cf. another e-list response to this subject,
http://sites.google.com/site/vsdjklsdbmasas/dhma4x

Friday, September 10, 2010

collection of images, mainly 1930s

Postcard Collection. The collection is part of our open-access digital archive called Lafayette College East Asia Image Collections. The Lin
Collection consists of 370 Japanese postcards, mostly depicting scenes from 1930s Japan and Taiwan, but with some images of from Korea and
Chinahttp://digital.lafayette.edu/collections/eastasia

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Koguryeo battle of 612 A.D.

Q. Studying for history of Korea I run into the battle between Koguryeo and Sui dinasty's China of 612 A.D.
 
A. Sources to consult (besides the Samguk Sagi)
Asmolov, Konstantin V. "The System of Military Activity of Kogury?." Korea Journal 32:2 (Summer 1992): 103-116.
Gabriel, Richard A. and Boose, Donald W. "The Korean Way of War: Salsu River." In Richard A. Gabriel and Donald W. Boose. The Great Battles of Antiquity: A Strategic and Tactical Guide to Great Battles that Shaped the Development of War. Westport, CN: Greenwood Press, 1994.
 
Wikipedia (if you read Chinese or Korean compare those Wikipedia entries, too)
Search also under Battle of the Salsu River. Try also looking under Eulji Mundeok

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

DPRK and YouTube

via the morning radio program at NPR (cf. the youtube search string, DPRK)

North Korea Joins Twitter, YouTube

North's government-run website announced it has a Twitter account and a YouTube channel.
 
[searching "channels" maybe this one, http://www.youtube.com/user/supernorthkorea]

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

educator resources, supplementary list of links

Publications and Educational Articles

-          Korean Heritage (Quarterly from the Cultural Heritage Administration)

o        http://www.english.cha.go.kr

-          Koreana - Art and Culture (Quarterly magazine of the Korea Foundation)

o        http://www.koreana.or.kr

-          Korea (Monthly magazine of the Korean Culture and Information Service)

o        http://www.korea.net

 

Teaching Resources

-          Korean Spirit & Culture Promotion Project, http://www.kscpp.net

-          Asia Educational Media Service,  http://www.aems.illinois.edu/

-          Asia for Educators, http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/

-          The Korea Foundation, http://www.kf.or.kr/

-          The Korea Society, http://www.koreasociety.org/k-12_resources/

-          World Affairs Council Teacher Resource Packets Online

o        http://www.world-affairs.org/globalclassroom/resourcepackets.htm


Current News about Korea

-          The Korea Herald Online,  http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/

-          Korea.net,  http://www.korea.net/news.do

Current and Pop Culture

-          Korean Film,  http://www.koreanfilm.org

-          Korean Pop Culture,  http://www.seoulstyle.com/culture.php

-          Go Korea! http://www.asiaeducation.edu.au/sites/gokorea/index1.html

Friday, August 6, 2010

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

about British efforts in Korean War

via the KoreanStudies e-list today:

  Max Hastings The Korean War1987
  Mark Phythian, The Labour Party, War and International Relations 1945-2006
(Routledge, 2007),
  Clement Attlee (his memoirs), As it Happened, 1954.
  Kenneth O. Morgan, Labour in Power 1945?51, Oxford University Press, 1984;
  Alan Bullock, Life and Times of Ernest Bevin, Politicos Publising in 2002.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

book, Korea collections, Smithsonian Institution

Flagship of a Fleet, A Korean Gallery Guide
Dr. Paul Michael Taylor and Christopher Lotis
Asian Cultural History Program, Smithsonian Institute
ISBN 078-0-9724557-0-1

Flagship of a Fleet: A Korea Gallery Guide ...serves as a companion guide to the Korea Gallery, an on-going exhibition at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. The Korea Gallery presents a millennia of history and its distinctive culture through ceramics, paintings, textiles, and sculptures, ranging from the 6th century B.C.E.

Introducing Korea to a broad audience, the guidebook highlights and identifies the objects on exhibit, many of them previously unpublished. The book includes an introduction to the Smithsonian's Asian Cultural History Program and its Korean Heritage Project, founded in 1985. It provides a historical context and background of how the Korea Gallery exhibition
developed within an integrated curatorial program. The authors consider this exhibition the flagship of a fleet of related activities in the field of Korean heritage, including research, education, outreach, public programs and the development and improvement of museum collections.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

links to Journals & Centers

from the LINKs page at http://actakoreana.kmu.ac.jp
 
Journals

The Review of Korean Studies
Academy of Korean Studies
Korea Journal Korean National Commission for UNESCO
Journal of Korean Studies Korean Studies Program at Stanford University
Journal of Korean Studies Korean Studies Program at University of Washington
International Journal of Korean History Korea University
Korean Studies Review Korean Studies Internet Discussion List
Korean Literature Today Korean Center, Int'l P.E.N. English tr. of modern Korean lit.
Korean Studies University of Hawaii
Sungkyun Journal of East Korean Studies Sungkyunkwan University
Seoul Journal of Korean Studies Kyujanggak Inst for Korean Sts at Seoul Nat'l U.

Sunday, June 13, 2010

colonial days - film versions

via the koreanstudies-web e-list [thanks to Todd Henry]
 
"2009 Lost Memories," "YMCA Baseball Club," "Once Upon a Time," "Radio Days," "Modern Boy," "The Korean Peninsula," "Epitaph," and "Asako in Ruby Shoes," to name a few.

documentaries,  "Annyong, Sayonara" and "Choi Sunghee: The Korean Dancer,"
both available on DVD.
 

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

content for eBook reading

extract from KoreaToday story: ...On April 20, KT fired up the e-book open market with the launch of QOOK Book Café (http://bookcafe.qook.co.kr), which provides diverse content such as books, comics and magazines on a range of terminals including computers, e-book readers and smart phones.

Friday, May 28, 2010

popular culture in Korea & E.Asia

(free online access) of Monash University Press's Complicated Currents: Media Flows, Soft Power
and East Asia
, a collection of studies on Korean and East Asian popular culture

book, http://www.epress.monash.edu/cc
abstract, http://www.epress.monash.edu/cc/about.html

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Korean War color photos

Sixty of Rich's photos are on display May-June, 2010 in Seoul. His book will be in two editions, (in Korean & in English) with the complete series of pictures.
Korean War in Color: A Correspondent's Retrospective on a Forgotten War By John Rich 170 color photos. 248 pages. Seoul Selection. 60,000 won.
A good sampling and article about them can be viewed at
http://www.seoulselection.com/index.php/article/single/korean-war-in-color/

The actual book is e-published (turnable pages) as well at
http://issuu.com/seoulselection/docs/koreanwarincolor_1

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

small North Korean atlas

small North Korean atlas, Joseon Jidocheob (Atlas of Korea), 
Pyongyang, 1997, http://www.scribd.com/doc/30485687/North-Korean-Atlas

Monday, April 12, 2010

online re: DPRK

http://38north.org and http://www.nk-news.net, which makes KCNA  searchable.

Friday, April 2, 2010

islanders between N & S Koreas

Islanders Aim For Normalcy In North Korea's Shadow

April 1, 2010 An island in the Yellow Sea is the base of operations to find 46 missing South Korean sailors from a navy ship that went down March 26 after a mysterious explosion. Baengnyeong Island is about 10 miles from North Korea's west coast. Its residents try to live ordinary lives — but are among the first to suffer when tensions rise. [Nat'l Public Radio 1 April 2010]

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

seeking statistics

Statistics available from the Korea website http://kosis.kr/
--Example:

The literacy rate in colonial Korea, according to statistics, was
geographically very uneven. In 1930, the national average was 49% for
men and 11% for women (age 12 and above). In Seoul, however, 80% of
men and 44% of women could read and write Korean, and in P'yongyang
83% of men and 40% of women. Plus, about 53% of men and 15% of women
in Seoul were bilingual.

The most comprehensive compilation of statistics for colonial Korea in
English, still, is Andrew Grajdanzev's Modern Korea. Here is a Google
Books link: http://books.google.com/books?id=5jp8-KKy6eAC&dq=modern+korea&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Sunday, March 14, 2010

all articles from Korean newspapers

The Korean Press Foundation (KPF) provides an index of all articles of Korean newspapers. Their KINDS service is well-known among Korean mass communication and journalism scholars. http://www.kpf.or.kr/index2.html [Korean Language website]

Friday, March 5, 2010

old photos 1950s-1970s Seoul

photographs of an impoverished Cheongyecheon in 1965 - and a wealth of other images of Seoul in the 1950s-70s, http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=611726&page=4

Friday, February 19, 2010

Korea and her neighbors [1897 pub.]

Korea and her neighbors; a narrative of travel, with an account of the recent vicissitudes and present position of the country, by Isabella Bird Bishop ... With a preface by Sir Walter C. Hillier ... With illustrations from photographs by the author ... Bird, Isabella L. (Isabella Lucy), 1831-1904.New York, Revell, 1897.
(Full text) on GoogleBooks

Monday, February 8, 2010

old photos from Korea

gathered by Henny (Lee Hae Kang)
-----------------------------
http://www.henny-savenije.pe.kr Portal to all my sites
http://www.cartography.henny-savenije.pe.kr (in English) Korea
through Western Cartographic eyes
http://www.hwasong.henny-savenije.pe.kr Hwasong the fortress in Suwon
http://www.oldKorea.henny-savenije.pe.kr Old Korea in pictures
http://www.british.henny-savenije.pe.kr A British encounter in Pusan (1797)

Thursday, January 21, 2010

old maps of Korea/chosen Kingdom

via koreaweb.ws on Jan. 20, 2010; announced by
Angie Cope, Senior Academic Librarian
American Geographical Society Library - UW Milwaukee Libraries
2311 E. Hartford Avenue, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53201 USA

AGS Library map: 1861 Territorial Map of the Great East online

view all 22 sheets, 1 index sheet and 1 composite map:
http://collections.lib.uwm.edu/u?/agdm,828

OTHER MAPS OF INTEREST

Haejwa Jondo or [A native map of Chosen] -
http://collections.lib.uwm.edu/u?/agdm,604

Whole map of Seoul, 2nd Book - http://collections.lib.uwm.edu/u?/agdm,605

Yeojido [atlas of Korea from between 1823-1869] - 
http://collections.lib.uwm.edu/u?/agdm,705

Shannon McCune and George C. Foulk Photographs of Korea -
http://www4.uwm.edu/libraries/digilib/agsphoto/index.cfm
cf. http://old-koreaphotos.wikispaces.com

see also, Nov 20, 2009 symposium "Korean maps of the 19th Century"
http://www4.uwm.edu/libraries/AGSL/korean_maps.cfm

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Academy for Korean Studies - online content

via the KoreanStudies e-list of January 12, 2010:

...the Academy of Korean Studies has started to distribute their wealth of premodern historical
data under a Creative Commons license. For one example, see: http://bit.ly/7OJHyu. Not all parts of the AKS website reflect this change yet...

Thursday, November 12, 2009

college entrance - one nation, one exam

In South Korea, Nation Stops For Mega Exam

More than 650,000 high school seniors in South Korea on Thursday took the only national college placement exam that many believe will determine the rest of their lives. The government takes it so seriously that even those infected with the H1N1 virus took the exam under medical supervision. [Nat'l Public Radio 12 Nov 2009 story]
South Korean parents pray for high scores at Jogyesa, the largest Buddhist temple in Seoul.

Sunday, September 27, 2009

Korea books online - Internet Archive &c

...quite a number of early books about Korea are available through the Internet
...a list of some of the most obviously interesting titles [is] at
   http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/BooksKorea.htm   but a search for "Korea" in the "texts" section of the Internet Archive http://www.archive.org/index.php     will bring up many more.

[for Isabella Bird's 19c travels, see also] http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/Bird/KoreaandherNeighbors.htm  a few additional photos taken by her that were not used in her book. Those of Kwanghwa-mun and the west gate to Pusan-jin are especially interesting.

[via KoreanStudies.ws] Brother Anthony at Sogang University, Seoul

Sunday, September 13, 2009

why the diacritics on romanized Korean writing?

a concise explanation for the question:
 
>  WHY is there still, in 2009, no concerted move among the (very limited) number of people regularly using the McCune-Reischauer method of transciption to revise it and get rid of those impossible breves? What is the great advantage of retaining them? Do they have magic powers?

[R King writes] They do indeed have magical powers -- they render unambiguously and without resorting to clumsy digraphs vowels that the Korean sound system insists be distinguished and that otherwise would go undistinguished in roman script. They signal, through their unitary unigraphicity, that a single vowel is being represented -- something that Seong-su or Seung-mi from Incheon cannot do with the new system. ...there is a trade-off between the clumsiness of the special character and the clumsiness of a digraph...
 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= in short, those who no longer need the romanized aids to pronunciation do not have a stake in the system of diacritics any more. Those new to the language do not have a stake in one system of transcription over another. But those who are neither beginners or intermediate students of Korean language do very much benefit from the diacritic cues to distinguish sounds.

Friday, September 4, 2009

online level 1-2 Korean textbooks

Monash Korean language textbooks 'My Korean 1 and 2' (by Young-A Cho, In-Jung Cho and Douglas Ling) are now available free of charge at
http://www.arts.monash.edu.au/korean/klec/ .

supported by the Korea Foundation with a 2008 grant
(Support for Instructional Materials Development).
-- Young-A Cho & In-Jung Cho, Korean Studies at Monash

Thursday, September 3, 2009

all about Isabella Bird's 1800s Korea visit

[online] ...devoted to Isabella Bishop and her book "Korea and Her Neighbors," http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/Bird/KoreaandherNeighbors.htm 

Brother Anthony of Sogang University, Seoul, http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

sijo in North America

For those interested in the sijo form itself, or a story about Korean literature
making its way into English language circles, please do check the Boston Globe
story about it... [English submissions welcome]
--via D. McCann [koreanstudies.ws]

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/gallery/sijocontest/

Friday, August 7, 2009

reviews online - Korean Studies

Eventually Korean Studies Review  (KSR) will migrate to a new server, but for the time being reviews from 1998-2007 will continue to be available at http://koreaweb.ws/ks/ksr/ ;  reviews from 2008 will be at the new KSR website, http://hangul.snu.ac.kr/ksr/

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Indonesian tribe picks Korean alphabet as official writing system


via Korean Studies Discussion List <http://us.mc580.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=koreanstudies@koreaweb.ws>

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2009/08/06/56/0302000000AEN20090806001200315F.HTML

[compare to] ...other instances in the past where other cultures attempted to adopt Han'gu(l / Choso(n'gu(l as their written language only to have it be rejected, no?
I don't recall as it has been a long time since I read Kim-Renaud, Y-K.
(ed) 1997. The Korean Alphabet: Its History and Structure.

Anyway, this is a very interesting language development that *gasp* for
once doesn't involve romanizations.


=-=-=-= follow up:
The case of using hangeul by one of Indonesian tribes as a practical systemof writing is funny. It is one more ?success? of local nationalists in theera of globalization, when the state sponsors such "experiments"! Koreanalphabet is excellent only for the Korean language, but is almost unsuitablefor the transmission of sounds, which are absent in the Korean language. Inthe Soviet Union in 1920-30?s attempts were made to create scripts fornationalities, which had no their own script on the basis of the Latinalphabet. This letter alphabet, as well as Cyrillic, is much more suitablethan Korean letter-syllabic alphabet, for transcription of all kinds ofsounds through a combination of letters or diacritics. But the grandioseexperiment failed. It is difficult to believe that the Korean experimentwill last for long.
---Lev Kontsevich [Moscow]

=-=-=-= more [Sept. 12, 2009]
reporting by Choe Sang-Hun in this morning's NY Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/12/world/asia/12script.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Korean%20alphabet%20/%20Indonesia&st=cse

Saturday, July 18, 2009

RESOURCE e-Asia Digital Library

"e-Asia [est. 2001 - ed.] is a library of downloadable full text
(currently over 4000 items -- primarily books -- are available.) Focus
is on China, Japan, Taiwan, and Korea (South and North). While most
items are in Western languages, there are many items in Chinese,
Japanese, and Korean. e-Asia also offers audio, video, and special
collections.

The e-Asia project is funded by the University of Oregon Library
through the generosity of Nissho Iwai.

While the e-Asia project is based largely on resources held at the University of Oregon Library, its purpose is neither to duplicate nor displace printed traditonal materials. Rather, by providing searchable full text, the digitalization efforts
of e-Asia represent a new tool aimed at facilitating the information-gathering process.

Friday, June 26, 2009

which romanization logic to use in Korea?

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2009/06/113_47389.html

[thanks to Brother Anthony at Sogang University, Seoul
http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/]

Sunday, June 21, 2009

mythology for Korea

from e-list of KoreanStudies, 21 June 2009.

sources to read about myths besides Tangun, Chumong and Hyokkose:

<> Dr Grayson's "Myths and Legends from Korea: An Annotated Compendium of Ancient and Modern Materials"
http://www.amazon.com/Myths-Legends-Korea-Annotated-Compendium/dp/0700712410/ref=sr_1_1
is a classic standard-setter;
<> limited preview of this book, including table of contents, is available on http://books.google.com/books?id=HZO49KfGLiMC&pg=PP1&dq=Myths+and+Legends+from+Korea
<> This book by Grayson has been reissued by Routledge.

<> source also by Dr. Kim Hwa-kyong, (Yeungnam Univ), www.jisik.co.kr

<>
Zong In-sob, Folk tales from Korea, Elizabeth NJ and Seoul: Hollym 1970, often reprinted
<> Korean National Commission for UNESCO, Korean Folklore,? Seoul: Si-sa yong-o-sa and Arch Cape Oregon: Pace, 1983
<> Choi Won-oh, An Illustrated Guide to Korean Mythology, Folkestone Kent UK: Global Oriental 2008