The diplomat and scholar-official Min Yong-hwan (1861-1905), described by one contemporary Western observer as undoubtably the first Korean after the emperor, is best remembered in Korean historiography for his pioneering diplomacy at the courts of Tsar Nicholas II and Queen Victoria in the late 1890s. Furthermore, he is considered to be the foremost patriot of Korea's Taehan era (1897-1907). This pioneering study of Min Yong-hwan is long overdue and provides us with a new perspective on a period of Korean history that still casts its shadow over the region today.
This new biography...
The diplomat and scholar-official Min Yong-hwan (1861-1905), described by one contemporary Western observer as undoubtably the first Korean after t...
A deeply compelling saga of love, jealously, honor, and greed, And So Flows History (Yoksanun hurunda, 1947) depicts the relentless power of exterior forces on the individual lives of three generations of the illustrious Cho family--from the waning years of the Choson dynasty in the late nineteenth century to the tumultuous postliberation era.
A deeply compelling saga of love, jealously, honor, and greed, And So Flows History (Yoksanun hurunda, 1947) depicts the relentless power of exterior ...
Arranged around a set of provocative themes, the essays in this volume engage in the discussion from various critical perspectives on Korean geography. Part One, Geographies of the (Colonial) City, focuses on Seoul during the Japanese colonial occupation from 1910-1945 and the lasting impact of that period on the construction of specific places in Seoul. In Part Two, Geographies of the (Imagined) Village, the authors delve into the implications for the conceptions of the village of recent economic and industrial development. In this context, they examine both constructed space, such as the...
Arranged around a set of provocative themes, the essays in this volume engage in the discussion from various critical perspectives on Korean geogra...
The Japonic (Japanese and Ryukyuan) portmanteau language family and the Korean language have long been considered isolates on the fringe of northeast Asia. Although in the last fifty years many specialists in Japonic and Korean historical linguistics have voiced their support for a genetic relationship between the two, this concept has not been endorsed by general historical linguists and no significant attempts have been made to advance beyond the status quo. Alexander Vovin, a longtime advocate of the genetic relationship view, engaged in a reanalysis of the known data in the hope of...
The Japonic (Japanese and Ryukyuan) portmanteau language family and the Korean language have long been considered isolates on the fringe of northea...
Thirty years ago, anthropologist Laurel Kendall did intensive fieldwork among South Korea's (mostly female) shamans and their clients as a reflection of village women's lives. In the intervening decades, South Korea experienced an unprecedented economic, social, political, and material transformation and Korean villages all but disappeared. And the shamans? Kendall attests that they not only persist but are very much a part of South Korean modernity.
This enlightening and entertaining study of contemporary Korean shamanism makes the case for the dynamism of popular religious...
Thirty years ago, anthropologist Laurel Kendall did intensive fieldwork among South Korea's (mostly female) shamans and their clients as a reflecti...
Available for the first time in English, the ten short stories by modern Korean women collected here touch in one way or another on issues related to gender and kinship politics. All of the protagonists are women who face personal crises or defining moments in their lives as gender-marked beings in a Confucian, patriarchal Korean society. Their personal dreams and values have been compromised by gender expectations or their own illusions about female existence. They are compelled to ask themselves Who am I? Where am I going? What are my choices? Each story bears colorful and compelling...
Available for the first time in English, the ten short stories by modern Korean women collected here touch in one way or another on issues related ...
An understanding of contemporary North Korea's literature is virtually impossible without an investigation of its formative period, 1945-1960, which saw a gradual transformation from the initial Soviet era to a Korean version of national Stalinism. This turbulent epoch established a long-lasting framework for North Korean literature and set up an elaborate system of political control over literary matters, as well as over the people who served in this field.
In 1946 Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) leader Kim Il Sung described the country's writers as soldiers on the...
An understanding of contemporary North Korea's literature is virtually impossible without an investigation of its formative period, 1945-1960, whic...
Takes a multidisciplinary approach in an effort to provide a fuller understanding of both historic and contemporary practices linked with death in Korea. Contributors incorporate the approaches of archaeology, history, literature, religion, and anthropology in addressing a number of topics organised around issues of the body, disposal of remains, ancestor worship and rites, and the afterlife.
Takes a multidisciplinary approach in an effort to provide a fuller understanding of both historic and contemporary practices linked with death in Kor...
