In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Note from the Editor Sem Vermeersch, Editor-in-chief This issue includes six research articles, four on the history of pre-modern Korea, one on post-liberation south Korea, and one on transnational Korea. There is also one article that translates and contextualizes a source text, and three book notes. The first article, by King Kwong Wong

Abstract: During the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the Mongols incorporated Koryŏ through a myriad of interstate relations. Either approaching from the Tributary-Investiture practice or from the thesis of Koryŏ as a part of the Mongol empire, scholars have previously focused on only one of the many aspects of Koryŏ-Yuan relations to provide a clear picture. By examining the institution of the

Abstract: O Huimun, a Joseon yangban who had never passed the civil service examination and consequently never been appointed to a government position, was travelling around Jeolla Province in 1592 when the first Japanese invasion of the Imjin War (1592–1598) occurred. From the outset of his travels at the end of 1591 until his return to Seoul early in 1601, O Huimun kept an almost unbroken daily record

Abstract: This study examines the bridge memorial stones of Chosŏn, considering the intersection between public literature and exile literature. Bridge memorial stones are erected to commemorate stone bridge construction in a community. The entire community—from the local administration to the people—contributed to the bridge construction and the compositon of the epigraphs on bridge memorial stones

Abstract: The first land reform in South Korea after liberation from Japanese colonial rule took place in 1948, three years after US forces established a military government in the south. While the 1948 land reform is often evaluated as a success, less attention is given as to why it took so long to be carried out, especially when demand was high among people in a postcolonial agricultural society

Abstract: This paper aims to determine why Chilean fans of K-pop enjoy the incompatible aesthetics of K-pop idols. It will analyze the variation of the ideal of beauty according to socioeconomic level in Chile and fans’ perception of the beauty canons of K-pop. Hypothesizing that the relationship between race (rather skin color) and class in Chile affects K-pop consumption, this study will delve into

Abstract: This paper presents an annotated translation and hermeneutic interpretation of a garden record in Seo Yugu’s nineteenth-century Korean encyclopedia Treatises on Rural Living (Imwon gyeongje ji 林園經濟志). This particular garden record is about a fantasy garden called To-Become Garden (Jangchwiwon 將就園). The translation, historical annotations, and hermeneutic interpretation presented in this paper

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Reviewed by: The Power of the Brush: Epistolary Practices in Chosŏn Korea by Hwisang Cho Suyoung Son The Power of the Brush: Epistolary Practices in Chosŏn Korea by Hwisang Cho. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2020. 276 pp. Hwisang Cho’s The Power of the Brush is a welcome addition to a series of publications regarding textual

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Reviewed by: Seeds of Control: Japan’s Empire of Forestry in Colonial Korea by David Fedman Wybe Kuitert Seeds of Control: Japan’s Empire of Forestry in Colonial Korea by David Fedman. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 2020. 320 pp. As many of us are spending our days behind a screen rather than in a forest or a field, we tend

Abstract: This paper attempts to analyze the process by which early Catholicism in Joseon was repressed and persecuted through a primarily legal perspective. In doing so, I will try to lay out exactly how the Joseon government chose to legally handle the problem of Catholicism and seek to show how this legal treatment changed over time and reveal the reasons for this shift in law application. Here

Abstract: This paper seeks to study illustrations in the Sinjajeon 新字典 (1915), the "New Dictionary of Chinese Characters" created by the Joseon Gwangmunhoe 朝鮮光文會, which compiled and distributed Korean classics as part of an effort to promote knowledge of them. The illustrations were based on various sources, including ceremonial books, and reflect the academic culture in Korea of ritual thought (yehak

Abstract: This article investigates repertories of the Yiwangjik aakpu regular concert to examine how court musicians in colonial Korea reacted to the continuing influx of Western musical culture. The Yiwangjik aakpu was formerly the Changagwŏn in charge of music performed at the royal palace of Chosŏn Korea. The name change, along with a reduction in the number of affiliated musicians, occurred with

Abstract: This article discusses two adaptations of Korean "classics" by Ch'oe Inhun (1936–2018), Kuunmong (1962) and Kŭmo sinhwa (1963), offering an in-depth comparative analysis of these works with their canonized Chosŏn Dynasty models by Kim Manjung (1637–1692) and Kim Sisŭp (1435–1493) to identify and interpret intertextual ties. I hypothesize that Ch'oe Inhun's unusual transformations of these

Abstract: South Korea has one of the oldest non-amended constitutions in the world. However, while the comparative literature has been neglecting this puzzling case as such, Korean literature on the matter has been lacking theoretically informed investigation. Therefore, this article studies the mechanisms and dynamics responsible for this outstanding endurance from the perspective of comparative constitutional

Abstract: Using the perspective of cultural and critical geography, this paper discusses the fabric of Songdo, South Korea, a mega-urban project declared the paragon of a "smart city" and intended to house about 250,000 inhabitants by 2020. After demonstrating how Songdo fits David Harvey's (1975, 2001b) concept of a "mega-project," we deconstruct the development of Songdo to show how the city is a

Abstract: Despite the vital role played by ethnic churches in the retention of ethnic culture and a sense of identity, a significant proportion of second-generation Korean Brazilians drift away from their churches. This "silent exodus" from Korean religious organizations in São Paulo raises the question of how Korean Brazilians maintain a sense of belonging and community after their departure. Based

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Tonghak:A Progressive Ideological Heritage Indigenous to the Chosŏn Nation* Hak Hui Ro (bio) Translated by Keiran Mcrae Preface Vladimir Glomb Tonghak thought and its legacy, since the very beginning of the DPRK regime, were part of its political and ideological structure and a frequently discussed part of North Korean historical discourse

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Translating the T'aengniji:A Review of Inshil Choe Yoon's A Place to Live Adam Bohnet (bio) A Place to Live: A New Translation of Yi Chung-hwan's Taengniji, the Korean Classic for Choosing Settlements, translated, annotated, and with an introduction by Inshil Choe Yoon. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2018. 234 pp. Thanks to the

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: Reviewed by: Originless fantasy: Reading Korean modern and contemporary cultural history from feminist perspectives ed. by O Hyejin Soo Ryon Yoon Wonbon eomneun pantaji: peminiseuteu sigak euro ingneun Hanguk hyeondae munhwasa [Originless fantasy: Reading Korean modern and contemporary cultural history from feminist perspectives] by O

Abstract:In narrative literature, the Silla monk Ŭisang 義湘 (625–702), who studied Huayan under Zhiyan 智嚴 (602–668) and was venerated as the founder of the Hwaŏm school 華嚴宗 in Silla Korea (ca. 300–935), is remembered as a devout practitioner of devotional Buddhism more than as an exegete. Aside from his famous Seal-diagram Symbolizing the Dharma Realm of the One Vehicle of the Avatam . saka-sūtra (Hwaŏm

Abstract:This article examines the ambiguous roles of birth and merit in Korea from around 900 to 1500 CE. Medieval Korea’s yangban aristocracy valued pedigree but did not guarantee heredity. Many illustrious houses failed to retain their status, and the void created opportunities for provincials to try establishing themselves as new and lasting capital-based yangban courtiers. The mesh of patron/client

Abstract:Early societies of the Korean peninsula experienced a variety of developmental forms ranging from simple social configurations to state-level organizations, with stark regional variation. Research on the social and political history of the peninsula prior to the tenth century must account for these regional variations, which frustrate attempts to create a general periodization applicable to

Opening with a vignette from a newspaper, Cheguk sinmun, Sonja Kim’s Imperatives of Care takes up a female candidate for medical education at the close of the nineteenth century mobilizing her circumstances within a public forum. As reported, the female applicant receives a denial from authorities in charge of the Government Medical School, but the newspaper’s recounting of her ambitions praises the

Abstract:Hepatitis B was a stigmatizing disease because of its reputation as a problem of underdeveloped countries and marginalized people. Biomedicine, including vaccination and science-based sanitation, was regarded as the only effective measure against it. Hence, some scholars have assumed that bodies and the disease were merely objects of biomedical intervention essential for nation-building. Challenging

Abstract:Between 1500 and 1800 CE, patterns of governance on the Korean Peninsula shifted toward a dynamic that I term the “rise of the brokered state.” While central political authority increasingly became entrenched in a small number of elite families residing in the capital region, the reach of the Chosŏn state continued to grow through local institutions such as clerks and military garrisons. Likewise

Abstract:This article approaches the challenge of reperiodizing Korean history by considering the place of the nineteenth century within accounts of modern Korea. In recent years, numerous studies have examined various aspects of Korean “modernity.” However, notwithstanding the contributions from such studies, an overemphasis on modernity as a central concept runs the risk of marginalizing significant

rethink the ways we divide the history of Korea from the formation of the earliest states through to the twentieth century. The established periodization scheme, based on dynastic units such as Old Chosŏn 古朝鮮 (–108 BCE), Silla 新羅 (–935 CE), Koryŏ 高麗 (918–1392), Chosŏn 朝鮮 (1392–1910), and modern and contemporary Korea (1910–the present), may be convenient, but is problematic for numerous reasons. To

An earlier draft of this paper was presented at the 2019 Kyujanggak Symposium on Korean Studies that was held at Seoul National University in November 2019.

Abstract:This paper articulates Jeju shamanistic ideas of the human soul. While it has been thought in Jeju that human beings have three or even seven souls, I argue that these numbers are not specific but rather indicate the complete state of the multipart soul. By analyzing the neokdeurim, a Jeju shamanistic ritual performed to reintegrate the human soul, and by referring to related Jeju myths, I

Coincidentally, the publication of two important books on youth culture and political activism in South Korea occurred within months of the onset and denouement of the protest movement now known as the 2016–2017 Candlelight Revolution. The timing of the books’ publication, which carried a sense of remarkable serendipity, was by no means the result of their being rushed into production. On the contrary

Abstract:This article examines how queer literature’s experiment in the deconstruction of the representational model addresses not only modernist formalistic aesthetics but also the political imagination of future communities. The three short stories analyzed here transform themselves into a space where the reader actively engages in a visceral relationship with the texts. In this process, the reader

Abstract:Built in 1925 during the Japanese colonial period, Dongdaemun Stadium was the first modern sports stadium in Seoul, the capital of Korea. During the Japanese colonial occupation and after liberation, especially in the 1960s–80s, Korean sports fans experienced numerous significant victories at Dongdaemun. This article investigates how Dongdaemun Stadium, part of the Japanese colonial legacy

Abstract:The government of the Chosŏn Dynasty (1392–1910) employed highly restrictive and secretive measures to preserve the integrity of the Chosŏn wangjo sillok (Veritable Records of the Chosŏn Dynasty; hereafter Sillok) and to impart them to posterity. During the Japanese colonial period (1910–1945), the Sillok was used in research that served to justify Japanese colonial control, but the quality

tradition. The “quiet, serene beauty” of Korean ceramics can be viewed as an ironical “benefit” of the global isolation and technical simplicity of the Korean tradition (278). Moreover, this irony was not just a relic of the past, but is still very much alive in contemporary Korean ceramic art, in which the author has been an active participant (Epilogue, 278-283). In this sense, the author’s “Orient”

Abstract: In this paper the author not only analyzes the considerable number of Korean Protestant churches that are in default, but also attempts to apply the theoretical framework of Han Byung-Chul’s cultural criticism to the status quo situation of Korean Protestantism. Regarding the extent of the church defaults, one notices diverse factors impacting the situation, including a growth-oriented attitude

studies on Korean religions, literature, and politics. I am excited in particular by four articles that deal with different Korean religious traditions, and how each of those traditions has reacted to the challenges of a changing society. In the first article (as usual, articles appear in chronological order), Jang Jiyeon attempts a periodization of Korean geomancy. Although grave geomancy (ŭmt’aek

Patterson’s short monograph presents, contextualizes and analyzes the correspondence of William Nelson Lovatt, an American customs officer stationed in Pusan in the 1880s, and his family. The letters feature both personal and professional content, covering everything from mundane daily events to critical historical incidents, and the career trajectory of Lovatt as he moves from the customs office in

who is retiring from Seoul National University (SNU) this summer. Prof. Hejtmanek became editor in 2010, and his wisdom and steady hand have ensured that the journal has continued to flourish. I would like to thank him for his efforts, and wish him a happy and productive retirement. This year also marks the 30th volume already of the Seoul Journal of Korean Studies. It started in the Olympic year of

Abstract: The professionalization of archaeology is an understudied research topic in the history of South Korean archaeology. Literature on the subject has so far focused on the mechanisms that separate amateurs from professional archaeologists—in other words on the academic recognition and the credential system of the discipline. However, researchers have not considered the effect those mechanisms

Abstract: One of the most controversial issues to arise during the colonial period in Korea was the rise of clerical marriage and meat-eating among Korean monks. Given that sexual congress and meat dishes were prohibited in bhikṣu and bodhisattva precepts respectively, any examination of the issue of clerical marriage and meat-eating requires a careful exploration of the ways in which Korean monks

Abstract: This paper analyzes the perception on the roles of female clerics and sexual minorities in Won Buddhism. In particular, this study focuses on the areas of disagreement between the organizational leadership and members of Won Buddhism, which was ignited by the failed attempt to revise the religion’s statutes on the 100th anniversary of its foundation. The sections in this paper reflect the

This article examines how Korean geomancy evolved over a thousand years, from the early tenth century through the first half of the twentieth. Theories and practices that emerged over the years effectively reveal Korean geomancy’s uniqueness. Such uniqueness prompts us to examine Korean geomancy during three periods, as geomantic theories and practices in any one of these three periods certainly differed

Abstract: In 1968, in response to lackluster US support for Republic of Korea (ROK) military modernization amid rising North Korean threats, the Park Chung Hee regime (1961–1979) instituted the policy of “self-reliant national defense,” or chaju kukpang, which was centered on building a national defense industry in the 1970s. The wide-ranging impact of this policy is examined, including the way that

Despite its significance as the first time Korean athletes had participated in the Olympic Games, the 1932 Los Angeles Summer Olympics has attracted little scholarly attention. In this paper, I examine the 1932 Olympic Games’ multifaceted impact on colonial Korea beyond the typical nationalistic historiography that focuses on Japanese discrimination vs. Korean resistance. The Olympics, at that time

Kim Pusik’s 金富軾 (1075–1151) Samguk sagi 三國史記 (History of the Three Kingdoms) is arguably the single most important document for understanding the history of the early Korean state of Silla 新羅 (traditional dates, 57 bce–935 ce). Despite the existence of other literary and archeological materials, as a royally sanctioned “standard history” the Samguk sagi continues to enjoy a position of power in determining

Chosŏn Korea (1392–1910) began a special investigation into the rumored murder of an unnamed woman, the mother of Kim Chiryong and his two brothers.1 Suspecting a concealed murder, he gathered witnesses in situ and interrogated their complicity. The Kim brothers, the story goes, were itinerant “singing boys” (ch’angdong 唱童) who had found temporary lodging in a remote village. One night, they faced

Abstract:This paper surfaces the major contradictions between the “Account of the Han” in the third-century Sanguozhi 三國志 (Records of the Three Kingdoms) and the twelfth-century records of early Silla in the Samguk sagi 三國史記 (History of the Three Kingdoms) with regards to the formation of the Silla kingdom in southeastern Korea during the third and fourth centuries. Archaeological material, specifically

In Silla history, the Maripkan period saw the Kyŏngju-centered Saro polity subjugate peripheral regional polities and towns and develop into an ancient state. Archaeologically, this period saw the construction of large and small Silla-style tombs within the Silla area of authority. In the past, Silla archaeology has tended to study tomb material, especially high tombs constructed in Kyŏngju and the

Several studies of god pictures in Korean shamanism have introduced different types of pictures and their locations. Those written from the perspective of art history analyze their stylistic characteristics and the semantics of the symbols appearing in them. The discussion in folk and religious studies has focused on classifying the depicted deities, looking into the relationship between the pictures

According to the Samguk sagi (History of the Three Kingdoms), exchanges between the kingdoms of Koguryŏ and Silla commenced with military engagements in the middle of the third century. The broader interregional circumstances of the time, evidenced by both historical and archaeological data, make such an early encounter between these two polities highly unlikely. In this paper I examine data from historical

Contacts between Koguryŏ and the Turkic Khaganate Exchanges between the inhabitants of the Korean peninsula and those of the nomadic states of the Mongol steppes began in the ancient period. A specific example of this is to be found in the contacts between the Xiongnu and Old Chosŏn in the second century BCE. One of the primary goals of the invasion in 108 BCE by Han China of Old Chosŏn was the blocking

This article examines the history of Korean cookbooks and their female authors in the late Chosŏn period. Two female authors of cookbooks—Chang Kyehyang 張桂香 (1598–1680) and Yi Pinghŏgak 李憑虛閣 (1759–1824)—used letters and texts for the purpose of communication with and knowledge transmission to women, and in the process shaped an autonomous space for the female reading public. Prior to these female cookbook

The works of the avant-garde Korean writer Yi Sang (1910–1937) have puzzled many readers and confused many analysts. When his Crow’s-Eye View (Ogamdo) poems were first serialized in a Korean newspaper in 1934, Yi Sang’s playfulness was misread as a meaningless repetition of signs and regarded as an insult to his readers. The newspaper even stopped printing them before the series was complete. Most

of Silla, the Silla Annals, the most extensive body of evidence regarding the history of that major Northeast Asian polity. Yet there are significant problems, especially chronological problems, with its account of the early history of Silla. The Silla Annals provides a record, albeit at some points a sparse record, of events important to the Silla court from the alleged assumption of power in 57 BCE

Abstract: Subsequent to his abdication of the South Korean presidency in 1960, Syngman Rhee was generally criticized and condemned among scholars regardless of political orientation, a trend that continued for the better part of the next three decades. The dissolution of Korea’s Cold War regime and the transition to democracy, however, marked a decisive discursive shift, particularly among scholars

by moving to Kǔmsŏngdang 錦城堂, the shrine that used to house as its main god the spirit of Kǔmsŏng taegun 錦城大君, the sixth son of King Sejong. Yul Soo Yoon opened Gahoe Museum in Kahoe-dong (Seoul) in 2002. Its name was changed to Gahoe Minhwa Museum in 2007 and it moved from a traditional Korean house to a neighboring building in July 2016. The museum owns a large collection of folk paintings, including

This article seeks to offer a broad examination of the historical trajectory of Neo-Confucian thought in the Chosŏn Dynasty of the nineteenth century. In so doing, the article aspires to go beyond the pre-established view of equating Neo-Confucianism with the conservative wijŏng ch’ŏksa (“upholding orthodoxy, rejecting heterodoxy”) movement. First, attention will be paid to the fact that sequels to