“Provinces” Represented by Japanese People in Korea under Japanese Colonial Rule - With a Focus On the Publication of Provincial Guidebooks during the Japanese Colonial Period -

Abstract

This study set out to investigate modern format provincial guidebooks published by the colonial administrative agencies or Japanese people in Korea between 1907 and 1945 and critically review the aspects of Korea represented in them. During the Japanese rule, a number of provincial guidebooks were published in urban areas containing a large population of Japanese people and traditional cities filled with scenic spots and places of historic interest, whereas there are few or no data on provincial guidebooks on local agricultural towns where a majority of Korean population resided. The serious regional deviation in the publication of provincial guidebooks reflects an objective deviation in information about local areas available those days. The inequality of information structured in the generation process of historical materials cannot help being reflected in the historical aspects represented through local history research, which is why it is important to analyze an objective situation of “unequal distribution and absence of provincial guidebooks” based on comparative studies when doing a research on local history. Also needed is a discourse criticism of provincial guidebooks during the Japanese rule. The example of Suwon indicates that the provincial guidebooks published mainly by Japanese people targeted the Japanese nationalities and Japanese people in Korea as their readers. Settling down all over the nation, Japanese people placed themselves at the center to look at Korea and the local places where they settled down. As far as they were concerned, the existence of Korean people was a secondary landscape or the object of enlightenment. It is thus necessary to deconstruct such power of viewpoint and trace back the narration of a book in order to critically interpret provincial guidebooks those days. Korean people were in different conditions from the Japanese communities around the nation in the establishment process of colonial ruling system, and such a situation was reflected in provincial guidebooks. Thus reorganizing local history with provincial guidebooks should be preceded by comparing provincial guidebooks for the state of publication and critically comparing and analyzing their publication environments, conditions, and purposes.