Korean Nationalism Research Articles

Transplanted Modernity and the Reconfiguration of Nation: Im Hwa’s Writings on Modern Korean Literary History and National Literature

Abstract: This article explores the evolution of Im Hwa’s literary criticism, focusing on the continuity between his history of New Literature during Korea’s late colonial period and his theory of national literature in the post-liberation era. It discusses how Im’s view on the Korean nation contributes to postcolonial dialogues about preserving positive legacies of nationalist thought under colonial rule to facilitate complete decolonization and support for marginalized groups. In his historiography of New Literature, Im distinguishes modern Korean literature from its pre-modern counterparts, describing modernity in Korea as transplanted from the West. This makes contemporary literature, which he considers indefinable until history reaches a conclusive point, unfold through elements that are alien to Korea. Despite this, Im insists on classifying this essentially non-Korean literature as Korean due to its use of the Korean script. This paradoxical stance implies that the formality of writing in Korean is sufficient to define the literature as Korean. The inclusive vision of the Korean nation, open to anyone who writes in the Korean script, continues in Im’s theory of national literature. He argues that the nation, composed of anonymous individuals who identify as Korean, serves as the foundation for all modern literature and holds potential for building a literary collective open to any marginalized groups under various forms of oppression.

The Bible and the Mission: Mission of Japanese Missionaries in Korea under Japanese Imperialism, 1896–1921

This article examines the contrasting ways in which Korean Christians and Japanese missionaries interpreted the Bible during the Japanese occupation of Korea (1896–1921). Drawing on primary sources from both Japanese and Korean perspectives, the article highlights how biblical interpretation became a site of both ideological struggle and resistance. While Japanese missionaries often employed biblical narratives to legitimize Japanese imperialism and discourage Korean nationalism, Korean Christians found solace and inspiration in the Old Testament’s themes of liberation, drawing parallels between their own situation and the Israelites’ struggle for freedom. The Japanese government's prohibition on reading the Old Testament further exacerbated these contrasting interpretations, with Japanese missionaries generally supporting the ban and Korean Christians finding ways to resist it. By analysing these divergent interpretations, the article illuminates the complex interplay between mission, Bible, and imperialism in early twentieth-century colonial context of Korea. The article argues that the Korean case study offers a powerful historical example of how important it is that missionaries not only defend their own use of the Bible, but also remain open to the contextual interpretations of others.

The Gendered Construction of the Japanese Language-Learning Boom in Postcolonial Korea

ABSTRACT This article analyses the print news media’s gendered representation of Japanese language-learners in postcolonial Korea. It focuses on why young women, notably yŏdaesaeng (female college students) and kisaeng (sex workers in the tourism or entertainment industry), were identified as the main learners of Japanese. I argue that male media elites could not respond to the growing demand for learning the Japanese language in terms of the anti-Japanese nationalistic framework, which equated Korean nationalism to anti-Japanese sentiment. Instead, they attributed postcolonial Korea’s failure to create and sustain a monolingual state to female subjects’ sentimental, sexually promiscuous desire to learn Japanese. Throughout the article, I argue that public commentaries by male intellectuals on Korean women’s Japanese language-learning, which were widely circulated in the media, reinscribed language ideologies of women and bilingualism. This perpetuated patriarchal gender relations, as male nationalists sought to manage tensions arising from Japan’s continued economic and cultural influence, despite the ‘official’ normalisation of relations between Korea and the former colonial power.

The Impact of Thailand’s Hallyu on the Korean Nation Brand: Focusing on Holistic Thinking Tendency, Multicultural-acceptance, and Hallyu Playfulness

The Impact of Thailand’s Hallyu on the Korean Nation Brand: Focusing on Holistic Thinking Tendency, Multicultural-acceptance, and Hallyu Playfulness

Anarchist tendencies in the early socialist movement in Korea, 1919–1924

Korean anarchism is in many ways a unique phenomenon, as is the history of this Far Eastern country. Anarchists played a prominent role in the liberation of Korea from Japanese colonial rule, which dominated the country from 1910 to 1945. Along with Korean nationalists and communists, they became the “third force” in the anti-colonial struggle, which has attracted the interest of historians. A close connection with the issues of the struggle against the colonial power of Japan gave special features and direction to Korean anarchism, which was forced to oscillate between the demands for restoring the country’s independence and the anarchist tradition of denying any state as such. Unfortunately, the history of Korean anarchism remains virtually unexplored in Soviet and Russian academic literature. This article is intended to make the first steps in researching this topic. The article analyses the initial period in the development of the anarchist movement in the country, the time of its birth, drawing on original texts and publications by Korean socialists and anarchists of the early 1920s and taking into account the study of the issue in Korean and foreign historiography. The article shows that, as in other East Asian countries (Japan and China), anarchism in Korea was not initially identified as a special current in the socialist movement, and elements of anarchism, Bolshevism and social reformism were often mixed in the ideas of early Korean socialists. The separation of anarchism as a movement from this general socialist “conglomerate” occurred under the influence of disappointment in Russian Bolshevism and the results of the Great Russian Revolution.

The South Korean Military Ideological Complex: Transcendent Nationalism in Military Moral Education

Abstract Since its inception, the South Korean military, like an Althusserian ideological state apparatus, has served to articulate and disseminate state ideology through what is called the military moral education or ideological training program (chŏngsin or chŏnghun kyoyuk), which instructed soldiers in Korean history, society, and politics. A close reading of moral education textbooks from the Syngman Rhee (1948–60) and Park Chung Hee (1961–79) eras thus shows the content and themes of state ideology, which went beyond simple anti-communism and can instead be summed up as “transcendent nationalism”: a potent, fascistic mixture of ethnic nationalism, anti-communism, and anti-liberal collectivism that emphasized individual loyalty and sacrifice to the supreme representative of the Korean nation, the South Korean state. As part of a larger state ideological complex and as an ideological apparatus in its own right, the military moral education program should be examined to offer a better understanding of South Korean ideology and political discourse and the rise of anti-communist nationalist ideological hegemony during the Cold War. This large-scale effort to indoctrinate South Korean men, in which military moral education played a crucial part, arguably contributed to a significant degree of societal consent behind the Park Chung Hee regime.

‘An San’s hair is short, therefore she is a feminist:’ Women athletes’ hair, feminist movements, and nationalism

At the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics, South Korean archer An San received national attention for her short hair, when anti-feminists accused An of being a feminist. The anti-feminists’ online assaults made national headlines and evoked a strong feminist countermovement. In this paper, we ground this incident in the context of Korean nationalism and its relation to sport, and South Korean feminist movements. Using social media and news sources as our data, we analyze the meanings of women athletes’ hair length and styles, revealed in the case of An San. We explore meanings of hair in Korean women’s elite sport, and within the context of the tal-corset feminist movement. We argue that the An incident sheds light on the complex interplay between nationalism, feminist movements, and physical cultures of hair, and see the An incident as one that drew increasing public attention and support for the feminist movement in South Korea.

SIMILARITIES OF KOREAN AND UZBEK NATIONAL HOLIDAYS TASHKENT STATE UNIVERSITY OF ORIENTAL STUDIES

This article discusses the national holidays and culture of the Korean nation using the example of South Korea. The traditional customs of the Korean nation are fundamentally different from the culture of other eastern nations.

식민지 관료 시노다 지사쿠(篠田治策)의 평남·평양 인식과 도정(道政) 입안(1910~1923)

This article focuses on Shinoda Jisaku(篠田治策, 1872-1946)'s 13 years of service in South Pyongan Province to examine the place of the localities of the province and Pyongyang city in the history of colonial policy before and after the March 1st Movement of 1919. First, by viewing Manchuria and Russian Far East as buffer zones and the 39th parallel (Pyongyang-Wonsan line) as a potential buffer zone we identified a narrative casting of Pyongyang's local history that linked the Korean people's consciousness of recovering their northern territories with Japanese theories of continental aggression. Second, it is shown that Shinoda was the only person to be “promoted” from his longtime post in the provincial governor's reshuffle immediately after the March 1st Movement, and that he was appointed in the course of dealing with the local Korean national liberation movements linked with those of Manchuria and Russian Far East. Third, as the governor he proposed policies such as expanding elementary education for Koreans, overhauling rural terminal organizations, and encouraging “state-owned” company-led development which includes vague inducements for Koreans in Pyongyang. Shinoda would spend the rest of his career on the other side of the cultural frontier from colonial Korean nationalism. However, the argument of Korean-led local development and autonomy remained and gradually gained strength in Pyongyang.

고성 통일전망대와 접경에서의 북한 보여주기

Goseong Unification Observatory was established in 1984, based on President Chun Doo-hwan’s plan of mass tourism construction, and borderland tourism sites for inculcating the importance of anticommunism.The Goseong Unification Observatory achieved remarkable success by providing open access to the site and offering panoramic views of North Korean terrain, including the prominent Guemgang mountain. However, with the increasing influx of visitors to the borderland, North Korea began its propaganda targeting the public who came to witness the spectacle. As a countermeasure, the South Korean administration mandated mandatory anti-communism education before allowing entry into the CCZ(Civilian Controlled Zone). This measurement reveals the impregnated trait of the Observatory, where sole knowledge and values were permitted by the government.
 Unification Observatory distributed its knowledge systems through panel exhibition adorned of pictures and explanations accordingly. The compact exhibition room, strategically positioned along the route to the observation area, served as a window through which visitors could peer into North Korea. This exhibition site has changed three times between 1984 to 1991. The first period(1984-1987) of the exhibition portrayed Korean Nationalism, anti-communism, and the Chun administration’s fruit. Combining all together, the exhibition iconographically wrote the narrative of enemy North Korea and our auspicious nation, that has fought against the enemy for all time, persuading this government as the one who can guard and lead all of you under the president’s guidance. The second period(1987-1991) of exhibition started to focus more on the ‘North Korea’ itself, performing as a knowledge frontier. It emphasized the abnormality of North Korea, making an antithetical contrast to the normal South. It guided people’s gaze to North Korea as a subject that needed to be absorbed into the normal South. The third period(1991-) exhibition began to put distance from emotional anticommunism banners. It displayed the ‘everyday life of North Koreans’ which was newly started from North Korean Studies.
 However, we can find several dissent and discontent about the exhibition, and the tourism system of Observatory from newspaper articles. It suggests the possibility of future study of Transculturation, or Counter-Memory approach to the borderland tourism sites.

Left-wing nationalist-populist movement and identification: A psycho-political analysis of the “comfort woman” statue movements in South Korea

Sonyosang (girl statue in Korean) is a bronze statue symbolizing “comfort women,” the estimated 80,000 to 200,000 women physically, mentally, and sexually exploited by the Japanese Empire during WWII. As a backlash against the 2015 ″comfort women” agreement between the South Korean and Japanese governments, Koreans have installed 384 girl statues across South Korea. Based on ethnographic research that I conducted in South Korea between 2019 and 2021, including in-depth interviews with Korean activists who raised funds for or participated in creating, installing, and managing girl statues in South Korea, this research examines how the girl statue movement in South Korea has developed into a left-wing nationalist-populist movement and how affective identification with the statue generates a populist identity. To this end, this research firstly discusses how former President Park Geun-hye's undemocratic political measures recall the memory of minjungism (Korean populism) that led the pro-democracy movement in the 1980s, enabling Korean nationalist leftists' demands to form a chain of equivalence in the girl statue movement. Secondly, relying on Melanie Klein's theory of identification, this article examines how the ‘people’ is constituted through affective forms of identification with the girl statue. By doing so, this article demonstrates that the growth of the girl statue movement into a left-wing nationalist-populist movement blurs boundaries between the psychological, the personal, the national, and the (geo)political.

The Korean Diaspora of the Republic of Karakalpakstan

The promotion of interethnic harmony plays a crucial role in fostering socio–economic growth within a society, as it ensures that the rights and interests of all individuals, irrespective of their nationality, are legally protected. Presently, due to the implementation of the state policy pertaining to inter–ethnic relations, favorable circumstances have been established to facilitate the educational pursuits of individuals belonging to various ethnicities in their respective native languages. This inclusive approach aims to enable individuals to fully harness their capabilities and actively participate in the advancement of our shared homeland. This article examines the involvement of representatives from the Korean nation within the national framework of the Republic of Karakalpakstan during the period of independence. It explores their geographical distribution, conducts a year–by–year analysis of their activities, and evaluates the significance of the Korean National Cultural Center in fostering inter–ethnic relations.

How has the media's construction of a discourse of nationalism evolved? Critical discourse analysis of Korean sports nationalism through the FIFA World Cup

Drawing on Fairclough's critical discourse analysis, this study sheds light on sports nationalism and traces changes in the media's discursive construction of the Korean national football team over time by analyzing news articles from three different World Cups. Korean sports nationalism has evolved in complex ways and has been influenced by a combination of factors, including the colonial experience, initiatives by the former military government, the hosting of mega-sporting events, local professional leagues, and the globalization of athletes on the world stage. Given the multifaceted nature of Korean sports nationalism, this study aims to examine how it has changed in response to social transformations, particularly the impact of neoliberal globalization. The findings reveal that sports nationalism is often manifested in the terms of “fighting spirit” or “sacrifice” as a core national trait. However, it increasingly incorporates and embraces a new neoliberal meritocratic culture and subjectivity that foregrounds individual success on the world stage as a new form of nationalism in an era of accelerating globalized and commodified sports elitism.

주 태국 한국 문화원의 케이팝 아카데미 운영에 대한 고찰과 제언

This study aims to find out what effects the K-POP Academy operated by the Korean Cultural Center in Thailand has on K-POP consumption and the Korean nation branding in the Thai market and to make suggestions for the operation of the K-POP Academy. At the results, in Thailand, K-POP was mainly consumed by females in their teens. It was found that K-POP draws great popularity in Thailand because its unique musical characteristics correspond to the essential excitement of the Thai people. In addition, it was analyzed that Thai people's ‘multi-cultural acceptance’ is not significantly related to K-POP consumption. On the other hand, ‘experience’ served as a fundamental reason for Thais to participate in the K-POP Academy. Lastly, it was found that the K-POP Academy has an effect on Thais’ intention to visit Korea and purchase Korean products, thus effectively enhancing Korea's nation branding.

Beyond assimilation and national resistance: ‘education fever’ during the colonial period in Korea, 1910 – 1945

ABSTRACT By examining the widespread enthusiasm for education during the Japanese occupation of Korea (1910–1945), this article sets out to contribute to historiography on so-called ‘education fever’ (kyoyungyŏl), which so far has largely concentrated on researching the period after 1945. In the 1920s and 1930s the term was used to describe a multifaceted phenomenon that was driven by a striving for upward social mobility and the idea of national self-strengthening. Based on a wide range of sources including newspapers and journals, official documents as well as missionary reports, the article argues that ‘education fever’ was, on the one hand, closely linked to Korean nationalism, whose proponents made frequent recourse to the ubiquitous phenomenon in order to strengthen Korean political power through education. On the other hand, despite efforts to restrict school access, colonial authorities to a certain degree were forced to respond to these demands for education, highlighting Korean agency in the process.

『사기』로 본 고대의 요동

The location of the Liaodong (遼東) in ancient China was different from that of today. The Liaodong at the time was a major indicator of the western boundary of Old Joseon (古朝鮮), the first Korean nation. According to literature including Sagi (史記), Liaodong in ancient was a place name first used to point to the Far East of China. However, over time, it has also apply to name of the administrative district and princely states in China. Example of the former both includes Liadong-gun (遼東郡), an administrative district established after the Yan (燕) defeated Dongho (東胡) and Old Joseon, built their Great Wall, and is Liaodong-gun, an administrative district established during the Qin (秦) and Western Han (西漢) period. Example of the latter was Liaodong-guk (遼東國), an princely states established by dividing the land of the former Yan in the early Han Dynasty.
 The Liaodong before invasion Dongho and Old Joseon by Jingae (秦蓋) (approximately BC 300) seem to have pointed to outside the eastern border of the Yan, that is, the area between the Chisu (治水) River (currently Yeongjeongha 永定河) and the Gosu 沽水) River (currently Jobaekha 潮白河). After the invasion of Jingae, it went beyond the region and pointed to the east part of Yusu (濡水) River (currently Nanha 灤河). The Liaodong-gun which was established during the Jingae period, the Liaodong-gun which was established during the Qin Dynasty, and Liaodong-guk which was established during the Western Han were geographically overlapped on the same region. Therefore, we argue that the Liaodong from the ancient Yan to the Western Han period was a region limited to the east part of the lower stream of Yusu (濡水) River (currently Nanha 灤河).

The Status of Studies on the Korean Independence Movement in the U.S.

The Republic of Korea has been among the United States’ most reliable allies over the past seventy years. The two countries have developed a security alliance and an economic relationship that is mutually beneficial; for example, the United States has armed forces stationed on the Korean Peninsula, and South Korea is America’s sixth largest trade partner. However, despite the closeness of the two nations, American society has remained Eurocentric. As a result, most Americans know little about South Korea, its history, or its struggles against Japanese colonialism, which are critical to Korean nationalism. This essay is an assessment of what Americans know about the Korean independence movement and how to rectify American ignorance of the Korean struggle for freedom.

Gender Politics at Home and Abroad: Protestant Modernity in Colonial-Era Korea

Gender Politics at Home and Abroad: Protestant Modernity in Colonial-Era Korea

Perpetual ontological crisis: national division, enduring anxieties and South Korea’s discursive relationship with Japan

The broad agenda of ontological security scholarship in International Relations is to examine states’ (in)security of Self-identity and the implications for their international conduct. While ontological security may be an illusory goal, states vary in their levels of ontological insecurity, with more extreme levels producing acute defence mechanisms. Such ontological crises are therefore an important area of focus gaining increasing attention. Thus far, however, they have generally been conceptualised as ‘critical situations’: unpredictable, transient and practically resolvable ruptures of routinised practices. I argue that such a conceptualisation neglects the possibility of a more fundamental, long-term crisis of Self-identity, which I term perpetual ontological crisis. Such crises stem from inherent contradictions within dominant constructions of identity that may have always existed – rather than exogenous shocks to a hitherto secure Self – and are therefore irresolvable within the bounds of those constructions. I develop the example of nation/state incongruence: when a state’s territorial boundaries do not accord with the national spatial imaginary dominant in that state, resulting in an inherent and enduring contradiction. I then illustrate these contentions with a case study of South Korea, whose borders have never matched the imagined spatial bounds of the Korean nation. To demonstrate the implications of this crisis, I conduct a discourse analysis evidencing a nexus between enduring ontological anxieties concerning Korean division and South Korea’s persistently antagonistic relationship with Japan. In doing so, this article has important implications for how we understand ontological crisis and offers a novel account of its empirical case.

내셔널리즘 비판의 맥락에서 본 한일 지식인의 교류

This paper examines the exchange of intellectuals between Korea and Japan from the late 1990s to the 2000s, focusing on the criticism of nationalism or post-nationalism. Criticism of nationalism, which was actively raised in Korea around 2000, was based on globalization or postmodernism theory. And this criticism became more active when Japan's 『New History Textbook』 passed the official approval in 1997. Active self-criticism of Korean nationalism is triggered as Korean historians argue that criticizing Japan's nationalist history and criticizing Korea's national history and textbooks are overlapping. This is also influenced by Jie-Hyun Lim, who wrote 『Nationalism is treason』 and criticized nationalism early on. Later, through the magazine 『Dangdaebipyeong』, he actively introduced criticism of nationalism in Japan, and by launching the <East Asian Historical Forum for Criticism and Solidarity> he began full-fledged academic exchange between Japanese and Korean intellectuals to criticize nationalism. This paper analyzes the discussions on the critique of nationalism between Korea and Japan through he pages of the journal and academic exchanges, and examines how the exchanges of intellectuals at the time, criticizing nationalism, formed a complex relationship with their own national identity.