Modern Korean History and Society

Park, Tae Gyun (tgpark@snu.ac.kr, 880-8519, Bldg 140-1 Room 606)

Office hour:

Chae, Ria

Grade: Attendance 20%, Presentation 20%, Discussion 20%, Weekly Paper 20%, Final paper 20%

Weeks 1 ~ 7 by Prof. Park

Week 1. How to understand Korea?

Week 2. 19th Century in Northeast Asia and Colonization of Korea

Origins of the Northeast Asian controversial issues

Shimonoseki Treaty, Cairo Declaration, General Order No. 1

Week 3. Division of the Korean Peninsula

Main Question: 1. What is the most critical cause to divide the Korean Peninsula in 1945? Internal or external?

2. Why is the Korean Peninsula still divided even after the collapse of the Cold War system?

Reading: Park, An Ally and Empire, Two Myth in Korea-US Relationship, AKS, 2012, Chapter 1

Bruce Cumings, Korea's Place in the Sun, Chapter 4

The Moscow Agreement

Week 4. Korean War 3/26

Main Question: 1. Why did the US and China send troops during the Korean War?

2. Controversial Issues in the Korean War.

Reading: Park, An Ally and Empire, Two Myth in Korea-US Relationship, AKS, 2012, Chapter 2

Sources

Week 5. Unfinished War and Armistice system 4/2

Main Question: 1. What is the most critical problem of the Armistice Agreement?

2. Is the main problem from the structure of the agreement or the characteristics of the agents?

Reading: Park, "Beyond the Myth," Pacific Affairs, 2009

Park, "The Korean Armistice System since 1953 and the Origins of the Cheonan and Yeonpyeong Incidents, SJKS, 2011

Documents: Agreement between the Commander in Chief, United Nations Command, and the Supreme Commander of the Korean People's Army and the Commander of the Chinese People's Volunteers, Concerning a Military Armistice in Korea, signed at Panmunjom, Korea, July 27, 1953

Week 6. Vietnam War

Presentation: Korea should go or not?

Main Question: 1. Why did the leaders in East Asia try to consolidate its regime in early 1970s? And was it successful?

2. Why was the neo-liberalism spread all over the world since the 1980s?

Week 7. History of Modern Korean Politics

Part II (Weeks 8-15)

Chae, Ria (riachae@snu.ac.kr, Bldg. 140, Room 301)	Office hours: by appointment

Week 8. Compressed Modernity

Weekly paper: Is Korea’s modernity unique? Is “compressed modernity” a useful tool to examine the Korean society?

Reading material:

Kim Kyong-Dong, “Modernization as a Politico-cultural Response and Modernity as a Cultural Mixture: An Alternative View of Korean Modernization,” Development and Society, 34/1 (June 2005): 1-24.

Chang Kyung-Sup, South Korea under Compressed Modernity, London and New York: Routledge, 2010, Ch. 1, pp. 1-13.

Week 9. Gangnam Style as an Expression of Compressed Modernity

A field trip to the Gangnam area.

Reflection paper: How is compressed modernity reflected in Gangnam?

Week 10. The Korean Wave.

Weekly paper: To what extent is Hallyu a result of contingency and accident?

Reading material:

Park Jung-sun, “The Korean Wave: Transnational Cultural Flows in Northeast Asia,” in Charles K. Armstrong ed. Korea at the Center: Dynamics of Regionalism in Northeast Asia, Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe, 2006, 244-256.

Jang Wonho and Youngsun Kim, “Envisaging the Sociocultural Dynamics of K-Pop,” Korea Journal 53/4 (Winter 2013): 83-106.

Patrick A. Messerlin and Wonkyu Shin, “The K-pop Wave: An Economic Analysis” (July 2013) (Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2294712 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2294712).

Week 11. Korea’s Path to Democratization as a Model

Weekly paper: What kind of model can be seen in Korea’s democratic development?

Reading material:

Bruce Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun: A Modern History, New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company, 2005, Ch. 7 “The Virtues, II: The Democratic Movement, 1960 – Present,” 342-403.

Shin Gi-Wook et als., “South Korea’s Democracy Movement (1970-1993): Stanford Korea Democracy Project Report, Stanford University (December 2007).

Week 12. The US and the Gwangju Uprising

Question for weekly paper: What was the main reason for the US to acquiesce to the suppression of the Gwangju uprising?

Reading material:

Tim Shorrock, “Ex-leaders Go on Trial in Seoul,” Journal of Commerce, (Feb 27, 1996); and “The Kwangju Uprising and US-Sanctioned Massacre” (June 2010).

George Katsiaficas, “Neoliberalism and the Gwangju Uprising,” Korea Policy Review, Vol. II (2006).

Week 13. Modernization and the Korean Family

Weekly paper: What forces have been reinforcing the traditional Korean family (especially, gender roles) and which have been tearing it apart?

Reading material:

Moon Seungsook, Militarized Modernity and Gendered Citizenship in South Korea, 2005, Ch. 3 (pp. 68-94).

Eun Ki-soo, “Family Values Changing but Still Conservative,” Kim Kyong-dong ed. Social Change in Korea, Jimoondang, 2008, pp.146-156.

Chang Kyung-Sup, South Korea under Compressed Modernity, London and New York: Routledge, 2010, Ch. 2, pp. 14-26.

Kim Yi Eunhee, “Mothers and Sons in Modern Korea,” Korea Journal Vol.41 No.4 (2001): 5-27.

Week 14. Homogeneity and Multiculturalism

Weekly paper: Is Korea now an ethnically homogenous or a multicultural society?

Reading material:

Han Kyung-Koo, “The Archeology of the Ethnically Homogeneous Nation-State and Multiculturalism in Korea,” Korea Journal 47/4 (2007): 8-31.

Han Geon-Soo, “Multicultural Korea: Celebration or Challenge of Multiethnic Shift in Contemporary Korea?” Korea Journal 47/4 (2007): 32–63.

Kim Hyun Mee, “The State and Migrant Women: Diverging Hopes in the Making of “Multicultural Families” in Contemporary Korea,” Korea Journal 47/4 (2007): 100-122.

Week 15. Final Paper