Sunday, April 24, 2011

Somebody must be studying for midterms...

'cause he keeps posting random weird stuff on his blog.



Seriously, though, it's intellectually dishonest of many Korean scholars reinterpret their colonial history through the false binaries of (Japanese) exploitation/ (Korean attempts at) development, Japan/Korea, Imperialist repression/Nationalist modernization.  The hegemonic strategies Japan deployed were not monolithic, but nuanced, changing over time, and a complex mix of different cultural forces, interactions, and negotiations, while Korean responses to colonization were likewise.

8 comments:

Tim said...

Interesting.... I want to know more of what you're saying!

This Is Me Posting said...

I'd like a long post on this too, please.

Eugene said...

Careful what you say there. There's the truth, and then there is the opinion you are required to say. (Actually it depends on which professor you're studying this for.)

CedarBough said...

Oftentimes you don't get enough space to get into nuance. You have to bring your audience up to speed with what you're focusing on and then dive into your own research. For a lot of Korean scholars I know it's hard-- if you introduce something in a deeper/more complex/more nuanced/less essentializing sort of way you could end up with the members of the audience (who advocate a simple binary like you're discussing)only focused on a few sentences in your intro and totally ignoring the original research that comes later in your publication. I think the long term heavy-hitters from the nationalist school of Korean historical studies (ex. 이기백) make it hard for junior faculty to get away from these binaries, instead they just try to rush past them and then focus on something else.

Unknown said...

omg! Moxy Fruvos!

Roboseyo said...

hell yeah, moxy fruvous!

Roboseyo said...

@CedarBough:

interesting. what other shibboleths do you think I should know about?

Jonathan Auxier said...

I've been thinking of Moxie Fruvus a lot lately. I keep having this fantasy of doing an a capella version of "My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors" at the American Library Association, but then I realize I'd need a friend to sing with ... Wanna fly to New Orleans this summer?!