Koreanistik

Vortragsreihe der Koreanistik

18.10.2023 Kwang Oon Kim (Kyungnam University) with the discussants Cankui Piao (Yanbian University) and Boyuan Zhang (Yanbian University)
북조선사 연구와 자료의 이용 (No Records, No History)
08.11.2023 Eunsil Yim (Paris Cité University, Centre of Korean Studies, EHESS/UMR China Korea Japan (CNRS))
Confronting Korean Identities among the Korean diaspora in Post-Soviet Kazakhstan
15.11.2023 Eui-Hang Shin (Seoul National University)
What’s in a Name: Kims in Seoul, Pyongyang, and New York
22.11.2023 Ho-Keun Choi (Korea University)
Deutschlands Einfluss auf die koreanische Gedenkkultur nach 1990 Jüdisches Museum, Holocaust-Mahnmal und Topographie des Terrors
29.11.2023 Won-jik Kwon (Minister and Consul-General of the Republic of Korea, Berlin)
Korea and Germany: Key Partners with Shared Values
06.12.2023

canceled Cristina Bahon (Autonomous University of Madrid)
The Korean War: A New Vision of the Conflict through Latin American Novels
13.12.2023 Hyojin Pak (Leiden University)
The Politics of Resettlement: Selective Formalization and Precarity among Nanjido Waste Pickers
10.01.2024 Sea Jeong Kim (Chungnam National University)
Confucian Ecological Philosophy of Care and Coexistence
17.01.2024 Elizabeth Rauchholz (Heidelberg University)

Dancing to Korean Hierarchy: An Idea of Value Kept in View
24.01.2024 Antonio Doménech (University of Malaga)
Are Korean Women Shaman, mudang, feminist?
31.01.2024 Myungji Yang (University of Hawaii at Manoa)
Reactionary Politics in South Korea: Historical Legacies, Right-Wing Intellectuals, and Political Mobilization
07.02.2024 Yun-Young Choi (Seoul National University)
Die Sichtbarkeit und Einsamkeit der Rasse. Geschichte eines Kindes von Anna Kim

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Prof. Yun-Young Choi (Seoul National University)

Die Sichtbarkeit und Einsamkeit der Rasse:Geschichte eines Kindes von Anna Kim

Wednesday, February 7th, 2024, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Professor Yun-Young Choi is Professor at the Department of German Language and Literature, College of Humanities, Seoul National University. She was Vice-president at KGG (Koreanische Gesellschaft für Germanistik) and is currently the Dean of Faculty of Liberal Education at Seoul National University. Her expertise is German literature (Realism), German studies, and cultural studies and migration literature. She has published a variety of insightful works, such as Exo-pho-nie, Yoko Tawada's Writing, Konflikt zwischen der nationalen Wiedervereinigung und multikulturellen Gesellschaft and “Auseinanderfummeln vs. Textilweben. Monika Schmitz-Emans liest Yoko Tawada.”

Abstract
Anna Kims 2022 erschienener Roman Geschichte eines Kindes behandelt die Sichtbarkeit und Einsamkeit, die durch Rassismus bedingt sind, und macht deutlich, dass sie nicht nur in der Vergangenheit, sondern auch in der modernen Alltagswelt existieren. Der Roman hat eine thematisch parallele Doppelstruktur aus Binnenberichten und Rahmengeschichten. Der Roman zeigt, dass Fran in der Rahmengeschichte ebenfalls unter Sichtbarkeit und Einsamkeit leidet, was von der Notwendigkeit herrührt, sich als asiatische Frau an die weiße österreichische Gesellschaft anzupassen. Am Ende wird enthüllt, dass MW, Marlene Winckler, die Danny beharrlich vermaß, rassifizierte und zu einem Fremden machte, eine österreichische, von den Nazis beeinflusste Anthropologin war. Der Roman demonstriert die Aporie der versuchten und gescheiterten Assimilation in der Vergangenheit und Gegenwart.

Prof. Myungji Yang (University of Hawaii at Manoa)

Reactionary Politics in South Korea: Historical Legacies, Right-Wing Intellectuals, and Political Mobilization

Wednesday, January 31st, 2024, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Professor Myungji Yang is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Hawai'i-Mānoa. Her research interests include political sociology, social movements, and development in East Asia and Korea. Her work appeared at Nations and Nationalism, Politics and Society, Mobilization: An International Quarterly, and Urban Studies, among others. She is also the author of "From Miracle to Mirage: The Making and Unmaking of the Korean Middle Class, 1960-2015" published by Cornell University Press in 2018. She has served as a visiting fellow at the USC Korean Studies Institute (2015-16), MaxPo (2019-20), and the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences (2020-21).

Abstract
This talk tackles broad questions about what fuels right-wing mobilization and why some citizens vehemently resist pro-democratic changes in South Korea. Drawing from ethnographic observation, in-depth interviews, and archival data, it aims to understand how the right has constructed its political identity and mobilized social support, and how its political practices have contributed to particular political outcomes during the post-authoritarian period. Despite the arrival of electoral democracy in 1987 and changing geopolitical conditions, the Korean right has continued to deploy anti-communist rhetoric to condemn liberal progressive groups, accusing them of subverting the Republic of Korea. Exploring how right-wing elites and intellectuals capitalize on Cold War geopolitical contestation and glorify the national modernization projects of authoritarian regimes, this talk will demonstrate how the Korean right has constructed ideological and organizational infrastructures and maintained its hegemonic position in the post-authoritarian period.

Prof. Antonio Doménech (University of Malaga)

Are Korean Women Shaman, mudang, feminist?

Wednesday, January 24th, 2024, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Professor Antonio J. Domenech is Professor in the Area of East Asian Studies-Korean Studies, University of Malaga. He is also the coordinator of the Degree in Asian Studies-Korea Studies (UMA) and the Director of the Korean Office at the University of Malaga. He has held the position as principal investigator of the AKS project: “Path to Equality: Korean Studies Network on Inclusiveness.” As an anthropologist and historian of East Asian religions, he has been a researcher for Overseas Historical Materials of the National Institute of Korean History and also translated a variety of works on Korean thought, culture, and art. In 2017, for his remarkable contribution to Korean studies, he has been awarded with the “Order of Cultural Merit ‘Hwagwan’” by the President of the Republic of Korea and 5th LTI Korea Outstanding Service Award by LTI Korea.

Abstract
This lecture starts with the questions “What is the relationship between Korean Women Shamans and feminism?”, “Do shamans work actively for gender equality?” and “Did shamans play an active role in women’s liberation from a patriarchal society?” While answering these questions, it will deal with the topic of Korean women shaman and their role as “feminists” in Korean society. It will discuss if mudangs through their role among Korean women and their rituals have contributed to the creation of a more equal and inclusive society. In the end, it will discuss how Korean shamans have contributed to the development of a feminist spirituality.

Dr. Elizabeth Rauchholz (Heidelberg University)

Dancing to Korean Hierarchy: An Idea of Value Kept in View

Wednesday, January 17th, 2024, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Elizabeth Rauchholz just published her doctoral thesis in Sociocultural Anthropology, which she defended with magna cum laude at Heidelberg University within the Faculty of Behavioural and Cultural Studies. She is a German-American anthropologist with life and work experience among Protestants of Micronesia, the USA, Germany, the UK, and South Korea. Currently, she is in the process of publishing articles, including “Misunderstanding Equality, Power, and Vulnerability: Elevating the Individual over Cohesion in Hierarchy as a Value” and “An Ethnographic Analysis of the Korean Concept of Nunch’i (눈치): Adjusting Oneself in Response to Noticing Social Cues of Hierarchy as an Idea of Value.”

Abstract
This lecture presents the results of her ethnographic analysis of Korean hierarchy as a value kept in viewfor catalysing continuity and change, exemplified in Korean Christian practices and relationships. These findings evolved from analysing comparative discourses and participatory observations while following Korean Christians of the clergy and laity in eighteen British and subsequently in twenty-five Korean Protestant church communities. Her interlocutors described conceptualisations of Korean hierarchy as a value orientation realised inasymmetrical social communication and relationships.This realisation involved encompassing subordinated logics, emotions, ritualised conventions, and relationships within superior representations of an idea or social relation to form a cohesive whole, albeit in hierarchy (wigyejilseo 위계질서).

Prof. Sea Jeong Kim (Chungnam National University)

Confucian Ecological Philosophy of Care and Coexistence

Wednesday, January 10th, 2024, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Professor Sea Jeong Kim is professor in the Department of Philosophy, Chungnam National University, South Korea. He received his doctorate in Confucian studies at Sungkyunkwan University. He was visiting scholar at the State University of New York, California State University, Beijing University, director of Korean society of Yang-ming Studies, and director of Confucianism Research Institute (Chungnam National University). He is also chair of the Daejeon Federation for Environmental Movements. He has published over sixty articles and book chapters and more than one hundred articles in various journals. He currently conducts research on the study of East Asian philosophy from the perspectives of life philosophy, environmental philosophy, and caring philosophy.

Abstract
Over the past 2500 years, Confucianism has been changing and reforming according to the changing circumstances and issues emerging in each era. The global ecological crisis is the very issue now facing Confucianism. In this talk, titled ‘Confucian ecological philosophy of Care and Coexistence’, the author would like to share his ideas on the characteristics, meanings and tasks of ecological philosophy in Confucian thoughts in the age of ecological crisis. Firstly, the talk begins with conditions and various causes of the present ecological crisis. The next part focuses on various schools of Western environmental ethics that have been developing to solve that ecological crisis. And in the last part, the author demonstrates the characteristics and meanings of ‘Confucian ecological philosophy’, focusing on Yang-ming studies, by considering ‘innate knowledge as the subject of care and cure’, ‘realization of innate knowledge and the way of care’, ‘healing through the realization of innate knowledge and the world as one body’, and ‘towards the ecological civilization of care, cure and coexistence’.

Hyojin Pak (Leiden University)

The Politics of Resettlement: Selective Formalization and Precarity among Nanjido Waste Pickers

Wednesday, December 13th, 2023, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Hyojin Pak is a doctoral candidate at Leiden University’s Institute of Area Studies. Her dissertation, Taking up space: Waste and Waste Labor in Developing South Korea, examines the South Korean development experience through its remnants, focusing on the management of waste and the organization/regulation of informal waste labor. Her work situates modern Korean history at the intersection of waste studies and development studies to understand the social and environmental costs and consequences of development.

Abstract
This talk unpacks the history of Nanjido, which is commonly known as the World Cup Park in western Seoul. Examining its past as a landfill and a lived space, it asks how their labor and their dwelling relate to two types of informality and precarity. Firstly, it begins with the labor organization of waste pickers, which is characterized by hierarchical structure and intergroup competition. It then discusses their housing history, focusing particularly on the temporary resettlement process in 1984. Waste pickers achieved a provisional agreement for resettlement after they demonstrated their presence and contribution through selfenumeration surveys, self-drafted community maps, and their income data. These strategies formalized their dwelling and established their citizenship status. But it nonetheless left their labor unrecognized; rather, based on their income data, the state sought to effectively extract their labor. This demonstrates that 1) although one type of precarity (e.g., living conditions) is alleviated, other types of precarity (e.g., precarious labor) may not be entirely mitigated, and 2) informal people’s strategies to alleviate their precarious circumstances are susceptible to state appropriation, which may conversely exacerbate their precarity.

Minister Won-jik Kwon (Minister and Consul-General of the Republic of Korea, Berlin)

Korea and Germany: Key Partners with Shared Values

Wednesday, November 29th, 2023, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Minister Kwon Won jik has been the Minister of the Korean Embassy in the Federal Republic of Germany since October2022. He began his career at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) in 1993 and has since held key positions at various diplomatic posts, including the Korean Embassy in the United States of America, the Korean Embassy in the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, the Office of the President, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MOFAT), the Korean Embassy in the People’s Republic of China, the Korean Embassy in the Republic of the Philippines, and the Office for Government Policy Coordination.

Abstract
As this year marks the 140th anniversary of diplomatic ties between Korea and Germany, the Embassy of the Republic of Korea presents a special lecture titled “Korea and Germany: Key Partners with Shared Values.” The bilateral relations between Korea and Germany date back to the year 1883, marked by the signing of the “Treaty of Friendship, Commerce, and Navigation.” Since that historic moment, both nations have achieved significant milestones, fostering partnership and friendship across various fields, including politics, the economy, trade, society, and culture. This lecture will offer a good opportunity to reflect on the history of the two countries’ bilateral relations, assess the current state of our connections, and explore avenues for continued thriving future of Korea and Germany.

Prof. Ho-Keun Choi (Korea University)

Deutschlands Einfluss auf die koreanische Gedenkkultur nach 1990 - Jüdisches Museum, Holocaust-Mahnmal und Topographie des Terrors (in German)

Wednesday, November 22nd, 2023, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Professor Ho-Keun Choi is Professor of Modern European History at Korea University in Seoul. He has got his doctoral degree at Bielefeld University in Germany. He published Max Weber und der Historismus (2000), Genocide: A History of Massacres and their Concealments (2005), Holocaust: A Black Box of Western Civilization (2006), The Future of Commemoration (2020), A Class on Historical Literacy (2023). Moreover, he has published comparative studies of Holocaust education and commemorative culture around the world.

Abstract
This lecture shows how South Koreans over the last two decades have discussed and appropriated German commemorative culture in dealing with their own troubled past. The first section will show how the German experience has become a reference point for many Koreans. The second section examines Korean discourse on German commemorative culture, related to three key memorial sites in Berlin—the Jüdisches Museum (Jewish Museum, 2001), the Holocaust-Mahnmal (Holocaust Memorial, 2005), and the Topographie des Terrors (the Topography of Terror, 2010). The last section will show how Koreans have not merely appropriated but also applied elements of German commemorative culture in reckoning with the misuse and abuse of public power committed during the Korean War and by the military dictatorship.

Prof. em. Eui-Hang Shin (Seoul National University)

What’s in a Name: Kims in Seoul, Pyongyang, and New York

Wednesday, November 15th, 2023, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Professor Eui Hang Shin is Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the Department of Sociology, University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina and Visiting Research Fellow, Asia Center, Seoul National University (2019-); Invited Professor, Seoul National University (2005-20014); Invited Professor, Sungkyunkwan University (2014-2019). His areas of interest are the political demography of Korea and international higher education. He has published nearly 70 articles in such journals as Amerasia Journal, American Educational Research Journal, American Sociologist, and Asian Survey.

Abstract 
This lecture investigates the utilization of surnames in the context of ethnic studies, specifically focusing on the cultural conventions related to gender-specific naming practices in South Korea. The research conducts a comparative analysis to evaluate the prevalence of the surname Kim among individuals in both North and South Korea, as well as within ethnic Korean immigrant groups in the United States. The research aims to determine the viability of using individuals with the surname Kim from publicly available directories as a representative sample to gain insights into the ethnic Korean population in a particular region.

Dr. Eunsil Yim (Paris Cité University, Centre of Korean Studies, EHESS/UMR China Korea Japan (CNRS))

Confronting Korean Identities among the Korean diaspora in Post Soviet Kazakhstan

Wednesday, November 8th, 2023, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Dr. Eunsil Yim is an associate professor in Korean Studies at UFR LCAO, Université Paris Cité and research associate in Centre of Korean Studies at EHESS/UMR China, Korea, Japan (CNRS). Her book, Être Coréens au Kazakhstan. Les entrepreneurs d'identité aux frontières du monde coréen , Institut d'Études Coréennes , coll. Kalp'i , Collège de France, 393p published in December 2016 received the AKSE' Prize (Hendrik Hamel) in 2021.

Abstract
Since the late 1980s, ethnic Koreans in post Soviet Kazakhstan have been caught in a struggle for influence between North and South Korea. South Korea’s prominent presence in the post Soviet region has somewhat overshadowed North Korea, leading to claims that their confrontation is no longer a relevant paradigm. This could be explained by two key factors: 1) The conflict exists in a specific social space where various categories of actor are involved in a struggle over the legitimate definition of the collective identity of the ethnic Koreans, and 2) The positions taken by these “identity entrepreneurs” continually shift with changing power relations. In this relational and dynamic space, North and South Korea deploy their strategies to exert influence. Thus, understanding the issue of identity today facing the Korean minority in Kazakhstan requires considering the impact of the North/South confrontation within this community.

Prof. Dr. Kwang Oon Kim (Kyungnam University)

No Records, No History
북조선사 연구와 자료의 이용 (in Korean)

Wednesday, October 18th, 2023, 18:00 c.t., Wilhelmstraße 133, Room 30

Bio
Professor Kwang Oon Kim is a visiting endowed chair professor at Kyungnam University and a special appointed professor at Yanbian University. He completed his Ph.D. in history at Hanyang University and worked as a research associate at National Institute of Korean History. Starting in the 2000s, he focused on North Korean research and collected a significant amount of historical materials related to North Korea. Based on this work, he has contributed greatly to the establishment of an archive of North Korean materials and research on North Korea by publishing over 170 volumes of 북조선실록 (The Annals of North Korea) to date.

Abstract
With the discussants Cankui Piao (Yanbian University) and Boyuan Zhang (Yanbian University), this special lecture sheds light on the importance of organizing North Korean historical sources. It then discusses the processing and utilization of historical records through North Korean historical research examples. Furthermore, it introduces the achievements of 북조선실록 (The Annals of North Korea), which he has been actively writing over an extended period, based on the materials he has collected.