Remaking the Chinese Empire examines China’s development from an empire into a modern state through the lens of Sino-Korean political relations during the Qing period. Incorporating Korea into the historical narrative of the Chinese empire, it demonstrates that the Manchu regime used its relations with Chosŏn Korea to establish, legitimize, and consolidate its identity as the civilized … [Read More]
Archives: Books (page 37)
A Forgotten British War: The Accounts of Korean War Veterans
This book presents oral histories from the last surviving UK veterans of the Korean War. With the help of the UK National Army Museum and the British Korean Society, this book collects nearly twenty testimonials of UK veterans of the Korean War. Many only teenagers when mobilized, these veterans attempt to put words to the … [Read More]
Prostitutes, Hostesses, and Actresses at the Edge of the Japanese Empire: Fragmenting History
Analysing materials from literature and film, this book considers the fates of women who did not or could not buy into the Japanese imperial ideology of “good wives, wise mothers” in support of male empire-building. Although many feminist critics have articulated women’s active roles as dutiful collaborators for the Japanese empire, male-dominated narratives of empire-building … [Read More]
The Oxford Handbook of South Korean Politics
South Korea is best-known for its economic development, democratic transition and consolidation, vibrant civil society, and emergence as a cultural powerhouse. The Oxford Handbook of South Korean Politics presents and analyses contemporary South Korean politics, bringing together domestic political, economic, social cultural, and demographic developments and putting them in the context of trends in fellow … [Read More]
On BTS: Pop Music, Fandom, Sincerity
A love letter to Korean pop sensation BTS and an ode to fandom. The supersonic rise of the Korean pop group BTS may seem enigmatic to some, but for Lenika Cruz, senior culture editor at The Atlantic, their worldwide fame is obvious. As Cruz argues in On BTS: Pop Music, Fandom, Sincerity, the group’s trajectory—debuting on a … [Read More]
Introducing Korean Popular Culture
This new textbook is a timely and interdisciplinary resource for students looking for an introduction to Korean popular culture, exploring the multifaceted meaning of Korean popular culture at micro and macro levels and the process of cultural production, representation, circulation and consumption in a global context. Drawing on perspectives from the humanities and social sciences, … [Read More]
Korean Teachers
Winner of the Hankyoreh Literature Award, Seo Su-jin’s debut novel follows four Korean language lecturers at Seoul’s prestigious H University over the course of an academic year. Readers will spend one season with each of the four protagonists—Seon-yi in the spring, Mi-ju in the summer, Ga-eun in the autumn, and Han-hee in the winter—getting a … [Read More]
Everything Good Dies Here: Tales from the Linker Universe and Beyond
Introducing English readers to the speculative fiction of pseudonymous author Djuna, whose writings and interventions into internet culture have attracted a cult following in South Korea The stories brought together in this collection introduce for the first time in English the dazzling speculative imaginings of Djuna, one of South Korea’s most provocative SF writers. Whether … [Read More]
Another Person
Vacuum cleaner bitch. When Jina sees this anonymous comment on a forum it forces her out of her stupor. It is posted on a website dissecting her public allegations of workplace sexual assault, the backlash to which forced her to quit her job. She has spent months glued to her laptop screen, junk-food packaging piling … [Read More]
The End of August
A multi-generational, multilingual epic by the National Book Award Winner and bestselling author and translator of Tokyo Ueno Station In 1930s Japanese-occupied Korea, Lee Woo-Cheol was a running prodigy and a contender for the upcoming Tokyo Olympics. But he would have had to run under the Japanese flag. Nearly a century later, his granddaughter, living … [Read More]
Whale
A woman sells her daughter to a passing beekeeper for two jars of honey. A baby weighing fifteen pounds is born in the depths of winter but named “Girl of Spring”. A storm brings down the roof of a ramshackle restaurant to reveal a hidden fortune. These are just some of the events that set … [Read More]
A Morning with only Writing Left (K-Poet 28)
I opened my eyes Rhodopsin had disintegrated. He wasn’t there and the candle was weeping alone. I missed him who had disappeared. Time transitioned into a story, and I saw the shadow of a moving tree outside the window and the feathers of a bird flapping its wings and flying from a branch. It was … [Read More]
Nearly All Happiness (K-Poet 27)
Holding hands, we walk along Banghak Stream. Wherever he points, I find a poem. On some days, taking the form of ducks; on others, taking after white-naped cranes. Black koi swirl the clear water like brush strokes, and therein lies another poem. A poem rippling. Scattering. Startling tiny minnows. Fleeing from grey herons. From“ Poet’s … [Read More]
Thinking Less about Sad Things (K-Poet 26)
Poet Dongman Moon’s Think Less of Sadness English version. Perhaps the world is a place full of sorrow, and no one can escape the sorrow that comes upon them. The upright will to live “eating deliciously / thinking less about sad things/like green beans” is permeated throughout the poetry, even if you can’t handle all … [Read More]
Following Birds (K-Poet 25)
An English version of Poet Chul Park’s collection of poems Follow the Birds. The poet, who has looked into the edge of his life, is quietly approaching the sick beings alone in this collection of poems. You can also meet the poet’s notes and essays that give a glimpse of the poet’s poetry. Souce: Info … [Read More]
You Have Reached the End of the Future (K-Poet 24)
This is the English version of a collection of poems by poet Hwang In-chan. Everyday scenes flow like a plain confession and become a piece of poetry. The trivial conversations, sometimes like jokes and sometimes meaningless, approach me coldly and honestly, and the more I think about them, the more I think there will be … [Read More]