The Gateless Barrier is one of the most cherished yet also one of the most enigmatic Chan or Zen texts of East Asian Buddhism. Compiled by the Chinese Chan master Wumen Huikai in 1228, it contains forty-eight Zen stories of spiritual awakening called “public cases” or gong’ans (known as kōans in Japanese and kongans in Korean). This book presents a new English translation … [Read More]
Booklist: Regional Studies
Titles which, while relevant to Korea, consider a topic in the broader context of Korea’s neighbours
Border of Water and Ice: The Yalu River and Japan’s Empire in Korea and Manchuria
Border of Water and Ice explores the significance of the Yalu River as a strategic border between Korea and Manchuria (Northeast China) during a period of Japanese imperial expansion into the region. The Yalu’s seasonal patterns of freezing, thawing, and flooding shaped colonial efforts to control who and what could cross the border. Joseph A. Seeley shows … [Read More]
Comfort Women of the Japanese Empire: Colonial Rule and the Battle over Memory
This is an important and controversial book, hitherto available only in Korean, Japanese and Chinese, a book which has been subject to court cases attempting to have some parts of the book deleted. The author reconsiders the issue of the “comfort women”, that is the Korean women who were compelled to provide sexual comfort to … [Read More]
Past Progress: Time and Politics at the Borders of China, Russia, and Korea
While anxiety abounds in the old Cold War West that progress – whether political or economic – has been reversed, for citizens of former-socialist countries, murky temporal trajectories are nothing new. Grounded in the multiethnic frontier town of Hunchun at the triple border of China, Russia, and North Korea, Ed Pulford traces how several of … [Read More]
The Dynamic Essence of Transmedia Storytelling: A Graphical Approach to the Journey to the West in Korea
The Dynamic Essence of Transmedia Storytelling challenges many established truths about popular literary classics by presenting an analysis of sixty Korean variations of The Journey to the West, a set which includes novels and poems, as well as films, comics, paintings, and dance performances dating from the 14th century until today. In contrast to the typical assumption … [Read More]
Borderland Dreams: The Transnational Lives of Korean Chinese Workers
In Borderland Dreams June Hee Kwon explores the trajectory of the “Korean dream” that has fueled the massive migration of Korean Chinese workers from the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in northeast China to South Korea since the early 1990s. Charting the interplay of bodies, money, and time, the ethnography reveals how these migrant workers, in … [Read More]
Afterlives of Letters: The Transnational Origins of Modern Literature in China, Japan, and Korea
When East Asia opened itself to the world in the nineteenth century, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean intellectuals had shared notions of literature because of the centuries-long cultural exchanges in the region. As modernization profoundly destabilized cultural norms, they ventured to create new literature for the new era. Satoru Hashimoto offers a novel way of understanding … [Read More]
East Asia Observed: Selected Writings 1973-2021
This collection brings together themes in East Asian history, diplomacy, culture and politics written by J E Hoare since the early 1970s. His writings derive from his training as a historian, from his time as a Research Analyst in the British Foreign Office from 1969-2003, and from his experiences as a diplomat in the Republic … [Read More]
How Three Kingdoms Became a National Novel of Korea: From Sanguozhi Yanyi to Samgukchi
This book is a comparative exploration of the impact of a celebrated Chinese historical novel, the Sanguozhi yanyi (Three Kingdoms) on the popular culture of Korea since its dissemination in the sixteenth century. It elucidates not only the reception of Chinese fiction in Chosŏn Korea (1392–1910), but also the fascinating ways in which this particular story lives … [Read More]
Human-Animal Relations and the Hunt in Korea and Northeast Asia
Studies the hunt, animals and how regional dynamics informed local cultural practices on the Korean peninsula Elucidates the significance of the peninsula in regional and Eurasian history through detailing and navigating animals and the hunt, themes scholarship has overlooked. Reframes the struggle between a kingship and a powerful bureaucracy competing for authority over an expanding … [Read More]
A Global History of Ginseng: Imperialism, Modernity and Orientalism
Sul’s history of the international ginseng trade reveals the cultural aspects of international capitalism and the impact of this single commodity on relations between East and West. Ginseng emerged as a major international commodity in the seventeenth century, when the East India Company began trading it westward. Europeans were drawn to the plant’s efficacy as … [Read More]
Imaging Migration in Post-War Britain: Artists of Chinese, Korean, Japanese and Taiwanese Heritage
This book examines the artistic practices of a range of British-based artists of East Asian (Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Taiwanese) heritage in order to consider the social, political and cultural effects of migration or diaspora upon their creative production. Beccy Kennedy-Schtyk demonstrates three themes: the multiplicity and expansive contemporaneity of these artists’ visual oeuvres; the … [Read More]
The Borders of Chinese Architecture
An internationally acclaimed expert explains why Chinese-style architecture has remained so consistent for two thousand years, no matter where it is built. For the last two millennia, an overwhelming number of Chinese buildings have been elevated on platforms, supported by pillars, and covered by ceramic-tile roofs. Less obvious features, like the brackets connecting the pillars … [Read More]
The God Susanoo and Korea in Japan’s Cultural Memory: Ancient Myths and Modern Empire
From the publisher’s website: This book discusses how ancient Japanese mythology was utilized during the colonial period to justify the annexation of Korea to Japan, with special focus on the god Susanoo. Described as an ambivalent figure and wanderer between the worlds, Susanoo served as a foil to set off the sun goddess, who played … [Read More]
A Long Road to Justice: Stories from the Frontlines in Asia
A constant stream of impoverished women and girls have been, and are being, enslaved and abused in the Asia Pacific region. Slavery is not a historical issue – it’s happening today. History is repeating itself. Through Sylvia Yu Friedman’s work in journalism, counter-trafficking and philanthropy, she has had rare and incredible access to victims of … [Read More]
Koreans in Transnational Diasporas of the Russian Far East and Manchuria, 1895–1920: Arirang People
From the publisher’s website: Much attention has been paid to the Japanese deployment of Koreans in their war efforts during WWII. Much less attention, however, has been given to the subject prior to 1910. This book will: 1) present the evidence which reveals the presence of Koreans in the Japanese military during the Russo-Japanese War, … [Read More]