[KS] 'Early Modern' Conference at Rutgers

[Ann Choi]

"Korea's 'Early Modern': Colonial Literature and the Constellation of History"

November 5-6, Rutgers University

"Constellation" refers to the result of a non-predetermined intellectual pursuit and a type of reading that animates the relations between disparate elements of a given sociopolitical reality which produces a work of art.  Built on the premise that there is no neutral ground on which any work stands, such a reading allows for the discovery of a complex field of relations between literature and history, between literary production, memory, and political option; this is the kind of reading that encourages movement across the borders which used to separate the disciplines.  In this conference we will examine issues that deal with modernity in the colonial context of early twentieth century Korea.  Papers on poetry, fiction, intellectual history, as well as on film and cultural studies will be presented in the hope that the papers would themselves animate one another and illuminate a vital field of inquiry. Pending funding, a workshop will follow next year featuring selected papers to be published as a volume.

Conference Schedule
Friday,  November 5th
DAY 1 : Graduate Students' Lounge (Student Center*), College Avenue Campus
8:00 to 8:45.  Registration.
8:45-9:00. Opening Remarks: Ching-I Tu, Chair of Asian Languages and Cultures

Panel 1: 9:00 to 10:45. Language and Poetry
Ann Choi, Rutgers University, "Kim Ok and the Beginnings of Modern Korean Poetry"
Sanada Hiroko, Meiji Gakuin University, "Chong Chiyong's Invention of Poetic Language."  Presented in Korean.
Mickey Hong, UCLA, "Desire and Decadence in Modern Korean Poetry"
Discussant: David McCann, Harvard University

Panel 2. 10:45-12:30.  Textual Mobility and Its Constraints
Kyeong-Hee Choi, University of Chicago, "Colonial Censorship and Modern Literature in Korea"
Jina Kim, University of Washington, "Alternative Narratives of Korean Modernity: Colonial Literary Modernism in Yi Sang, Yi Hyo-sok and Kim Ki-rim's Essays"
Walter Lew, "Intertextual Critiques of Colonial Modernization in the Writings of Yi Sang
and Other Kuinhoe Authors"
Discussant: Paul Anderer, Columbia University

Lunch (12:30 to 1:30)

Panel 3.  1:30-3:15.  Making Culture, Making Literature
Jin-Kyung Lee, UC San Diego, "Sovereign Aesthetics, Disciplining Emotion, and Racial Rehabilitation in Colonial Korea, 1910-1922"
Jiwon Shin, UC Berkeley, "Folksong Nation: Evolutionism and Cultural Determinism in the Conception of Oral Tradition in 1920s Korea"
Sunyoung Park, Columbia University, "In Search of Faraway History: Kim Namch'on's Literary Experiments"
Discussant:  Janet Walker, Rutgers University  

Panel 4. 3:15 -5:00. Realisms and Film
Yung-Hee Kim, University of Hawaii, "Nationalist Project and Filmmaking-- Na Un-gyu of Colonial Korea"
Hyun-jeong Lee, University of Chicago, "In Face of Alien Modernity: A Comparative Reading of Kang Kyongae's 'Salt' and Xiao Hong's The Field of Life and Death"
Yoo Sai-jong, Hanshin University "Comparison of Lu Xun and Han Yongun's View of Nation." Presented in Korean.
Discussant:  Young-mee Cho and Dietrich Tschanz, Rutgers University

6:00-7:15.  Dinner at Winants Hall
7:30.  Poetry Reading and Presentation by Walter Lew, Student Center 411ABC

* The Student Center is located on 126 College Ave.

Saturday, November 6th
DAY 2: Conference Room A, Hyatt Regency (New Brunswick)
8:00 to 8:45.  Continental Breakfast.

Panel 5: 8:45 to 10:30.  Urban Subjects.
Ji-young Suh, Academy of Korean Studies, "The Modern Girl in Urban Everyday Space in Colonial Korea"
Janet Poole, New York University, "Form, Colonialism and (Sub)urban Subject"
Ted Hughes, Columbia University, "Bourgeois Nationalist Detective Fiction: Securing the Home in Yom Sang-sop's Three Generations and Fig"
Discussant:  Atsuko Ueda, Princeton University

Panel 6. 10:30-12:15.  Looking at It from Both Sides
Nayoung Aimee Kwon, UCLA, "Colonial Retelling of the 'Tale of Spring Fragrance' (Ch'unhyangjon)"
Kelly Jeong, City University of New York, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, "The Paradox of Korean Colonial Modernity:  New Woman in Colonial Literature"
Serk-Bae Suh, UCLA,"The Location of 'Korean' Culture: Ch'oe Chaeso and Korean Literature in the Time of Transition"
Discussant:  Indra Levy, Stanford University

Lunch (12:15-1:15)

Final Panel: 1:15 -2:45.   Nation and Literature
Michael Shin, Cornell University, " Yi Kwangsu's Tanjong aesa and the Construction of Cultural Memory"
Hyung-Ki Shin, Yonsei University, "Ch'oe Myongik and the Dream of Reform."  Presented in Korean.
Discussant: JaHyun Kim Haboush, Columbia University

Wrap Up Session: 2:45-3:30.  "Where do we go from here?"
Yung-Hee Kim, University of Hawaii
JaHyun Kim Haboush, Columbia University
Kyeong-Hee Choi, University of Chicago
Henry Em, University of Michigan

Closing Remarks.

End of Conference

The  conference is supported by the 2004 Korea Research Foundation Overseas Korean Studies Grant and the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures at Rutgers University.
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