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<P>Well done, Frank, short as your remarks are: there are many other points in the posting that made me shiver, but I am sure most on the list had the same feeling, so I do not want to go into detail. I am glad to have a "delete" button on the keyboard.</P>
<P>Just another short reminder to the use of the word "h/H-istory". When we talk about "history" , the word is really meaning "historiography", and to rewrite the view of the past is both a normal everyday process and a healthy one. </P>
<P>Add another one: For us non-Koreans it is certainly not the question what is "right or wrong" in the way this Korean debate is going on. The question should be "why", and it should be added "why is my view different". A good way to learn something about the Korean situation, and maybe more importantly to learn something about ourselves....</P>
<P>Anyway, histeriography is always big fun, Werner Sasse</P>
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<DIV></DIV>>From: Frank Hoffmann <HOFFMANN@FAS.HARVARD.EDU>
<DIV></DIV>>Reply-To: Koreanstudies@koreaweb.ws
<DIV></DIV>>To: Koreanstudies@koreaweb.ws
<DIV></DIV>>Subject: Re: [KS] History's twists: thoughts on kwago ch'ongsan and the MOPE syndrome
<DIV></DIV>>Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 11:14:14 -0700
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>Highly interesting posting, in a way ...
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>>My sense is that some Koreans essentialize History (capital H)
<DIV></DIV>>>through a mindset which, by confusing many things, guarantees that
<DIV></DIV>>>none of them ever get resolved.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>You tell "some Koreans" that they are "confusing many things" and
<DIV></DIV>>therefore are unable to get things resolved (read: to write their
<DIV></DIV>>own history). Hmm...
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>>For instance: coming to Korea from Africa, it puzzled me how hard
<DIV></DIV>>>it
<DIV></DIV>>>is to have a grown-up discussion about colonialism here.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>You are seriously telling Koreans not to be "grown up" and Africans
<DIV></DIV>>to be "grown up"? You are in a position to tell both? How did you
<DIV></DIV>>get there? Is your judgment based on the hundreds of years of
<DIV></DIV>>British colonialism or on the hundreds of years having been
<DIV></DIV>>colonized? Why and how are you bringing your own identity into this
<DIV></DIV>>discussion -- what does it for the credibility or your argument? The
<DIV></DIV>>British but not so British scholar, presenting something that sounds
<DIV></DIV>>to my ears like an amazingly intact colonial approach while claiming
<DIV></DIV>>your "colonized" status at the same time .... does that help to make
<DIV></DIV>>your "argument" valid?
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>>Endlessly refighting yesterday's battles means wounds never heal.
<DIV></DIV>>>Why not close the book?
<DIV></DIV>>>In all of the above periods, some Koreans did things for which
<DIV></DIV>>>other
<DIV></DIV>>>Koreans cannot forgive them. (Another question: Why does Asia's
<DIV></DIV>>>second most Christian nation find forgiveness so difficult?)
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>Wow! Very condensed writing. Koreans are bad Christians as well ...
<DIV></DIV>>okay, sure. And Koreans are not united, as they cannot forgive each
<DIV></DIV>>other ... the old colonial Japanese argument, sure, I eat that too.
<DIV></DIV>>And they don't seem to know what they are doing anyway (useless
<DIV></DIV>>"refighting yesterday's battles"), so you (we -- the Korea
<DIV></DIV>>specialist?) need to tell them.
<DIV></DIV>>
<DIV></DIV>>Regards,
<DIV></DIV>>Frank
<DIV></DIV>>--
<DIV></DIV>>______________________________________________________
<DIV></DIV>>Frank Hoffmann
<DIV></DIV>>http://KoreaWeb.ws * Fax: (415) 727-4792
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