<HTML><FONT FACE=arial,helvetica><HTML><BODY BGCOLOR="#ffffff"><FONT BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=3 PTSIZE=12 FAMILY="SERIF" FACE="Times New Roman" LANG="0">Dear Listmembers,<BR>
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This editorial from today's Korea Times caught my eye.<BR>
It's the first I'd heard of the matter.<BR>
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Informed comment would be welcome. Is it really the case<BR>
that South (and North?) Koreans have been using inaccurate<BR>
maps, missing out most mountain ranges, for over a century?<BR>
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I'm struck, too, by what one might call this article's implicit<BR>
metaphysics of national vertebracy ....<BR>
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Happy New Year! (may all chickens come home to roost),<BR>
Aidan<BR>
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AIDAN FOSTER-CARTER<BR>
Honorary Senior Research Fellow in Sociology & Modern Korea, Leeds University <BR>
Home address: 17 Birklands Road, Shipley, West Yorkshire, BD18 3BY, UK <BR>
tel: +44(0) 1274 588586 mobile: +44(0) 7970 741307 <BR>
fax: +44(0) 1274 773663 ISDN: +44(0) 1274 589280<BR>
Email: afostercarter@aol.com website: www.aidanfc.net<BR>
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</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=4 PTSIZE=14 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">Real Look of Peninsula<BR>
'Paektu Taegan' Must Be Preserved </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=2 PTSIZE=10 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><BR>
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The map of the Korean peninsula we commonly use is largely based on what a Japanese geologist drew in 1903. There is no reason to discredit the map if it shows how the peninsula really looks. However, its accuracy has been questioned by a new map released by the Korea Research Institute for Human Settlements.<BR>
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The striking difference is the configuration of mountains on the peninsula. The new map, which the research institute drew based on satellite images and its own field studies, shows that the nation is interlinked with 48 mountain ranges. Of all the ranges, 47 branch out from Paektu Taegan, the backbone of the peninsula, which starts from Mt. Paektu in the North, the highest peak in the country, and ends at Mt. Chiri in the South. The old map shows only 14 ranges, some of which do not even appear on the institute's map.<BR>
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More surprising than this difference is the accuracy of a map drawn by Kim Chong-ho, the nation's first cartographer, in 1861 on the basis of a lifetime of observation and studies of geographical figures on the peninsula. He is reported to have climbed Mt. Paektu seven times before completing his detailed map of Korea, the Taedong Yojido.<BR>
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It is deplorable that we have ignored a map that accurately depicted mountain ranges more than 140 years ago, when it was impossible to travel to every corner of the then undeveloped peninsula. Probably decades before the state institute came up with a new map identical with Kim's, it had been known among mountaineering fans that the Japanese geologist drew the ranges according to his own whim simply as a means of locating the peninsula's natural resources to help his country when it colonized Korea, which took place in 1909.<BR>
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Even though we are all responsible for having used the wrong map for some time, academic circles should bear most of the blame because they have never shown any concern. The first thing that the government should do right now is address the misrepresentation of the peninsula's appearance in textbooks used in primary and secondary schools. The government also needs to correct the names of certain administrative units that still carry the legacy of Japan's 36 years of occupation.<BR>
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In the meantime, it is very urgent to take appropriate steps to prevent the further destruction of the 1,494 kilometers of Paektu Taegan, which carries the spirit of the Korean people. Many parts of the range in the South have already seen complete destruction, having become the victim of national development and the mountaineering boom in recent years. It is our duty to pass on well-preserved natural assets to coming generations <BR>
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01-09-2005 15:52<BR>
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