<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">Esteemed colleagues:<BR>
<BR>
1. Mark's first sentence was surely ironic:<BR>
a gentle nod to current sad ructions<BR>
across the Sea of No Agreed Name.<BR>
<BR>
Japan Focus is indeed indispensable. And free!<BR>
To cite just one recent Korea-related example,<BR>
Gavan McCormack has an excellent piece on <BR>
a macabre but vital matter: <BR>
</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=2 PTSIZE=10 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">Disputed Bones: Japan, North Korea and the 'Nature' Controversy<BR>
<B>by Gavan McCormack</B><BR>
</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=3 PTSIZE=12 FAMILY="SERIF" FACE="Times New Roman" LANG="0">http://www.japanfocus.org/article.asp?id=258<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
2. Gari's suggestion of a similar organ for Korea is an excellent one. <BR>
But the name <I>Korea Focus</I> is already taken, by another fine publication:<BR>
the Korea Foundation's bi-monthly roundup of the Seoul press, plus<BR>
longer essays on topics of current concern. There is also a handy chronology. <BR>
Your local ROK embassy or consulate will send it to you, courtesy of the <BR>
Korean taxpayer. Or it's online (both as text and PDF; the latter slow-loading), <BR>
with a useful search facility, at http://www.koreafocus.or.kr/<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
3. I hope Gari is right that the underlying trend is towards better Japan-ROK relations; <BR>
and that this year's row is merely some kind of evanescent spring squall.<BR>
I'm more pessimistic: fearing the bile runs deeper than that - mainly on the Korean side -<BR>
and that real harm has been done. Whatever the trends in culture, peninsula politics seem <BR>
to be becoming more insular; which bodes ill in the age of <I>segyehwa.<BR>
<BR>
</I>Koreans are of course free (south of the DMZ) to chart whatever course they choose.<BR>
But what is one to make of opinion polls which cite either the US or Japan as the <BR>
main threat to South Korea, ahead of North Korea or China? See eg<BR>
http://joongangdaily.joins.com/200504/17/200504172206552209900090309031.html<BR>
As John McEnroe used to say: you cannot be serious!<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
4. Gari's final paragraph alludes to arcane rituals beyond my ken.<BR>
If Koreans ever take up cricket, you'll hear it here first ....<BR>
<BR>
Yours at silly mid off,<BR>
Aidan<BR>
<BR>
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 (alt) +44(0) 1264 737434 mobile: +44(0) 7970 741307 <BR>
fax: +44(0) 1274 773663 ISDN: +44(0) 1274 589280<BR>
Email: afostercarter@aol.com (alt) afostercarter@yahoo.com website: www.aidanfc.net<BR>
[Please use @aol; but if any problems, please try @yahoo too - and let me know, so I can chide AOL]<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
In a message dated 23/05/2005 01:54:11 GMT Standard Time, gkl1@columbia.edu writes:<BR>
<BR>
</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=2 PTSIZE=10 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0"><BR>
<BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">Subj:<B>Re: [KS] Japan, Korea and the Asia-Pacific </B><BR>
Date:23/05/2005 01:54:11 GMT Standard Time<BR>
From:<A HREF="mailto:gkl1@columbia.edu">gkl1@columbia.edu</A><BR>
Reply-to:<A HREF="mailto:Koreanstudies@koreaweb.ws">Koreanstudies@koreaweb.ws</A><BR>
To:<A HREF="mailto:Koreanstudies@koreaweb.ws">Koreanstudies@koreaweb.ws</A><BR>
CC:<A HREF="mailto:ms44@cornell.edu">ms44@cornell.edu</A><BR>
<I>Sent from the Internet </I><BR>
<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
I quite agree with its owner and chief operator, Mark Selden, that<BR>
Japan Focus is well worth following for any Korea specialist,<BR>
especially modern Korea specialists. As he justly says in his<BR>
posting and self-advertisement, the Focus has lots of stuff on<BR>
Korea, and in spite of its name is really focused on Northeast<BR>
Asia, although I think it's fair to say that it's focused from<BR>
Japan. That's no disadvantage. Lest people think that somehow the<BR>
Korea angles come with a Japanese slant, I have found him often<BR>
featuring Japanese writers who have very objective spins on<BR>
Korea-Japan issues.<BR>
The only thing in his posting that I might differ with is Mark's<BR>
surmise that "a Koreanist, in good conscience," might<BR>
understandably lean away from anything with a Japanese label. But<BR>
if one has a good conscience, one will also be fair-minded. And it<BR>
should be said that Koreans nowadays, especially the younger ones<BR>
and especially in the cultural area, are much more balanced and<BR>
open than they used to be with respect to Japan, and more and more<BR>
this is met by equal attention to Korea on the part of Japanese.<BR>
"Yonsama" may be a fad, but it's one with an increasingly deep<BR>
understructure. It's true that when the big-buzz issues pop up<BR>
periodically, such as Tokto and the history textbooks, one can<BR>
count on peninsular passions to come into play for a couple of<BR>
weeks. That is to be understood and taken in stride.<BR>
Someone in the modern Korean field might well consider building<BR>
an internet feature like Mark's, maybe called Korea Focus, and aim<BR>
for the same kind of broad, outreaching coverage. Between North<BR>
Korea's nuclear specialists and diplomats that routinely flummox<BR>
the rest of the world, and South Korean pop culture and stem cell<BR>
technology that are state of the art, Korea is a world force. I<BR>
thought of this this morning, reading in the sports section about<BR>
an exploit of Dae Sung Koo, a relief pitcher for the NY Mets who<BR>
played four seasons with the Orix Blue Wave in the Japanese<BR>
leagues. He put four straight Yankees down with a handful of<BR>
pitches, then came to the plate in the bottom of the 7th and<BR>
promptly hit a Randy Johnson pitch to the center field wall for a<BR>
double. Then right away he scored from second on a sacrifice bunt<BR>
with a slide that took your breath away. OK, as he claimed, maybe<BR>
he hadn't had a hit since high school, or slid since junior high,<BR>
but can anyone doubt the "Korean Wave"? Why not put that into an<BR>
intellectually broad internet format that comes to you every week<BR>
with something new and interesting?<BR>
<BR>
Gari Ledyard<BR>
Quoting mark selden <ms44@cornell.edu>:<BR>
<BR>
> Can a Koreanist, in good conscience subscribe to Japan Focus?<BR>
> True, the name of our electronic journal is<BR>
> something of an affront, and it is to be hoped<BR>
> that it changes in due time to reflect the<BR>
> Asia-Pacific thrust of the work that appears<BR>
> there, notably reportage and scholarship on<BR>
> Japan, China, Korea and the Asia-Pacific.<BR>
> In fact a great deal is being published that is<BR>
> central to Korea and to Northeast Asia: on the<BR>
> two Koreas, on Japan-Korea relations, on US-NK-6<BR>
> nation nuclear negotiations, on the future of a<BR>
> Northeast Asia community, on China-Japan-Korea<BR>
> conflicts over territorial issues and war memory.<BR>
><BR>
> We invite Koreanists to subscribe and contribute to the journal.<BR>
><BR>
> Japan Focus is an electronic journal chronicling<BR>
> Japan and the Asia-Pacific in global perspective,<BR>
> encompassing politics, economics, society,<BR>
> history, culture, international relations, war<BR>
> and peace, and historical memory. In addition to<BR>
> Japan Focus exclusives, it presents translations<BR>
> from Japanese and other languages as well as<BR>
> reprints of important texts. Japan Focus draws on<BR>
> the writings of researchers, journalists, policy<BR>
> analysts and writers throughout Asia and the<BR>
> Pacific, North America, Europe and Australia. Its<BR>
> fully indexed website provides a permanent<BR>
> resource for researchers on the Asia-Pacific.<BR>
><BR>
> Subscribers receive a weekly announcement of the<BR>
> latest posts and a link to each. Here are the<BR>
> articles posted during the last two weeks.<BR>
> Articles of particular reference to Korea are<BR>
> asterisked (*).<BR>
><BR>
> Japan Focus Newsletter<BR>
> New Articles Posted May 11, 2005<BR>
><BR>
> in this issue<BR>
> <#feature>Robert S. McNamara, Apocalypse Soon<BR>
> <#article1>*Utsumi Aiko, Japanese World War II<BR>
> POW Policy: Indifference and Irresponsibility<BR>
> <#article2>*Jess Bravin, Prisoner Rights<BR>
> and International Law: Japanese and American<BR>
> Responsibility >From World War II to Guantanamo<BR>
> <#article3>Geremie Barmé, Mirrors of History: On<BR>
> a Sino-Japanese Moment and Some Antecedents<BR>
> <#article4>Mark Selden, Remembering 'The Good<BR>
> War': The Atomic Bombing and the Internment of<BR>
> Japanese-Americans in U.S. History Textbooks<BR>
> <#article5>*Asahi Shimbun, Korean Slave Laborers:<BR>
> Repatriating and Burying the Dead<BR>
> <#article6>*Jin Hyung-joo, Textbook Nationalism:<BR>
> Perspetives on China, Japan and Korea<BR>
> <#article7>*Kaneko Masaru, Lost Horizons: The<BR>
> Flawed 'Nationalism' of the Koizumi Regime<BR>
><BR>
> New Articles Posted May 19, 2005<BR>
><BR>
> in this issue<BR>
> <#feature>Yuki Tanaka, Firebombing and Atom<BR>
> Bombing: an historical perspective on<BR>
> indiscriminate bombing<BR>
> <#article1>Andrew DeWit, Scientific Stereotypes East and West<BR>
> <#article2>Tony de Brum, BRAVO and Today: US<BR>
> Nuclear Tests in the Marshall Islands<BR>
> *<#article3>Karasaki Taro, Why Japanese Wartime<BR>
> Apologies Fail: A German perspective<BR>
> <#article4>Greg Mitchell, Incribing Hiroshima:<BR>
> The Photography of Matsushige Yoshito<BR>
><BR>
><BR>
> For access to all Japan Focus articles, or to<BR>
> subscribe, go to http://japanfocus.org/<BR>
><BR>
><BR>
><BR>
> mark selden<BR>
> ms44@cornell.edu<BR>
> coordinator, japan focus<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
<BR>
</BLOCKQUOTE><BR>
</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" BACK="#ffffff" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff" SIZE=3 PTSIZE=12 FAMILY="SERIF" FACE="Times New Roman" LANG="0"><BR>
<BR>
<BR>
</FONT></HTML>