[KS] Re: Still doubting about the rendering of Korea prior to Japanese occupation?

[Michael Finch]

Dear Richard Miller,

In some respects the documents that you quote might be
considered to support the conspiracy theory. From 1905
until 1910 Korea was not a colony of Japan but a
protectorate and retained vestiges of independence.
Its foreign relations, however, were conducted by
Japan. At this time, as you point out, Japan chose to
refer to Korea as "Korea". After 1910 when Korea was
no longer an independent nation but a part of the
Japanese empire, the Japanese revert to the
traditional term Chosen as Korea's alphabetical
ranking in the world's list of independent nations was
no longer relevant.

>From my own research into Min YOng-hwan's 1896 mission
to the coronation of Tsar Nicholas II, I found that
Min (as ChosOn's Minister Plenipotentiary) was
received at diplomatic functions before the Japanese
representative Yamagata Aritomo. This fact caused Min
considerable concern as he felt that it was certain to
offend the Japanese. His Russian assistants reassured
him by telling him about the Western practice of
receiving diplomats according to the alphabetical
precedence of the nation that they represented. The
fact that Min expressed such concerns does suggest to
me that at the time this could have been a potential
source of irritation to the Japanese.
   The fact that the Japanese also did not insist on
being referred to as Nippon in western contexts might
also suggest that they may have been sensitive to
where this would have placed them in the alphabetical
rankings.

--- "Richard C. Miller" <rcmiller at students.wisc.edu>
wrote: > Dear Henny,
> 
> One might also look at how the Japanese government
> itself rendered the name
> of Korea in their own English-language publications,
> on the supposition
> that they themselves, at least, would participate in
> their own conspiracy.
> From my own study (long ago) of the English-language
> publications by the
> colonial government, mostly based on materials
> easily found in our library
> at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, I see no
> support for the K-conspiracy.
> 
> If we begin with the first colonial government,
> rendered in English (by
> themselves) as the "Residency-General of Korea:"
> 
> 1908	Annual Report for 1907 on Reforms and Progress
> in Korea.  Seoul: His
> Imperial Japanese Majesty's Residency-General. 
> 
> 1909	Second Annual Report on Reforms and Progress in
> Korea (1908-1909).
> Seoul: Residency-General of Korea. 
> 
> The next colonial government styled itself the
> "Government-General of
> Korea," and produced two publications lauding its
> successes in the penninsula:
> 
> 1910	The Material Progress of Korea for the Last
> Five Years (1905-1910).
> Seoul: Government-General of Korea. 
> 
> 1910	Third Annual Report on Reforms and Progress in
> Korea.  Seoul:
> Government-General of Korea. 
> 
> After annexation in 1910, when the Empire no longer
> considered Korea
> anything but a large and somewhat wayward
> prefecture, the colonial
> government entitled itself the Government-General of
> Chosen. It's Annual
> Reports, which were occasionally bienial, always
> called the area "Chosen,"
> with the exception of the very first one published
> after annexation, in
> which they felt compelled to clarify what "Chosen"
> was:
> 
> 1911	Annual Report on Reforms and Progress in Chosen
> (Korea) (1910-1911).
> Keijo (Seoul): Government-General of Chosen. 
> 
> Publications other than the Annual Reports also
> referred to "Chosen," such as:
> 
> 1914	Results of Three Years' Administration of
> Chosen Since Annexation.
> Keijo: Government-General of Chosen.
> 
> 1921	The New Administration in Chosen.  Keijo:
> Government-General of Chosen. 
> 
> 1924	Development of Chosen and Necessity for
> Spiritual Enlightenment.
> Keijo: Government-General of Chosen, General Affairs
> Department. (Moriya
> Sakau authored this volume)
> 
> 1935	Thriving Chosen: A Survey of Twenty-Five Years'
> Administration.  N.p.:
> Taisho Shashin Kogeisho for the Government-General
> of Chosen, Foreign
> Affairs Division. 
> 
> This use of "Chosen" continued unabated from 1911
> until 1937, when the
> Japanese government promulgated a new
> transliteration system (which,
> thankfully, did not survive the Occupation) to
> replace Hepburn system. I do
> not know the history of this other system, but it is
> interesting to note
> that, like those promulgated in nearby countries,
> this one insisted on
> duplicating the vagaries of Japanese kana spelling
> with Roman letters. In
> kana, you may remember, the "ch" sound is
> represented with a letterform in
> the "t" series: ta t[ch]i t[s]u te to. In instances
> in which other vowels
> follow the "ch" sound, the 'i' is replaced with
> "y+vowel," as in this
> series: tya tyi tyu tye tyo (but all pronounced "cha
> chi chu che cho"). The
> "j" sound, which can in theory be represented with
> either kana in the "t"
> series or kana in the "s" series (sa s[h]i su se so)
> was officially placed
> in the latter series, and represented in roman
> letters with a "z." Thus
> "Chosen" became "Tyosen," "Keijo" became "Keizyo,"
> and the reports became
> as follows:
> 
> 1937	Annual Report on the Administration of Tyosen
> (1936-1937).  Keizyo:
> Government-General of Chosen. 
> 
> 1938	Annual Report on the Administration of Tyosen
> (1937-1938).  Keizyo:
> Government-General of Chosen. 
> 
> 1938 seems to represent the endpoint of these Annual
> Reports, no doubt
> because, by 1939, the Empire no longer concerned
> itself with the opinions
> of English speakers. Incidently, these documents,
> and more importantly the
> photographs in them, make interesting reading,
> particularly when you read
> them against the backdrop of Japanese
> self-presentation (nihonjinron in
> particular), and in the company of similar documents
> concerning the
> puppet-state of Manchoukuo.
>  
> So, in sum: the sequence in official Japanese
> colonial government
> English-language documents is "Korea" to "Chosen" to
> "Tyosen," or K to C to
> T, and not C to K at all. I might also point out
> that the truly
> nationalistic Japanese of the era preferred to
> render their country's name
> as "Nippon," which begins with N, so changing from C
> to K would, in any
> case, not have satisfied them. The ICAS folks may
> have a case for refusing
> to spell "Korea" with a "T," but I rather doubt any
> of them will make it.
> 
> Richard
> --Richard C. Miller
> --UW School of Music
> --Manado, Indonesia
> --rcmiller at students.wisc.edu



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