[KS] The rhetoric of chunghung

[Michael Robinson]

Thanks to Gari for once again providing us with a great summary on this 
term.  I have nothing to add on the historical derivations of these terms, 
but would like to note that the terms must surely be understood in their 
contemporary context.  As Gari points out these are in everyday use.  Park 
Chung Hee used a number of terms that could be linked to long historical 
useage within Confucianism or otherwise, but it was what he made of them 
that was important.  From the mid-1960s onward he gave a number of speeches 
and the press followed his comments in detail with a vast amount of 
comentary.....they also printed the government's own elaboration of his 
development ideology ad nausium.  It seems to me there was no mistaking 
where he was going with these terms at the level of the general public.  I 
particularly remember the great jokes and send ups on the propaganda that 
revolved around the saemaul undong and all the uisik it demanded.  These 
jokes were sophisticated play with all the meanings possible within the 
termenology.  It within this discursive context that the terms continue to 
live, and quite possibly continue to morph as they are re-deployed.  One 
might only consider the American English example of how the useage of 
"liberal/liberalism" has changed over the last generation.

Mike Robinson
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <gkl1 at columbia.edu>
To: "Korean Studies Discussion List" <Koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws>
Sent: Friday, March 03, 2006 12:04 AM
Subject: Re: [KS] The rhetoric of chunghung


>   As noted by Jiyul Kim, the term <chunghUng> goes far back in
> history, with a career much like <yusin> which was discussed here a
> few months ago. They also share some connotations. Whereas yusin
> suggests reform and the re-establishment of legitimacy, chunghUng
> implies revival and a restoration of spirit or prosperity, which
> comes especially from the second character, hUng-- start up, rise,
> increase, prosper, etc. The first character, chung, is the common
> character for "middle," but that is the sense only when read in
> classical Chinese in the so-called "level" tone; in this compound
> it is usually glossed in Chinese texts in the "departing" tone, and
> has the meaning (among others) of "second" in a group of three or
> four, or "repeat," or "again." The basic idea of the compound is
> "prosperity once more," or, to go at it with an etymological
> calque, "a reprospering." (Of course, Sino-Korean readings don't
> have any tones when spoken, but if one's education involved Chinese
> poetry, as it did for many, one had to know the tones in order to
> write or parse the poem correctly.)
>   <ChunghUng> is not as obscure or arcane as some of the postings
> seem to reflect. It's in three ordinary pocket dictionaries within
> reach as I write; and though I wouldn't say it's any longer an
> everyday word in Korean, I've seen it in ordinary newspaper or
> magazine articles where it was used without the writer feeling that
> it needed to be explained. Any decently educated Korean who read
> literary or even general magazines in the 30s and 40s would have
> been familiar with it, or readily grasped its meaning from the
> characters-- which of course wouldn't be the case today. When Park
> Chung Hee was a young man it hardly required a classical or
> Confucian education to be capable of understanding it. We don't
> have to imagine him having to depend on old wizened scholars to
> know what it meant, and suggesting as much would be to unwisely
> underestimate him. Thus I suspect he used the term well aware of
> its historical meaning, and also in the belief that most literate
> people in Korean society (a very large number indeed) would
> understand exactly what he meant.
>   As for an expression like "Kojong chunghUng," it would have been
> impossible while Kojong was alive, since "Kojong" was his
> posthumous designation, not decided upon until after his death in
> 1919. "Kwangmu chunghUng," using his year title for the years
> 1897-1907, could probably be found in the journalism of that
> decade. In saying that the phrase "minjok chunghUng" originated in
> the colonial period, Bruce Cumings surely referred to the use of
> the term with "minjok," which itself came into Korean only in the
> early colonial period or just before.
>
> Gari Ledyard
>
> Quoting Jiyul Kim <jiyulkim at fas.harvard.edu>:
>
>> Does anyone have any thought or evidence on whether the use of
>> chunghung.
>> (restoration/renovation/rejuvenation) during the Park Chung Hee
>> years
>> was generic or deliberate in an historicized way?
>>
>> I refer specifically to the evocation of the term in the slogan
>> "minjok
>> chunghung" (national restoration) and the use in "munye chunghung
>> (culture and art renovation) 5 year plan."
>>
>> I am wondering if it is possible to consider whether the use of
>> the term
>> chunghung was purposefully designed to evoke its deep
>> Chinese/Confucian
>> connection. Mary Wright's book on the T'ung Chih Restoration (The
>> Last
>> Stand of Chinese Conservatism) provides a good chapter on the
>> term's
>> significance in Chinese dynastic history. Andre Schmid's Korea
>> Between
>> Empires has two mentions of the use of chunghung to refer to
>> Kojong's
>> efforts with the Taehan jeguk (Kojong chunghung?). Bruce Cumings
>> mentioned in a manuscript review that minjok chunghung was a term
>> that
>> has colonial origins (although by who and in what source I am not
>> sure).
>>
>> In an earlier brief discussion on the term "yusin" Prof. Ledyard
>> talked
>> about the Chinese/Confucian roots of that term and speculated
>> that Park
>> Chung Hee was very possibly aware and deliberately used the term
>> with
>> that connection in mind. Vladimir Tikhonov in the same discussion
>> speculated that Park's educational advisor Park Chong-hong would
>> have
>> known that historical significance and would have been in a
>> position to
>> advise PCH and that the evocation of the term/concept embedded in
>> Chinese imperial ideology was "hardly accidental."
>>
>> I wonder if we can make a similar inference about chunghung.
>> Better
>> yet, does anyone have any  evidence that can take us beyond
>> speculation.
>>
>> Jiyul Kim
>> Director of Asian Studies
>> US Army War College
>>
>>
>>
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