[KS] Vulnerabilities of Korean Studies

michael ralston mkr_lists at yahoo.com
Sun May 11 23:25:32 EDT 2008


Hello everyone,

   Yes, there are vulnerabilities within Korea
Studies.  Not to be too Panglossian, but, despite the
weaknesses, the field has never been better. 
Hopefully without being too repetitive... 

 1.  There are a few strong centers of Korean
Studies-- centers with a good group of scholars
situated within solid Asian Studies programs (e.g.,
UCLA, Hawaii, UBC...). 

 2. There are now Korea scholars in departments at
universities that don't have large Korean Studies
programs and had even less a decade or so ago (e.g.,
Texas, Michigan State, Toronto, Indiana, Cornell...).

  3. As Mike mentioned, people focusing on Korea are,
generally, more broadly trained in the regional
context and will therefore have the knowledge to teach
broader courses (might not always have the teaching
experience, but the knowledge is there).  

  4.  Enough has been written in English that, for
many areas, we aren't limited to the lone book on the
topic when looking for textbooks.  There are now
enough good books we can even offer specialized
classes on some subjects. Still lots to do, of course,
but the field has laid a good foundation.  

   5.  There is a lot more good material available for
learning Korean than in the past, and the Korean is
offered in more places (though as Ross points out, it
sometime struggles).  

   6.  The reasons for studying Korea are as valid as
ever, more so in some ways-- historically important
for understanding East Asia, culturally interesting in
too many ways to mention, strategically and
economically important...

   7.  The number of Korea-focused panels or panels
with Korean content at major or regional conferences
is up, and the there are some good Korean Studies
journals.  


  But there are also things to do.  


  Don's comments about increasing the representation
of Korean studies in liberal arts colleges are bang
on.  Another obvious area is larger colleges and
universities (and community colleges?).  I left a lot
of good schools out when listing them above (e.g.
Columbia, Illinois, UW, USC...), but the number left
off pales in comparison to the number of schools that
still offer no courses on Korea.  In short, two areas
with a lot of potential for growth.  

   I'm not sure the "near future" over-production of
PhD isn't actually imminent (if it's not here
already).  

   Luckily, the number of academic job listings for an
East Asian position (e.g. history, religion, etc.)
that lists "China and Japan" with no mention of Korea
is decreasing, but they still pop up from time to
time.  Is there a way to politely remind search
committees that Korea really is part of East Asia and
there are good reasons for hiring a Koreanist?  

  Is there a way to better use the Korean Studies
distinguish lectureship to promote Korean studies at
liberal arts colleges (or to enhance the program at
places that have an East Asian studies program with
little or no Korea representation)?  

   One way we might be able to increase the exposure
to Korean studies is join or form thematic panels on
East Asia, history, religion, sociology, etc. at more
conferences (regional conferences included).  

   What can we reasonably expect from the Korea
Foundation, which it trying to promote Korean Studies
worldwide?  I'm not sure...

   Regards, mike ralston


--- michael robinson <robime at indiana.edu> wrote:

> Dear All: 
> 
> Don words should be seriously weighed by all in the
> field, and hopefully the KF advisory committee of
which I am a member will be seeing this as well.
> While I have to good fortune to work at a large
> research university, my school is not on the top 10
top 5 or top anything of the Korean prestige
> hierarchy.  Yet we are able to maintain a modest
> presence for Korean studies and even convince our
larger EALC department that Korea belongs any integral
> part of any East Asia program.  Not for lack of
> trying, we have be off the charts of the KF or other
Korea based funders, but other sources have helped
> us do some amazing things.  The current Freeman
> foundation program for Undergraduate education on
East Asia has allowed us  to get a number of HS
> teacher, even undergraduate study trips to Korea. 
> The impact of these trips is emblematic of how
money, not even large grants, can recruit interest
into the field.  My undergraduate study tour last
year...a group with no-heritage students....produced 5
recruits to the Korean language program.  These
students are now working their way through school and
several will be out there next year looking for work
in NGOs, graduate school, Law, etc.  They continue to
carry their interest in East Asia gained through the
lens of Korea with them.   Rebalancing our efforts to
smaller programs, colleges, or places where there is
no representation of Korea of any sort is long
overdue.   I fear for the overproduction of Ph.D.s in
Korean studies in the near future(a prospect I never
thought I would see).
>  
> 
> Another thread in this discussion is the issue of
> why we study this place.  While not as bad as 30
years ago, I have always been distracted by the
> disconnect between Korean's interest in our 
representations of Korea and our own research and
writing.  During the bad old days this meant not
taking
> money with strings real or implied or imagined.  But
> there still is the issue of Korean simply agog about
being seen through our work.....now days things are
better.  But the money showered on the field was not
for pure research it was in the minds of the funders a
way to get Korea seen and read about.  Ironically our
monographs do much less a job of this than any number
> of popular books about the Korean war or travel
> accounts, etc.  But the pressures have always been
there to say the right thing.  I'm not sure the
Koreans have bought the field in the same manner that
I believe the Japanese did in the 1960s
70s....producing scholars who literally bought the
"uniqueness" obsession of the Japanese.....but we
might reflect on the topics and general literature
produced by Korean funding in this light. 
> 
> We now have a field.  And as Gari notes that is a
> far cry from the 1950s and 1960s.  I still think we
are trained more broadly than our Japan or China
> interested colleagues.  So it is incumbent on us to
> push the current trend of thinking about the region
in truly regional terms forward.  This can be
> done by re-thinking how we focus our lobbying for
> money and where it might be spent within the North
American educational system.
> 
> Mike R
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: koreanstudies-bounces at koreaweb.ws
> [mailto:koreanstudies-bounces at koreaweb.ws] On Behalf
> Of Clark, Donald
> Sent: Friday, April 25, 2008 12:04 PM
> To: koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws
> Subject: [KS] Vulnerabilities of Korean Studies
> 
> Dear All,
>      	Following Gari Ledyard's comment, and thinking
> about the North
> American advisory group to the Korea Foundation, I
> want to add an
> additional point.     	
> 	In my experience the Korea Foundation has ignored
the potential that exists on liberal arts campuses
across America, for the "Koreanization" of existing
Asian Studies curricula.
>  Here are thousands of bright undergraduates who
will go on to graduate school and careers teaching
anthropology, history, political science, etc. etc.,
who should be encouraged to use Korea in their future
teaching.  They may not have much to do with the
Kyujanggak, ever, but they can turn students on to
 Korea across this country, if they themselves have
 some exposure to it.

>       The Korea Foundation appears to know nothing
> about this potential pool of scholar-teachers and
their potential effect raising awareness about Korea
in American higher education.  The fact that most of
these
> potential teachers are "non-heritage" represents in
> my opinion the future viability of "Korean Studies,"
not as a balkanized special interest that is easy to
cut in hard times, but as an essential component of
the Asian Studies, or even disciplinary, curriculum.

>       "China and India" are sucking all the oxygen
> out of undergraduate resources for education about
Asia.  In my service with the liberal arts consortium
primarily concerned with teaching about Asia
(www.asianetwork.org ) I have found much enthusiasm
for Korea and spreading the word about Korea in the
170+ member colleges that range from Macalester to
Eckerd to Redlands to Bard.  "The field," however, is
mesmerized by the great centers that produce numbers
of specialists who appear indifferent to the
possibilities for the development of Korean Studies in
the wide world of undergraduate education--meaning
classroom teaching of smart students (directly, not by
teaching assistants), guiding them to study Korea, to
study abroad in Korea, and to make Korean themes the
subjects of their senior theses in history,
anthropology, and the like.

>       If "Korean Studies" is to outlive the wave of
> heritage students and become a permanent part of
American education, it should pay more attention to
the millions of students who attend liberal arts
colleges and would be enchanted by Korea if only there
were someone to open the window for them. 
> Don Clark 




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