[KS] 풍토/향토 translation question to literary and philosophy scholars

Frank Hoffmann hoffmann at koreanstudies.com
Tue May 23 23:09:19 EDT 2017


The FOLLOWING was written as a reply to a message I got -- I *thought* 
-- here on the list. Only realized that it was sent as a private 
message when trying to send it out. Since I already composed it, let me 
send it anyway to the list. Maybe it evokes some more responses. (And 
I'd suggest Mark sends HIS interesting message that I am replying here 
also to the list.) Thanks.
-------


Dear Mark:

Thank you for sharing your insights and thoughts.

Let me add these thoughts from my end:

1. These terms, as most terms with origins in Chinese script, often 
have long etymological and ideological tails, and the history of the 
terms themselves often becomes part of their ideological use and abuse. 
What I wonder about is the use of these two terms in the colonial 
period, in other areas than art history (or texts referring to art) -- 
particularly in texts related to literature and philosophy. (But your 
notes are already interesting -- so, thanks!)

2. Why is all this interesting? Well, here is what I found: the areas, 
the fields of study ...
  (a) folklore studies / ethnology / ethnography / Völkerkunde
  (b) art history
  (c) philosophy
... were in the 19th and earlier 20th centuries not really as 
"divided", as clearly separated as they are today. Today we think in 
terms of established university subjects and fields, each with its own 
set of tools and methodologies. So, as a trained art historian -- and I 
did have quite a number of private discussions on that with a friend in 
the past -- I can hardly "work" with terms such as "aesthetics." That 
term just breathes the air of some room that was locked a century ago, 
and the key thrown into the next well. It seems obscure and outdated to 
me to talk about "aesthetics" and "art" at the same time, I do not have 
the tools to work on an art work and then say something meaningful 
about it in terms of aesthetics. It seems completely unprofessional and 
out of place. Yet, that was different in the past. Guys like Heidegger 
or Watsuji would discuss works of art (and sometimes what we today 
consider to be folklore) as if they were specialists in interpreting 
them, as they talked about "aesthetics and art" -- WHEREBY aesthetics 
again is a part of philosophy. So, there today so nicely separated 
subjects were in the mind of scholars more like a united field (you may 
have a more elegant way to phrase this). I read those texts today, and 
I find all are more or less utterly useless in understanding works of 
art, UNLESS one is interested in the history of reception of certain 
art works within a certain timeframe (which is certainly an important 
part of art history as a field). But you won't look at art today and 
then study your Heidegger or Watsuji to come up with a meaningful 
understanding. 
Now, what is interesting in the context I am working on now is that in 
the German speaking countries, where art history was as a university 
field was established for many decades by 1900, that "cut" between 
these fields was pretty much completed during the 1890s. When the field 
(as an academic field and university subject) was then adapted to Japan 
and later Korea, though, this separation does NOT show in any way. It 
still was mostly philosophers teaching "aesthetics" and not "art 
history." Both Japanese and Korean art was dealt within the 
"Aesthetics" or Philosophy department, and the methodologies applied 
was that of philosophy (basically no methodology, in other words). That 
is then also, as I see it, one of the reasons why "Archaeology" as a 
field was early on blooming and successful, before and after 
liberation, while art historians were in fact "aestheticians" (is that 
a word?) who just had not learned the crafts of art history, and so 
they would come up with their own "methods" in analyzing Korean art. 
That resulted in what I would call a close-to-complete failure in terms 
of explaining style and stylistic and historical developments! On top 
of that, especially after liberation, there was a huge pressure of 
Koreanizing Korean art, of finding the "characteristics of Korean art" 
(plenty of articles on that!) -- all this still with the handicap, at 
least partially, of not having an actual art historical toolset at hand 
(other than was the case with their colleagues in archaeology). 

This is the larger frame I am looking at. (Since this is just email, 
kindly forgive my somewhat rough attempt to summarize my thoughts.) And 
in this context I am interested to learn a little more about such key 
terms, and if these played any roles other than the art context, and if 
so, which.

See -- this is also really fascinating if you try to match such 
findings (of the developments of academic fields in Korea and Japan) 
with the whole history of westernization and modernization. In the case 
of art history, it shows that what was imported was by no means the 
latest in research, but an at the time already outdated concept hardly 
followed (at least so in the German-speaking countries it was adapted 
from). Yes, someone like Heidegger would write about art & aesthetics, 
but in the field of art history he did not exist, he had no really a 
voice there. In the Japanese adaptation this seems completely 
different. Even in translated texts -- I am among others looking at 
Curt Glaser, and Watsuji translated one of his short key texts on the 
research of East Asian art, and even there the most extraordinary, 
forward-looking, concepts, not being reproduced in Euramerica until the 
postmodern times, the 1980s and 90s, were by Watsuji himself then 
embedded into a philosophical context that defied the main message and 
methodological outview of the translated text. 

Your input and discussion is much welcome! 

Best,
Frank


--------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreanstudies.com




More information about the Koreanstudies mailing list