South and North Korea were historically one nation that was divided after World War II along the 38th parallel. The division split families and established South Korea as aligned with the US and its capitalist system, while North Korea aligned with the Soviet Union and adopted communism. The Korean language and ethnic identity are shared between the two countries, though their governments, economic systems, and relationship to one another have been strongly divided since the Korean War in the 1950s.
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15 korea introduction
1. Korea
South Korea North Korea
Hankuk Chosun
한국
조선
韓國
朝鮮
The land of the morning calm
2. Geopolitical Location
Manchuria
• Appendage to China
• “Dagger pointed at the heart of Japan”
3. Geography
Overall Shape?
• What do you see?
Size:
• Roughly equal to Utah
Population: in ‘06
• South Korea: 48,846,823
• North Korea: 23,113,019
Climate:
• Temperate:
• Cold winters
• Hot, wet summers
Topography:
• Mountainous
4. Divided Nation
• Japanese Occupation 1910
• Divided in 1945
– Carrot used by US to lure USSR into the Pacific
phase of WWII
– 38th Parallel
– North: Soviet realm… ergo Communist
– South: US realm … ergo Capitalist
• Korean War: 1950-53
– Enemies
– Divided Families
– No mail, no trade, no visits, no phone calls
5. Ethnic Homogeneity
“Racially pure,” Unique Race
East Asian or Mongoloid
racial group
• Strong sense of racial
identity
• Self-identification as
distinct from other Asian
nations
6. Korean Language
한국어
조선말
Altaic Language Group
Structurally identical to Japanese
60% of vocabulary borrowed from Chinese
Distinct from both
Not a tonal language
Regional dialects – Just like U.S.
7. Korean Language
한국어
조선말
Early Literacy: Chinese
Early Writing: Chinese Characters
1400s Hangul – commissioned by King Sejong
• Phonetic system
• “Simple enough for women & servants”
8.
9. Writing System
Mixed Writing system
• Chinese root words written in Chinese
characters
– 900 characters to pass middle school
– 1800 characters to pass high school
• Korean Native words written in Hangul
• Typical until 1945
– North Korea dropped Chinese about 1950
– Hangul only newspapers in South Korea first
published in 1988
10. National Creation Myth:
Tangun 2333 BC
• Hwan-ung (god figure)
• Tiger and Bear want to be
human
• Live in cave 100 days eating
mugwort and garlic
• Bear endures and becomes a woman
• She prays for a husband
• Hwan-ung takes her as wife and they bear a
son, Tangun who governs over the people of
Korea
See
http://www.lifeinkorea.com/information/tangun.cfm for
a simple but solid version of this story on the web.
11. Native Religious Traditions
• Animistic religious beliefs
• Shamanism
• Mudang:
– Korean Shaman
– Always Female
• Kut:
– Korean exorcism
– Ecstatic dance
12. Native Spiritual /
Cultural Concepts
• Han
– Collective burden of historic pain
– Centuries of oppression
– Eons of suffering
– Creates a sorrow, sense of ‘blues’ that is
unique to Koreans and pervades their art,
music and culture
13. Native
Spiritual
Concepts
• Nature of the
Human Soul
– Similar to China – spirit resides in the environment of
its life/death.
– Burial practices similar to China
14. Native Spiritual Concepts
Ancestor Veneration:
• Chesa
• Enhanced & formalized by Confucianism
• Major part of civil responsibility in later
Korean history
15. Borrowed Religious Concepts
• Daoism
– Focus on nature
– Fengshui
• Confucianism
• Buddhism
• Christianity – arrives late
16. Daoist ideas:
Symbolism of the
South Korean Flag
• Center is the Korean version of the Yin-Yang
symbol
• The four trigrams are:
• ☰; geon ( 건 ; 乾 ) = heaven 天
• ☷; gon ( 곤 ; 坤 ) = earth 地
• ☲; ri ( 리 ; 離 ) = sun 日
• ☵; gam ( 감 ; 坎 ) = moon 月
17. Fengshui (Chinese)
Pungsu (Korean)
• Geomancy
• Wind and Water
• Used in:
• Interior decorating
• Architecture
• City planning, etc.
• 5 Frog Brothers Folk tale…
18. Confucianism
• Borrowed from China
• Dominant Governing Ideology
in later dynasties
• Major impact on Korean Culture
– Hierarchy
– Ritualism and formality
– Male dominance
19. Buddhism
• Borrowed from
China
– About 50 CE
– Becomes
important
about 500 CE
• Adopted by early dynasties
• Political dominance early on
• Coexists with Confucianism, Daoism and native
traditions -- usually
20. Christianity
• Catholics enter 1774
• Protestants enter 1884
Myongdong
Cathedral: Seoul
• Both become politically and socially very
important
– Protestants 1900 to the present
– Catholics briefly about 1800 and again since 1970
(much more to come in later history discussion)