The first half of the twentieth century in Korean history is marked by two harsh and painful experiences, the Japanese occupation between 1910 and 1945 and the Korean War of 1950 through 1953. These events rule the total of every national mind for many years. The legacy left by the colonial period is complex and filled with feeling of love, hate, guilt, and many others. The Japanese colonialists' push toward modernization brings extreme technological, and as a result social, advances, such as the building of infrastrue and the development of modern school systems. The Japanese also carry out the first modern archeological digging jobs of ancient Korean sites, royal graves, temples, ceramic kiln and preservation of their artifacts. On the flip side is the question of the colonialists' desires and their methods in these cultural efforts, and more seriously, war crimes of torture, rape, and killing. In the postcolonial period, Korea struggles with the issue of how to create an agreement between the positive developments of the colonial time in history and the unforgettable animal-like violence, embarrassment, and…
"Joong Ang Daily Article, Embracing Cultural Diversity in Korea.” Weblog post. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Sept. 2013.…
Political and social issues between Korea and Japan are fraught with tension in the present day because of the Japanese occupation of Korea during World War II. During the occupation, the Japanese tried to eliminate Korean culture and enforced a policy to obliterate the Korean nation. The occupation was a relatively recent historical event that has been taught in classes and imparted to Korean generations, thus marking the memory of the present generation, which makes it difficult for them not to be so biased with Japanese actions in the present day. I think we should look at how Korean government defines and teaches about the relationship between the two countries through usage of cultural identity and collective memory of Japanese occupation to unify people and up-build Korean economic. In hope of both countries do not make matters worse for Korean–Japanese political and social issues.…
The Yin and Yang of American Culture: A Paradox by Eun Y. Kim is a perspective of the American way of life by a Korean American. Kim uses the yin and yang symbol to describe the positive and negatives of American culture and how it compares to Asian culture. Kim’s exposure to American culture as a young child in Korea and immigrating to the United States while also being raised in a Korean household where Korean tradition was upheld provides a solid basis for her analysis. I have chosen five of her yang statements for discussion which I believe I have experienced being a fourth generation American but also witnessing the truth to these statements during my travels to Asia as well as to Portugal.…
The Korea’s colonial period spans a time frame of 35 years from 1910 to 1945 until Japan was defeated in World War II. It started with the Eulsa Treaty also known as Japan-Korea Protectorate treaty which is signed between Empire of Japan and the Korean Empire on 17 November 1905 by the influence of Russo-Japanese War. This treaty effectively made Korea a protectorate of Japan. Immediately after that, on 22 August 1910 the Japan-Korea Annexation Treaty was signed, which officially unveiled Korea’s colonial period.1 The impacts of the colonial period on Korea can be discussed in three different aspects, namely infrastructure development, economics, education and culture.…
The Korean entertainment industry for a long time studied and understood the concept of soft power and its uses on the world stage. They knew the only way to penetrate an American cultured global concept of the entertainment market is not by riding against the tidal wave of US cultural imperialism, but to adopt it. They understood that in order to appeal globally and make it, they had to transform the popular K-pop music production to be more American. And today, in the soft power stage, K-pop is considered to be South Korea’s most powerful weapon on the world stage. Bringing in revenues of billions to the country and making the country a top recognized business hub for investors from around the…
Due in part to the western influence, Japan has received many effects, both good and bad. In the same way that various cultural influence has helped countries such as the United States to gain perspective and broader its horizons, so has western influence helped to expand the cultural viewpoints of Japan. Also, western influence has opened the minds of the Japanese people, allowing them to accept new ideas and concepts. Some of these ideas include music, movies and even fashion. Perhaps it is due to western influence that the country of Japan possesses the technological importance that it holds today.…
In the early 20th century, the imperialistic ambitions of Japan made several, significant impacts on various countries. After the success of Japan’s modernization, they wanted to declare to the world how powerful their nation had become. The Japanese began their quest for their empire by occupying Korean. As harsh ruler, they forced many Koreans to do things that would only benefit themselves as a growing country. Additionally, Japan took their imperialism and aimed for China; they invaded in an attempt to gain full control of China. As Japan began to imperialize foreign nations to build their dominant empire, they made many historical impacts on these nations.…
Korea has a long and distinguished cultural history. It culture has blossomed during her long history. Owing to its geo-historical dependencies, Japan has adopted many Korean ideas and customs. Korea has also spawned some great inventions: its ancient printing systems, the first ever iron-clad battleship, and the Korean alphabet, devised by a group of 15th century scholars, remains largely unchanged today.…
In the present, the people who gain glory, in any field, represent their name of country, and increase their reputation as so-called the heroes. Until now, there are many people in the world who do not know about Korea yet. Also still, many people get confused with North Korea and South Korea because of the nuclear issue. However 10 years ago, by watching Samsung television and using Samsung mobile phones, people began to know about Korea. Samsung can be a hero as the first contributor of an informed Korea. Ji-Sung Park, Korea soccer star as famous as David Beckham, and Yun-A Kim, World-leading in the field of figure skating, also symbolized Korea to the whole world by getting a good result of the play such as Olympic and the World Cup. Finally, in the last year, PSY, a famous Korean singer as Gang-nam style, can tell a hero as the best contributor caused the biggest boom with Gang-nam style. Popular of Gang-nam style spreads around the world quickly. Foreigners who do not know Korean sing along with his songs, and even people are gathered from around the world in order to make flash mobs. Then, people became interested in Korea, at the same time of increasing his popularity, Korea, of course, became well known throughout the world. They did not sacrifice themselves and fight for…
Over the confronted, yet shared borderline, Korea and China have actively been engaged with each other in various fields of life ever since the dawn of the nations. Such frequent and constant interactions had undoubtedly brought about the civil similitude between them until nowadays. Amongst numerous cultural resemblances of Korea and China from the history, this paper focuses on how their unique, yet similar-to-each-other culture had developed particularly during the early 20th century. Both Korean and Chinese culture prospered in the process of fighting against the Japanese colonialism in 1920’s and 1930’s, and the notable sentiment underlying such cultural movements was nationalism. For the cultural nationalism during this period had lot contributed in advancing the modernization of both countries, I found it worthwhile to study further on this phenomenon of respective countries and then pinpoint similarities, as well as differences between them. As far as I have researched on this topic from the given text materials of “East Asian History and Civilization” class, the comparison could be narrowed down onto the criteria of political backgrounds that had initiated the cultural nationalism, features of the changes in educational, communicational, and consumer-habit culture of Korea and China.…
a. The Hallyu Wave, Korean pop, and/or kpop is a term for popular music of different genres which branched out into movies and television; it also has garnered its own pop culture among the younger generation.…
I have grown up in Korea since I was born but I have never been to Korea traditional music concert in my life. It was my very first time to try to listen Korean music. I didn’t expect that much how much it would to be interesting for me. My first thought about the Korean music was “boring” because I know its beat and rhythm are really slower then other countries music. But my whole experience at the music concert totally made my bias different. Last time I went another Korean music concert a few months ago, I just went with my classmates but at this time I told all my friends out of my school to go with me because it was fun! When I walked into to the concert I was really shock that so many people came to join and I saw many foreigner people in there. I took a sit with my friends and I got an information note for the music show. I did not have any knowledge about the Korean traditional music so I was kind of totally out of it. After my professor had an announcement shortly, the show began. I really liked the first show because one of my classmates performed there. The first performance was the very highlight and last part of the Korean classical music is called “Samulnori, Buksori” was performed at the very last. The roots of amul nori come from ‘nog-ak’ which is known as famers music. A special ensemble called Samulnori was formed in the late 70s in Korea. Embedded depply in Korean heritage, samul nori depicts traditional Korean culture, an agricultural society roote in the natural environment. Through this music, I would feel the kinda of divinity. It was performed with UCLA sutuends and professor with our traditional Korean costumes. Prof. Dong suck is now respected as a great performer, and teacher of samulnori at UCLA. Samulnori means four instruments or object and it is called the genre of traditional percussion music in Korean. Upbeat sound of Samulnori heightened the agitation of the concert. This samulnori sounded…
Although these nations are so indifferent, it cannot be denied that at one point in time Koreans, Chinese and Japanese have also constantly interacted with each other, but only to a certain degree. Each nation didn’t want their country to be inferior, so they distant themselves from others and assemble their own unique and renowned history.…
Even though Japan is no longer the colonial power in Asia, it still has a strong presence over Asia due to its cultural power within the region. Through various forms of media and popular culture, Japanese culture has spread to not only Asia but also many Western societies. There are many factors contributing to this cultural power. Although the Japanese government has various policies to support the spread of Japanese culture, many Asian countries on the receiving end are accepting of this and want more of it. On top of this, there are also economical and technological factors contributing to the spread of Japanese culture. However, this cultural power that Japan possesses does not necessarily intersect with Japan’s postcolonial ambition. If Japan’s cultural power is related to their postcolonial ambition, then with the rise of the Hallyu wave, South Korea would be doing the same. Also, Japan’s colonial ambition lied mostly in Asia however, Japanese culture has not only dominated Asia, it has also infiltrated the West.…