CEFIA News

The 157th Colloquium on Korean Studies Abroad was held at the conference room in 2F Munhyeongggwan, the Academy of Korean Studies at 2 p.m. on December 7, 2018.

In this session, Inga Kim Diederich gave a presentation titled Blood of the Nation: Medical Eugenics, Bio-Nationalism, and Identity Formation in Cold War South Korea.

Diederich has conducted research on the formation of the Korean national identity during the Cold War period. She has analyzed gender and nationalism frames observed in the development of and public participation in the blood donation campaigns conducted after the Korean War and the April 19 Revolution. Both researchers in the related fields and students participated in and contributed to the colloquium.

The Academy of Korean Studies (AKS) and India's National Council of Educational Research Training (NCERT) held a two-day workshop for cooperation on textbooks and education between Korea and India at the NCERT headquarters in New Delhi on December 10 and 11, 2018.

The workshop was arranged as a follow-up to the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed between the AKS and NCERT, and was sponsored by the Embassy of the Republic of Korea in India. It was conducted in four parallel sub-groups in the following areas: Curriculum and Textbook Development; Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Education; Vocational Education; and Special Education. Officials from Korea's specialized educational institutions that have signed cooperation agreements with the AKS, including the Korea Education and Research Information Service, the Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training, and the National Institute of Special Education, joined the AKS delegation to conduct the workshops for the four groups.

The AKS participated in the workshop on "Curriculum and Textbook Development" to review the implementation of matters discussed in 2017 and discuss the schedule for future programs. This was followed by working-level consultations regarding the joint Korea-India development of teaching materials, the translation and distribution of each party's respective materials demonstrating the national identity, and a mutual review of the content of the two countries' textbooks.

Last year's workshop led to the inclusion of a six-and-a-half-page-long description of Korea's development in India's 10th grade textbook on world history. This year's workshop was therefore conducted with the focus on exploring the possibility of continuously developing bilateral cooperation on textbooks and education. As a full-scale revision of India's textbooks is imminent, the officials held working-level consultations on the provision of content that could be included in India's textbooks to help improve the national image of Korea in India. Based on the outcomes of this year's workshop, the AKS will closely cooperate with the Korean Ministry of Education and the Embassy of the Republic of Korea to India with a view to expanding the inclusion of Korea-related content in Indian textbooks in an effort to enhance the image of Korea in India and promote mutual understanding between the two countries.

At 17:30, December 12, 2018, the 77th Societas Koreana Lecture Meeting was held in the Lilac & Tulip Rooms of The Westin Chosun Seoul.

Around sixty foreign opinion leaders residing in Korea, including diplomatic officials and researchers, attended the lecture by Professor Chan E. Park of Ohio State University on "Singing Story in Pansori: The Korean Oral Tradition for the World."

In his lecture, Professor Park, who is not only devoted to the study of Korean music and the narrative tradition but is also a Pansori singer, presented the history of Pansori and the ongoing efforts to preserve the genre and promote it to the wider world. He discussed how he had produced a Pansori piece with a dual narrative structure in two languages to help an audience composed of diverse nationalities to understand the narrative, thus transcending the language barrier. Professor Park performed his most recent work Hare Journeys to the Water Palace, his personal adaptation of Sugungga, thereby offering the attendees an opportunity to experience Pansori.

The 158th Colloquium on Korean Studies Abroad was held at the conference room in 3F Munhyeonggwan, the Academy of Korean Studies at 2 p.m. on December 27, 2018.

This session was composed of three presentations titled An Itinerary of Portals: Yemeni Refugees in Jeju by Angie Heo, Those Femis: Feminism and Community in Contemporary South Korea by Anat Schwartz, and Reading Yonhaengrok as Trans-Local Gazetteers: The Production of Geographical Knowledge and Parallel Narratives by Zhijun Ren.

Angie Heo discussed the roles of religious groups and the major incidents that arose in the controversy over the arrival of Yemeni refugees in the island of Jeju, bringing humanitarian issues to the attention of the audience. Anat Schwartz discussed his analysis of feminism in contemporary Korea with the emphasis on the characteristics and significance of the "Me Too" movement. Finally, Zhijun Ren presented his reinterpretation of Yeonhaengrok, in which he uses part of a legend about a withered tree to point out that Yeonhaengrok forms a parallel narrative with the imperial perspective of the Qing Dynasty.