But why do I think these guys are the last people I’d want to see teaching about it?
The Korea Academy for Educators is a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization based in Los Angeles, dedicated to informing American educators about Korean history and culture and the general Korean-American experience in order to promote cross-cultural understanding.
“Our Executive Director Susanna Park’s daughter was assigned to read ‘So Far From the Bamboo Grove (The Yoko Story).’ She had been educated by her parents about this period of history and found the experience of reading the Yoko story so painful that she not only refused to read the book but also refused to return to school,” began Connor.
Oh dear.
“Many Koreans appear to be preoccupied with accuracy. I understand that Koreans want Americans to know that Dokdo belongs to Korea and that the Sea of Japan should be called the East Sea. Accuracy is important, but Americans need to know about Korean history and culture first. For instance, Koreans should work to educate Americans about the Japanese colonial period, the role of the U.S. in Korean history and the fact that we divided a country that had been unified for centuries,” said Connor.
Oh dear.
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“and the fact that we divided a country that had been unified for centuries”
Lol, what a joke.
You’ve been busy, Marmot.
“Many Koreans appear to be preoccupied with accuracy.”
So I guess they avoid reading their newspapers or watching their TV news broadcasts?
Mizar beat me to my comment.
My pleasure, cmm.
The funny thing is… given the domestic lack of knowledge in Asian history in the U.S., I think these guys will get a lot of what they are asking for…
….the role of the U.S. in Korean history and the fact that we divided a country that had been unified for centuries.
And we might start with the findings of writer James Bradley, author of a recent new book “Imperial Cruise”, regarding Teddy Roosevelt.
I heard this very segment on Imus’s radio show only a couple of days ago.
Teddy Roosevelt’s Unknown Asian Agenda
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....r_embedded
You listen to Imus?
Yes, in the mornings on my way to work. Why?
You have a job?!
No reason. Used to listen to Howard Stern myself.
Rob,
I’m totally not surprised.
People who have some anger towards women love Imus.
Interpret what you will from that.
I listen to John & Ken now (via podcast).
What does that say about me?
You right wing nut!
You have deep seated father abandonment issues!..
I’m all in favor of blaming America when the shoe fits, but I do not follow the logic here. I know Roosevelt gave his consent to Japan’s expansion into Korea. But this was a 1905 America, not a 2005 America (or a 1945 America). If Roosevelt had staunchly refused, do Korean people believe that Japan simply would have backed down? Or is it Korea’s belief that the US military should have mobilized in 1905-7 to protect Korea?
When I read things like this, I ask myself how bad it really would have been for U.S. interests if we’d have just let Stalin have Korea.
Of course, no matter what we’d have done in ‘45 or ‘50, some group of Koreans would bitch about it.
As a matter of fact, Koreans do fault the US for pulling its troops out in 1949. Blamed if we stay, blamed if we don’t.
Of course it could backfire on ‘em when folks start questioning the exaggerations and distortions. Who knows, a conclusion could be reached that they were collaborators.
Stern show has been outstanding since the move to Sirius. (NSFW) Go to last page for most recent shows – they’re off this week for Thanksgiving. F Jackie.
Korean educational missionaries on a tare. I find the lack of critical thought going on about their “tares” disturbing. Buy Yuan. Now.
oh dear. Too bad the OP neglects to choose a clear POV. Must be rough being a foreign Korean apologist when attempting to reconcile all the incongruities in this article.
ex: Dokdo is Korean. East Sea is ridiculous.
@11 good comment wk, thanks.
At a November Korea Day Conference at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee, Gari Ledyard, King Sejong Professor Emeritus of Korean Studies at Columbia University, supposedly shocked a Korean attendee at the conference when he said that Kim Jeong-ho, the famous 19th century Korean mapmaker who made the equally famous “Daedong Yeojido” (1861) map, had no concept of Dokdo (Liancourt Rocks). When the shocked Korean, who had been upset that Professor Ledyard had not mentioned Dokdo in his presentation of Kim’s 1861 map, then pulled out a copy of Kim Jeong-ho’s 1834 “Jeonggu-do” map and pointed to Ulleungdo’s neighboring island of “Usando” (于山島) to prove that Kim had known of Dokdo, Professor Ledyard looked at the map and supposedly said that the island beside Ulleungdo was “Usando,” not Dokdo. Then Professor Ledyard supposedly walked away, leaving the Korean Dokdo advocate standing there in shock.
Frankly, I was disgusted by my American teachers who totally failed to teach me about Korea and it’s important position in the world. Not only that, but they also neglected to teach units on Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Angola, Antigua, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan…. See where I’m going with this?
Frankly, I was disgusted by my American teachers who totally failed to teach me about Korea and it’s important position in the world. Not only that, but they also neglected to teach units on Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Angola, Antigua, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan…. See where I’m going with this?
Well, if you live in an Empire, the history book of the Empire is bound to be rather thick. It stands to reason, however, that the parts of the world that the American Empire has affected greatly (like as in millions of people dying in a war) should at least get more than a footnote treatment. Unlike, say, Andorra.
Agreed, NK. Andorra’s historical drama gets sufficient attention from Max Frisch and thus needs no additional scrutiny from the US, especially given the American way of learning about foreign countries. I believe that it was Ambrose Bierce who quipped that “War is God’s way of teaching Americans geography,” so all of you out there grousing that Americans are still too ignorant of the world, take care in what you wish for . . . you might just get it.
Jeffery Hodges
* * *
Mr. Hodges: I bow in your general direction.
“However, most do not know that it was the United States that divided Korea.” Great message to be teaching the kiddies.
At present, I am campaigning for a program which educates the abovementioned
educators about Korea and its history. Part of my proposal would require all Korean educators of Korean history to attend a 30-hour re-re-education
seminar to help instill a more “true” Korean history in their minds.
I have great hopes for this program.
(Where was it that the term “brainwashing” found its etymological origins?)
It’s not like the U.S. made the decision to divide Korea by itself. A detailed look at the decision, and both the Soviet and US roles in it, is here:
http://www.carlisle.army.mil/u...../boose.htm
Didn’t realize Bradley’s book was out.
I’m in agreement with 14, but at the same time Roosevelt did write in a letter before he was even elected as vice president that, in the wake of the Boxer Rebellion, ‘Japan should have Korea.’ Still, I think the Anglo-Japanese treaty of 1902 played more of a part in sealing Korea’s fate than any agreements with the US.
“At present, I am campaigning for a program which educates the abovementioned educators about Korea and its history.”
I’ve yet to meet a Korean who can tell me why or even when the U.S. army entered Korea*. Instead they say silly things such as, “The U.S. wanted to control Korea.” Shame on Korean educators.
* For the kyopo in the audience, the correct answer is “To disarm the Japanese army in the south after V-J Day in 1945 while the Russians disarmed the Japanese in the north.” If you want to blame foreigners, start with the Russians and continue with the Chinese, who sacrificed hundreds of thousands of Chinese lives to save the DPRK in 1950-53.
By the way, we’ve all heard about the French Resistance; and of course the Chinese Communists won the hearts and minds of their own people by fighting the Japanese while Chiang Kai-Shek sat out the war. What about the Koreans? To hear Koreans tell it, the Japanese occupation of Korea was the cruelest event in human history (while any mention of what the Japanese did elsewhere in Asia draws blank stares); but what did the Koreans do about it? Did they resist the Japanese at all?
They mimicked the cruelty the Japanese inflicted upon them and enhanced the brutality against their own people, at least in the north.
And still managed to blame someone else.
Koreans don’t care about “history” in terms of any sense of “accuracy” but rather in terms of an obvious political agenda. In that sense, those in the South are no different than the North. Doesn’t matter if an assertion is true, but how it affects national pride and standing.
I teach American history, and after a vicious attack job by the Kyunghyang Shinmun was over, my class had become the reason foreigners cannot teach a non-conversation related subject during school hours in a public school. Because page 945 of our American history textbook had a diagram of movements during the Korean War that referred to the “Sea of Japan.” The reporter implied I was teaching pro-Japanese, anti-Korean propaganda. Also, the fact that one hour of my American history class overlapped with their “Morals” class got them up in arms about “Korean moral values” being taught by a dirty American.
That’s the reason the Ministry banned foreigners from teaching non-conversation subjects in public schools.
http://news.naver.com/main/rea.....0000167484
Sorry about that, guys. I should have based my choice of American history textbook on whether it said “East Sea” and referred to Tokdo. Based on those two criteria, my teaching of American history would have been “accurate” and acceptable, I guess.
Koreans don’t care about “history” in terms of any sense of “accuracy” but rather in terms of an obvious political agenda. In that sense, those in the South are no different than the North. Doesn’t matter if an assertion is true, but how it affects national pride and standing.
That’s rich since American history itself is full of glaring distortions. Consider the “Boston Massacre” of 1770. Standard wisdom surrounding the events that led to the American Revolutionary War is based largely upon the works of master propagandists such as Paul Revere. When I think of “massacre”, I think of hundreds of people being slaughtered indiscriminately in cold blood. In reality, only five people were killed in this so-called “massacre”. Standard wisdom would also have one believe that this was due to some undue aggression on the part of the British soldiers stationed at the Old State House when in fact they were outnumbered, threatened, and incited by a violent mob.
If American textbooks are not objective and neutral about its own history why would any sane person think it would also be objective and neutral about Korean history?
Concerning the space where American history intersects with Korean history, does any American history book make mention of Teddy Roosevelt’s diplomatic mission to Asia and the subsequent Taft-Katsura agreement in the context of the Great Game that was being played out at the time?
This is never mentioned in American history texts, is it? Which is odd considering the consequences led to the colonization of Korea by Japan and WW2 in the Pacific.
Sorry about that, guys. I should have based my choice of American history textbook on whether it said “East Sea” and referred to Tokdo. Based on those two criteria, my teaching of American history would have been “accurate” and acceptable, I guess.
Considering the fact that Chinese, Japanese, and Korean cartography existed for hundreds of years before the White man arrived and had their own nomenclature before the White man decided to call that body of water “The Sea of Japan”, which is being more accurate, to call it the “East Sea” or the “Sea of Japan”?
The standard American history text is a catalog of lies:
http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle200.....22-01.html
That’s the reason the Ministry banned foreigners from teaching non-conversation subjects in public schools.
I endorse this decision.
“That’s rich since American history itself is full of glaring distortions. Consider the “Boston Massacre” of 1770.”
Uh, the “version” I was taught is that “only” five were killed, including a free black man, Crispus Attucks. That’s about the same body count, iirc, as the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in Chicago’s gang wars. Plus I think a couple more persons were wounded in Boston. Granted, our definition of “massacre” has since been changed by the horrors of the 20th century.
Yet the most important thing I was taught about the Boston Massacre is that the British commander was subsequently tried – and acquitted – in a Boston court by a Boston jury. Thus setting the standard for the fairness that has guided American jurisprudence ever since. Did you know that?
I wonder if a Korean court would have acquitted the two American GIs who accidentally ran over the two middle school girls in 2002. As for the East Sea, forget it; that tells an English speaker nothing about where in the world we’re talking about. You’d have much better luck with Sea of Korea, like the Arabs who claim the Persian Gulf s/b the Gulf of Arabia.
When Korean high school students are taught to place the Korean War in its proper decade at the very least, then you can lecture us about the importance of accuracy in Korean history education. Until then, I ask this question: did the Koreans do ANYTHING to resist the Japanese?
This is pretty ironic coming from a PhD candidate in “Ethnic Studies” which basically consists of
brainwashingtraining in ideological Leftism and has about the same relation to reality as astrology does.No doubt history is politicized in Korea, but it is plenty politicized in the US, especially when it comes to the teaching of it in the educational system.
The Koreans are just less sophisticated and less slick about it.
Yet the most important thing I was taught about the Boston Massacre is that the British commander was subsequently tried – and acquitted – in a Boston court by a Boston jury. Thus setting the standard for the fairness that has guided American jurisprudence ever since. Did you know that?
Shhhh. Do you hear something? I think I hear the sounds of hysterical laughter coming from African-Americans.
That’s beside the point. As deplorable as distortions of the historical record in all nations are, it’s disappointing that, as NK’s comment once again exemplifies, for Koreans, otherwise so insistent on demanding that other people reflect on their own shortcomings, typically the response is NOT to engage in such reflection but to aggressively focus on everyone else’s shortcomings, and the general phenomenon to the detriment of even recognizing let alone acknowledging the important, and really not so subtle or minimal differences, between places where such distortions are at least aired, and the professors are not punished for doing so, and Korea where making the mistake that there is a free market in ideas gets you fired.
I suspect that there is no mention on Korea in standard American school history texts except possibly in connection with the Korean War – which is not surprising given that in the larger scheme of US history Korea really was insignificant until then and still isn’t terribly important. That may offend KOREAN PRIDE™; too bad, that’s the way it is.
As for the Taft-Katsura Agreement, first of all take note that what was going on in East Asia at the time was only tangentially related to ‘The Great Game” and that the US wasn’t really involved in that contest, which properly refers to the rivalry between Britain and Russia over their respective spheres of influence in south Asia and their efforts to expand their own interests at the the expense of the other. The Agreement itself, moreover, has been the subject of extensive scholarly research and writing, all of which (outside of Korea) finds the agreement to have had minimal consequences, if only because even assuming that US policy-makers were clairvoyant enough to discern the future trajectory of Japanese history, the US wasn’t in a position to do anything about it – the US armed forced were pathetically small at the time and the Army was completely committed to and yet could barely contain the Philippine rebellion, and the US had NO national interests at the time, let alone compelling ones, that would be served by attempting to interfere with Japanese designs on Korea.
I listened to Bradley this morning on ‘Morning Joe” He seems to blame TR for all the ills that beset Asia, including Vietnam.
Does a “secret” treaty have any legal standing?
Americans are pretty damn stupid, no ignorant, of their own history..Real or Imagined.
I was watching a debate by African American scholars on CSPAN on Abe Lincoln. Time and again there was criticism of him and his racism. When one brave soul mentioned that we should consider the “context” of his time and place, that ALSO drew ridicule. After all he SHOULD have 2009 values!!!!!
So it was with TR. He was a product of his time and place.
New things are learned all the time.
Its all depends on your source of info and ones POV.
There was a renowned archeologist back in early 1900’s who was enamored of the Aztec.
He found a cave in which he found Aztec glyphs that he said showed the glory and majesty of Aztec culture.
What he DIDN’T say was there also was evidence of Aztec human sacrifice.
Frog in the well.
NetizenKim — You totally miss the point. I’m saying that there are LOTS of debates in history, including that American history. There is no single, “true” history that can’t be challenged by new evidence, new interpretations. The book I use, written for the college textbook market and so bound up in the commercial interests that drive the public school textbook markets (largely decided by Texas and California), also written by Gary Nash, one of the most active textbook critic/historians alive, is far from the polemic, 1950’s-esque, “distorted” history that you’re pointing to. In fact, what makes the book so good is the fact that it DOES point out controversy and debate over different moments in history. And yes, present-day American historians now point out the actual factual distortions of the Boston radicals in their representation of the “Massacre”, including the language used, as well as Thomas Paine’s famous (and wildly inaccurate) depiction of what happened. What you’re talking about isn’t news to a responsible historian and experienced US History teacher, NK. We talked about that very issue last week, and how British and American representations of the Revolutionary period differ, from simple nomenclature such as the “Coercive” vs. “Intolerable Acts” to the mob mentality of the “popular committees” that tarred and feathered everyone from royal officials to the postman. Good history is that which teaches how historiography is part of the story — and the fact that a map showing troop movements referred to the “Sea of Japan” isn’t a sign of imperial history, but rather that a book in its 8th edition that hadn’t changed the diagram since the 1st (written in the 1980’s), and which itself probably simply copied a simple map from an encyclopedia referring to the same said “Sea of Japan”, can accidentally step right into the middle of a political debate going on thousands of miles away. Actually, the incident made for a great discussion, as we talked about where that reference probably came from, and even called Longman Korea about it to 1) let them know it was an issue, and 2) ask about the background of it. If anything, the book’s discussion of early contact with Korea, the reason the US abandoned its previous statement of friendship with Korea out of fear of coming into conflict with the growing Japanese empire past the Phillipines, and the reasons Japan would eventually take the Pacific War to the US — students are presented with historical arguments and options, not dogma. All American history textbooks aren’t written the same, NK.
MKAPLAN — So, any specifics to back up your claim that the Ethnic Studies curriculum is “brainwashing”? Do you know anything about the content of the classes? The methodological approaches/training? The fact that my 3 years of classwork includes being in a traditional “affiliated discipline”, which means in my case that I had to also take the same graduate courses as a History grad student, or another person in Sociology, or Anthropology? Or the fact that half of many humanities/social sciences graduate courses have to do with “mechanics” such as methodology, historiography, and basic theory?
You might not like the somewhat liberal slant of some of the undergraduate ES courses in some places, and I myself don’t like the touchy-feely approach of some of my more lefty colleagues, or but those are debates we have within our field as well. But you apparently know jack SHIT about the ES grad curriculum, since we spend as much time on the mechanics and theory made by dead white men as we do actually taking the basic courses offered in the more “traditional” departments. Which leaves little time to keep reminding each other that Columbus didn’t discover America, have encounter sessions over our conflicted identities, or other kinds of the “brainwashing” you’re imagining.
I spent too much time reading everything from Hegel to Fukuyama, Freud to Jung, Lacan to Foucault, Beard to Benjamin. So spare me the “left-wing brainwashing” crap. I’d like to hear more about YOUR academic training, since you’re so interested in mine.
Whatever Metro has been smoking, I’ll have some too. An eloquent rebuttal that says as much about the man who received the education as the institution where he studied. Berkeley will probably never shake its liberal image, but Metro’s record speaks for itself.
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