At its simplest, this essay provides a narrative of migration in Asia since the arrival of Homo sapiens some 70,000 years ago. More fully, it presents the case for conducting long-term, world-historical interpretation for Asia with attention to multiple perspectives, which has become increasingly central to global historical analysis. Following an introductory articulation of the benefits of long-term interpretation, the second section presents a balance of three perspectives-empire, exchange, and migration-as frameworks for interpreting the Asian past. The third section presents further detail on migration in long-term Asian history. The concluding section identifies four changes in patterns of migration during the past two centuries and emphasizes the underlying importance of cross-community migration in long-term human biological and social evolution.

World history today has been greatly influenced by the fact that it was the revolution in naval power during the past two centuries that made the world truly global. This has led to a new master narrative that re-framed five millennia of recorded history in order to explain the ultimate triumph of the maritime economies. The result of such revision is to underestimate and distort the role of continental Eurasia in the shaping of the three key civilizations that developed independently and remain distinct: the Mediterranean, the Indic and the Sinic. Only by a fuller reappraisal of the linkages of trade and war dominated by the Eurasian central forces for most of history can we understand the global pressures perennially at work. By setting the continental and the maritime in their total historical context and recognizing their importance today, we can better explain what is happening and what is likely to continue to influence the course of world history.

The author stresses delicate but important differences of meaning between "global history" in English and its Japanized form "gurobaru hisutori." After explaining the specific path of Japanese historiography on world history from the end of the nineteenth century to the present, he points out important features of contemporary Japanese view on world history and discusses its merits and demerits. Finally, he underlines the potential of various contributions by Japanese historians who have a particular background and joined the discussion on global history in the world through a different path.

It has been about twenty years since world history in a new sense was introduced to Korean academia. At first, it was the educators who showed a lot of interest in world history. But, before long, world/global history came to exert an important influence on history research and teaching in Korea. Even though certain unfavorable conditions still exist, the need for world/global history is growing and a number of academic institutes and scholars are putting in a great deal of effort to advance it in Korea. Here, we examine the changing meanings of world history on the basis of the history of concepts and provide a general idea of its introduction and diffusion in historiography and history education in Korea.