• The Journal of Korean Philosophical History
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• no.52
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• pp.213-241
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• 2017

The systematic research on the Joseon history under Japanese imperialism in the 1920s, including that of the Joseon History Compilation Committee, was one of the stratagems that Japan employed to perpetuate the colonization of Joseon. The 'renovation of national traits', one of the three cultural measures taken by Japanese imperialism after the 1919 Independence Movement, was an attempt to degrade Joseon's nationality as extraneous, dependent, factional, and uncivilized. Against this, Koreans tried to create their own tradition that could prove Joseon's uniqueness and independence. The purpose of their study on ancient history, which became animated in the 1920s, was not to escape from the reality of Joseon into the idealized past, but to construct the history of Korean people anew. In this context, Dangun could refer to cultural identity as the communal origin of the nation, and this invented identity could lead to the healing of the injured subject. An Hwak's attempt was part of this efforts to call out myth as history. He suggests that Joseon's national traits are superior even to the Western civilization in several ways, and his vast plan to set up Joseon's cultural uniqueness and identity as history of universal civilization bore fruit in the History of Joseon Civilization. With cultural research for figuring out Joseon's national peculiarity and identity and historiography for revealing Joseon's national potential, he makes it possible for people to imagine various agents in the Joseon's past as belonging to a single nation with an identical history. Through his study on Joseon, he fought back the Japanese colonial view of history and tried to exalt national consciousness. Asserting independent and rational individuals as agency of civilization and culture though firm in the national perspective, he eventually went a way quite different from that of Japanese history of culture.

• (The)Study of the Eastern Classic
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• no.67
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• pp.259-295
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• 2017

The purpose of this article is to understand Ahn Hwak(1886~1946)'s perception of national history through "History of Joseon Literature" and "History of Joseon Civilization". He presented the 'cultural history' of Joseon from a modern point of view, by exploring the mental and emotional aspects of the Korean people ingrained in the literary works from the various historical periods. He also reconstructed the national history from Gojoseon era to Joseon dynasty as a continuous 'political history'. For him, a nation was not merely a cultural community, but also a political community. His thought was that while 'culture' and 'politics' are dualistic, they should also be viewed as the two sides of the same coin. In "History of Joseon Literature", Ahn emphasized the mental 'Awakening(自覺)' of the nation. 'Awakening' is a process of universal progress in which the mind pursues freedom by freeing itself from the material bondage. In "History of Joseon Civilization", he finds history of 'Autonomy(自治)' as the characteristics of Joseon's 'history of politics'. He believes that Joseon was able evolve into 'self-aware and voluntary civilization' because of the tradition of 'Autonomy', a political system of reflecting and gathering of the will of the people. Through his two books, Ahn Hwak underlines the idea that the national history of Joseon was a history of 'Awakening', from a cultural perspective, and a history of 'Autonomy', from a political point of view. To him, 'Awakening' was a concept focused on the universality of the mind, while 'Autonomy' was a concept that emphasized the uniqueness of a nation. In sum, Ahn Hwak, through his works, tried to combine cultural universality and political identity.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Costume
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• v.64 no.6
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• pp.176-191
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• 2014

This article focuses on the late 19th to early 20th century gat, the Korean top hat for men, to understand the diverse meanings behind the hat. During the late 19th to early 20th century, the Joseon Dynasty (1392~1910) was plunged into confusion and turmoil as it was nearing its end. It was a period of drastic changes in regards to philosophy and ideology. To that end, the hats of society mirrored such changing times, as well as the differences in the awareness of Joseon's internal subject entities and external observers. Based on the analyses of the relevant documents, this study takes a multi-faceted approach to the process in which traditional Korean hats, which were once a symbol of the Joseon civilization, became reduced to an outdated object, as well as observing the awareness and attitudes of the entities involved in such a pivotal process.

• The Journal of Korean Philosophical History
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• no.50
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• pp.171-200
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• 2016

The full-scaled study of Joseon conducted by Japan in the 1910s was part of its colonial policy, while the native Joseon studies against it contained political aspiration to recover the national rights and independence. Accordingly, the conceptual meaning of 'Joseon' varied according to its subject of speech. The establishment of modern nation-state failed along with the extinction of Korean Empire, but 'Joseon' was newly discovered within national ideology. It became a historical concept in which the experience of the past and the expectation toward the future could be united. The so-called 'Joseon Studies' was only limited to intellectuals in the academic circle, but 'Joseon' embraced the articulations from more various social agents. Furthermore, it is only natural that 'Joseon Studies' should be interpreted within the historical semantics of 'Joseon', considering the connection between concept and discourse. In his The History of Joseon Civilization, An Hwak encompassed the history from the times of ancient mythology to the contemporary times under the banner of 'Joseon'. Opposing Japanese distortion of history carried out in the name of historical positivism, he idealized Joseon history as comparable to that of the Western democracy. He extended the study of 'Joseon' into culture at large, foreshadowing a kind of Joseon philosophy. In his An Overview of Joseon Philosophical Ideas, the first description of 'Joseon philosophy' as an independent field, he proposed philosophy as one of three sources of pride in Joseon and asserted its uniqueness and originality compared to the West. It was an attempt to grasp the peculiarity of Joseon ideas from a perspective of the history of universal human civilization. He considered 'Jong'(倧) as an ideological foundation held from the ancient to the modern times, and the acceptance of Buddhism and Confucianism as beneficial to 'Joseon philosophy'. The birth of 'Joseon philosophy', the modern transformation of the traditional knowledge system, was an intellectual experiment to apply traditional knowledge to the modern disciplinary classification system.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.169-181
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• 2018

We here discuss about the roles and meaning of Joseon mathematics in the history of Asian mathematics from cultural perspective. To do so, we focus on culture. We first look at the meanings and the definitions of the terms, civilization and culture, and their differences. We next discuss on the cultural perspective to look at the mathematical history of Korea, which is considered as a part of the history of Asian mathematics. It is notable that Joseon mathematics of Korea made Asian mathematics develop further, and played the roles of academic bridges among China, Korea and Japan. It also kept and prolonged the life of the Asian mathematics up to the beginning of the 20th century.

• Journal of the Daesoon Academy of Sciences
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• v.32
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• pp.109-136
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to look at the concept of Gaebyeok as used by Kang Jeungsan (姜甑山) from a civilizational perspective. The combination of East Asian civilization during the period of Korea's port-opening and the subsequent inflow of Western powers with material civilization all at the forefront in the late Joseon Korea, served as the driving force for a new civilizational transition. Unlike the Chuk-sa Party and the Gae-hwa Party, modern Korean religions that emphasized Gaebyeok also responded to Western civilization and suggested a new view of civilization. Kang Jeung-san, resisting discrimination and oppression, presented a civilization built upon mutual beneficence while criticizing Western civilizations which centered on reason. Amid this process of the spread of modern Western civilization, Jeungsan declared the construction of a new civilization to the people who were negatively impacted by various social factions, such as class and gender discrimination, political corruption, exploitation via political corruption, and the inflow of Western powers. Jeungsanist Thought developed criticisms of materialism and human alienation, and this resulted in the claim of Gaebyeok. This was an expression of efforts to build a new civilization that aimed to harmonize, integrate, and thrive. The new civilization envisioned by Jeungsan was that of a society run according to mutual beneficence, and it can be summarized as a 'Civilization of Harmonious Union' that integrates philosophical thought and civilizational models of both East and West. This could also be referred to a 'Civilization of Public-commons and Harmony between Divine Beings and Human Beings (神人公共).' The life of Jeungsan was a life spent in the service of curing the world to save the lives of humanity. Since then, his 'movement of mutual beneficence' as observed in Mugeuk-do and Taegeuk-do were also efforts to build the new civilization envisioned by Jeungsan.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.33 no.5
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• pp.732-740
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• 2009

The purpose of this study is to discuss Joseon dynastyis first perspective on the Western-style Court Costume which was newly introduced to Joseon through the problems receiving the credential that Japan had sent in new style. For this study, the records of Joseon and Japan at that period have been analyzed. The followings are the results of this research; First, a critical argument on the Western-style Court Costume occurred just before the Port Opening because whether wearing a western costume was the key factor in Joseon dynastyis receiving the credential that Japan had send in new style. Second, Japan received western costume as its domestic courtesy system by establishing the Court Costume of Civil servants in 1872 and consequently Japan established new ceremony procedure of western-style bow in 1875. Third, Joseon dynasty officially opposed to the Western-style Court Costume when Japan sent the credential, because the western costume selected by Japan had beenregarded as that of western barbarian at that time in Joseon. Accordingly, it seems reasonable that before the introduction of western costume into Joseon dynasty, an open-door policy for the West had been a prior settlement for Joseon dynasty regardless of the details of Western-style Court Costume. And also, the pride of civilization of Joseon dynasty, which has been used to express Joseon dynastyis identity as Joseon-centrism, had to be converted before the open-door policy. Ultimately, it could be inferred that the reception of the Western-style Court Costume had been raised as the political and diplomatic problems in the circumstances when the submissive relationship in the traditional Eastern- Asia had been forced to be converted to modern sovereign international relationship.

• Animal Bioscience
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• v.35 no.8
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• pp.1141-1150
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• 2022

Objective: To understand the domestication and spread of horses in history, genetic information is essential. However, mitogenetic traits of ancient or medieval horses have yet to be comprehensively revealed, especially for East Asia. This study thus set out to reveal the maternal lineage of skeletal horse remains retrieved from a 15th century archaeological site (Gongpyeongdong) at Old Seoul City in South Korea. Methods: We extracted DNA from the femur of Equus caballus (SNU-A001) from Joseon period Gongpyeongdong site. Mitochondrial (mt) DNA (HRS 15128-16116) of E. caballus was amplified by polymerase chain reaction. Cloning and sequencing were conducted for the mtDNA amplicons. The sequencing results were analyzed by NCBI/BLAST and phylogenetic tool of MEGA7 software. Results: By means of mtDNA cytochrome b and D-loop analysis, we found that the 15th century Korean horse belonged to haplogroup Q representing those horses that have historically been raised widely in East Asia. Conclusion: The horse is unique among domesticated animals for the remarkable impact it has on human civilization in terms of transportation and trade. Utilizing the Joseon-period horse remains, we can obtain clues to reveal the genetic traits of Korean horse that existed before the introduction of Western horses.

• Korean Journal of Oriental Medicine
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.65-73
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• 2010

This study is to discuss the content of Posangkimun on the whole and to report the understanding of Seokgok Lee Gyujoon on western civilization. Through the overall analysis of Posangkimun, it is found the following facts: 1. Posangkimun aroused interest of academic circles as it covered theories of western civilization. Most of the introduction to western civilization contained in the book is related to astronomy and geography. Seokgok criticized all the western theories on revolution of the earth, astronomy, continents and oceans on the ground that these theories were not congruous with the teaching of the Oriental sages. 2. Seokgok found the reasons why the West had led the East from 'nationalism' of the West. The nationalism mentioned here were more similar to 'democracy' in modern sense, or rather 'democratism'. What is specially noteworthy is that he did not find the reasons of western advancement from the spiritual issues not from the machine civilization. In this way, Seokgok could avoid the fallacy of throwing away traditional ideas to concentrate in western machine civilization. 3. The content of Posangkimun shows that Seokgok was a person with a very conservative view. Notwithstanding his inclination, he had good knowledge about western theories, most of which were gathered from newspapers and magazines at that time. It means that newspapers and magazines should be treated with more importance when studying Korean intellectuals in late Joseon period or during the time of Japanese forced occupation.

• Journal of Korean Medical classics
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.107-118
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• 2011

Classified Emergency Materia Medica is a pharmacopoeia published by the government of the Song(宋) dynasty. After publishment, it had a decisive effect on East-Asian herbology of China, Korean & Japan. Sakae Miki(三木榮), Tameto Okanisi(岡西爲人) wrote papers on the subjects of type, publishing process, bibliographic terms of Classified Emergency Materia Medica published in the early and middle years of Joseon Dynasty. Moreover, Sakae Miki claimed that Classified Emergency Materia Medica from China had been a standard of herbology of Joseon Dynasty since its publishment, and herbology based on materia medica from countryside(鄕藥) also had occupied a part of herbology in Joseon Dynasty. Nevertheless the specific influences, from Classified Emergency Materia Medica to the medical books of Joseon Dynasty which established the herbology based on materia medica from countryside has never been handled so far. So I would like to investigate the influence of Classified Emergency Materia Medica to Joseon Dynasty, through a comparison with literature review. The main literatures for comparison are two representative medical books of Joseon Dynasty, Compendium of Prescriptions from the Countryside(1433) & Treasured Mirror of Eastern Medicine(1613), especially focusing on the pharmacognostic parts. The main comparing points on researching literatures will be the following: publication year of books; order of herbs; and quotations. This paper will show which edition of Classified Emergency Materia Medica was utilized to publish two medical books of Joseon Dynasty, and the process how Korean herbology based on materia medica from countryside was transformed after accepting Chinese herbology.