Session 8 - 11/4, Jennifer Jung-Kim

[Angela Chong]

What seems more important to him than anything, aside from his personal survival, is his watch. He talks about it multiple times, and when asked if he would like any other favor when being released back to his daily life by the Soviets, he asks about the watch!? He never knew what happened ot his son, and didn't ask about that? No mention of ensuring his younger wife and their children are ok, just the watch. He is definitely a chameleon and it is more about his survival than ensuring any of his family are ok. It makes me wonder, since this was part of such a popular book, if the appeal to Koreans is that he only takes care of himself? Also, that he in the end keeps going, he survives and in embarquing on the next chapter. Or maybe he's a kind of everyman character? Koreans will keep going, even if individuals do not surive, they as a people do? His focus on the physical characteristics of the other races were also likely part of the appeal. Things they couldn't necessarily say outloud, but were thinking over the years. 

[Haena Shin]

I thought Cranes was a beautifully written piece in the way it showed the reader the perspective of two different boys with very different futures. Although they come from the same background and beginnings, it was interesting to see how their fate would realign as foes and how their lives respectively turned out. 

Your point of view of the two Korea's veering into different paths were very interesting and paints a visual comparison in relation to the boths. I enjoyed how your take of this analogy was at the very least, a way of understanding each other and being able to be open to learning about each other's perspectives.

[Haena Shin]

I also loved how she tied in Korean snacks and goodies as an incentive to increase participation. Choco pies always remind me of the story where South Korea would fill large balloons attached to bags with Choco Pie and drift them over to North Korea. It's definitely mind boggling to know how much change and shift occured in South Korea through many leaders, oppositions, and various constitutions. In some ways, I think that the frequent changes somewhat molded South Korea to be more open to various economic and industrial ideas as you mentioned. In comparision, North Korea's close-minded and anti-US way of thinking limited their economy to flourish and grow as a country.

[Cynthia Stults]

Angela, when I read this (several weeks later), it hit me that Dr. Yi had a very similar mindset to that of the Japanese government in regards to its relationship with U.S. presidents. Both do not care who is in power, they adapt and work with them. This ensures survival. The majority of us as humans want to survive and adapt to get along. This is where it truly takes incredible incidents and people to create revolution. What does it take for people and/or governments to decide that they cannot adapt and "work with" whomever is in power? We can see some residents of Hong Kong have hit that point in their protests. It's almost frightening wondering how their revolt will end.

[Matthew Hurwitz]

Two things stood out to me during the lecture. The first was that the lecture, as previous lectures have, made me reevaluate how I teach Korea in my own class. Professor Jung-Kim mentioned that although we learn about the Korean War as part of the Cold War, it wasn't cold for the people who lived there. It seems like such an obvious point, but one which made me think about how we teach certain events through very narrow lenses, and how the titles that we give to things has weight. It made me think about how I can teach the Cold War from other perspectives, and also made me curious what the conflict was called in different parts of the world.

The second thing that stood out to me was what a rough road towards democracy South Korea has had. Partly because of the way learned Korean history, partly because it's always compared to North Korea, and party because of my own assumptions, I always thought of South Korea as this shining success story for democracy in Asia. Learning about the coups, dictators, assassinations, and scandals that have rocked the country over the last 50 years, and the fact that they've only had a fully democratic system for 30 years was surprising to me. It made me think about the ways in which our perceptions of "allied" countries are different than our perception of others, and how teachers can address or fight this societal bias we have in the way we teach about those nations.

[Matthew Hurwitz]

I was also thinking about what high level thinking questions based on this topic that students could think about/debate. I like the idea of asking who was to "blame" for the Korean War. I was thinking asking students to incorporate current event stories/events into this topic and asking something along the lines of: "Who is responsble for the continued division of North and South Korea?", or "Who should be responsible for trying to reconcile the two countries?". Or even something like: "Can South Korea be called a "success story?" I'm still braninstorming, but I'm excited to try and implement a deeper, more thorough look at the Korean conflict the next time we get to the Korean War in World History. 

[Matthew Hurwitz]

I was also interested in the photos that clearly show that children of party elites are better fed than ordinary children. What's fascinating is that this happens so openly in a society that is technically classless. I'm curious how people in North Korea reconcile the official Socialist positions and values when it comes to class, and the unofficial and yet very obvious hierarchies that exist in society. Do they just put up with it out of fear of reprisal? Are most citizens convinced by state propaganda that the hierarchy is normal? That disconnect would seem to be something that would cause problems for the government in the long term, and yet so far the government there has been very successful at staying in power. 

[Matthew Hurwitz]

I like how you touch on the way in which current events can change the way see past history. The idea that after even just a few years, things can happen that change our evaluation of things that came before. It struck me that just as the Korean War is in limbo, over and yet not technically over, so too is our understanding of the war, and the two countries in limbo. When we teach the Korean War, we often look at it as if the war ended in 1953 (even though we know it didn't). Looked at through that context, the war seems like an American success, a blow to the spread of Communism that also gave rise, with U.S. support, to a modern democratic South Korea that is a rich and powerful economic force in the region. At the same time, the war didn't end, and so the end of the story remains to be seen. As humans, I think our instinct is always to try and find narratives in history, and part of having a narrative is having a beginning, middle, and end. Putting TBD next to the modern history of Korea would feel incomplete, and yet is the only alternative to ignore key facts about it in our search for a clear arc? It made me think about whether it's possible to present all perspectives and show all angles of a particular conflict, and yet also retain the narrative aspect of history that allows us to stitch together an overall understanding of a topic.

[Lizette Bernal]

Hi Matthew,

The photos of the better-fed children were in fact alarming. I wasn't aware that malnourishment led to discoloration of hair. Though I was quick to blame the society for their lack of attention to the needs of the young, it reminds me of the high cost of healthy food in American. It definitely speaks on class and how there is a division between rich and poor, or upper and lower classes. In both situations however, malnourishment can be prevented but at what cost? Does it mean sacrificing power?

[Sara Newman]

Last night I was at LACMA for one of their Evenings for Educators nights and they had an amazing new exhibit by Korean artist Do Ho Suh. LACMA describes the exhibit as "a 1:1 scale model replica of the artist’s former apartment in a historical 19th-century building in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood. Do Ho Suh’s works elicit a physical manifestation of memory, exploring ideas of personal history, cultural tradition, and belief systems in the contemporary world. Best known for his full-size, fabric reconstructions of his former residences in Seoul, Providence, Berlin, London, and New York, Suh’s creations of physicalized memory address issues of home, displacement, individuality, and collectivity, articulated through the architecture of domestic space.": https://www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/do-ho-suh-348-west-22nd-street 

Essentially, the artist spend four years handsewing a fabric reproduction of the apartment he lived in while in New York City. Part of the beauty of the piece is the vibrant, sheer fabric he works in and the almost fantastical quality the colors create. Even more enthralling, however, is the incredible detail of the building. Not only does he create walls and doorways, but he handstitches the letters on a note from the utility compnay and separately sews each individual piece of the air conditioning unit. I can't recommend visiting enough!

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[Dennis O'Connell]

There were several surprises for me during this session.  Firstly, I have always viewed North Korea as an authoritarian regime, but it did not occur to me that the South Korean story is quite authoritarian in terms of political power as well.  There have been moves toward democracy, but South Korea does not have as deep a democratic foundation as I once thought.  The political intrigue of the South, with past presidents being put on trial and such, is much deeper than I ever suspected!  Secondly, both Koreas were devastated by the war on the peninsula.  The economy in the North actually developed more quickly and recovered faster, before the economy in the South eventually caught up and far surpassed that of the North.  Thirdly, I was intrigued by the growth of the migrant workforce in South Korea.  It seems to be following the model similar to many other fast growing economies where migrant workers are used for the Three Ds - jobs that are Dirty, Dangerous, and Demeaning.  I will be curious to see what issues arise between these foreign workers and the more homogeneous population. 

As I joked in class, I like to show my third grade students movie footage of hundreds of school aged North Koreans performing difficult routines in amazing synchronicity.  I plead with them to at least make a straight line to get us from the classroom to the cafeteria!  

[Cynthia Stults]

Dennis, I was like you in terms of my understandings of the Koreas. I held an extremely simplistic view that South Korea was basically perfect in all of their development and North Korea was evil and messed everything up. That lecture definitely opened my eyes. I had also wondered how the North Korean government was able to establish and maintain control if everything was horrible and all of their population was starving. Learning about their extremely quick economic growth and development (under the strict government control) compared with South Korea made me start to understand how North Korean people would develop early trust of their government. Learning about all the scandal, intrigue, and death as South Korea developed their government and democracy (Parade of Presidents), was shocking and I almost thought I was learning about North Korea. In social studies, I have seen a shift in more recent times away from the glorification of home culture and more towards a less biased approach to history. I also remember from my own education, that the old textbooks and sometimes even teachers would only point out the positive contributions and actions of the U.S. and their allies, and avoid or gloss over the negative attitudes, actions, or even attrocities committed, while only focusing on negative aspects of "rival" countries. (Has anyone else experienced this bias in their education?) When we heard about very blatant indoctrination of youth under controlling regimes in East Asian countries, we all are shocked and horrified, but if we reflect, I think that many of us would realize that similar things happen in our country- maybe not to the same extent, but they still happen. As teachers of social studies, we have to be extremely conscious of how we are presenting and representing the players in historical events- am I presenting the positive and negative actions of all parties, or am I uncomfortable admitting to bad behavior of my own country, or the positive contributions of "evil countries"?

[Katherine Oh]

I appreciate your post Kurt. The way you described it is so simple that I could see the theme of this story being explored in the classroom. The two koreas can be described with many different symbols and representations but the color blue can be significant. During the recent Olympics hosted in South Korea, the two Koreas walked together in the opening ceremony and the unification flag was used to represent the two countries. The flag uses a light blue color to represent the unified country and I thought this symbol was so significant but now that you mentioned the blue sky, where the two cranes fly towards, I wonder if there is a deeper significance. 

[Katherine Oh]

I once used Choco Pies as a snack to motivate my students in my classroom once. It started with our once a week cultural study where I showed videos of kids trying different types of foods from different countries. The youtube chanel is called HiHo Kids and I loved seeing different posts of kids trying very interesting foods from around the world. One video highlighted Korean snacks and after showing this video, I couldn't help but bring some snacks for my kids to try. Since I grew up eating choco pies as a kid, I didn't really think they were that interesting or cool. But my kids became obsessed. So obsessed that I got a message from one of my parents asking me where I got them because their child was so adamant about eating them more. It was his birthday a few months later and his parents didn't provide any snacks for the class to celebrate. But I had two boxes of Choco pies so I used it as his birthday cupcake and they loved it. I just thought that this is such an easy way to get students engaged with Korean Culture and get them exposed to more than just american snacks and treats. Especially for elementary school students, this was a great way to bridge something they were familiar with in the US with something from South Korea. 

[Katherine Oh]

I also never saw a photo of a child who had discoloration in their hair because of malnourishment. I always heard about how the rich families, mostly ones with political power were fatter and better dressed than the regular civilians in North Korea, but I didn't realize that their nourishment was so bad that their hair color was different. However, we see this kind of gap in the United States as well. We as a country also struggle with the division between the rich and poor and it trickles down generations for certain families. The distinction between the upper class and working class is even more evident in our schools and the amount of resources our students have. I wonder if the picture Professor Jung Kim showed during the lecture was taken in a school. If it was, I wonder why students from differring economic and political backgrounds go to the same school. 

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