Tag Archive for Korea

Faculty position in “gender geography,” Seoul National University

04/18/2012 Job No comments

Advertised as a posi­tion in “gen­der geog­ra­phy,” this posi­tion should inter­est fem­i­nist geo­g­ra­phers and gen­der stud­ies schol­ars with geog­ra­phy empha­sis. It is a tenure-track posi­tion at a top uni­ver­sity in Korea. The posi­tion does not require Korean lan­guage pro­fi­ciency since courses would be taught in English, but of course, some Korean would be help­ful in liv­ing in Korea. There’s a vibrant fem­i­nist com­mu­nity at SNU and other uni­ver­si­ties in Seoul, and this could be a great oppor­tu­nity espe­cially for those with research inter­ests in Korea.


Faculty Position at the Department of Geography
Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea

The Department of Geography, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea, invites appli­ca­tions for a full-time pro­fes­sor at all ranks begin­ning September 2012 or March 2013. We seek a per­son with research and teach­ing inter­ests in Gender Geography and related dis­ci­plines. A Ph.D. in Geography or a closely related dis­ci­pline is required at the time of appoint­ment. The suc­cess­ful can­di­date will join the depart­ment that offers degrees at the bachelor’s, master’s and PhD lev­els. In addi­tion, the can­di­date may join the Interdisciplinary Program in Gender Studies, one of the grad­u­ate courses, and may have oppor­tu­nity to do inter­dis­ci­pli­nary gender-related researches with var­i­ous depart­ments sup­ported by the Institute for Gender Research in the University.

Applicants should be Non-Korean Nationals, prefer­ably native English speak­ers. The avail­abil­ity of the posi­tion will be deter­mined by the University, based on the aca­d­e­mic qual­i­fi­ca­tions and expe­ri­ence of the appli­cants. Starting salary ranges approx­i­mately from USD 52,000 at the begin­ning assis­tant pro­fes­sor level and would increase depend­ing on the qual­i­fi­ca­tions and expe­ri­ence. University fac­ulty hous­ing will be avail­able and mov­ing cost will be cov­ered by the University.
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Research snapshot: religious dimensions of militarism

03/06/2012 Research No comments

(Photo sources:  Hankyoreh and NewsNJoy)

South Korean Catholic priests are putting their lives on the line to oppose mil­i­tary base con­struc­tion: “To blow up the Gurombi Rocks, first blow up the peo­ple of faith!”

Gurombi Catholics

Catholics led a cer­e­mony of 153 bows, as they have done every day since August 25, 2011. This is in ref­er­ence to the mir­a­cles asso­ci­ated with the num­ber 153 in the Bible, but I think it is also rem­i­nis­cent of Buddhist prac­tice of tak­ing three pros­trate bows and one step (sambo ilbae 삼보일배 三步一拜), a main­stay in con­tem­po­rary protest reper­toire in Korea espe­cially in recent years.

Catholics bow153

In the mean­time, ultra-conservative Christians held a prayer rally on March 1 to denounce Communism, pro­mote the Christian Democratic Party, and vow to oblit­er­ate left­ists with­out mercy. Rev. KIM Hong-do, the retired pas­tor of the largest Methodist con­gre­ga­tion in the world, is quoted in this arti­cle for ser­mo­niz­ing, “Communism kills all peo­ple. I would rather die as a slave under blacks in Africa than live under Communism.” He always has a way with words.

Another right-wing Christian pas­tor, Rev. SUH Kyong-seok urged sup­port for naval base con­struc­tion and declared that he’s ready to head down to Jeju Island to “com­bat Catholics and left­ists” seen above.

Christianright1 Christianright2

In response, a Christian activist from Jeju wrote this open let­ter with a heart­felt plea: “When the Church stands to pro­tect state power, it may tem­porar­ily ben­e­fit from shar­ing that power. But the Church can­not then speak for Jesus Christ. Now is a time to pro­tect the gospel of peace for which Jesus gave up his life. To fol­low Jesus means to relin­quish the priv­i­lege and vested inter­ests and to embrace suf­fer­ing, but gained in return will be the priv­i­lege of being called a “child of God.”

Gurombi Catholics2

The Third Flying University of Transnational Humanities, Seoul, Korea

02/14/2012 CFP No comments

Borders of Knowledge — The Third Flying University of Transnational Humanities

Venue: Hanyang University, Seoul, Korea
Date: July 15 – 18, 2012
Application Deadline: March 16, 2012
Extended Application Deadline: March 30, 2012

Eligibility: Graduate stu­dents and recent PhDs inter­ested in the transna­tional par­a­digm of human­is­tic inquiry and con­duct­ing research on top­ics related to the theme of the mak­ing and unmak­ing of bor­ders of knowledge

The Flying University of Transnational Humanities (FUTH) is an annual sum­mer school for grad­u­ate stu­dents and young schol­ars inter­ested in the transna­tional par­a­digm of human­is­tic inquiry. FUTH takes its name and imme­di­ate inspi­ra­tion from Polands Flying University, an under­ground insti­tu­tion that offered an alter­na­tive edu­ca­tion out­side the con­fines of state con­trol and gov­ern­ment cen­sor­ship. The pro­gram is par­tic­u­larly con­cerned with devel­op­ing crit­i­cal under­stand­ings that resist the ide­o­log­i­cal and con­cep­tual hege­mony of the nation-state and the epis­te­mo­log­i­cal and hermeneu­tic con­ven­tions that sup­port it. This does not mean that FUTH seeks to dis­pense with the national and con­struct a rei­fied transna­tional with which to replace it, or to fos­ter transna­tion­al­ism as an ide­o­log­i­cal alter­na­tive to nation­al­ism. Rather, FUTH aims to free our imag­i­na­tions from essen­tial­ist approaches to the nation or the state and to offer new ways of think­ing about the polit­i­cal, social and cul­tural order of the world, both past and present.

Started in 2010, the Flying University of Transnational Humanities is orga­nized annu­ally usu­ally in the sum­mer by the Research Institute of Comparative History and Culture (RICH), Hanyang University, Seoul, Korea. FUTH con­sists of a series of advanced lec­tures, stu­dent pre­sen­ta­tions and feed­back ses­sions where renowned schol­ars from RICHs part­ner and other insti­tu­tions are invited to share their knowl­edge, insights and per­spec­tives. Student par­tic­i­pants are required to study the rec­om­mended read­ings in advance. They are also expected to present their own schol­arly work related to the theme of each year. The offi­cial lan­guage of FUTH is English, although the pos­si­bil­ity of trans-lingual prac­tices is being con­sid­ered. Graduate stu­dents and recent PhDs inter­ested in the transna­tional turn in the human­i­ties and social sci­ences are wel­come to apply with a pre­sen­ta­tion proposal.

The third FUTH will take place at Hanyang University, July 15 – 18, 2012, under the title of Borders of Knowledge. As numer­ous empir­i­cal stud­ies in intel­lec­tual his­tory, soci­ol­ogy of knowl­edge, and history/sociology/anthropology of the social, human, and nat­ural sci­ences have con­vinc­ingly demon­strated for sev­eral decades, the pro­duc­tion, dis­sem­i­na­tion and use of knowl­edge, though seem­ingly uni­ver­sal, are always embed­ded in spe­cific social, cul­tural, and his­tor­i­cal con­texts. Often, the sub­ject, the object and the modus operandi of knowl­edge are defined, con­strued, and con­strained by (national) bor­ders. Knowledge and its asso­ci­ated prac­tices thus shaped may in turn rein­force, repro­duce or rede­fine those very bor­ders. How then, does knowl­edge travel across bor­ders? Rather than fol­low­ing the nave mod­ernist assump­tion that knowl­edge is spread because it is true and/or is chan­neled through uni­ver­sally trans­fer­able method­i­cal prac­tices, one should approach the trav­els of knowl­edge as them­selves explananda rather than merely explanans for other phe­nom­ena. For instance, one may ask, what are the ways in which locally-produced knowl­edge is trans­lated, adapted, appro­pri­ated, or con­tested in dif­fer­ent local con­texts? By the same token, one may also ask, how does knowl­edge, despite its local ori­gins, come to acquire a pro­claimed uni­ver­sal­ity or glob­al­ity? With such ques­tions as a basis, the third FUTH in 2012 aims to pro­vide grad­u­ate stu­dents and young schol­ars with a unique oppor­tu­nity to crit­i­cally exam­ine the mak­ing and unmak­ing of the bor­ders of knowl­edge includ­ing the social sci­ences, human­i­ties, nat­ural sci­ences, and other forms of knowl­edge. Read more

NUS workshop in June 2012 : “The urban ecology of religion: growth and redevelopment in Seoul”

02/13/2012 Research No comments

I’ve been invited to attend a work­shop on “Doing Asian Cities: The MPI-ARI-TISS-AKS-Shanghai Urban Aspirations Project” (5−6 June 2012, Singapore) as part of the MPI/AKS project on urban aspi­ra­tions. It’s a chance to meet with other researchers work­ing on the Asian megac­i­ties project in Mumbai, Shangai, Singapore, and Seoul. Just sub­mit­ted the fol­low­ing abstract:

The urban ecol­ogy of reli­gion: growth and rede­vel­op­ment in Seoul

With some of the largest and most spec­tac­u­lar megachurches in the world located in the City of Seoul, it is easy to find impres­sive the mate­r­ial pros­per­ity and polit­i­cal power asso­ci­ated with con­tem­po­rary Protestantism in South Korea. It is also easy to over­look the fact that in con­trast, nearly eighty per­cent of churches in Korea are quite small, with only fifty to two hun­dred mem­bers in their con­gre­ga­tion. There is much the­o­log­i­cal reflec­tion and polit­i­cal cri­tiques con­cern­ing the grow­ing gap between the rich and poor, cor­po­rate megachurches and vul­ner­a­ble microchurches. This paper addresses the pol­i­tics of scale and urban reli­gion as they relate to aspi­ra­tions for — and against — growth and (re)development in Seoul. In par­tic­u­lar, I will dis­cuss crit­i­cal ethno­graphic meth­ods includ­ing some new ideas for research­ing reli­gion (e.g. “cir­cle the church”) in the city.

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CFP: “Political Popular” Conference, UC Irvine

01/22/2012 CFP No comments

Call for Papers
‘Political Popular: Intersection of Democracy and Popular/Public Culture in South Korea’ Conference
University of California, Irvine
September 20 – 22, 2012

Proposals may address (but are not lim­ited to) the fol­low­ing topics:

  • Critical analy­sis of Korean pop­u­lar cul­ture rang­ing from music, the­ater, film, tele­vi­sion, man­hwa, etc. Post-1980s lit­er­a­ture and poetry beyond ‘autonomous lit­er­a­ture’ (sunsu munhak 순수문학) vs ‘engaged lit­er­a­ture’ (ch’amyô munhak 참여문학)
  • Aesthetic nego­ti­a­tions in min­jung visual cul­ture and “post-minjung” art production
  • Protest cul­ture (both on-line and off-line)
  • New polit­i­cal media such as SNS activism, Nakkomsu, and inter­net blogging
  • Cinema, music, tele­vi­sion at the age of block­buster, super-talent agency, and neoliberalism
  • New youth cul­ture, con­sumerism, and urban space

Held con­cur­rently with a film series that high­light both fic­tion and doc­u­men­tary inde­pen­dent pro­duc­tion in South Korea and an art exhi­bi­tion that show­cases the visual cul­ture of South Korea’s democ­ra­ti­za­tion over the past three decades (1980s to the first decade of the 2000s), we invite pro­pos­als for unpub­lished, orig­i­nal indi­vid­ual papers (pre-constituted pan­els may also be given con­sid­er­a­tion). All pre­sen­ters of selected papers will have their travel, hotel, and meal expenses remu­ner­ated by the orga­niz­ing com­mit­tee. A brief bio and a 500-word abstract should be sub­mit­ted elec­tron­i­cally to Kyung Hyun Kim (kyunghk@​uci.​edu) no later than April 15, 2012. Conference will be held on September 20 – 22, 2012 at UC Irvine cam­pus. This event is co-sponsored by Academy of Korean Studies.

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