Modern Korean History
Course Outline
Instructor: Young Ick Lew, Ph.D.
Office: New Millennium Hall 605
E-mail: yilew@yonsei.ac.kr
Course Description:
This is a graduate course designed to help English-speaking students learn modern Korean
history from mid-nineteenth century to the 1950s with emphasis on political history of the given
period. Major topics to be dealt with in this course include the late nineteenth-century Korean
reform movement, Japanese colonial rule, Korean independence movement, the emergence of two
rival regimes after 1945, and the Korean War (1950-1953) and its aftermaths in South and North
Korea.
Course Requirements:
1. Mandatory attendance at classes and active participation in discussion.
2. Independent reading of the papers and book chapters listed in the “Lecture Topics and
Reading Requirements” shown below.
3. A 20-page critical book review on one of the three following books:
-Gregory Henderson. Korea: The Politics of the Vortex.
Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968.
-Bruce Cumings. Korea’s Place in the Sun: A Modern History.
New York and London: W.W. Norton & Co., 1997.
-Sun Yup Paik, From Pusan to Panmunjom. Dulles, VA: Brassey’s, 1992
This term paper must be typed doublespace and due prior to the final examination day.
Grading Policy:
Students’ grade will depend on (1) the results of two examinations (mid-term and the final),
(2) the quality of the book review, (3) the record of class attendance, and (4) the level of
participation in the classroom discussions.
Textbooks:
Carter Eckert …… Young Ick Lew, et. al. Korean Old and New: A History. Seoul: Ilchokak,
1990.
Andrew C. Nahm. Korea: Tradition and Transformation. Seoul: Hollym, 1988.
Lecture Topics and Reading Assignments
1. An overview of Modern Korean History
2. Early Korean Contact with the West and the Taewon’gun’s Exclusionism, 1800s-1870’s
-Key-Hiuk Kim, Opening of Korea: a Confucian Response to the Western Impact (Seoul:
Yonsei University Press, 1999), pp. 1-23.
3. Opening of the “Hermit Kingdom” to Japan and the West, 1876-1880’s
-Key Hiuk Kim, ibid., pp. 80.
-Young Ick Lew, “The Shufeldt Treaty and Early Korean American Interaction, 18821905,” The Journal of Asiatic Studies, 25:1 (1982), pp. 36-51.
-_______________, “Japanese Challenge and Korean Response, 1870-1910, ”Korea Journal,
25:12 (Dec. 1985), pp. 36-51.
4. The “Enlightenment” Movement and the Kapsin Coup, 1870-1884.
-Young
Ick
Lew,
“Late
Nineteenth-Century
Korean
Reformers’
Receptivity
to
Protestantism: The Cases of Six Leaders of the 1880’ and 1890’s Reform
Movements,” [아시아 文化], 4 (1988), pp. 163-66.
-Yong-ho Ch’oe,: “A Reappraisal of Coup of 1884,” Korean Studies, 2 (1978).
5. Korea under the Chinese Domination and the Outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War, 1885-1894
-Young Ick Lew,: “Yuan Shih-k’ai’s Residency and the Korean Enlightenment Movement,
1885-94, ”The Journal of Korean Studies, 5 (1984), pp. 63-107.
-_______________, “Minister Inoue Kaoru and the Japanese Reform Attempts in Korea during
the Sino-Japanese War, 1894-1895,” The Journal of Asiatic Studies, 27:2 (1984), pp.
145-86.
6. Tonghak and the Tonghak Peasant Uprising, 1894
-Susan Shin, “The Tonghak Movement : From Enlightenment to Revolution,” Korean
Studies Forum, 5 (Winter-Spring, 1978-1979), pp. 1-79.
-Young Ick Lew, “The Conservative Character of the 1894 Tonghak Peasant Uprising.”
The Journal of Korean Studies, 7(1990), pp. 149-80.
7. The Kabo Reforms and the Independence Club Movement, 1884-1898
-Young Ick Lew, “Korean-Japanese Politics behind the Kabo Reform Movement, 1894 to
1896,” The Journal of Korean Studies, 3 (1981), pp. 39-81.
-_______________, “The Reform Efforts and Ideas of Pak Yong-hyo, 1894-1895,” Korean
Studies, 1 (1977), pp. 21-61.
-Vipan Chandra, Imperialism, Resistance and Reform in Late Nineteenth Century Korea :
Enlightenment and the Independence Club (Berkeley: Center of Korean Studies,
University of California, 1988), pp. 104-125; 173-210.
8. Japanese Colonial Rule, 1905-1945
-Han-Kyo Kim, “The Japanese Colonial Administration on Korea. An Overview,” Andrew C.
Nahm ed., Korea under Japanese Colonial Rule (Kalamazoo, Mich: The Center for
Korean Studies, Western Michigan University, 1973), pp. 41-53.
-Bruce Cumings, “The Legacy of Japanese Colonialism in Korea,” Raymon H. Myers and
Mark R. Peattie, eds., The Japanese Colonial Empire, 1895-1945 (Princeton
University Press, 1984), pp. 487-496.
9. Korean Independence Movement, 1905-1945
-Frank Baldwin, “Participatory Anti-Imperialism: The 1919 Independence Movement,” The
Journal for Korean Studies, 1 (1970), pp. 123-62.
-Chong-sik Lee, The Politics of Korean Nationalism (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University
of California Press, 1965), pp. 129-179.
10. Liberation and the Birth of Rival Regimes, 1945-1948
-Bruce Cumings, “American Policy and Korean Liberation, “Frank Baldwin, ed., Without
Parallel: The American-Korean Relationship Since 1945 (New York: Pantheon
Books, 1973), pp. 39-93.
-Chong-sik Lee, “The Personality of Four Koran Political Leaders: Syngman Rhee, Kim Ku,
Kim Kyu-sik, and Yo Un-hyong,” Korea and Asia: In Commemoration of the
Sixtieth Birthday of Dr. Kim Junyop (Seoul: The Asiatic Research Center, Korea
University, 1983), pp. 181-226.
11. The Korean War (1950-1953) and After
-David Rees, A Short History of Modern Korea (Ellan Vannin: Ham Publishing Co., 1988),
pp. 96-133.
-James B. Palais, “ ‘Democracy’ in South Korea, 1948-72,” Frank Baldwin ed., Without
Parallel, pp. 96-133.
-Chong-sik Lee, Korean Workers’ Party: A Short History. (Stanford: Hoover Institute
Press, 1978), pp. 1-134.