Kim - The Northern Region of Korea

The inception of this project in 2003 under the working title The Northern Region, Culture, and Identity in Korea was much encouraged by my dearest colleague, Carter J. Eckert. Without his rather forceful push, I would not have dared to initiate this project, which I knew would take years to complete. I am most thankful for his steady support and faith in me. Professors Yi Taejin and Oh Soo-chang resided in Cambridge while I struggled to develop concrete plans for the project. Together with my colleagues David R. McCann and Edward J. Baker, they served as members of the advisory committee for the project, which first met in January 2004, and helped me establish useful directions for the project. Since then, numerous people, in particular Peter K. Bol, supported the project throughout the past seven years. I am greatly indebted to their warm guidance.

The project convened two workshops on June 14, 2004 and February 1819, 2005 respectively, and one conference on October 2021, 2005. Altogether twenty-four papers were presented at these three occasions, but this present volume carries only eleven. Those scholars, who participated in and enriched the project, but whose papers are not included in this book because of various reasons, including the protracted publication process, are: Kyung Moon Hwang, Northern Koreans in the Chosn and Early Modern Eras; Jeon Bong-hee, A Preliminary Study on the Characteristics of Architectural Heritages in the Northern Region in Korea,; Sun Joo Kim, An Investigation of Elite Culture and Society of Chngju, Pyngan Province, in the Late Chosn Period; Oh Soo-chang, Expectations and Policies of Pyngan Province in the Early Nineteenth Century: Perspectives from the Local and the Center; David R. McCann, Kim Sowl and His Poetic World as a Northerner; Ann Y. Choi, United Nation: The Poetry of Kim Sowl and Kim Yngnang; Lee Jung Sook, Kim Sa-ryangs Literary Connection with Pyngyang; Kim Kuen-Tae, The Characteristics of the Financial Policy in Pyngan Province as seen through Household Registers in Mid-Nineteenth Century Korea; Ko Seung Hee, The Characteristics of Regional Development in Hamgyng Province in Late Chosn; Chong Bum Kim, Jerusalem is Doomed: Kil Sn-ju and Christian Millennialism in Northwest Korea and For God and Country: The Osan School in Colonial Korea; Kim Gwi-Ok, Life Experience and Culture of the People from Hamgyng Province during Japanese Colonial Rule; and Seung-Hee Jeon, Korean History from the Late Nineteenth to Mid-Twentieth Century from the Perspective of a Kaesng Merchant Family in Pak Wanss Kkum endl ichiriya.

Many other scholars from near and far joined these meetings as commentators and moderators; their critical views and encouraging comments were enormously helpful in revising the papers and tightening arguments. They are: John B. Duncan at UCLA, Vipan Chandra at Wheaton College, Gari Keith Ledyard at Columbia University, Kyung Moon Hwang at the University of Southern California, Christine Kim at Georgetown University, Kwon Youngmin at Seoul National University, Sung-Yoon Lee at Tufts University, and Peter K. Bol, Elizabeth J. Perry, David R. McCann, Carter J. Eckert, Mikael Adolphson, Sang-Suk Oh, and Wesley Jacobsen at Harvard University. I am grateful for their intellectual generosity. A number of students at Harvard lent enthusiastic hands for the project: Jungwon Kim, Aeri Shin, Sue-Jean Cho, and Junghwan Lee as assistants; Ellie Choi, Peter Wayne de Fremery, Jungwon Kim, Ji-Eun Lee, Junghwan Lee, Javier Cha, and Aeri Shin as translators; Jaeyoon Song, Ellie Choi, Victoria Kim, and Mia You as simultaneous interpreters; and Joe Wicentowski and Tae Yang Kwak in managing the conference website. Susan Lee Laurence, Myong-suk Chandra, Kathryn Maldonis, Susan McHone, and Melanie Wang all provided essential services in various administrative capacities. I owe all of them a huge hug and many thanks.

All three meetings and the publication itself would have been impossible without the generous financial support of a number of organizations. I would like to thank the Korea Research Foundation, the Korea Foundation, the Harvard-Yenching Institute, and Harvards Asia Center and Korea Institute. From the beginning, Clark Sorensen showed genuine enthusiasm, embraced the book, and took great care of it through every step of the publication , which required expertise in linguistics.