Confucianism

Introduction

Confucianism has been mobilized as part of the clash of civilizations of Asia with the West. This paper considers how cultural boundaries are negotiated within the region via an analysis of the workings of the transnational discourse of Confucianism in the construction of Korean identity. While many make truth claims about what 'Confucianism' means in Korea, this paper examines the discursive economies of 'Confucian events' in three overlapping social spaces: official, mass media, and academic. This paper will show the shape of Confucianism is an active political issue. While many try to define a core 'Korean Confucianism ', Confucianism as an analytical tool to understand something else, citing how some scholars are using Confucianism for the specific project of building democracy in Korea.

Discussion

Confucianism is tied up even more intimately with the palace; the Rites of Zhou was praised by Confucius and is a central text in Confucian propriety; as we will see, the Choson dynasty which built the palace is known in Korea as the quintessential Confucian dynasty.

When the regent reconstructed the palace in the 1880s, he was also reasserting Confucian orthodoxy against enemies both foreign and domestic. The most recent reconstructions of Kyongbuk Palace likewise have been accompanied a renewed interest in Confucianism in Korea. For example, the inaugural editorial of the new intellectual journal Chontonggwa Hyondae (Tradition & Modernity) directly ties together the theme of the demolition of the Japanese headquarters with the reassertion of Confucian values. The editors use the palace to represent Confucian Korean culture, and argue that it must be reconstructed, just as Confucian tradition needs to be reconstructed in Korea (Tanaka, 25-205) Indeed, the end of the military period of South Korean politics in 1987/1992 presented two options: the opposite of military dictatorship is not just liberal democracy, but also elite Confucianism. Presidents Kim Young-sam, Kim Dae-jung, and editorial writers increasingly use a Confucian vocabulary in discussing political problems and solutions.

The financial crisis of late 1997 quickly became an identity crisis about how to deal with capitalist modernity in a proper Confucian style (Lee and Bary, 98-396). This renewed interest in Confucianism, which is indicative of the tensions between tradition and modernity, does not just come out in new journals with names like Tradition & Modernity. It is also wonderfully reproduced in a picture of the construction site at the Kyongbok Palace where the ancient buildings are framed by the crane of the capitalist conglomerate Hyundai, which is labelled 'HYUNDAI', which means 'modern'.

Therefore, though Japan is the most obvious focus of 'Othering' in the discourse of Korean identity, this is largely limited to the 20th century. Discussions of Korean national identity that look to both the past and the future address the curiously complex relationship Korea has had with China not only politically, but culturally. (Deuchler, 74-299) though the United States is the most obvious target for charges of cultural imperialism, the paper argues that the Chinese Empire was organized around cultural imperialism, and that traces persist not merely as residue ...