Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Troll_Bait]

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2008/03/25/20/0301000000AEN20080325004000315F.HTML

[billybrobby]

Wow. I remember one movie director saying that nowadays you could make movies about anything, no matter how dark, except ones that mentioned the possibility that there could have been an upside to colonialization. He said it was the final taboo. Maybe it's coming down.

[endo]

This doesn't only apply to the Korean, but everybody. Pure frank honestly, sometimes brutal honestly, is what's needed for a person or a nation to truely grow and mature.

[Unposter]

I don't know. The textbook sounds a little harsh. It seems to imply that Korea would not of or could not of modernized without Japanese Colonization which is pretty hard to prove.

And, why should the textbook celebrate the dictators and chaeobol owners that lead Korean economic expansion when we also know that they were corrupt, rife with human rights violations including against a futre President of the Republic, and caused much suffering.

And, why not mention the help of the U.S. Government and Japanese Banks in the economic expansion of Korea, rather than emphasize said dictators and chaebol owners.

While I am very supportive of the idea of the teaching of Korean history that is less victimization and more successful, I am not sure this textbook is really trying to do that as much as trying to indoctrine a political view.

The textbook sounds like a propaganda piece rather than educational.

[eamo]

Korea, like a lot of small countries with a turbulent past, seems to lack a rare and precious resource. Historians. Actual, real, credible historians. Every 'historian' in Korea writes with an agenda.

[nicholas_chiasson]

All historians write with an agenda. Korea lacks historians who write with differing agendas. They always start with 'korea number 1' and procede to remove any data that would contradict this 'fact'.

[GoldMember]

Studying History is all about analysis, debate and conjecture. These things don't exist in Korea.
How is History "tested", in Korea, with Multiple choice tests.
The correct answer is the answer that tows the Nationalistic line.
It's not education it's brainwashing.

[Troll_Bait]

[ytuque]

Colonization has a tremendous influence on a country's development. Just compare countries that were colonized by England versus those by Spain/Portugal.

[nicholas_chiasson]

Whatever one MAY say to defend Korea, the obvious fact is that it has delusions of grandeur. Stuck between a mighty economy that managed to recover from being nuked, and a billion people, no matter what korea does, it will never equal China and Japan in the eyes of the world. I keep telling my korean friend, 'what do you think of Poland?' I get no response. I tell them Poland is bigger than Korea but they don't know anything about it, so why should Poles know about Korea?

[thematrixiam]

this is a little off topic...

Multiple skills reading A .. I think is the name. I could be wrong..

The book changes drastically through editions. if you check out the old 80's or 90's version, it's full of a vast array of races and people.
If you look at the new edition, the drawings are all the same, but tweaked just enough to make every person white.

[Otherside]

[billybrobby]

[Gwangjuboy]

This kind of book is well overdue. One problem with East Asia, specifically Korea and China, is the lack of discussion with respect to history.