Open Access Published by Cornell University Press 2023

Forces of Nature

New Perspectives on Korean Environments

Edited by: David Fedman , Eleana J. Kim and Albert L. Park
Funded by: Luce Foundation
Preface by: Ann Sherif

In the series The Environments of East Asia

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501768811

Overview
Contents

About this book

Bringing together a multidisciplinary conversation about the entanglement of nature and society in the Korean peninsula, Forces of Nature aims to define and develop the field of the Korean environmental humanities. At its core, the volume works to foreground non-human agents that have long been marginalized in Korean studies, placing flora, fauna, mineral deposits, and climatic conditions that have hitherto been confined to footnotes front and center. In the process, the authors blaze new trails through Korea's social and physical landscapes.

What emerges is a deeper appreciation of the environmental conflicts that have animated life in Korea. The authors show how natural processes have continually shaped the course of events on the peninsula—how floods, droughts, famines, fires, and pests have inexorably impinged on human affairs—and how different forces have been mobilized by the state to variously, control, extract, modernize, and showcase the Korean landscape. Forces of Nature suggestively reveals Korea's physical landscape to be not so much a passive context to Korea's history, but an active agent in its transformation and reinvention across centuries.

With support from the Henry Luce Foundation, our goal is to produce all titles in this series both in Open Access, for reasons of global accessibility and equity, as well as in print editions.

Author / Editor information

David Fedman is Associate Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Seeds of Control.

Eleana Kim is Associate Professor of Anthropology, University of California, Irvine. She is the author of Adopted Territory and Making Peace with Nature.

Albert L. Park is the Bank of America Associate Professor of Pacific Basin Studies at Claremont McKenna College of The Claremont Colleges. He is the author of Building a Heaven on Earth.

Reviews

John P. DiMoia, Seoul National University, coeditor of Engineering Asia:

Forces of Nature is an extremely strong volume whose well-edited essays form a strong, coherent whole—a vision of the Korean peninsula as embedded within the classic questions and concerns of environmental history.

Mary Alice Haddad, Wesleyan University, coeditor of Greening East Asia:

Forces of Nature is beautifully written and covers an important and under-researched topic. An incredibly valuable addition to our understanding of environmental history, environmental politics, and East Asian studies.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Foreword Ann Sherif Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
Note on Transliteration and Terminology Publicly Available Download PDF	xiii
General Introduction: Whose Nature? Centering the Environment in Korean Studies David Fedman Open Access Download PDF	1
Geographical Introduction: A Biography of the Korean Peninsula in Maps Marc Los Huertos and Albert L. Park Open Access Download PDF	15
Part 1 IMPERIAL INTERVENTIONS
Introduction David Fedman Open Access Download PDF	33
1. A State of Ranches and Forests: The Environmental Legacy of the Mongol Empire in Korea John S. Lee Open Access Download PDF	37
2. Dammed Fish: Piscatorial Developmentalism and the Remaking of the Yalu River Joseph Seeley Open Access Download PDF	48
Part 2 CRISIS AND RESPONSE
Introduction Eleana J. Kim Open Access Download PDF	61
3. The Politics of Frugality: Environmental Crisis and Artistic Production in Eighteenth-Century Korea Sooa Im McCormick Open Access Download PDF	65
4. Between Memory and Amnesia: Seoul’s Nanjido Landfill, 1978–1993 Hyojin Pak Open Access Download PDF	76
5. North Korea Caught between Developmentalism and Humanitarianism Ewa Eriksson Fortier and Suzy Kim Open Access Download PDF	87
Par t 3 PROCESSES OF DISPOSSESSION
Introduction Albert L. Park Open Access Download PDF	105
6. Rice Fields, Mountains, and the Invisible Meatification of Korean Agriculture Anders Riel Muller Open Access Download PDF	109
7. The Eco-zombies of South Korean Cinema: Consumerism, Carnivores, and Eco-criticism Lindsay S. R. Jolivette Open Access Download PDF	122
Par t 4 RECLAIMING LIFE
Introduction Eleana J. Kim Open Access Download PDF	135
8. Communal Environmentalism in the History of the Organic Farming Movement in South Korea Yonjae Paik Open Access Download PDF	139
9. Gotjawal: The Promise of Becoming Wild Jeongsu Shin Open Access Download PDF	149
10. South Korea’s Nuclear-Energy Entanglements and the Timescales of Ecological Democracy Nan Kim Open Access Download PDF	164
Epilogue: On Everyday Ecologies and Systems of Mediation Albert L. Park and Eleana J. Kim Open Access Download PDF	178
Notes Open Access Download PDF	191
List of Contributors Open Access Download PDF	229
Index Open Access Download PDF	231

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 258
Illustrations
- Illustrations: 13
- Images: 10
- Coloured Images: 2
- Other: 10 b&w halftones, 2 color halftones, 13 maps, 1 graph
Keywords: environmental history of Korea; Korean environmentalism; environmental politics in Korea; nature and wildlife in Korea; industrial pollution; climate change in Korea; Korean environmental humanities; natural disaster in Korea; Korean beef industry

eBook

Published: May 15, 2023
ISBN: 9781501768811