Global History and East Asia : A Late Chosŏn Perspective

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Global History and East Asia : A Late Chosŏn Perspective

Journal Title: International Journal of Korean History - Year 2012, Vol 17, Issue 1

Abstract

Some Asia historians have recently argued for a new understanding of global history by reexamining how the European countries took the lead in making modern civilization and capitalism, specifically concentrating on historical exchanges between Europe and Asia from the 17 th to 18th centuries. The European countries, according to these scholars, learned far more from their contact with Asia than is conventionally known, to the point of building the groundwork for the early shape of modern civilization in Europe. This way of looking at Europe and China on the same level is relevant both for a future-oriented discussion on symmetric perspectives in the shape of early modern history. However, global historians do not seem to effectively deal with the problem of the established Eurocentric interpretation. In this paper, we argue that the globalist frontage on convergence is not to neglect divergence but maintain the co-operation of convergence and divergence together from a balanced perspective. To be specific, the analytic unit of comparison should move further into the history of Asia, East Asia, and even more specific narrower locales so as to shed light on the working of convergence and divergence in the unfolding of modern civilization. The above approves us to catechize afresh such crucial subject matters as power relations, cultural order, collective identity and historiography 1) within the 2) context of specific locale, 2) in the historical setting of continental East Asia, and 3) along with the advent of modern civilization. In light of this, we revisit the issue of collective identity in late Chos?n from the 17th to 18th centuries, and briefly discuss how Chos?n actors, specifically state and ruling elites, developed the collective identity of Chos?n herself without breaking the long-standing partnership with the China-led world order and civilization in continental East Asia. This paper stays away from any debate over a Korean prototype of modern nation-state or a pristine non-Confucian nativism contrary to Confucianism during the periods. Instead, it takes on the issue in such a way as to understand the vivid process of interactions displaying one layer of convergence(universal civilization/imperium) and divergence (accommodation/sovereignty) within the East Asia of the time. This paradigm will help us to look not only at the dynamic workings of globalism and localism in East Asia, but also the larger scale of the convergence-divergence frame that opens up a coexistence of the West-focused, Asia-focused, East Asia-focused. China-focused, and Korea-focused perspectives in a truer sense of world history.

Authors and Affiliations

Nae-hyun Kwon / Joseph Jeong-il Lee

Keywords

Collective Identity Convergence Divergence Eurocentrism Global History Historiography of World History Late Chosŏn

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EP ID EP26379
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