Korean Literature 213. The Book in Korea Before the 20th Century

Korean Literature 213
 

Professor Si Nae Park
Prof. Si Nae Park

This course is for graduate students and advanced undergraduate students interested in the book from pre-20th-century Korea. With a focus on the “vernacular book” (i.e., books within which the Korean language is inscribed and books of foreign origins published in Korea), this course teaches students the art of reading slowly to bring “dead” books to life, including how to dissect the book space as a site of visual and aural inscription, to understand the contents of the book (i.e., linguistic decipherment), and to map out producers and readers’ horizon of expectations. Students must have advanced knowledge of Korean and should have had some exposure to reading texts written in Literary Chinese or Chinese.

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