Nature, Technology, and Medicine in Korea

This course examines the cultural history of modern Korea with a focus on science, technology, and medicine. From about 1500 to the present, a number of hugely consequential things happened in Korea that have been called revolutionary-or what historians dub "early modern" and "modern." Confucian kings planned large-scale projects that changed nature, rustic scholars made inventories of flora and fauna, colonial Koreans became biologists, nurses, and "Edisons," and in North and South Korea, new professionals created distinctive-and in some cases, globally-competitive-regimes of knowing, making, and healing. Students will interrogate these developments as an opportunity to revisit the history of modernity, which has been told predominantly from the perspective of the West. What does it mean to be "modern" in Korea? How did that modernity intersect with Korean science, technology, and medicine? Students will find and articulate their own answers by writing the final research paper. Recommended to have taken Korean Civilization or equivalent course that provides basic working knowledge of Korean history. Course also counts as an EALC capstone course. Undergraduates enroll in the 400-level section; 500-level section is for graduate students only. Fulfills modern elective for EALC major. Prerequisite: junior level or above or permission of instructor.
Course Attributes: BU Eth; AS HUM; AS LCD; FA HUM; AR HUM; EN H

Nature, Technology, and Medicine in Korea

KOREAN 420

Section 01