Establishing a Pluralist Society in Medieval Korea, 918-1170: History, Ideology, and Identity in the Koryo Dynasty (Brill's Korean Studies Library, 1) - Hardcover

Breuker, Remco

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 9004183256 ISBN 13: 9789004183254

Publisher: Brill Academic Pub, 2010

Synopsis

Recognizing the uniquely codified pluralist orientation of early Kory? society (918-1170), this book presents a radical re-evaluation of Kory? identities and self-perceptions, which entails far-reaching consequences for the understanding of Kory? history

About this title

About the Author:

Remco E. Breuker, Ph.D. (2006) in Korean History, Leiden University, works on medieval Korean and Northeast Asian history and historiography. He has published extensively on Koryo history including Forging the Truth: Creative Deception and National Identity in Medieval Korea (2009).

Review:

'The importance of this outstanding work goes well beyond reshaping our understanding of Koryŏ. Indeed, Koryŏ's way of understanding and living within the world as analyzed by Breuker would become an object of fear during the subsequent Chosŏn (1392-1910) dynasty. Those fears--and the way they came to be expressed--provide much additional evidence for Breuker's thesis on Koryŏ's pluralism. They also point to a profound historical irony. In the minds of the Chosŏn elite, Myoch'ŏng was synonymous with political disorder. Yet in a fundamental sense, the Chosŏn elite's outlook had far more in common with Myoch'ŏng's monism than with Kim Pusik's pluralism. Among many other things, Breuker illuminates the origins of that remarkable contradiction.'
Gregory Evon, University of New South Wales, The Review of Korean Studies 16:2 (2013)

About this edition

• Publisher: Brill Academic Pub
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 9004183256
• ISBN 13: 9789004183254
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 484