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John Mahelm Berry Sill's role as the American Minister to Korea (1894-1897) is one of controversy. He has been described as weak, ineffective, and reluctant by some and as independent, proactive, and alert by others, depending on the researcher. He served during an extremely turbulent period of Korean history, a span of time that encompassed the Sino-Japanese War, the Gabo Reforms, the murder of the Korean queen, and King Gojong's subsequent refuge in the Russian legation. While this book does utilize some diplomatic despatches, it generally relies upon the personal correspondences between the Sills in Korea and their family in the United States. These letters provide a candid view of life in not only the American community in Seoul, but also in the Russian legation, where King Gojong and the crown prince sought refuge following the murder of Queen Min. The letters also give evidence of the rumors and speculation that plagued the daily lives of not only the Western community in Seoul but the Korean community as well.
In The Great Enterprise, Henry H. Em examines how the project of national sovereignty shaped the work of Korean historians and their representations of Korea's past. The goal of Korea attaining validity and equal standing among sovereign nations, Em shows, was foundational to modern Korean politics in that it served a pedagogical function for Japanese and Western imperialisms, as well as for Korean nationalism. Sovereignty thus functioned as police power and political power in shaping Korea's modernity, including anticolonial and postcolonial movements toward a radically democratic politics. Surveying historical works written over the course of the twentieth century, Em elucidates the influence of Christian missionaries, as well as the role that Japan's colonial policy played in determining the narrative framework for defining Korea's national past. Em goes on to analyze postcolonial works in which South Korean historians promoted national narratives appropriate for South Korea's place in the U.S.-led Cold War system. Throughout, Em highlights equal sovereignty's creative and productive potential to generate oppositional subjectivities and vital political alternatives.
Using sources in Japanese, Chinese and American archives, this text reassesses Woodrow Wilson's agenda at the Paris Peace Conference. It argues Wilson did not "betray" China, but negotiated a compromise with the Japanese to ensure that China's sovereignty would be respected in Shandong Province.
The Russian Empire once extended deep into America: in 1818 Russia's furthest outposts were in California and Hawaii. The dreamer behind this great Imperial vision was Nikolai Rezanov ? diplomat, adventurer, courtier, millionaire and gambler. His quest to plant Russian colonies from Siberia to California led him to San Francisco, where he was captivated by Conchita, the fifteen-year-old daughter of the Spanish Governor, who embodied his dreams of both love and empire. From the glittering court of Catherine the Great to the wilds of the New World, Matthews conjures a brilliantly original portrait of one of Russia's most eccentric Empire-builders.
A dramatic new telling of the dawn of modern East Asia, placing Korea at the center of a transformed world order wrought by imperial greed and devastating wars. In the nineteenth century, Russia participated in two “great games”: one, well known, pitted the tsar’s empire against Britain in Central Asia. The other, hitherto unrecognized but no less significant, saw Russia, China, and Japan vying for domination of the Korean Peninsula. In this eye-opening account, brought to life in lucid narrative prose, Sheila Miyoshi Jager argues that the contest over Korea, driven both by Korean domestic disputes and by great-power rivalry, set the course for the future of East Asia and the larger gl...
The fifty months of the Siberian Intervention encompass the existential crisis which affected Japanese at virtually all levels when confronted with the new 'world situation' left in the wake of the First World War. From elite politicians and military professionals, to public intellectuals and the families of servicemen in small garrison towns, the intervention was perceived as a test of how Japan might fit itself into the emerging postwar world order. Both domestically and internationally Japan's actions in Siberia were seen as critical proof of the nation's ability, depending on one's viewpoint, to embrace or to ride out the 'trends of the times,' the seeming triumph of constitutional democ...
An examination of sea otters in a Pacific World context and an exploration of how this iconic sea mammal once defined the world’s largest oceanscape.